Kelly turned brick-red. "You're not supposed to say that, you know."

"I didn't know," Jusa said. "But I'm willing to learn. What should I have—"

"Excuse me," Beliakoff broke in sourly. "Your Majesty, we've come to ask you to stop the war."

"You don't mean it!" Jusa turned bewilderedly to Kelly.

"Have to do it, honey," Kelly said softly. "You folks just aren't ready for a war yet."

Jusa's eyes flashed and she began to regain a little of her imperial pose. "But of course we are! Look at what we've done. Go over our battlefields, look at our cities, interrogate our refugees. You'll find that everything has been done in strict accordance with the rules. We're as ready for war as anyone!"

"I'm sorry, you'll have to stop it," Beliakoff said, and Kelly nodded his agreement.

Jusa gave Nob a beseeching look, but the Prime Minister averted his eyes. The dilemma was there again, enormous, insurmountable, and squarely on Jusa's shoulders. To stop the war now would be Unearthlike; to refuse the Earthmen was unthinkable.

"I just don't know," Jusa said. She looked at Kelly, who wore the guilty expression of a man caught murdering a fawn. Then she burst into tears and collapsed on a couch.

Nob and the Earthmen looked at each other, made several helpless gestures, and left.

"What now?" Beliakoff asked, in the corridor. "Do you think she'll stop the war?"

Nob shrugged his shoulders. "Who knows? It's a problem without a solution."

"But she has to make up her mind," Kelly said. "That's one of the duties of authority."

"The Empress is aware of that. And she will make up her mind, though it could take a year or more. Unless she fails completely under the strain."

"Poor kid," Kelly said. "She needs a man to help her out."

"Indeed she does," Nob agreed hastily. "A strong man, a wise man, a man who could guide her and be as adviser and husband to her."

Kelly blinked, then laughed nervously. "Don't look at me! I mean she's a cute kid, 

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