 From an Unseen Sensor. by Rosal George Brown. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit LibriVox.org. From an Unseen Sensor. Uncle Isidore's ship wasn't in bad shape, at first glance, but a second look showed the combustion chamber was crumpled to pieces, and the jets were fused into the rocks, making a smooth depression. The ship had tilted into a horizontal position, nestling in the hollow its last blasts had made. Dust had sifted in around it, piling over the almost invisible seam of the port and filming the whole ship. We circled around the ship. It was all closed and sealed, blind as a bullet. Okay, Renee said. He's dead, my regrets. He coughed the word out as though it were something he had swallowed by accident. But how do you know, I asked. He might be in there. That port hasn't been open for months, maybe years. I told you the converter wouldn't last more than a month in dock. He couldn't live locked up in there without air or water. Let's go. My guide had no further interest in the ship. He hadn't even looked to see what the planet was like. I stood shivering in my warm clothes. The ship seemed to radiate a chill. I looked around at the lumpy, unimaginative landscape of Elvarla. There was nothing in sight, but a scraggly, done heather sprouting here and there in the rocks and dust, making her suit patches in the low hills. I had some wild idea, I think, that Uncle Izzy might come sauntering nonchalantly over the hills, one hand in the pocket of a grilch-down jacket and the other holding a Martian figurine. And he would have on his face that look which makes everything he says seem cynical and slightly clever even if it isn't. The scenery is dull, he might say, but it makes a nice backdrop for you. Something like that, leaving the impression he'd illuminated a side of your character for you to figure out later on. Nothing of the kind happened, of course. I just got colder standing there. All right, Rene said. We've had a moment of silence. Now, let's go. I—there's something wrong, I told him. Let's go in and see the—body. We can't go in. That ship's sealed from the inside. You think they make those things so any painted alien can open the door and shoot in poisoned arrows? Believe me, he HAS to be inside if those outside ports are sealed. And he HAS to be dead, because that port hasn't been opened in months. Look at the dust! It's a fourth of the way up the port! Rene lumbered over to it and blew away some of the lighter dust higher up. See that? He asked. No. He groaned. Well, you'll have to take my word for it. It's a raindrop. Almost four months old. A very light rain. You could see the faint, crusted outline of the drop if you knew how to look. I believe you, I said. I hired you because you know which side of the trees the moss grows on and things like that. Still—Rene was beginning to stomp around impatiently. Still what? It just isn't like Uncle Isidor. I was trying to search out, myself, what it was that struck me as incongruous. It's out of character. It's out of character for anybody to die, Rene said, but I've seen a lot of them dead. I mean, at least he would have died outside. Oh, for Pete's sake, why outside? You think he took rat poison? I went around to the other side of the spaceship, mostly to get away from Rene for a moment. I'm only a studs and neck-class man and Rene had twenty years' experience on alien planets. So he was right, of course, about the evidence. There was no getting around it. Still—I circled back around to where Rene was smoking his first cigarette since we left Earth. His face was a mask of sun-baked wrinkles pointing down to the cigarette smack in the middle of his mouth. Uncle Isi wouldn't die like an ordinary mortal, I said. He'd have a brass band, or we'd find his body lying in a bed of roses with a big lily in his hand, or he might even disappear into thin air. But not this. I waved a hand toward the dead ship. Look, Rene said, my job was to find your Uncle Isidor. I found him. We can't get inside that ship with anything short of a matter-reducer, which I don't happen to have along since they weigh several tons. You'll have to take my word for it that his body's in there. Now, let's go home. He managed to talk without moving the cigarette at all. You said a week, I reminded Rene. I said if I didn't find him in a week then he wasn't there. I found him. I'm sorry if he was your favorite uncle or something. As a matter of fact, I never liked him. He was frivolous. He never had a job. He thought life was a big game. Then how come he got so rich? He always won. Not this time, brother. But if he's not your favorite uncle, why all this concern? You can take my word for it, he's dead, and you've done your duty. There are two things that bother me. One is curiosity. I just don't believe Uncle Isid died in an ordinary fashion locked up in a spaceship. You don't know him, so you wouldn't understand. The other thing I'm concerned about is... well, his will. Rene barked a couple of times. I had learned this indicated laughter. I figured what you were really after was his money. Under my yellow overskin I could feel myself coloring. That wasn't at all the point. I'd mortgaged Mother's bonds to finance this trip, confident that Uncle Izzy would make it good when we found him. If I couldn't get Mother's bonds out of Hock, she'd have to live out her life in a comfort park. I shuddered at the thought. Uncle Isidore must have known that when he radar'd for help. He must have provided some way. You said a week, and we're staying a week, I told Rene, as authoritatively as I could manage. You haven't actually showed me, Uncle Izzy's... er, corpus delectae. So I have you on a legal technicality. I didn't know whether or not this was true, but it sounded good. All right, we'll stay... Rene spat the sentence out onto the ground. But if you think I'm going to do any more looking, take another guess. He tremp'd back into his own ship, leaving the outside port and the pressure chamber open. If only Uncle Izzy had done that. I went over his ship inch by inch, feeling with my hands to be sure there was no extra door that might be opened. Rene would have laughed, but I was beginning to build up antibodies against Rene's laughter. I got the bottom part of the ship dusted off and found nothing. I pushed open the door of Rene's ship and asked him for a ladder. "'You'll have to pay for it,' he warned. "'Once it's open, I can't carry it in my ship, and I'll have to get another. OK, OK, I'll pay for it.' He handed me a synthetic affair that looked like a meshed rope, wound tight, about the size of a venusian cigar. This is a ladder,' I asked incredulously, but he had shut the door in my face. I slipped the cellophane off and unrolled it. It seemed to unroll endlessly. When it was ten feet long and four feet wide, I stopped unrolling. Sure enough, it hardened into a ladder in about ten minutes. It was so strong I couldn't begin to bend it over my knee. I set it against the side of the ship and began to investigate the viewports. The first two were sealed tight as a drum. The third slipped off in my hands and clattered over the side of the ship onto the rocks. I was almost afraid to look through the glass beneath. I'd needn't have been. I could see absolutely nothing. It was space black inside. I went back to Rene's ship for a flashlight. He was unimpressed by my discovery. "'Even if you could break the glass, which you can't,' he said, "'you still couldn't get through that little porthole. Here's the flash. You won't be able to see anything.'" He came with me this time, not because he was interested, but because he wanted another cigarette and never smoked in the