Helton stripped off his breathing gear. "You guys get over to the battalion surgeon," he said to the two wounded men and the two that were helping. "The other two; take an air-scrubber in there and start it up. Then you get over to the doc, too. Have him check you over."

"What happened?" Hollo way put the inevitable question. Helton looked down at the front of his body armor. With his thumb and index finger, he extracted a bullet from the chest area, held it up to the sunlight, smiled, and put it in his pants pocket. "Three tried to put up a fight, "he said. "The other one made a run for it."

In the far distance there was the pop-pop-pop-pop-pop of automatic weapons fire, followed by a muffled explosion.

"I see they found the transportation and someone there tried to get away,"

Holloway said drily.

Helton smiled and nodded. "Might be our lost sheep. Maybe he had someone waiting for him. We may still have to flush him out."

Helton posted two guards at the tunnel mouth. "Nobody, but nobody has access to this place except myself and Commissioner Holloway. That includes the Captain and the Colonel and the Corporal of the Guard. I'm in charge of the dig, and this is part of the dig."

"What about Colonel O'Bannon?" one of the guards asked timidly.

"It includes Colonel O'Bannon, too. Nobody. Understand?"

They both looked unhappy and nodded.Helton motioned to Holloway to follow him. "Come on, Jack. I want your opinion about something."

Gerd began to follow. Helton turned. "Nobody but Jack or myself, I said.

Sorry, Gerd." Gerd protested.

"Put it in writing," Helton said. "What I said stands until I say different."

Inside, the cavern was warm and large, with a high roof structure. It was also light inside-all the time. The roof and walls were studded with sunstones, excited to thermofluoresence by the geothermal heat of the mountain.

Jack's mouth fell open. "There must be millions of them," he said as he slowly looked at the glowing lights. "I see it, but I can't believe it. You did the right thing to clap the lid on this, Phil. If word of this gets put, it won't just start a Sunstone Rush-it'll start a Sunstone War."

"Well, Ingermann's boys won't be telling anyone. That's probably who they were working for," Helton said. "How would you go about explaining this place geologically?"

"For one thing," Hollo way said, "it's the answer to my speculations about 'the dying-place of the jellyfish,' and why the sunstone deposits get richer close to Fuzzy Divide." Jack kicked his toe in the rock powder on the cavern floor. "This was the original dying-place of the jellyfish. If I were going to speculate, I'd say a bunch of the jellyfish died here, for whatever reason, and sank into what used to be a mud layer." He pointed to the roof of the cavern. "Apparently North Beta and South Beta were once separate continents and this place was a shallow sea between them. As the tectonic plates drifted together, they pushed up this formation while the mud layer was still hardening into flint. Ground water ^slowly dissolved the limestone layer beneath the flint and made this cavern." He reached down and picked up a handful of the rock dust. "That's what this stuff looks like to me- decomposed limestone.

"You did the right thing to put the lid on this, Phil," he repeated.

"That's not the real reason, though," Helton said. "Come over here."

Against one wall of the cavern was a row of instrument racks, like computer consoles, perhaps, but totally alien-looking. There were pieces of furniture, desks and chairs- all about Fuzzy size. There were some Fuzzies there, as well, mummified by the warm, dry air of the cave and much better preserved than the remains that had been found in the wrecked starship. A recent earthquake had apparently opened the fissure through which Ingermann's stooges had entered the cavern, and the outside air was making the mummies start to deteriorate.

"Great Ghu," Jack said softly as he looked over the scene. "More Fuzzy bones."

Chapter 30.

"This is incredible!" Holloway said. "They must have been here at a time close to the crashing of the ship-at least before the rockslide that buried it. Why would they drag all this stuff up here from the wreck? Just to have something to play with?"

"Perhaps," Helton said. "The ones in here were trapped by the rockslide that closed the cavern. We'll have to date it out and see if both events were caused by the same rockslide.""That might explain the Fuzzy bones in the ship. Gerd and Ruth will be able to date the remains. That will help tell you if there were two separate rockslides."

"Or," Helton said, "the survivors of the wreck may have been long-since picked up when the Fuzzies found it, and all this gear was left behind. The Fuzzies who died inside the wreck could have wandered in there and been killed by radiation leakage."

"Too easy," Jack said. "If there was all that much radiation leakage, it would have contaminated the whole area, and Fuzzies would have abandoned the place-not dragged all this electronic gear into the cave."

