"Was anyone with them?"
"Ah—yes, there was," she said. "Lieutenant Bayliss Kent and some other junior officers."
Conroy nodded. That was as expected. "Did they say where they were going?"
"There seems to be something wrong with the atomic furnace at Number Nineteen Thrust Tube. I heard them say they were going down to check it."
"Thanks."
He had no time to call anyone, no time to explain. He had to move fast if he was going to save the Captain and the others. Somehow, the thought of Kent's murdering the Captain was inconceivable. The old man had been on the ship half a century; he was the last survivor of the original crew, and was as much a part of the great starship by now as the drive engines and the navigator's turret.
Conroy could see the whole fiendish plan. Bayliss Kent had forced the ship's officers down to Number Nineteen Thrust Tube, one of the huge projectors that drove the mighty ship through space. All Kent needed to do would be to kill them with ray pistols and claim that something had gone wrong with the atomic furnace. It would be impossible to disprove.
And then Bayliss Kent would be Captain.
Unless Peter Conroy could stop him.
He raced through the gleaming, twisting corridors of the giant ship, running frantically down and down toward Number Nineteen Thrust Tube. He pushed his way past surprised crew members, circled into the lower levels of the ship, made his way through the network of passageways that led to the blast tubes. Finally he reached Power Section.