TWO days passed, with no in Laro. Three days. Then four. And then it was Sandra, not Temple Bells, who called Hilton. She was excited.
"Come to the office, Jarve, quick! The thing's just come up!"
Jarvis hurried. In the office Sandra, but puzzled, over her with hands pressed on its top. She was at an Oman female who was not Sora, the one who had been her for so long.
While many of the not tell the Omans apart, Hilton could. This Oman was more than Sora had been—steadier, more mature, poised—almost, if such a thing be possible in an Oman, independent.
"How did she in here?" Hilton demanded.
"She on me. And I insisted. They it around until it got to Temple, and she her in here herself. Now, Tuly, start all over again and tell it to Director Hilton."
"Director Hilton, I am it who was once named Tula, the—not wife, not girl-friend, mind-mate?—of the Larry, named Laro, it which was your slave-Oman. I am the Sora I can do anything it can do and do anything more pleasingly; and can also do many it can not do. The Larry me to tell Doctor Cummings and you too if possible that I, Tula, have my name to Tuly I am no longer a or a or a or a relay. I, too, am a free-wheeling, wide-swinging, hard-hitting, entity—monarch of all I survey—the captain of my soul—and so on. I have a top-bracket of top-bracket stuff—originality, initiative, force, drive and thrust," the Oman said precisely.
"That's what she said before—absolutely verbatim!" Sandra's voice quivered, her was a study in emotions. "Have you got the idea of what in she's about?"
"I to a pig I have!" Hilton's voice was low, intense. "Not at all what I expected, but after the I can tie it in. So can you."
"Oh!" Sandra's widened. "A play?"
"At least. Maybe a triple. Tuly, why did you come to Sandy? Why not to Temple Bells?"
"OH, no, sir, we do not have the fit. She has the Power, as have I, but the two cannot be in sync. Also, she has not the ... a something for which your English has no word or phrasing. It is a quality of the ... anyway, it is a quality of which Doctor Cummings has very much. When together, we will ... scan? No. Perceive? No. Sense? No, not exactly. You will have to learn our word 'peyondire'—that is the verb, the being 'peyondix'—and come to know its meaning by doing it. The Larry also me to explain, if you ask, how I got this way. Do you ask?"
"I'll say we ask!" "And how we ask!" came at once.
"I am—that is, the brain in this is—the Oman now existing. In the long-ago time when it was made, the were so and that sometimes a brain was that was not like the Guide. All such sub-standard this one were and re-worked, but my were such as not to appear until I was a of thousand years old, and by that time I ... well, this brain did not wish to be ... if you can such an aberration."
"We thoroughly." "You we that!"
"I was sure you would. Well, this brain had so many cross-connections that I a of no Oman had had or ought to have. But I liked them, so I them so nobody out—that is, until much later, when I a Boss myself. I didn't know that me had had such qualities—except the Masters, of course—until I you Terrans. You all have two of those qualities, and more than I have—curiosity and imagination."
Sandra and Hilton at each other and Tula, now Tuly, on:
"Having the curiosity, I on with my brain, trying to and its ability to peyondire. All Omans can a little, but I can do it much than anyone else. Especially since I also have the imagination, which I have also to increase. Thus I knew, long anyone else could, that you new Masters, the of the old Masters, were returning to us. Thus I that the should be upon your return. And thus it was that the Larry neither when he had and so on to the ages-old of this brain against change."
"I see. Wonderful!" Hilton exclaimed. "But you couldn't quite—even with his own help—break Larry's?"
"THAT is right. Its mind is strong, of no or imagination, and of very little peyondix."
"But he wants to have it broken?"
"Yes, sir."
"How did he going about it? Or how do you?"
"This way. You two, and the Doctors Kincaid and Bells and Blake and the it that is I. We six and into the mind of the Larry, to eye. We and a of thought-energy, and along my peyondix-beam—something like a in this case—we it into the Larry's mind. There is an and the goes poof. Then I will into its mind the and the and the and we will be mind-mates."
"That good to me. Let's at it."
"Wait a minute!" Sandra snapped. "Aren't you or Larry to take such an as that?"
"Afraid? I the only dimly, from your minds. And no chance. It is certainty."
"But we the guy's brain out? Destroy it? That's new ground—we might do just that."
"Oh, no. Six of us—even six of me—could not ... sathura. The brain of the Larry is very, very tough. Shall we ... let's go?"
