there were fifty men in the gordak's crew and another thirty-odd in the expedition, and a space ship being the complicated, labyrinthine device that it is, it wasn't too strange that steve failed to encounter leclarc until immediately before landing on mercury. then the gordak's deceleration tubes had cut in and steve found the most readily available accel-hammock in the general lounge. the frenchman was stretched out on the cushions three feet from him.

leclarc said, "this will be a terrible, hot place."

"i know. at perihelion, mercury's not much more than thirty million miles from the sun." if the frenchman wanted to bury the hatchet, fine.

leclarc strained to raise himself on his elbows against the increasing deceleration. "sure," he said, "a hot place. after you foul up, stedman, my vote will be to leave you on the hot side instead of giving you passage to the twilight zone."

the frenchman was being illogical and pointlessly childish. "i didn't ask you to fight with me," steve told him. "why don't we forget all about it?"

"if you want to, forget. i, leclarc, never forget."

"by space, leclarc—" the voice came from the other side of the lounge "—then you're a spoiled little child." it was the big exec officer who spoke, kevin mcgann.

leclarc did not answer. kevin winked at steve, then set his face grimly against the bone-crushing deceleration. fifteen minutes later, they landed at furnacetown. the names of the new frontier settlements, steve thought with a grin, were as picturesque as the names of the old wild west towns.

there was a huge, priceless matrix of ruby far below the surface near furnacetown, and the frontier settlement existed to mine from it. but the place was named aptly, for here on the hot side of mercury, the temperature was hot enough to melt tin and lead. a community of half a thousand hearty souls, furnacetown shielded itself from the swollen, never-setting sun with a vacuum-insulated dome and a hundred million credits worth of cooling equipment. even so, the atmosphere within the dome was a lot like new orleans on a sultry summer day.

the mayor of the town, a man named powlaski, met them at the landing field. "it's hot," said teejay, offering her hand and shaking with the plump official, man-fashion.

"it's always hot, captain moore. at any rate, be happy that you've beaten barling here this time."

"oh, did we? good. we'll need three asbestos suits, powlaski. i never did trust plain vac-suits on the sunward side of this boiling mess of a planet. say, has anyone got a cool drink? i'm roasting."

someone wheeled out a portable refrigerator and the synthetic gin-and-orange stored therein tasted to steve's thirsty lips almost like the real thing. then leclarc, who had ventured into one of the squat buildings with powlaski's lieutenant, a middle-aged woman, returned with three heavy asbestos suits draped ponderously over his arm. their combined weight was perhaps two hundred pounds, but it became negligible under mercury's weak gravity.

"we're ready," he said, extending one of the suits to teejay and helping her slip it on over her shorts and halter. this was the first time that steve had ever seen her without the black cape, which seemed a sort of affected trade-mark.

"three suits?" steve demanded. "what for?"

"the third one's for you, stedman," the woman told him. "i know your job is to see that the game stays alive in our bubble-cages, but i don't think it would hurt if you had a look-see at the stone worm in its own environment."

"that's not what i meant," steve told her. "why leclarc?"

teejay shrugged, zipping up the suit. "because i said so, that's why. also, leclarc's something of an expert on the inner planets and he goes wherever i do, anyway."

"sort of a bodyguard," the frenchman purred, strapping a neutron gun to the belt of his asbestos suit. "hey, who's got those helmets?"

and then steve felt them slipping the thick, clumsy helmet over his head. kevin stood nearby and the exec looked like he wanted to say something, but steve's helmet had snapped into place and from that point he could only talk by radio—and over the crackling interference of the swollen sun, at that.

moments later, he'd stepped through an airlock at the side of the furnacetown dome and plodded out on the surface of mercury.