ship. He was right. I couldn't see a darn thing in the ship with the flashlight. But I found something, a little lead object that looked like a coin. It had rolled into a corner of the port. Now, I don't like adventure. I don't like strange planets. All I've ever asked of life was my little four-by-six cubby in the Brooklyn block and my job. A job I know inside out. It's a comfortable, happy, harmless way to live, and I test ten to nine on job adjustment. All the same it was a thrill to discover a clue that Rene would have thrown away if he'd been the one looking. I tossed it casually in the air and showed it to Rene. "'Know what that is?' I asked. Slug for a half-deck slot machine? Nope. Know what I can do with it?' He didn't say. "'I'm going to open Uncle Izzy's ship from the inside.'" Rene lighted a fresh cigarette from the old one and let the smoke out of his nose. He gave rather the impression of a bull resting between picadors. "'Can you show me, on the outside, approximately where the button is that you push on the inside to unseal the ship?' I inquired casually. "'I can show you exactly.'" He pointed to a spot next to the entrance port. I wet my finger and made a mark on the dust so I could get it just right. Then I found a sharp stone and cut around the edges of the lead. As I slipped off the back half of the coin-like affair I clapped it over the finger-mark. The entrance port swung open. If I'd had a feather I would have taken great pleasure in knocking Rene over with it. "'It'd be worth a million dollars,' he breathed, to know how you did that. "'Oh, a lot less than that,' I said eerily. "'Well, explain.'" A Galizador had set it up, I told him, using the same patiently impatient tone he used on me. He knew I'd recognize that lead coin. There was a cufflink in it. "'A cufflink?' "'A studs-and-net class man has to know about cufflinks, too. This happens to be an expensive cufflink, but worth only about a year's salary, not a million dollars. They're held together by a jazzed-up, electromagnetic force rather than by a clasp. This force is so strong it would take a derrick to pull them apart. The idea is to keep you from losing one. If you drop it to the floor you just wave the mate around a little and it pops up through the air. How do you get them apart? Just slip them sideways, like a magnet. You can sheathe them in a lead, like the one I found, to cut down the attraction. This is how they're packaged. You don't know about them because they're not advertised. That keeps them a luxury item, you know." "'So your Uncle Isidore pasted one of them on the port button. He didn't have to paste. All he had to do was stick it on. All I had to do was line up the mate to it and the attractive force pushed the button.' "'That's very neat,' Renee said. But why the hell didn't he just leave the port open? He'd hardly do this sort of thing with his dying gasp.' "'I'm not sure,' I admitted. As a matter of fact, I wonder why he radar'd me if he really wanted to be rescued. He had plenty of friends who could rescue him more reliably. I had an inkling of what had been on Uncle Isidore's mind. Although Uncle Izzy had had three, or was it four, wives, he'd very carefully had no children. And it had occurred to him at an advanced age to take an interest in me. He'd sent me through two years of general studies, and reluctantly let me specialize in studs and net-clasps.' "'You were a grill-chop expert in middle school,' he had told me. "'How come you're getting so stuffy?' "'Because I can't be an adolescent all my life, Uncle Isidore,' I had replied stiffly. I would like to get into some solid line of work and be a good citizen.' "'Foe-ee,' he'd said. But he had let me do what I'd wanted. It was because of this that I had felt duty-bound to answer his call for help. I'd not felt duty-bound to take all the opportunities he'd tried to force on me when I got out of school. Mining the semi-solid seas of Al-Fard Kappa, fur trading on Procyon Beta, and a hundred others all obviously doomed to failure unless there was one lucky chance. "'But I'm happy here with my little room and my little job,' I kept telling Uncle Isidore. "'You only think you're happy because you don't know any better,' he kept telling me. Only, now that he was dead, he seemed to have me where he wanted me. Now that nothing could matter to him any longer.' "'Maybe he was getting senile,' Rene suggested. "'Uncle Isidore always said he'd rather die than...' "'He did die,' I replied, suddenly recalling myself to the present and the open outside port of the ship. I realized how reluctant I was to go in. It was one thing to admit Uncle Isidore was dead. I cherished no great affection for him, but it was something else to have to face his dead body. "'Would you mind going in first?' I asked Rene. He shrugged and shouldered the inside door open. He came out, his face a study in perplexity. "'Not here,' he said. "'This is the first time I've been wrong in fifteen years.' "'That's because it's the first time you've been up against Uncle Isi. He must have closed the port behind him the same way I opened it.' I climbed through the door, feeling immensely relieved. I realized then what had really been worrying me. If the gods had abandoned Isidore at the last, what do they have in mind for the rest of us mere mortals?' I kicked at my mind irritably, knowing these were young thoughts. But then I am young, I explained to myself. The inside of the ship was neat and empty. Stuck on the instrument panel with a vac-cup was a note in Uncle Isi's flowery script. "'My boy, I have died of boredom. Do not look for the remains. I have hidden my body to avoid the banality of a decent burial. I bequeath you my entire fortune. Find it.' Rene groaned. "'I suppose now you want to look for the body.' "'No. If he says it's hidden, it's hidden. But it would be a little silly to go off without finding his fortune, wouldn't it?' "'Looking for buried treasure wasn't in the contract,' Rene pointed out. "'You'll have to make it worth my while.' "'Another five thousand,' I said. Make it ten. Payable if I find it.' "'Suppose I find it.' "'Don't be ridiculous. You'd be a fool to take two steps on this planet without me.' He was right, of course, and if we left I wouldn't get anything. I thought of mother living by the bells at a comfort park. "'All right,' I said.' "'What form was his fortune in?' Rene asked. Money, bonds, polarian droplets? It would help to know what I'm looking for.' "'I have no idea,' I confessed. Ordinarily it would take a computer to figure out Uncle Isidor's financial affairs, but he'd have been perfectly capable of selling out everything and taking his entire fortune along with him for some new project.' Rene had skilfully unscrewed the instrument panel and he lifted it off and began poking inside and removing mysterious bits of machinery. "'That makes it harder. You don't know whether he sold out or not?' "'I have no idea. He might have all his money piled in the locker of the Wist Club of Sirius Beta. In that case we look for a key. Or he might have a block of Eritrevium buried somewhere. Your guess is as good as mine.' "'If he's dug up the ground,' Rene said, I'll recognize the spot. But that'll mean walking over every inch of ground for a day's journey around, or more if he did any overnight traveling.' "'Nah, Uncle Izzy,' I said. He wouldn't be at all likely to spend a freezing night out on Alvarla, even for a good joke.' "'Radar equipment's in perfect shape,' Rene said, shifting his activities to another segment of the ship's equipment. I wonder why he didn't leave it on so we could locate him easier. Not that we had any trouble. Or why he didn't continue