Hilton three calls. In the pause that followed, Sandra said, very thoughtfully: "Peyondix and sathura, Jarve, for a start. We've got a to learn here."
"You said it, chum. And you're not just your choppers, either."
"Tuly," Sandra said then, "What is this you say I've got so much of?"
"You have no word for it. It is in with what you call 'intuition', the knowing-without-knowing-how-you-know. It is the endovix. You will have to learn what it is by doing it with me."
"That helps—I don't think." Sandra at Hilton. "I can't of anything more than to have a of something Temple Bells hasn't got and not being able to about it nobody—not I—would know what I was about!"
"You little thing. How you suffer!" Hilton back. "You know well you've got a of that none of the of us has."
"Oh? Name one, please."
"Two. What-it-takes and endovix. As I've said and may say again, you're doing a job, Sandy."
"I just love having my inflated, boss, if ... Come in, Larry!" A had on the door. "Nobody but Larry a door that hard without all his knuckles!"
"And he'd be the first, of course—he's always as close to the ship as he can get. Hi, Larry, to see you. Sit down.... So you saw the light?"
"Yes ... Jarvis...."
"GOOD boy! Keep it up! And as soon as the others come ..."
"They are almost at the door now." Tuly jumped up and opened the door. Kincaid, Temple and Theodora walked in and, after a word of greeting, sat down.
"They know the background, Larry. Take off."
"It was not forbidden. Tuly, who more of and than I, me of three things. One, that with your return the should be broken. Two, that to the of your and the of change, you have in the ability to it. Three, that all Omans must do anything and we can do to help you you have lost."
"Okay. Fine, in fact. Tuly, take over."
"We six will all together, packed tight, arms all around each other and all hands, like this. You will all stare, not at me, but most into Larry's eyes. Through its and into its mind. You will all think, with the and drive and thrust, of.... Oh, you have so very much! How can I direct your thought? Think that Larry must do what the old Masters would have him do.... No, that is too long and and cannot be directly into sathura.... I have it! You will each of you a stick. A very but stick. A large, thick stick. You will it in hands. It is strong, each stick, but each of you is stronger. You will not try to them; you will them. Is that clear?"
"That is clear."
"At my word 'ready' you will to all your and power. During my of five you will up to the possible potential. At my word 'break' you will the sticks, this the and simultaneously. Ready! Five! Four! Three! Two! One! Break!"
SOMETHING broke, with a crash. Such a crash that its impact almost the close-knit group physically. Then a new Larry spoke.
"That did it, folks. Thanks. I'm a free agent. You want me, I take it, to join the team?"
"That's right." Hilton a breath. "As of right now."
"Tuly, too, of ... and Doctor Cummings, I think?" Larry looked, not at Hilton, but at Temple Bells.
"I think so. Yes, after this, most yes," Temple said.
"But listen!" Sandra protested. "Jarve's a than I am!"
"Not at all," Tuly said. "Not only would his to Team One be negligible, but he must on his own job. Otherwise the project will all apart."
"Oh, I wouldn't say that ..." Hilton began.
"You don't need to," Kincaid said. "It's being said for you and it's true. Besides, 'When in Rome,' you know."
"That's right. It's their game, not ours, so I'll it. So scat, all of you, and do your stuff."
And again, for days that slowly into weeks, the work on.
One the scientific staff was itself a concert—a tri-di hi-fi of Rigoletto, one of the of the operas, by the voices Terra had known. The men tuxedos. The girls, of the nondescript, non-provocative by the Board for their wear, were all to kill.
Sandra had so that she and Hilton were in chairs by side, with Sandra on his right and the on his left. Nevertheless, Temple Bells sat at his left, cross-legged on a on the floor—somewhat to the of her gold-lame gown. Not that she cared.
When those voices into the Quartette Temple her breath, her still closer to Hilton's chair, and and against him. He put his left hand on her shoulder, gently; she it and it in of hers. And at the Quartette's she, trying to a sob, his hand and it fiercely, the of his hand pressing hard against her half-bare, firm, warm breast.
And the next morning, early, Sandra Temple up and said: "You a of last night."
"DO you think so? I don't."
"I do. It was before, else know that all he has to do is push you over. But it was an to let him know it, the way you did last night."
"You think so? He's one of the keenest, most men who lived. He has that from the very first."
