and listened luxuriously to the sound of a voice without worrying too strenuously concerning the contents of the speech.
Then suddenly amusement was gone and both ears were on the job and he said, 'Hold it. Ho-Id it. What are you talking about?'
'Haven't you been listening, you dumb cop? I'm talking my heart out to you.'
'Well, deal it out in smaller pieces, will you? What's this about a silicony?' This guy's got one on board. He calls it a pet and feeds it greasy rocks.'
'Huh? I swear, a miner on the asteroid run would make a pet out of a piece of cheese if he could get it to talk back to him.'
'Not just a silicony. Not one of these little inch jobs. It's over a foot across. Don't you get it? Space, you'd think a guy would know something about the asteroids, living out here.'
'All right. Suppose you tell me.'
'Look, greasy rocks build tissues, but where does a silicony that size get its energy from?'
'I couldn't tell you.'
'Directly from- Have you got anyone around you right now?'
'Right now, no. I wish there were.'
'You won't in a minute. Siliconies get their energy by the direct absorption of gamma rays.'
'Says who?'
'Says a guy called Wendell Urth. He's a big-shot extraterrologist. What's more, he says that's what the silicony's ears are for.' Vernadsky put his two forefingers to his temples and wiggled them. 'Not telepathy at all. They detect gamma radiation at levels no human instrument can detect.'
'Okay. Now what?' asked Hawkins. But he was growing thoughtful 'Now this. Urth says there isn't enough gamma radiation on any asteroid to support siliconies more than an inch or two long. Not enough radioactivity. So here we have one a foot long, a good fifteen inches.'
'Well-'
'So it has to come from an asteroid just riddled with the stuff, lousy with uranium, solid with gamma rays.
An asteroid with enough radioactivity to be warm to the touch and off the regular orbit patterns so that no one's come across it. Only suppose some smart boy landed on the asteroid by happenstance and noticed the warmth of the rocks and got to thinking. This captain of the Robert Q. is no rock-hopping ignoramus. He's a shrewd guy.'
'Go on.'
'Suppose he blasts off chunks for assay and comes across a giant silicony. Now he knows he's got the most unbelievable strike in all history. And he doesn't need assays. The silicony can lead him to the rich veins.'
'Why should it?'
'Because it wants to learn about the universe. Because it's spent a thousand years, maybe, under rock, and it's just discovered the stars. It can read minds and it could learn to talk. It could make a deal. Listen, the captain would jump at it. Uranium mining is a state monopoly. Unlicensed miners aren't even allowed to carry counters. It's a perfect setup for the captain.' Hawkins said, 'Maybe you're right.'
'No maybe at all. You should have seen them standing around me while I watched the silicony, ready to jump me if I said one funny word. You should have seen them drag me out after two minutes.'
Hawkins brushed his unshaven chin with his hand and made a mental estimate of the time it would take him to shave. He said, 'How long can you keep the boy at your station?'
'Keep him! Space, he's gone!'
'What! Then what the devil is all this talk about? Why did you let him get away?'
'Three guys,' said Vernadsky patiently, 'each one bigger than I am, each one armed, and each one ready to kill, I'll bet. What did you want me to do?'
'All right, but what do we do now?'
'Come out and pick them up. That's simple enough. I was fixing their semireflectors and I fixed them my way. Then-power will shut off completely within ten thousand miles. And I installed a tracer in the Jenner manifold.'
Hawkins goggled at Vernadsky's grinning face. 'Holy Toledo.'
'And don't get anyone else in on this. Just you, me, and the police cruiser. They'll have no energy and we'll have, a cannon or two. They'll tell us where the uranium asteroid is. We locate it, then get in touch with Patrol Headquarters. We will deliver unto them, three, count them, three, uranium smugglers, one giant-size silicony like nobody on Earth ever saw, and one, I repeat, one great big fat chunk of uranium ore like nobody on Earth saw, either. And you make a lieutenancy and I get promoted to a permanent Earth-side job. Right?'
Hawkins was dazed. 'Right,' he yelled.