"Maybe they did," Helton said, "then came back later-much later. It 's all too much for me. I 'm going to have this stuff impounded and taken to Xerxes where it can be gone over properly."

Jack's mustache twitched. "Just a minute!" he said gruffly. "This stuff is on a legally established Fuzzy Reservation! It's their property, and, as Commissioner of Native Affairs, I intend to see they have some say-so about what's done with it."

Helton smiled. "Eventually, I suppose you will. In the meantime, I'm impounding it under Priority One. All perfectly legal. You'll get a copy of the inventory, and Governor Rainsford will co-sign the order for its removal from the planetary surface. There are records and scientific apparatus here, not built by Terrans, and obviously never intended for use by Terrans. Under Federation Law, the Navy has the first priority for the examination of-let's see, the code states it . . .Oh, yes. 'Artifacts of unknown or unestablished origin.' "

Holloway was silent for a moment, trying to think of a loophole in Priority One. He couldn 't think of any. If anyone could, he should be the man. He'd been skating on the edge of the law on more planets than he could remember.

"Dammit," he said, "you are within the law."

"I guess Napier had a hunch about that when he put me in charge of the dig,"

Helton said. "I will guarantee you one thing, though."

"Which is?" Holloway said.

"Tight security," Helton said. "I'll have the battalion surgeon put those six guys in quarantine. They, and only they will pack this stuff up for transfer to Xerxes, and I'll have the chief psychologist there put them on ice. I'11 also have Byers' boys drive a hatchway in the tunnel, keyed to yours and my thumbprints only."

"And blast shut the tunnel that Ingermann's stooges came through," Holloway said.

Helton nodded.

"And what about the bodies?" Holloway asked.

"Ill have the same six that blasted in here with me pack those up according to Dr. van Riebeek's specifications and cart them outside, where they will be turned over to him for further research and comparison." Helton waited for Jack's reply."Sounds airtight to me," Jack said.

Helton grinned. "No such thing as totally airtight security, -Jack, because it's handled by people. All the works of man are flawed by human nature in some way."

"Well," Holloway said with a chuckle, "I'll settle for what you've outlined.

You're right-as usual. Xerxes is the only place around that has any chance of deciphering what's here."

"Thank you," Helton said.

"Besides," Holloway continued, "we're going to have quite enough to do to keep the news of 'something big' out here from being all over the planet by sundown. I don't relish the size of the task."

"Do you want to be in here when I make the inventory?"

Helton asked.

Holloway shrugged. "Not necessarily. I trust you." "Well, you could help out,"

Helton said. "It'll go a lot faster if you measure and I write than if I do it all myself."

While Helton was expressing his displeasure to Chief Byers over the fact that a two-meter security hatchway could not be freighted from Xerxes and installed in the tunnel before morning, Colonial Governor Ben Rainsford and Attorney General Gus Brannhard were unraveling puzzles in Mallory sport.

"Now, what in Nifflheim did Ingermann hope to accomplish by sending his tame lawyer into court with a case like that?" Rainsford demanded."Surely he knew Pendarvis wouldn't admit it on the issues framed in the complaint."

Gus Brannhard sloshed the whiskey in his glass. "Of course he did. He just wanted to tie things up for a while. If Pendarvis had scheduled the case for a preliminary hearing, that would have given the plaintiff certain 'Rights of Discovery,' the authority to subpoena records, take depositions, that sort of thing."

"Federated Sunstone Co-operative, indeed!" Rainsford jerked his pipe out of his pocket and began to tamp tobacco into the bowl. "Isn't a real prospector in the whole shebang!"

"The best he could have hoped for might be an injunction against the CZC and the colonial government entering into or pursuing any kind of joint ventures or leasing agreements." Brannhard rumbled, like a volcano preparing to erupt.

He was chuckling. "Then, young Throckmorton had to 'beef up' the case by trying to sue the government for conspiracy. I bet Ingermann roasted him alive over that one."

"In the meantime," Rainsford grumped, "the press is roasting me alive-especially the news analysts. I could throttle that young squirt at ZNS.

Do you know he infiltrated my own staff? My own staff, by Ghu! They didn't have any useful information for him, though. They don't know any more about what's really going on over on North Beta than I do, which is precisely zero."

Brannhard chuckled, again. "Why, Ben, all you have to do is take a run over there and ask Jack. He 'd tell you what's going on. I'm sure he would."