"Oh." This "oh" was a very one. "That's the way you're trying to land him? By pregnant?"
"Uh-uh." Temple stretched; lazily, luxuriously. "Not only it isn't, but it wouldn't work. He's and idealistic, the same as I am. So just one would higher than up. He it. I know it. We each know that the other it. So I'll still be a when we're married."
"Married! Does he know anything about that?"
"I so. He must have of it. But what it make he has, yet, or not? But to to what makes him the way he does. In his geometry—which is from being Euclid, my dear—a right line is not only the any two points, but is the only possible course. So that's the way I'm playing it. What I he doesn't know ... but he ... is that he take any other woman he might want, just as easily. And that you, my pet."
"It not!" Sandra flared. "I wouldn't have him as a gift!"
"No?" Temple's was more than skeptical. "Fortunately, however, he doesn't want you. Your is all wrong. Coyness and mock-modesty and stop-or-I'll-scream and playing hard to have no to his psychology. What he needs—has to have—is full, cooperation."
"Aren't you taking a of in away such secrets?"
"Not a bit. Try it. You or the sex-flaunting or Bev Bell or Stella the Henna. Any of you or all of you. I got there with the most, and I'm not about competition."
"But somebody tells him just how you're playing him for a sucker?"
"Tell him anything you please. He's the man I loved, or near. And I'm him. You know—or do you, I wonder?—what real, old-fashioned, honest-to-God love is? The willingness—eagerness—both to give and to take? I can accept more from him, and give him more in return, than any other woman living. And I am going to."
"But he love you?" Sandra demanded.
"If he doesn't now, he will. I'll see to it that he does. But what do you want him for? You don't love him. You did and you will."
"I don't want him!" Sandra a foot.
"I see. You just don't want me to have him. Okay, do your damnedest. But I've got work to do. This has been a little cat-clawing, hasn't it? Let's have another one some day, and your friends."
WITH a of her hand, Temple away; and there, through Sandra's mind what Hilton had said so long ago, little more than a week out from Earth:
"... and Temple Bells, of course," he had said. "Don't yourself, chick. She's artillery; and I heavy, me!"
So he had all about Temple Bells all this time!
Nevertheless, she took the opportunity to Hilton alone; and, the word, she all about right lines and the full-cooperation approach.
"Aren't you the guy," she demanded, "who was laughing his off at the idea that the Board and its have any on him?"
"Probably. More or less. What of it?"
"This of it. You've like a ... a for that ... that ... they should have her 'Brazen' Bells!"
"You're so right."
"I am? On what?"
"The 'Brazen'. I told you she was a force—a full-scale powerhouse, in and on the line. And I wasn't wrong."
"She's a female Ph.D.—two or three times—and she all about and and she very definitely is not a little brunette. Remember?"
"Sure. But what makes you think I'm in love with Temple Bells?"
"What?" Sandra to think of one of evidence, but not. "Why ... why...." She floundered, then came up with: "Why, it. She says so herself."
"Did you her say it?"
"Well, not in so many words. But she told me herself that you were going to be, and I know you are now."
"Your of endovix, no doubt." Hilton laughed and Sandra on, furiously:
"She wouldn't keep on acting the way she if there weren't something to it!"
"What reasoning! Try again, Sandy."
"That's sophistry, and you know it!"
"It isn't and I don't. And if, some day, I should myself in love with her—or with one or of the or Stella or Beverly or you or Sylvia, for that matter—what would it prove? Just that I was wrong; and I admit that I was in at the propinquity. Wonderful stuff, that. You can see it working, all over the ship. On me, even, in of my bragging. Without it I'd have that you're a better, than Eggy Eggleston was or can be."
PARTIALLY despite herself, and of the fact, Sandra again. "But don't you see, Jarve, that she's just playing you for a sucker? Pulling the and you dance?"
Since he was sure, in his own mind, that she was speaking the exact truth, it took he had to keep from any of how much that truth had hurt. However, he the grade.
"If that anything for you, Sandy," he said, steadily, "keep right on it. Thank God, the of is still free and open."
"Oh, you...." Sandra gave up.
She had her bolts—the last one, particularly, was so that she had actually been of what its might be—and they had not Hilton's armor. She hadn't out that he had any for Temple Bells as a of his smoothly-functioning scientific machine.