broadcasting for help until he died. Mind if I take some of the equipment?' "'You haven't been exactly generous with me.' "'I intend to subtract its value from the cost of supplies and mileage on my ship. I never said I was generous, but by God I'm honest.' "'Rene slid out the compartment of lunch-packages, dumped them on the floor.' "'All unopened,' he was saying disgustedly. Then he picked up a heavy square object with square corners, open on three sides. "'What the hell is this?' "'A book,' I informed him. Rene opened it. "'Hey! A real antique book! Must be worth at least a thousand. Look at the size of that print! You can read it with the naked eye, like an instrument panel. Well, here's a little piece of your fortune.' He tossed it to me and went on examining the lunch-packages. He didn't trust me to help him because I wouldn't be able to tell if they'd been opened and something inserted. I hung the book by the covers and let the pages flip open. Nothing fell out. I sighed. I'd have to go through the whole damn thing.' "'I'm going back to your ship and read in comfort,' I told Rene. "'You're no help here, anyway,' he said, putting the lunch-packages in a large plastic bag he'd found somewhere. No use letting these go to waste.' I didn't tell him. I had the clue to Uncle Isidor's fortune in my hand. He didn't know Uncle Isidor, so he wouldn't have believed me. Nothing is more uncomfortable than reading an antique book. There's no way to lie back and flash it on a screen or run the tape over your reading-glasses while you lie prone and relax. You have to hold it. If you try to hold it lying down, your arms get tired. If you put it down on a table to read, your neck gets tired from bending over, and the pages keep flipping and making you lose your place. Still, I read it all the way through. It wasn't too bad, not like Edgar Guest, of course, who was the only ancient author I'd liked in general studies, but I found there was a sort of Grinch hop beat to it that reminded me of the footlooses I used to go to in middle school. I grinned. It was funny to think of now. I found no clues in the book. The only thing to do was read it again more carefully. I noticed there was one poem with a real Grinch hop beat. I thought suddenly of Sally, my regular partner at the footlooses. She was very blond, and she affected a green crest wave in her hair, pulled over her forehead with a diamond clip. She was a beauty all right, but she was a little silly, and she had that tendency to overdress. No, I sighed. She wouldn't have done for us studs and neck class, man. But I couldn't help wondering where she was now and what she was like now. Did she remember me and did she think about me when she heard that song we used to dance to because it was about a girl named Sally? Once I knew a girl named Sally. Met her at a footloose rally. I began humming the old Grinch hop tune to the ancient poem in Uncle Algy's book. It was fantastic how closely it fitted, though of course the words in the poem were plain silly. But imagine finding a poem with a perfect Grinch hop beat before anybody even knew what a Grinch was. Before Venus was even discovered. Jump on both feet, hop three times on left foot, jump, hop three times on right foot. The rhythm was correct, right down to the breakaway and four-step at the end of each run. It was while I was singing this poem to a Grinch hop tune that I noticed the clue. The poem was named The Dodo, and the rhyming was very smooth until I came to the lines. Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, though I said art like a raven, ghastly grim and ancient dodo, wandering from the nightly shore. Tell me what thy lordly name is on the night's plutonian shore. Quote the dodo, Isidore. Now the author had gone to a lot of trouble in the previous verse not to break the Grinch hop rhyme scheme. He made there at is, rhyme with lattice, and that is. Why did he follow shaven and raven with dodo? Furthermore it had not struck me the first time I read the poem quickly that there was anything odd about a bird being named Isidore. People who keep pet grilches frequently name them after famous reed players, and Isidore is a common name. On the other hand it was my uncle's name, and the word dodo didn't rhyme as it should. I got out a magnifying glass to examine the ancient print. Sure enough it had been tampered with. The print looked so odd to me anyway I hadn't noticed the part that had been changed. But it was obvious under the glass that dodo had been substituted for a word of almost equal length. The same with Isidore. I went over the whole poem now carefully to see which words had been changed. There weren't many. White, in a couple of places, dodo and Isidore wherever they occurred. An O in the line, perfume from an unseen censor. S in the line, wretch I cried, Isidore hath sent thee. Sitting back I thought about what I had read. It made no sense at all. Was I to look for a white bird, grim, ungainly, ghastly? And what if I found him? Why was he like a raven? What was this perfume from an unseen censor? I could picture the ghost of Uncle Isidore, knowing his financial imagination as the unseen censor, because he always criticized me. Was I to look for perfume? Did he have a fortune in perfume stowed somewhere? It seemed to me it would take an awful lot of even the most expensive perfume to comprise a fortune. I decided to start with the bird. I went outside Rene's ship and looked around. No birds. Rene, I called. He was still looking through Uncle Izzy's ship. Have you seen an ungainly white bird around? What! he snapped, sticking an indignant face out of the door. I guess you haven't. Can your woodsy lore tell if there are birds on this planet? Obviously, Rene said. I don't know why you can't find your own spore. I noticed the droppings immediately. Where are the birds? How the hell would I know? But he couldn't contain his special knowledge. They're probably night birds, he said. Oh, yes. It checked. Wandering from the night's plutonian shore. He looked at me suspiciously. You ever had a nervous breakdown? I have not. I test ten to nine on job adjustment and ten to eight on life adjustment. Some people crack on alien planets, he said. I have a padded room in my ship. You'd be surprised how often I have to use it. I told him about the poem I found in Uncle Izzy's book. We look for a white bird, I said, or perfume. You're nuts! he pointed out with some justice because he had no Uncle Isidor. How do you know these changes weren't made by somebody else a long time ago? Maybe this ancient printer printed it wrong and had to change it afterward. I don't think they were that primitive back then. But I didn't know what back then meant or how primitive ancient printing was. All I knew for sure was that as the poem stood, it sounded as if somebody had loused up a perfect grilled-chop rhyme. And Uncle Izzy knew I was a grilled-chop expert in middle school, and this was the only real grilled-chop rhythm in the book. What's more, Uncle Izzy could depend on me to go over that book in painstaking detail because a studs and neck-class man has to be good on details. All right, I said, you look your way and I'll look my way. We're not looking any more anyway today, Rene said, emerging from Uncle Izidor's ship loaded down with removings. It'll be night and below freezing in half an hour. What do you think, I asked, a dodo would like to eat? A what? The birds. I want to put something out to attract them. Crackers or something? I think you're crazy. If you have any idea of sitting outside to wait for them, you'll freeze to death. Not only that, there's no moon. You wouldn't be able to see your hand in front