Don't worry, Mason telepathed. I'll be there with bells on.

There were occasional buildings now, he saw; the main bulk of Mordarga City lay up ahead, sprawling in a disorderly, confused fashion. The Mordargans, for all their neat precision of mind, cared little about the arrangement of their cities.

Mason saw some of the Mordargans now—husky brutes seven feet tall, square-shouldered and thick-muscled. They were gray-skinned with blazing white eyes and savage fangs; they diverged most sharply from the humanoid pattern in the pair of thick, stubby antenna sprouting from their heavy-browed foreheads.

Those antenna governed the extra Mordargan sense—the sense of balance, of perspective, of distance-judgment. It made them deadly in a hand-to-hand fight.

A couple of the Mordargans looked at him suspiciously but without overt antagonism. Earth and Mordarga were still theoretically at peace and Earthmen on Mordarga were, if not common, at least not totally unknown.

Mason kept his eyes to the ground and walked quickly past the Mordargans. They were a surly, unpredictable race; he didn't want any trouble with them now.

He tried a message to Klon Darra.

Hey, Venusian! How's it going?

The telepath is due to arrive in one hour, Rick. Where are you now?

On the outskirts, just coming into the city. I'll be there to spring you in plenty of time.

The main palace was visible ahead, about a mile further into the city. Mason quickened his pace. There was time but not much.

He stepped between a pair of drunken Mordargans who were jostling each other on the narrow street. Suddenly one of them turned and said, "Hey, there's an Earthman. Come on, Terran. Have a drink with us?"

They were wobbling unsteadily. Mason caught his breath. He had little enough time to get to Klon Darra as it was. He calculated the speed at which they could move and wondered if he could outrun them.

"Sorry," he snapped. "I'm 

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