It was not easy, especially with DeCastros breathing down one's neck. Mr. Wordsley began to perspire heavily, and the moisture ran down and puddled in his boots.

An hour passed that was like an age. The prognosis became known and was not reassuring. This was one of the toxic space viruses, dormant at absolute zero, but active under shipboard conditions. A species, in fact, of the dread, oxygen-eating _dryorus_, which multiplies with explosive rapidity, and kills upon penetration of the human respiratory system.

Because of the leak in the hull, the decontaminators could not even hold their own. Mr. Wordsley shuddered to note that ominous, rust-colored cobwebs--countless trillions of _dryori_--already festooned the stringers of the hull.

Another precious hour was taken from them. Mr. Wordsley emerged wearily from the last inspection hole.

* * * * *

"Well?" DeCastros snapped. "Well--well?" His face was greenish from the effects of the special, contamination resistant mixture that they were breathing.

"I found the leak," Mr. Wordsley said.

"Did you fix it?"

"It was one of the irmium alloy plugs in the outer hull beneath the pile. They were originally placed there, I believe, for the installation of a radiation tester. The plug is missing, and I am sorry to say that we have no extras. Anything other than irmium would melt at once, of course."

"We have less than eight hours of pure air in the tanks," DeCastros said. "Have you thought of that, you rattle-head?"

"Yes, sir," Mr. Wordsley said. "And if I might be allowed to speculate, Captain, I would say that we are finished unless we can make a planetfall. Only then would I be able to remove the lower port tube, weld the cavity, seal the ship and fumigate."

"We're four weeks from the nearest star, Fomalhaut; you know that as well as I do."

"I was thinking," said Mr. Wordsley, with a sudden, suffused glow in his cheeks, "of Avis Solis."

Mr. Wordsley shut his eyes as they were going down, because he wanted to open them and surprise himself, at the moment of landing. But the cold, white glare was more intense than he had expected, and he had to shut them again and turn on the polarizer.

He buckled on his tools and the carbo-torch, and went down the ladder. He dropped at once to his knees, not because of the gravity, which was not bad, but because of a compulsion to get his face as near to the surface of Avis Solis as possible. It was even lovelier than when seen from space. He trod upon a sea of diamonds. A million tiny winkings and scintillations emanated from each crystal. A million crystals lay beneath the sole of his boot. He would rather not have stepped on them, but it could not be helped. They were everywhere. Mr. Wordsley gloated.

* * * * *

DeCastros dropped like a huge slug from the ladder behind him. "What are you doing?" he said. "Picnicking?"

"I was tying my shoe," Mr. Wordsley said, and got to work with an alacrity that was wholly false.