of your face. How do the birds see? Maybe they aren't night-birds. Maybe they migrated somewhere else. And if I use a light, I might scare them away, I mused. Well, maybe I'm not supposed to wait outside anyway. Rene went in and switched on the heat and lights. Leave the outside port open, I said. Why? So the birds can knock. Can what? It's possible, I said, defensively. It won't hurt anything to leave it open. All right, he consented, curving his mouth around unpleasantly, just to show what a jackass you are. Rene had the heat turned low for sleeping and the lights off, as soon as we had eaten and fed the converter. I hydrated a package of crackers so that they were full-sized, but not soggy, broke them into pieces, and tossed them out. I admit, I felt a little embarrassed. I sat there in the chill quiet on this ugly, alien world, reading the dodo by the light of a miniature flash so as not to disturb Rene. Pretty soon I began to feel creepy. The dodo is a ghastly poem. There's an insidious morbidity about it. It had sounded merely funny the first time I read it. Now, the more I read it, the more I began to hear strange, impossible creakings and sighs which might or might not be due to temperature changes. The night outside was a deep, cold cup of darkness where no human thing moved. There was a knock at the door. I dropped the book and flashlight. Rene was up like a cat. He didn't turn on the light. Oh, there! he shouted. There was a scratching noise at the door. Then a voice croaked. My name is Isidore Summers. I reached a trembling hand for the door. Wait, you fool! Rene cried. He picked up the flash and got his gun. Stand behind me and keep your hands off your gun. I know when to shoot and when not to shoot. You don't. If it's Uncle Isidore, I tell you, you've got to leave it up to me if you want to get off this planet alive. Now, stand back and keep your mouth shut, no matter what happens. He kicked the door open and stood back and to one side of it. Come in with your arms up. There was a sort of rustling sound and Rene walked a huge, white, wingless bird. My name, the dodo repeated, somewhat plaintively this time, with a glance toward the lunch compartment, is Isidore Summers. I couldn't help it. I rolled all over the ship with laughter. Rene looked a little shame-faced, tossed his gun onto the rack, and punched the lighting on. Obviously, the dodo recognized our lunch compartment from familiarity with Uncle Izzy's ship. Then he'd looked at the alcohol tap that led from the fuel conversion. Now, petty, he begged. I hesitated. Isn't there something, I asked Rene, about corrupting the natives of a primitive planet? But Rene was sitting on his bunk, his jaw slack. This is the first time I've ever been made a fool of by an alcoholic bird. If it's just a bird, of course, like a parrot... I addressed the bird. Sir, I began, and caught myself. Or, perhaps, madam, can you say anything else? Nappanthi! the bird said, firmly. I shrugged and drew a cup. The dodo lifted the cup and drained it in one smooth gesture. This, as it turned out, was the only thing it seemed to do smoothly. It began a wild attempt to scratch its head with one claw and remain upright. Then, abandoning all dignity, it rolled to its side and scratched furiously to satisfaction. After that, it began what looked like a hopeless attempt to write its awkward body, legs struggling in the air and back bumping around the ship. I couldn't help remembering Uncle Izzy after a meal, slim and suave, lighting up a tapered, perfectly packed figurine and blowing out one round shapely smoke ring that hovered before his light sardonic grin like a comment on his thoughts. An uncomfortable comparison I shook myself to life. I righted the bird, no small problem, for he weighed almost two hundred pounds. Well, Rene finally said, coming out of his mood, now that you have this bird, what are you going to do with it? I had thought it might lead us to Uncle Izzy's fortune, I explained. The bird obviously had no such intention. It was getting ready to take a nap. A night bird, I told it approvingly, shouldn't take a nap in the middle of the night. All you're approving is that he has no self-respect, Rene pointed out. Why don't you look to see if he's got a note tagged to his leg or something? I did. He didn't. I think this whole thing is crazy, Rene said, but since he's a talking bird, you might ask him a few questions. Maybe he's trained to say something else. Where is Uncle Izzy's fortune? I asked, when I had tugged at the Dodo's feathers until he opened one eye. He closed it. Do you have a message for me? He drew away from me irritably and closed the eye again, ruffling down into his feathers. He may be keyed to respond to certain phrases. Try your uncle's name. He obviously knows that. Rene suggested coldly, wanting no part of this, but unable to hold down the suggestion. My name, I screamed at the somnolent Dodo, is Isidor Summers. He reared back and pecked a hell out of me. I picked the book up off the floor and flipped through the bent pages until I found the Dodo. Maybe there'd be something in that. Listen to this, Rene, I said, and see if you catch anything I might have missed. Rene looked discomforted, but he didn't stop up his ears. When I came to the part, tell me what thy lordly name is, on the knight's plutonian shore, the Dodo looked up and said, Isidor. Clearly this was it, although I couldn't recall that any of the questions in the poem were to the point. I got to, on the morrow he will leave me as my hopes have flown before, and then the bird said, Ask me more, said the Dodo, without missing a beat. I read on, getting excited. Quaff, oh quaff, this kind of penthe, and forget this lost Lenore. Quoth the Dodo, Give me more, he supplied, pointing his beak at the alcohol tap. I gave him another cup and continued, sure that he must be going to say something relevant to Uncle Izzy's fortune. Is there, is there balm in Gilead? Tell me, tell me, I implore. Quoth the Dodo. Probably not, the Dodo said, breaking the grill-chop rhythm at last. But there are perfume trees on Alvarla. Perfume trees, Rene shouted. That bird's lying, it's impossible. Shut up, I yelled at him, the poem's not over. I read on, somewhat ashamed of having to say such inhospitable words to a Dodo who had been, after all, cooperating with me. Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door. Quoth the Dodo. I was just leaving, the bird said, and struggled to his feet and went and stood by the door expectantly. I got up. Wait, I commanded the bird, who couldn't do much else because the door was closed. Do you know what perfume trees are, Rene? Yeah, I know what they are, and they don't grow on this planet. You can take my word for it. They need a warm moist soil to germinate in. They need to have their soil cultivated every day for a year. They die fast on contact with any sort of industrial fumes. They die in captivity, like some wild animals. They die if you sweat on them. They die if you breathe on them. They need to start off warm and get colder every month until they form their flowers. Then they need a frost for the pods to fill with the perfume, along with the seeds. There aren't any industrial fumes here, I pointed out, and they could get plenty of frost. That's all they'd get. Where's the warm moist climate to germinate in? Where's the parasitical runes to cultivate their soil? The urns couldn't exist without their glies, and the glies can't exist without? Never mind. The only place perfume trees can grow is on Odoria, and that's why the perfume is worth two thousand dollars an ounce. I have never heard of anything, I informed him, that spelled Uncle