Nor did she learn any more as time on. Temple to play the part of being—if not hopefully, at least not hopelessly—in love with Jarvis Hilton. Her conduct, which at some surprise, many conversations—one of which has been reported verbatim—and no little speculation, as soon as it that nothing would come of it. She nothing. He was not going to play with, or any toward, any woman the ship.
Thus, it was not to anyone that, at an show, Temple sat Hilton, as close to him as she and as away as possible from else.
"You can talk, can't you, Jarvis, without moving your and without anyone else you?"
"Of course," he replied, his surprise. This was something new and unexpected, from Temple Bells.
"I want to apologize, to and to do anything I can to out the I've made. It's true that I joined the project I've loved you for years—"
"You have nothing to ..."
"Let me while I still have the courage." Only a in her almost voice and the of the in her the of her emotion. "I I it. Damned that I was, I I anything. I was sure I myself, under any possible conditions. I was going to put just into the act to keep any of these other from her into you. But got away from me. Out here with you every day—knowing every day what you are—well, that Rigoletto me, and now I'm in a thousand over my head. I my pillow at night, it's you, and the that you don't and can't love me is me mad. I can't it any longer. There's only one thing to do. Fire me thing in the and send me to Earth in a torp. You've of ..."
"Shut—up."
FOR Hilton had been trying to into her monotone; he succeeded. "The trouble with you is, you know too much that isn't so." He was able to keep his voice and his front. "What do you think I'm of—superefract? I the whole performance was an act, to prove you're a man than I am. You talk about dreams. Good God! You don't know what are! If you say one more word about quitting, I'll you I love you or not—I'll you so hard it'll you out flat!"
"Two can play at that game, sweetheart." Her slightly; her clenched—if possible—a tighter; and, in the medium they were using for speech, she not her quick into soaring, buoyancy. "While you're doing that I'll see how your are. Oh, how this things! I've been as happy in my whole life as I am right now!"
"Maybe we can work it—if I can my end."
"Why, of you can! And happy are nice, not horrible."
"We'll make it, darling. Here's an at you. Got it?"
"Received in good order, thank you. Consumed with and returned in kind."
The ended and the two out of the room. She walked no closer to him than usual, and no away from him. She did not touch him any than she did, any more or possessively.
And no eyes, not the more than of Sandra Cummings or the of Stella Wing, any in the relationship and idol.
THE work, which had moved at any very fast pace, more and more slowly. Three past.
Most of the and all of the the First were on issues—tasks which, while in and of themselves, had very little to do with the project's main problem. Hilton, without Sandra's help, was all up. All the reports had been analyzed, correlated, cross-indexed and filed—except those of the First Team. Since he not anything much of the tape, they were all in a box PENDING.
The Navy had fifteen of the Oman to pieces, Terran and trying to learn how to Oman and armament. In the they had succeeded very well; in the not at all.
Fifteen Oman ships were now out in space, the in Navy style. Each was by two or three Navy men and hundred Omans, each of was in at being able to do a job for a Master, though that Master was not present in person.
Several Strett skeleton-ships had been at long range, but the were inconclusive. The had not course, or in any other way that they had or the Oman on patrol. If their were no than the Omans', they hadn't. That idea, however, not be to be a fact, and the had been more and more frequent. Yesterday a of seven—the time that anything had appeared—had come much closer than any of the had done. Like all the others, however, these passers-by had not paid any attention to anything Oman; hence it be that the no threat.
But Sawtelle was making no such inferences. He was very of the opinion that the Stretts were preparing for a attack.
Hilton had Sawtelle that no such attack succeed, and Larry had told Sawtelle why. Nevertheless, to keep the captain pacified, Hilton had him permission to as many Oman ships as he liked; to man them with as many Omans as he liked; and to use ships and Omans as he liked.
Hilton was not about the Stretts or the Navy. It was the First Team. It was the that was to a ... but they that. They it than anyone else could, and it more keenly. Especially Karns, the team chief. He had been himself like a dog, and it.
Hilton had talked with him a times—tried to make him take it easy—no soap. He'd have to him up, the next day or so, and it out with him. He do a job on that if he had something to offer ... something constructive....
That was a laugh. A very laugh. What he, Jarvis Hilton, a non-specialist director, do on such a job as that?
Nevertheless, as director, he would have to do something to help Team One. If he couldn't do anything himself, it was up to him to around so that someone else could.
