"What is this?" Teejay demanded defiantly. "What's the meaning of—"
"Will you be quiet and let me do the talking?" Barling interrupted her. "It was LeClarc who radioed and told me your coin had two heads. If you wanted to play the game that way, I wasn't going to stand by and let you. So—"
"So," LeClarc took up the thread for him, "we got together, Mr. Barling and I."
"But you, LeClarc," said Kevin. "You'd jump through a fire-hoop into a pit of acid if Captain Moore told you to."
"Would I?" LeClarc chuckled softly.
"Yes. Yes, you would."
"Perhaps there was a time I'd have done that, McGann. Perhaps. But then I thought the Captain needed me, and wanted me to help her, too. Now, with you and Stedman—well, LeClarc isn't so important, is he?"
"So that's it!" Kevin roared. "You're jealous. Not jealous the way a man should be, when he loves a woman, but jealous because you believed Captain Moore had discarded you—had decided you weren't such an essential cog in the Gordak machine."
"Shut up." LeClarc took a quick step toward Kevin and hit him, hooking his left fist at the bigger man's jaw. Kevin staggered but did not go down. Bellowing, he charged at LeClarc, but the Frenchman waved him off with the neutron gun.
"Stop it, LeClarc!" Barling snapped. "I didn't have you bring them here to make a shambles of the lounge. Just stand off in the corner—that's right, there—and watch them. I'll do the talking."