"Most kind," I said, jingling the six glowing five-hundred-thousand-credit coins. "A decent fee for a decent job done."

"You better put them in a bank vault before they go missing," was his surly advice.

"Of course. A capital idea!"

A singularly stupid idea. Banks were for robbing and for the tax authorities to keep track of. So first I went into the machine shop where I did some crafty metalwork before I packed wrapped and labeled the coins. Then I went for a walk and, as a precaution, I exercised all of my considerable talents at avoiding observation to shake off any possible tails the Admiral had put on me. I was risking my life-in more ways than one! — for this money. If I came out of it all in one piece I wanted to have it waiting.

I finally reached a small country post office, selected at random, some distance from the city. It was manned by a nearsighted gentleman of advanced years.

"Spatial express and insured for offplanet delivery. That ain't gonna be cheap young feller."

"Do it, daddy — o, do it. I've got the gilt." He blinked and I translated back to his native language. "Payment is not a problem, dear sir. You must assure me that this gets to Professor Van Diver at the Galaksia Universitato at once. He is expecting these historical documents."

I had already spaciofaxed the professor that I was sending him some personal possessions, that he should please hold on to them until I came and picked them up. In case he got curious the contents were sealed in an armored case that would take a diamond drill to open. I was betting that his curiosity would not go that far. My package vanished into the mailchute and I went back to work.

At the end of the sixth day we were all pretty exhausted.