Second Foundation

“I’ll have to take you back, you know,” said Homir, and there was a sudden wild glee within him at the thought. By Space, this wasn’t his fault.

“You can’t,” said Arcadia, calmly, “it would attract attention.”

“What?”

“You know. The whole purpose of your going to Kalgan was because it was natural for you to go and ask for permission to look into the Mule’s records. And you’ve got to be so natural that you’re to attract no attention at all. If you go back with a girl stowaway, it might even get into the tele-news reports.”

“Where did you g .?.?. get those notions about Kalgan? These .?.?. uh .?.?. childish—” He was far too flippant for conviction, of course, even to one who knew less than did Arcadia.

“I heard,” she couldn’t avoid pride completely, “with a sound-recorder. I know all about it—so you’ve got to let me come along.”

“What about your father?” He played a quick trump. “For all he knows, you’re kidnapped .?.?. dead.”

“I left a note,” she said, overtrumping, “and he probably knows he mustn’t make a fuss, or anything. You’ll probably get a spacegram from him.”

To Munn the only explanation was sorcery, because the receiving signal sounded wildly two seconds after she finished.

She said: “That’s my father, I bet,” and it was.

The message wasn’t long and it was addressed to Arcadia. It said: “Thank you for your lovely present, which I’m sure you put to good use. Have a good time.”

“You see,” she said, “that’s instructions.”

Homir grew used to her. After a while, he was glad she was there. Eventually, he wondered how he would have made it without her. She prattled! She was excited! Most of all, she was completely unconcerned. She knew the Second Foundation was the enemy, yet it didn’t bother her. She knew that on Kalgan, he was to deal with a hostile officialdom, but she could hardly wait.

Maybe it came of being fourteen.

At any rate, the week-long trip now meant conversation rather than introspection. To be sure, it wasn’t a very enlightening conversation, since it concerned, almost entirely, the girl’s notions on the subject of how best to treat the Lord of Kalgan. Amusing and nonsensical, and yet delivered with weighty deliberation.

Homir found himself actually capable of smiling as he listened and wondered out of just which gem of historical fiction she got her twisted notion of the great universe.

It was the evening before the last jump. Kalgan was a bright star in the scarcely-twinkling emptiness of the outer reaches of the Galaxy. The ship’s telescope made it a sparkling blob of barely-perceptible diameter.

Arcadia sat cross-legged in the good chair. She was wearing a pair of slacks and a none-too-roomy shirt that belonged to Homir. Her own more feminine wardrobe had been washed and ironed for the landing.

She said, “I’m going to write historical novels, you know.” She was quite happy about the trip. Uncle Homir didn’t in the least mind listening to her and it made conversation so much more pleasant when you could talk to a really intelligent person who was serious about what you said.

She continued: “I’ve read books and books about all the great men of Foundation history. You know, like Seldon, Hardin, Mallow, Devers, and all the rest. I’ve even read most of what you’ve written about the Mule, except that it isn’t much fun to read those parts where the Foundation loses. Wouldn’t you rather read a history where they skipped the silly, tragic parts?”

“Yes, I would,” Munn assured her, gravely. “But it wouldn’t be a fair history, would it, Arkady? You’d never get academic respect, unless you give the whole story.”

“Oh, poof. Who cares about academic respect?” She found him delightful. He hadn’t missed calling her Arkady for days. “My novels are going to be interesting and are going to sell and be famous. What’s the use of writing books unless you sell them and become well-known? I don’t want just some old professors to know me. It’s got to be everybody.”

Her eyes darkened with pleasure at the thought and she wriggled into a more comfortable position. “In fact, as soon as I can get father to let me, I’m going to visit Trantor, so’s I can get background material on the First Empire, you know. I was born on Trantor; did you know that?”

He did, but he said, “You were?” and put just the right amount of amazement into his voice. He was rewarded with something between a beam and a simper.

“Uh-huh. My grandmother .?.?. you know, Bayta Darell, you’ve heard of her .?.?. was on Trantor once with my grandfather. In fact, that’s where they stopped the Mule, when all the Galaxy was at his feet; and my father and mother went there also when they were first married. I was born there. I even lived there till mother died, only I was just three then, and I don’t remember much about it. Were you ever on Trantor, Uncle Homir?”

“No, can’t say I was.” He leaned back against the cold bulkhead and listened idly. Kalgan was very close, and he felt his uneasiness flooding back.

“Isn’t it just the most romantic world? My father says that under Stannel V, it had more people than any ten worlds nowadays. He says it was just one big world of metals—one big city—that was the capital of all the Galaxy. He’s shown me pictures that he took on Trantor. It’s all in ruins now, but it’s still stupendous. I’d just love to see it again. In fact .?.?. Homir!”

“Yes?”

“Why don’t we go there, when we’re finished with Kalgan?”

Some of the fright hurtled back into his face. “What? Now don’t start on that. This is business, not pleasure. Remember that.”

“But it is business,” she squeaked. “There might be incredible amounts of information on Trantor. Don’t you think so?”

“No, I don’t.” He scrambled to his feet. “Now untangle yourself from the computer. We’ve got to make the last jump, and then you turn in.” One good thing about landing, anyway; he was about fed up with trying to sleep on an overcoat on the metal floor.

The calculations were not difficult. The “Space Route Handbook” was quite explicit on the Foundation-Kalgan route. There was the momentary twitch of the timeless passage through hyperspace and the final light-year dropped away.

The sun of Kalgan was a sun now—large, bright, and yellow-white; invisible behind the portholes that had automatically closed on the sunlit side.

Kalgan was only a night’s sleep away.

12 LORD

Of all the worlds of the Galaxy, Kalgan undoubtedly had the most unique history. That of the planet Terminus, for instance, was that of an almost uninterrupted rise. That of Trantor, once capital of the Galaxy, was that of an almost uninterrupted fall. But Kalgan—

Kalgan first gained fame as the pleasure world of the Galaxy two centuries before the birth of Hari Seldon. It was a pleasure world in the sense that it made an industry—and an immensely profitable one, at that—out of amusement.

And it was a stable industry. It was the most stable industry in the Galaxy. When all the Galaxy perished as a civilization, little by little, scarcely a feather’s weight of catastrophe fell upon Kalgan. No matter how the economy and sociology of the neighboring sectors of the Galaxy changed, there was always an elite; and it is always the characteristic of an elite that it possesses leisure as the great reward of its elite- hood.

Kalgan was at the service, therefore, successively—and successfully—of the effete and perfumed dandies of