reluctantly.

“Then you ought to be taking it all down on a piece of folded paper. I want everybody to know. The whole world. It’s important. Terribly important. It explains everything. My life won’t be safe unless I can pass along the information and make people believe it.”

“Why won’t your life be safe?”

“Because of the Martians, you fool. They own the world.”

The brown man sighed. “Then they own my newspaper, too,” he objected, “so I can’t print anything they don’t like.”

“I never thought of that,” Lyman said, considering the bottom of his glass, where two ice-cubes had fused into a cold, immutable union. “They’re not omnipotent, though. I’m sure they’re vulnerable, or why have they always kept under cover? They’re afraid of being found out. If the world had convincing evidence—look, people always believe what they read in the newspapers. Couldn’t you—”

“Ha,” said the brown man with deep significance.

Lyman drummed sadly on the bar and murmured, “There must be some way. Perhaps if I had another drink....”

The brown suited man tasted his collins, which seemed to stimulate him. “Just what is all this about Martians?” he asked Lyman. “Suppose you start at the beginning and tell me again. Or can’t you remember?”

“Of course I can remember. I’ve got practically total recall. It’s something new. Very new. I never could do it before. I can even remember my last conversation with the Martians.” Lyman favored the brown man with a glance of triumph.

“When was that?”

“This morning.”

“I can even remember conversations I had last week,” the brown man said mildly. “So what?”

“You don’t understand. They make us forget, you see. They tell us what to do and we forget about the conversation—it’s post-hypnotic suggestion, I expect—but we follow their orders just the same. There’s the compulsion, though we think we’re making our own decisions. Oh, they own the world, all right, but nobody knows it except me.”

“And how did you find out?”

“Well, I got my brain scrambled, in a way. I’ve been fooling around with supersonic detergents, trying to work out something marketable, you 

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