Isidor so exactly. He always said, if it can't be done, I can do it. Well, there's only one way to find out. Surely there's something on the ship I can wear. You mean you're going out into that frozen ink pot after that idiotic bird? That's exactly what I mean. For Pete's sake, you're as brainless as the bird is! But I think, for all his attitude, he was curious, too. He began to spray me with something. Close your eyes and mouth. If you don't wash this off with soap and water in twenty-four hours, you'll die, but it sure keeps in the body heat. I stuck the book in my pocket for good luck, and Renee handed me a gun, some lunch-packages, an antibiotic kit, and a water purification kit. All right, I said, pocketing them, but it can't be far. Uncle Isi wouldn't have gone more than a day's journey. Then why haven't we smelled the perfume? And why would he have gone through all this rigamarole when he must have known you'd searched that far? I didn't know why. I pushed the door open, the bird hopped out, and I realized how easy it would be to lose him from the small round glow of my flash. He looked curiously at me, as though expecting something further. I looked curiously at him, wondering where he would lead to. Then he was off. There was no question of following him. That big, awkward bird ran so fast that in a few minutes we could no longer hear the beat of his huge claws on the rocks, even in the perfectly still dry air. How fast do you figure he's going, I asked René? How the hell would I know? Roughly. Roughly? Maybe fifty miles an hour? But that's incredible. The big point tails on the Aldebaran coppock and do 80 with a native on their backs. Ah, I said. So that's it. Maybe tomorrow night. But we could hear the drumming of the returning Dodo. Don't be stupid, René said. He can't carry both of us, and you'd be a fool either to go alone or stay here alone. As a tribute to my deceased uncle, I'm going to be a fool. I stuck my flashlight into one of my many pockets and climbed onto the huge bird's back. The down beneath his outer feathers was as soft and strong as heavy fur. I dug in with my hands and feet, my head braced against the thickened part of his neck. He started off with a lurch that brought my stomach out of hiding. I kept my eyes squeezed closed. I couldn't have seen anything anyway, not even the impossible creature that was rushing through the darkness carrying me, for all I knew, straight to damnation. The night rushed past my ears into a wild keening, and it crossed my mind to wonder what Mr. Picks, my supervisor, would say if he saw me now. I had a sudden vision of Mr. Picks, even more neatly dressed than I always was, with middle-cost neck clasp and stud discreetly shining from a plain square-edged bag shirt and done suit. I pictured him opening a refined little box and holding it two feet under the customer's eyes with a gesture of faint, unconscious application. A comfortable, warm, happy picture, in which my place, one counter behind Mr. Picks, was reassuringly assured. Then, out of nowhere, into the picture galloped a yellow-skinned monster, astride a huge white bird. It turned out to be me, and I tumbled off the bird, crying, Mr. Picks, I don't know what came over me. But I was answered only by a multitude of squawks, rustles, and scratchings. The bird was home. I could almost see vague forms. The darkness was beginning to give a little. I was warm, itchy, and uncomfortable under whatever it was that Rene had sprayed on me. Warm? Perfume trees? All I could smell were bird roosts. I stood up, finding my limbs weak, trembling and painful. First I glanced at my watch. Five hours' tarentime since we left the ship. At fifty miles per hour, we'd have gone two hundred and fifty miles. If we'd gone dune north, as the bird started out, we must be in the snow zone. And I was warm. I switched my flash around. All I could see were birds. There seemed to be hundreds of them. I couldn't tell which one was my bearer. Where is the perfume? I bawled. All I got was squawks. Some of the birds were, in fact, standing on one foot and tucking their heads away. It was growing lighter. The birds were going to bed. Feverishly I pulled out Uncle Izzy's old volume of poetry. Brushing from my mind a vision of Mr. Picks in a state of shock and another picture of Uncle Isidor snickering triumphantly, I stood on that desert land, enchanted, on that home by horror haunted and solemnly read, The Dodo to a Colony of Wingless Birds. My Dodo identified himself at the proper place, but I kept on, waiting for something to show me my inheritance. Then me thought the air grew denser, I read. Perfume from an unseen censor. A bird croaked from the back row. Where, I cried, pushing my way through the birds crowding around me in various stages of roost and curiosity. Then, I repeated, the air grew denser. Perfume, the bird now in front of me said, from an unseen censor. He began to scratch at the ground assiduously under one of the four dim shapes about the level of my eyes. Then he yawned gapingly, gave up, and went to sleep. I sat down to wait, because it was almost dawn and the last Dodo had tucked his head into his feathers. Daylight showed me four little trees, nothing like the usual scraggly vegetation of Alvarla. They must be perfume trees, I thought, but they were too young to have blossoms or pods. I didn't go too near them, remembering what Rene had said. And remembering that, I began to figure out how they grew here. This place was a little valley. No, a crater, several feet deeper than my height, with sloping sides. The birds apparently kept it warm with their body heat, plus the heat of the rocky sides would store. Since it was a crater, the winds wouldn't reach it. The crater made a basin to catch the snow, which I could see beginning to melt at the edges and ooze down the slope. The birds provided more than ample fertilizer, and Uncle Izzy had apparently trained at least one of them to cultivate the soil under the trees. I climbed out of the crater to see that I was indeed in the regions of snow. To the north were huge drifts, and far off loomed towering glaciers. To the south the hills tapered off from white to spotted brown. That was the reason for Uncle Izzy's crazy setup. Rene and I would never have come across this crater in an ordinary search. Of course, the setup neaten have been quite so crazy. That was the personal equation of which Uncle Izzy was so fond. The trees would, I assumed, poke their heads up over the crater as they grew, reaching toward the cold, and finally getting the frostbite to fill their pods properly. At two thousand dollars an ounce. I had neglected to ask Rene how many pods a tree could be expected to produce or how big the pods were, but say half an ounce in each pod and a conservative fifty pods in each tree. A hundred thousand dollars. I slid back into the crater, sat leaning against a somnolent dodo and ate a lunch package with a cup full of melted snow. All sorts of thoughts were jostling my brain. But I was bone weary. I hadn't slept since we hit Alvarla and the ride last night had been a tremendous strain because I wasn't in the habit of getting any exercise at all. Therefore I fell asleep in mid-thought. It was the noon sun that woke me. I wasn't just warm. I was hot. And I was very reluctant to let go of my dream. I kept grabbing at the tag ends of it with both hands. It was the most exciting dream I'd had since the one about succeeding Mr. Picks. Only very different. I'd made a fortune cultivating perfume trees. My dream was full of perfume. Some of it came from the exotic plants of my African estate. Some of it was from a long legged, pink-haired girl, the kind