"Well, isn't that just fine!" Rainsford exploded. "Take a run over to NorthBeta, the man says!" Rainsford took his pipe out of his mouth and ticked off his points on the fingers of his other hand. ' "The Constitutional Convention is coming to a fast boil. There are crazy rumors all over town. I 've been going on screen every night to try and pacify people. "There, there-nothing to worry about, folks; just digging up a little old spaceship wreck over there.

Everything's gonna be just fine.' For every yard of wool I get knit together, Ingermann and his gang come along behind me and unravel it before I can get home to watch myself on the screen. People are going nuts in the streets.

Junktown is like a combat zone: the only thing that's holding it together is that priest fella down there with his soup kitchen. That reminds me, I want to talk to him." Rainsford made a quick note into his stenomemophone. "Haven't had a good night's sleep in Ghu knows how long. And you want me to drop everything and take a little junket over to North Beta. Don't you go losing your marbles on me, too, Gus. Do you have any idea how foolish a man feels, standing up there shooting his mouth off just like he knew what he was talking about?"

Brannhard shrugged and refurbished his drink. "It was only a suggestion, Ben."

"Sure," Rainsford said. "Easy for you to say. I 'm the one that has to stand in front of that pickup and try to sound like I know what's what, when I have no idea how it's going to come out. You try that, some time and see how ridiculous it makes you feel."

"I do," Brannhard said quietly.

"When?" Rainsford demanded.

"Every time I take a case to trial," Brannhard replied.

"Hmmmph!" Rainsford grunted as he re-lighted his pipe. "And the CZC,"

Rainsford said, jabbing the air with his pipestem. "That's another thing.

They're about as much help as a zebralope in heat, lately."

Brannhard looked genuinely alarmed for the first time in the conversation.

"They're not holding back on the support Grego promised the government, are they?"

"No, no; nothing like that," Rainsford said. "Victor just doesn 't seem to have his mind on what he's doing some of the time. It's that Fuzzy-sitter of his; that's what it is."

"Christiana Stone?" Brannhard asked.

"That's the one," Rainsford said. He leaned forward in his chair. "Do you know," he whispered, "I was over there the other evening, and I saw them holding hands in the kitchen."

Brannhard grinned, showing white teeth through his gray-brown beard. "Why, you old snoop," he said.

"I was not snooping!" Rainsford declared. "I just happened to see it. That's all."

The midnight to 0400 shift had just gone on guard at the tunnel mouth as Helton left the cavern after thoroughly taping its contents. The tape would stay on his person until he had transmitted it to Commodore Napier-then it would be erased.

"Remember, guys," Helton said to the two Marines, "nobody goes in there exceptCommissioner Holloway or myself. Got that clear?"

They nodded. "Right, Gunnie," one of them said.

As soon as Helton was out of sight, one of the sentries whispered to his buddy. "Jim?"

"Whattaya want, Ev?" the other one said.

"Why would they leave the lights on in there?" Everett Diehl asked.

"How do you know the lights are on?" Jim Spelvin said. "There's a tarp over the far end of the tunnel."

Diehl smirked. "I sneaked a peek when the Gunnie came out. He had his back to me while he pulled the tarp-and he left the lights on."

"Aw, don't worry about it," Spelvin said.

"Well, it seems damned funny; that's all," Diehl said.

"Maybe he's drying fruit in there!" Spelvin said exasperatedly. "How should I know why he left the lights on? Bad enough we should get the mid-watch. We 're the rankers in the guard mount. How come the privates draw the easy hours?"

"Akor said he wanted NCOs on the mid-watch," Diehl said.

"Malarkey!" Spelvin said. "He put us on the mid-watch because he doesn't like us. He never has liked us. We're the rankers and he gives us the dirty jobs."

Perhaps a half-hour passed with neither of them saying anything.

"Jim?"

Spelvin started. "Now whattaya want? Do you know how hard it is to sleep standing up?"

"I'm going in and take a look," Diehl said.

"That's crazy," Spelvin said. "Why bother? We won't have to turn this drill again. I heard they're going to set a security hatch in the tunnel tomorrow morning."

' "That's what I mean," Diehl said. "If we don't look now, we'll never get another chance."

Spelvin was silent for a moment. "What if we get caught?"

"Aw, there won't be anybody around to check on us for at least another hour,"

Diehl said. "Besides, if you see anybody coming, you can throw a pebble down the tunnel. I can beat it back out here before they're close enough to see I'm gone."