can count on me for complete co-operation. Now I'll study all this in bed if one of you overweight gentlemen will show me to a room with a strong lock on the inside of the door. Don't call me, I'll call you when I want breakfast."

Brion wasn't sure how much of her barbed speech was humor and how much serious, so he said nothing. He showed her to an empty cabin—she did lock the door—then looked for Ihjel. The Winner was in the galley adding to his girth with an immense gelatin dessert that filled a good-sized tureen.

"Is she short for a native Terran?" Brion asked. "The top of her head is below my chin."

"That's the norm. Earth is a reservoir of tired genes. Weak backs, vermiform appendixes, bad eyes. If they didn't have the universities and the trained people we need, I would never use them."

"Why did you lie to her about the Foundation?"

"Because it's a secret—isn't that reason enough?" Ihjel rumbled angrily, scraping the last dregs from the bowl. "Better eat something. Build up the strength. The Foundation has to maintain its undercover status if it is going to accomplish anything. If she returns to Earth after [Pg 35]this, it's better that she should know nothing of our real work. If she joins up, there'll be time enough to tell her. But I doubt if she will like the way we operate. Particularly since I plan to drop some H-bombs on Dis myself—if we can't turn off the war."

[Pg 35]

"I don't believe it!"

"You heard me correctly. Don't bulge your eyes and look moronic. As a last resort I'll drop the bombs myself, rather than let the Nyjorders do it. That might save them."

"Save them—they'd all be radiated and dead!" Brion's voice was raised in anger.

"Not the Disans. I want to save the Nyjorders. Stop clenching your fists and sit down and have some of this cake. It's delicious. The Nyjorders are all that counts here. They have a planet blessed by the laws of chance. When Dis was cut off from outside contact the survivors turned into a gang of swamp-crawling homicidals. It did the opposite for Nyjord. You can survive there just by pulling fruit off a tree."

"The population was small, educated, intelligent. Instead of sinking into an eternal siesta they matured into a vitally different 

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