THE COSMIC COMPUTER

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"How the dickens did you wangle that?"

"Oh, it was Yves' idea, to start with. He knew about her; the T. & O.'s
been losing money on her for years. He said if they had to pay
prize-money on her and then either restore her to original condition or
finish the job and build a spaceship they didn't want, it would almost
bankrupt the company. They got up as high as fifty thousand sols for
prize-money and we just laughed at them. So we made a proposition of our
own.

"We proposed organizing a new company, subsidiary to both L. E. & S. and
T. & O., to engage in interplanetary shipping; both companies to assign
their equity in the /Harriet Barne/ to the new company, the work of
completing her to be done at our spaceport and the labor cost to be
shared. This would give us our spaceship, and get T. & O. off the hook
all around. Everybody was for it except the president of T. & O. Know
anything about him?"