On the Trail of the Space Pirates_ A Tom Corbett Space Cadet Adventure - Carey Rockwell [177]
The four spacemen laughed at Shinny's obvious indignation.
"Now come on!" he growled. "Let's eat. I'm hungry!"
Refusing to allow them to get near Molly, Shinny began pushing food into slots, compartments, turning on switches and punching buttons. In the cozy living room, Strong relaxed while the three cadets played with the Venusian wolfhound. Finally Shinny announced dinner and they fell to with gusto. There wasn't much talk during the course of the meal. Strong and the boys felt that Shinny would let them know when he was ready.
Finally the meal was over. Shinny sprawled in his chair, lit his pipe, then looked at his guests, his eyes twinkling. "All right, me friends, I think you've held back long enough. Let's have it."
Strong immediately told the old spaceman the entire story, from Wallace and Simms' false concession at the exposition to the present.
"You see, Nick," he concluded, "with an adjustable light-key enabling them to open any lock in the solar system, nothing is safe. Personally, I think it's only because they haven't a larger or faster ship and aren't better armed that they haven't tried more daring piracy. They'll reach that point soon, though. They've already robbed four ships for arms alone."
"I'll do anything I can to help you, Captain," said Shinny. "What is it you want to know?"
"We suspect that Wallace has a secret hide-out in the asteroid belt," said Strong. "Since you once prospected the asteroids with him I thought you might know where the hide-out is."
Shinny grew reflective and knocked the ashes out of his pipe before he answered. "That was a long time ago, Captain. More'n ten years. And Gus Wallace was a real square spaceman then. He didn't turn bad until after we split up and he met that other feller."
"What other fellow?" asked Strong.
Skinny paused. There was a hard glint in his eyes. "Bull Coxine!" He spat the name out as though it had left a bad taste in his mouth.
"Coxine!" exclaimed Strong.
"You heard me," snorted Shinny. "Bull Coxine and Gus Wallace got together after me and Wallace lost our stake hunting for uranium pitchblende in the asteroids and split up. Next thing I heard, him and Coxine was mixed up in that business up on Ganymede when the Credit Exchange was held up."
Strong's face had turned the color of chalk. "Coxine!" he repeated under his breath.
Noticing Strong's reaction to Shinny's statement, Tom asked, "Who is Coxine, Captain Strong?"
Strong was silent and Shinny turned to the cadets.
"When your skipper here was a young feller just starting out in the Solar Guard," the old man explained, "he was on a routine flight out to Titan and there was a mutiny. Coxine was the ringleader. The captain joined up with Coxine after they had put his skipper in the brig. When he had Coxine's confidence, he regained control of the ship and sent Coxine and the others to a prison asteroid. Coxine has hated the captain ever since and swore to get him."
"But how did he pull the holdup on Ganymede, then?" asked Roger.
"Coxine escaped from the prison asteroid in a jet boat, disguised as a guard," continued Shinny. "Only man ever to escape. He drifted around in the belt for a while and was picked up by a freighter going to Ganymede. The freighter had been out rocket-hopping among the asteroids, collecting the prospectors' small supplies of uranium and taking the stuff back to Ganymede for refining. Wallace happened to be dead-heading on the freighter. When they got to Ganymede, and Coxine saw all the money lying around at the Credit Exchange to pay off the prospectors, he convinced Wallace to go in with him and they robbed the Exchange. Coxine was caught red-handed, but Wallace got away. In fact, the Solar Guard didn't know Wallace had anything to do with it. So Coxine was taken back to the prison asteroid, and Wallace has been driftin' around the system ever since."