And as Samms walked toward the group a craneman dropped a couple of tons of steel plate, from a height of eight or ten feet, upon the floor directly behind him.
“I just about jumped right out of my armor,” is the way Samms himself described his reactions; and that description is perhaps as good as any.
At any rate, he went briefly out of control, and the Rigellian sent him a steadying, inquiring, wondering thought. He could no more understand the Tellurian’s sensitivity than Samms could understand the fact that to these people, even the concept of physical intrusion was absolutely incomprehensible. These builders were not workmen, in the Tellurian sense. They were Rigellians, each working his few hours per week for the common good. They would be no more in contact with the meeting than would their fellows on the other side of the planet.
Samms closed his eyes to the riot of clashing colors, deafened himself by main strength to the appalling clangor of sound, forced himself to concentrate every fiber of his mind upon his errand.
“Please synchronize with my mind, as many of you as possible,” he thought at the group as a whole, and went en rapport with mind after mind after mind. And mind after mind after mind lacked something. Some were stronger than others, had more initiative and drive and urge, but none would quite do. Until—
“Thank God!” In the wave of exultant relief, of fulfillment, Samms no longer saw the colors or heard the din. “You, sir, are of Lensman grade. I perceive that you are Dronvire.”
“Yes, Virgil Samms, I am Dronvire; and at long last I know what it is that I have been seeking all my life. But how of these, my other friends? Are not some of them … ?”
“I do not know, nor is it necessary that I find out. You will select …” Samms paused, amazed. The other Rigellians were still in the room, but mentally, he and Dronvire were completely alone.
“They anticipated your thought, and, knowing that it was to be more or less personal, they left us until one of us invites them to return.”
“I like that, and appreciate it. You will go to Arisia. You will receive your Lens. You will return here. You will select and send to Arisia as many or as few of your fellows as you choose. These things I require you, by the Lens of Arisia, to do. Afterward—please note that this is in no sense obligatory—I would like very much to have you visit Earth and accept appointment to the Galactic Council. Will you?”
“I will.” Dronvire needed no time to consider his decision.
The meeting was dismissed. The same entity who had been Samms’ chauffeur on the inbound trip drove him back to the Chicago, driving as “slowly” and as “carefully” as before. Nor, this time, did the punishment take such toll, even though Samms knew that each terrific lunge and lurch was adding one more bruise to the already much-too-large collection discoloring almost every square foot of his tough hide. He had succeeded, and the thrill of success had its usual analgesic effect.
The Chicago’s captain met him in the airlock and helped him remove his suit.
“Are you sure you’re all right, Samms?” Winfield was no longer the formal captain, but a friend. “Even though you didn’t call, we were beginning to wonder … you look as though you’d been to a Valerian clambake, and I sure as hell don’t like the way you’re favoring those ribs and that left leg. I’ll tell the boys you got back in A-prime shape, but I’ll have the doctors look you over, just to make sure.”
Winfield made the announcement, and through his Lens Samms could plainly feel the wave of relief and pleasure that spread throughout the great ship with the news. It surprised him immensely. Who was he, that all these boys should care so much whether he lived or died?
“I’m perfectly all right,” Samms protested. “There’s nothing at all the matter with me that twenty hours of sleep won’t fix as good as new.”
“Maybe; but you’ll go to the sickbay first, just the same,” Winfield insisted. “And I suppose you want me to blast back to Tellus?”
“Right. And fast. The Ambassadors’ Ball is next Tuesday evening, you know, and that’s one function I can’t stay away from, even with a Class A Double Prime excuse.”
VI
The Ambassadors’ Ball, one of the most ultra-ultra functions of the year, was well under way. It was not that everyone who was anyone was there; but everyone who was there was, in one way or another, very emphatically someone. Thus, there were affairs at which there were more young and beautiful women, and more young and handsome men; but none exhibiting newer or more expensive gowns, more ribbons and decorations, more or costlier or more refined jewelry, or a larger acreage of powdered and perfumed epidermis.
And even so, the younger set was well enough represented. Since pioneering appeals more to youth than to age, the men representing the colonies were young; and their wives, together with the daughters and the second (or third or fourth, or occasionally the fifth) wives of the human personages practically balanced the account.
Nor was the throng entirely human. The time had not yet come, of course, when warm-blooded, oxygen-breathing monstrosities from hundreds of other solar systems would vie in numbers with the humanity present. There were, however, a few Martians on the floor, wearing their light “robes du convention” and dancing with meticulously mathematical precision. A few Venerians, who did not dance, sat in state or waddled importantly about. Many worlds of the Solarian System, and not a few other systems, were represented.
One couple stood out, even against that opulent and magnificent background. Eyes followed them wherever they went.
The girl was tall, trim, supple; built like a symphony. Her Callistan vexto-silk gown,
