Farther ahead and looming magnificent in the late afternoon sun was the
first and largest of Venusian cities, Venusport. Like a fantastically
large diamond, the startling towers of the young city shot upward into
the misty atmosphere, catching the light and reflecting it in every
color of the spectrum.
Loring and Mason did not appreciate the beauty of the city as they rode
swiftly through the busy streets. Loring, in particular, thought as he
had never thought before. He was busily putting a plot together in his
mind--a plot as dangerous as it was criminal.
[Illustration: _The jet cab raced along the highway to Venusport_]
The jet cab slammed to a stop at a busy intersection of the city. This
was Spaceman's Row, and it dated back to Venusport's first rough and
tough pioneering days.
For two blocks on either side of the street, in building after building,
cafes, pawnshops, cheap restaurants above and below the street level,
supplied the needs of countless shadowy figures who came and went as
silently as ghosts. Spaceman's Row was where suspended spacemen and
space rats, prospectors of the asteroids for uranium and pitchblende,
gathered and found short-lived and rowdy fun.
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