On the other side of the door, Homir, too, was living in a sea of gelatin. He was fighting, with furious intensity, to keep from stuttering and, of course, could scarcely speak two consecutive words clearly as a result.
Lord Stettin was in full uniform, six-feet-six, large-jawed, and hard-mouthed. His balled, arrogant fists kept a powerful time to his sentences.
“Well, you have had two weeks, and you come to me with tales of nothing. Come, sir, tell me the worst. Is my navy to be cut to ribbons? Am I to fight the ghosts of the Second Foundation as well as the men of the First?”
“I .?.?. I repeat, my lord, I am no p .?.?. pre .?.?. predictor. I .?.?. I am at a complete .?.?. loss.”
“Or do you wish to go back to warn your countrymen? To deep Space with your play-acting. I want the truth or I’ll have it out of you along with half your guts.”
“I’m t .?.?. telling only the truth, and I’ll have you re .?.?. remember, my l .?.?. lord, that I am a citizen of the Foundation. Y .?.?. you cannot touch me without harvesting m .?.?. m .?.?. more than you count on.”
The Lord of Kalgan laughed uproariously. “A threat to frighten children. A horror with which to beat back an idiot. Come, Mr. Munn, I have been patient with you. I have listened to you for twenty minutes while you detailed wearisome nonsense to me which must have cost you sleepless nights to compose. It was wasted effort. I know you are here not merely to rake through the Mule’s dead ashes and to warm over the cinders you find—you come here for more than you have admitted. Is that not true?”
Homir Munn could no more have quenched the burning horror that grew in his eyes than, at that moment, he could have breathed. Lord Stettin saw that, and clapped the Foundation man upon his shoulder so that he and the chair he sat on reeled under the impact.
“Good. Now let us be frank. You are investigating the Seldon Plan. You know that it no longer holds. You know, perhaps, that
Munn said thickly, “What is it y .?.?. you w .?.?. want?”
“Your presence. I would not wish the Plan spoiled through overconfidence. You understand more of these things than I do; you can detect small flaws that I might miss. Come, you will be rewarded in the end; you will have your fair glut of the loot. What can you expect at the Foundation? To turn the tide of a perhaps inevitable defeat? To lengthen the war? Or is it merely a patriotic desire to die for your country?”
“I .?.?. I—” He finally spluttered into silence. Not a word would come.
“You will stay,” said the Lord of Kalgan, confidently. “You have no choice. Wait”—an almost forgotten afterthought—“I have information to the effect that your niece is of the family of Bayta Darell.”
Homir uttered a startled: “Yes.” He could not trust himself at this point to be capable of weaving anything but cold truth.
“It is a family of note on the Foundation?”
Homir nodded, “To whom they would certainly b .?.?. brook no harm.”
“Harm! Don’t be a fool, man; I am meditating the reverse. How old is she?”
“Fourteen.”
“So! Well, not even the Second Foundation, or Hari Seldon, himself, could stop time from passing or girls from becoming women.”
With that, he turned on his heel and strode to a draped door which he threw open violently.
He thundered, “What in Space have you dragged your shivering carcass here for?”
The Lady Callia blinked at him, and said in a small voice, “I didn’t know anyone was with you.”
“Well, there is. I’ll speak to you later of this, but now I want to see your back, and quickly.”
Her footsteps were a fading scurry in the corridor.
Stettin returned, “She is a remnant of an interlude that has lasted too long. It will end soon. Fourteen, you say?”
Homir stared at him with a brand-new horror!
Arcadia started at the noiseless opening of a door—jumping at the jangling sliver of movement it made in the corner of her eye. The finger that crooked frantically at her met no response for long moments, and then, as if in response to the cautions enforced by the very sight of that white, trembling figure, she tiptoed her way across the floor.
Their footsteps were a taut whisper in the corridor. It was the Lady Callia, of course, who held her hand so tightly that it hurt, and for some reason, she did not mind following her. Of the Lady Callia, at least, she was not afraid.
Now, why was that?
They were in a boudoir now, all pink fluff and spun sugar. Lady Callia stood with her back against the door.
She said, “This was our private way to me .?.?. to my room, you know, from his office. His, you know.” And she pointed with a thumb, as though even the thought of him were grinding her soul to death with fear.
“It’s so lucky .?.?. it’s so lucky—” Her pupils had blackened out the blue with their size.
“Can you tell me—” began Arcadia timidly.
And Callia was in frantic motion. “No, child, no. There is no time. Take off your clothes. Please. Please. I’ll get you more, and they won’t recognize you.”
She was in the closet, throwing useless bits of flummery in reckless heaps upon the ground, looking madly for something a girl could wear without becoming a living invitation to dalliance.
“Here, this will do. It will have to. Do you have money? Here, take it all—and this.” She was stripping her ears and fingers. “Just go home—go home to your Foundation.”
“But Homir .?.?. my uncle.” She protested vainly through the muffling folds of the sweet-smelling and luxurious spun-metal being forced over her head.
“He won’t leave. Poochie will hold him forever, but you mustn’t stay. Oh, dear, don’t you understand?”
“No.” Arcadia forced a standstill, “I
Lady Callia squeezed her hands tightly together. “You must go back to warn your people there will be war. Isn’t that clear?” Absolute terror seemed paradoxically to have lent a lucidity to her thoughts and words that was entirely out of character. “Now come!”
Out another way! Past officials who stared after them, but saw no reason to stop one whom only the Lord of Kalgan could stop with impunity. Guards clicked heels and presented arms when they went through doors.
Arcadia breathed only on occasion through the years the trip seemed to take—yet from the first crooking of the white finger to the time she stood at the outer gate, with people and noise and traffic in the distance, was only twenty-five minutes.
She looked back, with a sudden frightened pity. “I .?.?. I .?.?. don’t know why you’re doing this, my lady, but thanks—What’s going to happen to Uncle Homir?”
“I don’t know,” wailed the other. “Can’t you leave? Go straight to the spaceport. Don’t wait. He may be looking for you this very minute.”
And still Arcadia lingered. She would be leaving Homir; and, belatedly, now that she felt the free air about her, she was suspicious. “But what do you care if he does?”
Lady Callia bit her lower lip and muttered, “I can’t explain to a little girl like you. It would be improper. Well, you’ll be growing up and I .?.?. I met Poochie when I was sixteen. I can’t have you about, you know.” There was a half-ashamed hostility in her eyes.
The implications froze Arcadia. She whispered: “What will he do to you when he finds out?”
And she whimpered back: “I don’t know,” and threw her arm to her head as she left at a half-run, back along the wide way to the mansion of the Lord of Kalgan.
But for one eternal second, Arcadia
A vast, inhuman amusement.
It was much to see in such a quick flicker of a pair of eyes, but Arcadia had no doubt of what she saw.
