“Yes, sir.” The captain stepped to a grille in the wall. “Control room. Coby,” he said. He turned from the grille. “Can I show you to the lounge, commander?”

“For the time being,” said Donal. “And get us some coffee.”

They went on into the courier’s lounge, which was fixed up like the main room on a private yacht. And presently coffee was forthcoming on a small autocart from the galley, which scooted in the door by itself and parked itself in the midst of their floats.

“Sit down with us, Cor,” said Donal. “Lee, this is Captain Coruna El Man, Cor, my uncle Ian Graeme.”

“Dorsai!” said Ian, shaking hands.

“Dorsai!” responded El Man. They smiled slightly at each other, two grimly-carved professional warriors.

“Right,” said Donal. “Now that introductions are over—how long will it take us to make it to Coby?”

“We can make our first jump immediately we get outside atmosphere,” answered El Man, in his rather harsh, grating voice. “We’ve been running a steady calculation on a standby basis. After the first jump, it’ll take a minimum of four hours to calculate the next. We’ll be within a light-year of Coby then, and each phase shift will take progressively less calculation as we zero in. Still— five more calculation periods at an average of two hours a period. Ten hours, plus the original four makes fourteen, straight drive and landing in on Coby another three to four hours. Call it eighteen hours—minimum.”

“All right,” said Donal. “I’ll want ten of your men for an assault party. And a good officer.”

“Myself,” said El Man.

“Captain, I . . . very well,” said Donal. “You and ten men. Now.” He produced an architectural plan from inside his jacket. “If you’ll all look here; this is the job we have to do.”

The plan was that of an underground residence on Coby, that planet which had grown into a community from a collection of mines and never been properly terraformed. Indeed, there was a question whether even with modern methods, it could be. Vega, an AO type star, was too inhospitable to its planets, even though Coby was the fourth out from her, among seven.

The plan itself showed a residence of the middle size, comprising possibly eighteen rooms, surrounded by gardens and courtyards. The differences, which only began to appear as Donal proceeded to point them out, from an above-ground residence of the ordinary type on other planets, lay in the fakery involved. As far as appearances went, someone in the house, or in one of the gardens, would imagine he was surface-dwelling on at least a terraformed world. But eight-tenths of that impression would be sheer illusion. Actually, the person in question would have ultimate rock in all directions—rock ten meters overhead at the furthest, rock underfoot, and rock surrounding.