El hombre que vendió la tierra

Museum Catalog Note This Spanish-language science fiction pulp serial, issue 521 in Editorial Bruguera's "La Conquista del Espacio" (Space Conquest) collection, features "El Hombre Que Vendió la Tierra" (The Man Who Sold the Earth) by Clark Carrados. The story concerns con artist Neil Torres, who fraudulently sells Earth to G'Hadur Rheik, a Zebionite official, for 1.5 million interstellar units. When Rheik presents legitimate deed documents to Earth's authorities, Commissioner Ensdel faces an international incident: Zebion demands Torres's extradition within twenty-four hours for execution by slow roasting. Meanwhile, a mysterious woman named Syra Stimson appears at Torres's mountain cabin, interrupting his affair with a woman named Carol. Stimson, well-informed of Torres's past schemes (selling electric heaters to Mercurians, ice factories to Plutonians), coerces the desperate con artist into selling her worthless asteroid Orrull-5 by threatening to expose him to authorities.