African millionaires have. It was the sort of dream I mused, unable to keep it in mood any longer, as large-minded men have. Men like Uncle Isidor. I sat up suddenly. Uncle Isidor, large-minded? Why hadn't he had the avuncular decency to leave me his fortune the usual way? Why? Because then he wouldn't be able to play penny anti- psychology and get me dreaming about wild schemes with perfume trees and African estates. That's why. Or maybe there wasn't any fortune. Suddenly I understood why people smoke. It gives them something to do when they feel helpless. If there wasn't any fortune, then I was hopelessly tied to the perfume trees. If Uncle Izzy had lost his last scent, it would be very like him to borrow enough from friends to finance a perfume tree scheme. And if he didn't make it to the planet he had in mind, why, he'd make the planet he crashed on do. Anyone else would have shot the birds for fresh meat. Anyone else would have seen immediately that Alvarla was the last planted in the galaxy where perfume trees would grow. Anyone else would have seen immediately that I was one of the minor, comfortable people in the world who likes the happy regularities of a little job and an assured, if limited, future. Anyone else would have seen I had the sort of personality that could not be changed. But Uncle Izzy wasn't anyone else. Why did I keep smelling the perfume from my dream? I followed my nose out of the crater and found the snow melting around a water tank about four feet long and two feet in diameter, part of the ruined fuel system from Uncle Izzy's ship. I dislodged it from the ice beneath and shook it. The perfume was so strong as it unfroze that it made me dizzy, and all that smell was coming from a pinhole. There seemed to be half a gallon in it, enough to pay off Mother's Bonds and whatever I owed Rene with a handsome sum left over for me. I could go home and forget about perfume trees and Alvarla and Uncle Izidor. But that dream of the African estate kept irritating the back of my mind, and the large, free sky of Alvarla was soothing to the eye when compared to the little squares of blue I noted occasionally when writing the slide walks of Brooklyn. What did I want out of life, anyway? Damn, Uncle Izidor, I'd never test ten to nine on job adjustment again. I was still thinking when evening swept in fast, as it does in dry climates, and the birds began to wake up and climb out of the crater, presumably to forage for food. Wait! I cried. Izidor! I drew out a lunch package and spread it to attract him. It attracted all of them. I pulled out the dodo. Tell me what thy lordly name is on the night's plutonian shore. Izidor, he volunteered swallowing fast while I climbed aboard him. Take me back. Then I realized I had made a mistake with the food. Go! I cried. Spaceship! More food! He just stood there, his beak poking around the ground for crumbs. But I had to get that skin spray washed off before twenty-four hours were up. Nepenthe! I shouted desperately. The dodo was off like a flash and didn't stop till we were back at the ship. You are gone quite a while, Renee said nonchalantly. Find anything? Enough to pay you off, I said. And we'll make it five thousand because I found it. Stow this somewhere. It's perfume. He did. Find anything else? Nothing that would interest you. I'll be ready to blast off as soon as I've had a shower. Renee shrugged. The perfume, when we returned to Earth, proved to be worth what he'd said it would be. A lot of people wanted to know where I'd gotten it. The crops on Odoria, they said, are entirely sewed up by Odoria, Inc. They certainly are, I always replied, agreeably. It took all I cleared from the perfume to put a down payment on a ship and hire an expert on fertilizing perfume flowers. But this time I wanted to run the show. Mr. Pick shook his head sadly when I told him to replace me permanently. You have a great future ahead of you in studs and neck clasps, he said. Why not take a little time and reconsider your decision? Or... Nevermore, I answered. Not until five years later did I find out what happened to the rest of good old Uncle Aujarnan's fortune. I was stretched out on a gently undulating force field in my interior patio, a huge scarlet fan flower tree sifting in the sunshine. Leda, her pink hair flowing down to her knees, was just emerging from the pool of grilled milk. She bent to an Aphrodite of Canido's position. Perfect, I said, and threw away my figurine. Depart, I told the robot, who came rolling in. But, Master, it's the Chan of Betelgeuse, Lord of the Seven Planets and the Four Hundred Moons. Get dressed, Leda, I said regretfully. We have company. I'd never met him, but I knew he was one of Uncle Isidor's best friends, and I felt obliged to see him. The Chan had several meals and four cigarettes, maintaining a courteous silence all the while. Then he loosened his belt, reached into his furry pouch, and handed me a piece of copper scroll. It was a check for five million dollars. You won, he told me, or lost, as the case may be. I just looked at him. I was holding it in trust for you, the Chan explained, in accordance with your Uncle Isidor's last wishes. I blew a perfect smoke ring, let it float before my face for a perfect moment, and then asked, and suppose I had lost, or won, as the case may be. I was to save it to try on your son, the gods permitting you have one. If necessary, I told him, I'll try it on him myself, O Chan of the Seven Planets and the Four Hundred Moons. Call me, Charlie, he said. The End Of From An Unseen Sensor by Rosal George Brown In Case of Fire by Randall Garrett This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Nick Number In Case of Fire by Randall Garrett In his office apartment on the top floor of the Terran Embassy building in Ossac City, Bertrand Malloy leafed casually through the dossiers of the four new men who had been assigned to him. They were typical of the kind of men who were sent to him, he thought, which meant, as usual, that they were atypical. Every man in the diplomatic corps who developed a twitch or a quirk would ship to Sarkad IV to work under Bertrand Malloy, permanent Terran ambassador to his utter munificence, the Ossac of Sarkad. Take this first one, for instance. Malloy ran his finger down the columns of complex symbolism that showed the complete psychological analysis of the man. Psychopathic paranoia. The man wasn't technically insane. He could be as lucid as the next man most of the time, but he was morbidly suspicious that every man's hand was turned against him. He trusted no one and was perpetually on his guard against imaginary plots and persecutions. Number two suffered from some sort of emotional block that left him continually on the horns of one dilemma or another. He was psychologically incapable of making a decision if he were faced with two or more possible alternatives of any major importance. Number three. Malloy sighed and pushed the dossiers away from him. No two men were alike, and yet there sometimes seemed to be an eternal sameness about all men. He considered himself an individual, for instance, but wasn't the basic similarity there, after all? He was how old? He glanced at the Earth calendar dial that was automatically correlated with this Sarkadic calendar just above it. Fifty-nine this week. Fifty-nine years old. And what did he have to show for it besides flabby muscles, sagging skin, a wrinkled face and gray hair? Well, he had an excellent record in the core, if nothing else. One of the top men in his field, and he had his memories of Diane, dead these ten years, but still beautiful and alive in his recollections. And, he grinned softly to himself, he had Sarkad. He glanced up at the ceiling and mentally allowed his gaze to penetrate it to the blue sky beyond it. Out there was the terrible emptiness of interstellar space, a great yawning, infinite chasm capable of swallowing men, ships, planets, suns, and whole galaxies without filling its insatiable void. Maloy closed his eyes. Somewhere out there a war was raging. He didn't even like to think of that, but it was necessary to keep it in mind. Somewhere out there the ships of Earth were ranged against the ships of the alien Karna in the most important war that mankind had yet fought. And, Maloy knew, his own position was not unimportant in that war. He was not in the battle line, nor even in the major production line, but it was necessary to keep the drug supply lines flowing from Sarkad, and that meant keeping on good terms with the Sarkatic government. The Sarkada themselves were humanoid in physical form, if one allowed the term to cover a wide range of differences, but their minds just didn't function along the same lines. For nine years Bertrand Maloy had been ambassador to Sarkad, and for nine years no Sarkada had ever seen him. To have shown himself to one of them would have meant instant loss of prestige. To their way of thinking, an important official was aloof. The greater his importance, the greater must be his isolation. The Osec of Sarkad himself was never seen except by a handful of picked nobles, who themselves were never seen except by their underlings. It was a long, roundabout way of doing business, but it was the only way Sarkad would do any business at all. To violate the rigid social setup of Sarkad would mean the instant closing off of the supply of biochemical products at the Sarkatic laboratories produced from native plants and animals, products that were vitally necessary to Earth's war, and which could be duplicated nowhere else in the known universe. It was Bertrand Maloy's job to keep the production output high and to keep the material flowing towards Earth and her allies and outposts. The job would have been a snap cinch in the right circumstances. The Sarkada weren't difficult to get along with. A staff of top-grade men could have handled them without half trying. But Maloy didn't have top-grade men. They couldn't be spared from work that required their total capacity. It's inefficient to waste a man on a job that he can do without half trying, where there are more important jobs that will tax his full output. So Maloy was stuck with the culls. Not the worst ones, of course. There were places in the galaxy that were less important than Sarkad to the war effort. Maloy knew that, no matter what was wrong with a man, as long as he had the mental ability to dress himself and get himself to work, useful work could be found for him. Physical handicaps weren't at all difficult to deal with. A blind man can work very well in the total darkness of an infrared film dark room. Partial or total losses of limbs can be compensated for in one way or another. The mental disabilities were harder to deal with, but not totally impossible. On a world without liquor, a dipsomaniac could be channeled easily enough, and he'd better not try fermenting his own on Sarkad unless he brought his own yeast, which was impossible in view of the sterilization regulations. But Maloy didn't like to stop at merely thwarting mental quirks. He liked to find places where they were useful. The phone chimed. Maloy flipped it on with a practiced hand. Maloy here. Mr. Maloy? said a careful voice. A special communication for you has been teletyped in from Earth. Shall I bring it in? Bring it in, Mr. Rason. Mr. Rason was a case in point. She was uncommunicative. She liked to gather in information, but she found it difficult to give it up once it was in her possession. Maloy had made her his private secretary. Nothing, but nothing, got out of Maloy's office without his direct order. It had taken Maloy a long time to get it into Mr. Rason's head that it was perfectly all right, even desirable, for her to keep secrets from everyone except Maloy. She came in through the door, a rather handsome woman in her middle thirties, clutching a sheaf of papers in her right hand as though someone might at any instant snatch it from her before she could turn it over to Maloy. She laid them carefully on the desk. If anything else comes in I'll let you know immediately, sir, she said. Will there be anything else? Maloy let her stand there while he picked up the communique. She wanted to know what his reaction was going to be. It didn't matter because no one would ever find out from her what he had done unless she was ordered to tell someone. He read the first paragraph and his eyes widened involuntarily. Armistice, he said in a low whisper, there's a chance that the war may be over. Yes, sir, said Mr. Rason in a hushed voice. Maloy read the whole thing through, fighting to keep his emotions in check. Mr. Rason stood there calmly, her face amassed, her emotions were a secret. Finally Maloy looked up. I'll let you know as soon as I reach a decision, Mr. Rason. I think I hardly need to say that no news of this is to leave this office. Of course not, sir. Maloy watched her go out the door without actually seeing her. The war was over, at least for a while. He looked down at the papers again. The Karna, slowly being beaten back on every front, were suing for peace. They wanted an armistice conference, immediately. Earth was willing. Interstellar war is too costly to allow it to continue any longer than necessary, and this one had been going on for more than thirteen years now. Peace was necessary, but not peace at any price. The trouble was that the Karna had a reputation for losing wars and winning at the peace table. They were clever, persuasive talkers. They could twist a disadvantage to an advantage and make their own strengths look like weaknesses. If they won the armistice, they'd be able to retrench and rearm, and the war would break out again within a few years. Now, at this point in time, they could be beaten. They could be forced to allow supervision of the production potential, forced to disarm, rendered impotent, but if the armistice went to their own advantage. Already they had taken the offensive in the matter of the peace talks. They had sent a full delegation to Sarkad 5, the next planet out from the Sarkad Sun, a chilly world inhabited only by low intelligence animals. The Karna considered this to be fully neutral territory, and Earth couldn't argue the point very well. In addition, they demanded that the conference begin in three days terrestrial time. The trouble was that interstellar communication beams travel a devil of a lot faster than ships. It would take more than a week for the Earth government to get a vessel to Sarkad 5. Earth had been caught unprepared for an armistice. They objected. The Karna pointed out that the Sarkad Sun was just as far from Karn as it was from Earth, that it was only a few million miles from a planet which was allied with Earth, and that it was unfair for Earth to take so much time in preparing for an armistice. Why hadn't Earth been prepared? Did they intend to fight to the utter destruction of Karn? It wouldn't have been a problem at all if Earth and Karn had fostered the only two intelligent races in the galaxy. The sort of grandstanding the Karna were putting on had to be played to an audience. But there were other intelligent races throughout the galaxy, most of whom had remained as neutral as possible during the Earth Karn War. They had no intention of sticking their figurative noses into a battle between the two most powerful races in the galaxy. But whoever won the armistice would find that some of the now-neutral races would come in on their side if war broke out again. If the Karna played their cards right, their side would be strong enough next time to win. So Earth had to get a delegation to meet with the Karna representatives within the three-day limit or lose what might be a vital point in the negotiations. And that was where Bertrand Malloy came in. He had been appointed Minister and plenipotentiary extraordinary to the Earth Karn Peace Conference. He looked up at the ceiling again. What can I do? he said softly. On the second day after the arrival of the communique, Malloy made his decision. He flipped on his intercom and said, Miss Dresden, get hold of James Norden and Kylan Braenich. I want to see them both immediately. Send Norden in first and tell Braenich to wait. Yes, sir. And keep the recorder on. You can file the tape later. Yes, sir. Malloy knew the woman would listen in on the intercom anyway, and it was better to give her permission to do so. James Norden was tall, broad shouldered, and thirty-eight. His hair was graying at the temples, and his handsome face looked cool and efficient. Malloy waved him to a seat. Norden, I have a job for you. It's probably one of the most important jobs you'll ever have in your life. It can mean big things for you, promotion and prestige if you do it well. Norden nodded slowly. Yes, sir. Malloy explained the problem of the Karna peace talks. We need a man who can outthink them, Malloy finished, and judging from your record I think you're that man. It involves risk, of course. If you make the wrong decisions your name will be mud back on earth, but I don't think there's much chance of that, really. Do you want to handle small-time operations all your life? Of course not. You'll be leaving within an hour for Sarkad V. Norden nodded again. Yes, sir. Certainly. Am I to go alone? No, said Malloy. I'm sending an assistant with you, a man named Kylan Braenick. Ever heard of him? Norden shook his head. Not that I recall, Mr. Malloy. Should I have? Not necessarily. He's a pretty shrewd operator, though. He knows a lot about interstellar law, and he's capable of spotting a trap a mile away. You'll be in charge, of course, but I want you to pay special attention to his advice. I will, sir, Norden said, gratefully. A man like that can be useful. Right. Now you go into the anti-room over there. I've prepared a summary of the situation, and you'll have to study it and get it into your head before the ship leaves. That isn't much time, but it's the Karna who are doing the pushing, not us. As soon as Norden had left, Malloy said softly, Send in Braenick, Mr. Aisin. Kylan Braenick was a smallish man with mouse-brown hair that lay flat against his skull and hard penetrating dark eyes that were shadowed by heavy protruding brows. Malloy asked him to sit down. Again Malloy went through the explanation of the peace conference. Naturally they'll be trying to trick you every step of the way, Malloy went on. They're shrewd and underhanded. We'll simply have to be more shrewd and more underhanded. Norden's job is to sit quietly and evaluate the data. Yours will be to find the loopholes they're laying out for themselves and plug them. Don't antagonize them, but don't baby them either. If you see anything underhanded going on, let Norden know immediately. They won't get anything by me, Mr. Malloy. By the time the ship from Earth got there, the peace conference had been going on for four days. Bertrand Malloy had full reports on the whole parley as relayed to him through the ship that had taken Norden and Braenick to Sarkhod 5. Secretary of State Blendwell stopped off at Sarkhod 4 before going on to 5 to take charge of the conference. He was a tallish lean man with a few strands of gray hair on the top of his otherwise bald scalp and he wore a hearty professional smile that didn't quite make it to his calculating eyes. He took Malloy's hand and shook it warmly. How are you, Mr. Ambassador? Fine, Mr. Secretary. How's everything on Earth? Tense. They're waiting to see what is going to happen on 5. So am I for that matter. His eyes were curious. You decided not to go yourself, eh? I thought it better not to. I sent a good team instead. Would you like to see the reports? I certainly would. Malloy handed them to the secretary and as he read Malloy watched him. Blendwell was a political appointee, a good man Malloy had to admit, but he didn't know all the ins and outs of the diplomatic corps. When Blendwell looked up from the reports at last he said, Amazing! They've held off the Karna at every point. They've beaten them back. They've managed to cope with and outdo the finest team of negotiators that Karna could send. I thought they would, said Malloy, trying to appear modest. The secretary's eyes narrowed. I've heard of the work you've been doing here with, uh, sick men. Is this one of your, uh, successes? Malloy nodded. I think so. The Karna put us in a dilemma, so I threw a dilemma right back at them. How do you mean? Norton had a mental block against making decisions. If he took a girl out on a date he'd have trouble making up his mind whether to kiss her or not until she made up his mind for him, one way or the other. He's that kind of guy, until he's presented with one, single, clear decision which admits of no alternatives he can't move at all. As you can see the Karna tried to give us several choices on each point, and they were all rigged. Until they backed down to a single point and proved that it wasn't rigged, Norton couldn't possibly make up his mind. I drummed into him how important this was, and the more importance there is attached to his decisions, the more incapable he becomes of making them. The secretary nodded slowly. What about Braynick? Paranoid, said Malloy. He thinks everyone is plotting against him. In this case that's all to the good because the Karna are plotting against him. No matter what they put forth, Braynick is convinced that there's a trap in it somewhere, and he digs to find out what the trap is. Even if there isn't a trap, the Karna can't satisfy Braynick because he's convinced that there has to be somewhere. As a result, all his advice to Norton and all his questioning on the wildest possibilities just serves to keep Norton from getting unconfused. These two men are honestly doing their best to win at the peace conference, and they've got the Karna reeling. The Karna can see that we're not trying to stall, our men are actually working at trying to reach a decision, but what the Karna don't see is that those men, as a team, are unbeatable because, in this situation, they're psychologically incapable of losing. Again the Secretary of State nodded his approval, but there was still a question in his mind. Since you know all that, couldn't you have handled it yourself? Maybe, but I doubt it. They might have gotten around me some way by sneaking up on a blind spot. Norton and Braynick have blind spots, but they're covered with armor. No, I'm glad I couldn't go. It's better this way. The Secretary of State raised an eyebrow. Couldn't go, Mr. Ambassador? Malloy looked at him. Didn't you know? I've wondered why you appointed me in the first place. No, I couldn't go. The reason why I'm here cooped up in this office, hiding from the Sarkata the way a good Sarkatic big shot should, is because I like it that way. I suffer from agoraphobia and xenophobia. I have to be drugged to be put on a spaceship because I can't take all that empty space, even if I'm protected from it by a steel shell. A look of revulsion came over his face. And I can't stand aliens. End of In Case of Fire by Randall Garrett Recording by Nick Number