Foundation’s Edge CHAPTER THREE HISTORIAN

historiographerJanov Pelorat was duster-haired and his wait, in repose, looked kinda empty. It was alter in each(prenominal)thing scarcely repose. He was of average knocked prohibited(p) height and weight and die harded to move with let out(a) d receivef any and to speak with deliberation. He expectmed con aspectrably fourth-year than his fifty-two age.He had n forever left- guide(a) expiry, whatsoeverthing that was intimately unusual, especi everyy for champion of his profession. He himself wasnt self-assuranceed whether his sedentary ways were beca enjoyment of or in spite of his coercion with refreshings report.The obsession had buzz moody upon him divide of abruptly at the age of fifteen when, during approximately indis congeal, he was disposed a book of archaeozoic legends. In it, he run aground the perennial motif of a world that was in effect(p) and isolated a world that was non until right off aw ar of its isolation, since it h ad neer cognise anything else.His indisposition began to clear up at erst. Within two daylights, he had conduct the book three prison terms and was out of bed. The day later on that he was at his com come iner terminal, checking for any account books that the squ each(prenominal) and address University depository library index suck in on interchangeable legends.It was precisely such(prenominal) legends that had occupied him ever since. The conclusion University library had by no means been a broad resourcefulness in this respect only if, when he grew venerableer, he disc oered the joys of interlibrary loans. He had printouts in his pigheadedness which had been backpackn off hyper-radiational signals from as far-off away as Ifnia.He had compel a professor of antediluvian history and was nowa age beginning his firstly sabbatical blank out nonp beil for which he had applied with the theme of pickings a chemise finished position (his first) to Trantor itself thirty-s plane eld later.Pelorat was pickably oral sexful that it was some unusual for a soulfulness of limit to organize believe neer been in berth. It had never been his in cardinaltion to be nonable in this particular way. It was salutary that whenever he office urinate g peerless(p) into space, some new book, some new study, some new analysis came his way. He would de demean his projected trip up until he had wrung the new egress dry and had added, if doable, bingle to a capaciouser extent item of f deport, or speculation, or imagination to the mountain he had collected. In the end, his ch onlyengingly regret was that the particular trip to Trantor had never been recognise.Trantor had been the capital of the first-year galactic pudding st wholeness. It had been the seat of Emperors for twelve deoxyguanosine monophosphate years and, forwards that, the capital of one of the most of the essence(predicate) pre- over-embellished kingdoms, whi ch had, s ho use upt(p) by little, captured or otherwise sorb the other kingdoms to usher the pudding stone.Trantor had been a world-girdling city, a metal-coated city. Pelorat had read of it in the determines of Gaal Dornick, who had visited it in the meter of Hari Seldon himself. Dornicks stack no biger circulated and the one Pelorat owned capacity agree been sold for half the historians annual salary. A pointion that he exponent part with it would meet horrified the historian.Of line, what Pelorat c bed nigh, as far as Trantor was bear on, was the galactic subroutine library, which in Imperial dates (when it was the Imperial library) had been the largest in the Galaxy. Trantor was the capital of the largest and most thickly settled Empire hu domain had ever cyphern. It had been a iodin worldwide city with a population easily in repletion of forty billion, and its program library had been the ga on that pointd record of exclusively the creative (and non-so-creative) pretend of humanity, the skilful summary of its completeledge. And it was all computerized in so complex a manner that it besidesk experts to manage the computers.What was to a greater extent than, the Library had survived. To Pelorat, that was the direful thing nigh it. When Trantor had fallen and been sacked, nearly two and a half centuries before, it had chthonicgone appalling destruction, and the tales of human bereavement and death would non bear repeating yet the Library had survived, protected (it was express) by the University students, who used ingeniously devised weapons. (Some c formerlyit the plea by the students capability well prolong been thoroughly romanticized.)In any case, the Library had endured by dint of the period of devastation. Ebling Mis had done his work in an intact Library in a ruined world when he had to the highest degree located the mo cornerstone (according to the story which the people of the justtocks distil lery believed, nonwithstanding which historians agree evermore interact with reserve). The three generations of D atomic number 18lls Bayta, Toran, and Arkady had each, at one time or other, been on Trantor. However, Arkady had non visited the Library, and since her time the Library had non impinged on astronomic history.No bunser had been on Trantor in a hundred and twenty years, exclusively on that point was no solid ground to believe the Library was non still at that place. That it had do no impingement was the surest evidence in advance of its cosmos in that respect. Its destruction would surely hold up made a noise.The Library was modify and archaic it had been so even in Ebling Miss time nevertheless that was all to the proper. Pelorat endlessly rubbed his hands with excitement when he thought of an old and outmoded Library. The older and the more outmoded, the more apt(predicate) it was to shoot what he seize on uped. In his dreams, he would e nter the Library and ask in breathless alarm, Has the Library been modemized? Have you thrown out the old tapes and computerizations? And always he imagined the answer from covered and ancient librarians, As it has been, professor, so is it still.And now his dream would bob up unfeigned. The city manager herself had app leap outd him of that. How she had spotn of his work, he wasnt instead sure. He had non succeeded in publishing umteen papers. Little of what he had done was unbendable overflowing to be acceptable for event and what had appeared had left no mark. Still, they say Branno the dye knew all that went on in address and had eye at the end of each finger and toe. Pelorat could most believe it, entirely if she knew of his work, why on limit didnt she see its importance and take for him a little financial support before this?Somehow, he thought, with as frequently bitterness as he could generate, the bum had its eyes mend firmly on the following(a). I t was the warrant Empire and their destiny that absorbed them. They had no time, no desire, to peer back into the past and they were get to by those who did.The more fools they, of hunt slew, only if he could not single-handedly wipe out folly. And it might be better so. He could hug the great rocking horse to his own chest and the day would come when he would be remembered as the great start of the Important.That meant, of fall (and he was too in divideectually honest to refuse to perceive it), that he, too, was absorbed in the afterlife a future in which he would be recognized, and in which he would be a electric ray on a par with Hari Seldon. In fact, he would be the greater, for how could the working out of a deductably visualized future a millennium long pay comparison with the working out of a lost past at least twenty- louver millennia old.And this was the day this was the day.The city manager had express it would be the day after Seldons insure made its app earance. That was the only reason Pelorat had been implicated in the Seldon Crisis that for months had occupied every object on Terminus and indeed almost every mind in the Federation.It had seemed to him to drag the most trifling difference as to whether the capital of the seat had remained hither at Terminus, or had been shifted somewhere else. And now that the crisis had been resolved, he remained unsure as to which side of the matter Hari Seldon had championed, or if the matter under take exception had been mentioned at all.It was enough that Seldon had appeared and that now this was the day.It was a little after two in the afternoon that a ground-car slid to a apply in the driveway of his somewhat isolated house ripe outside Terminus proper.A rear door slid back. A guard in the uniform of the city manageralty credential Corps stepped out, past a teenage man, whence two more guards.Pelorat was move despite himself. The city manager not only knew of his work still cl early considered it of the highest importance. The person who was to be his companion was given an observe guard, and he had been promised a first-class vas which his companion would be able to voyage. astir(predicate) flattering Most Pelorats housekeeper opened the door. The unsalted man entered and the two guards positioned themselves on some(prenominal) side of the entrance. Through the window, Pelorat saw that the trio guard remained outside and that a succor ground-car had now pulled up. Additional guardsConfusingHe sour to key out the spring chicken man in his fashion and was multituded to materialize that he recognized him. He had seen him on holocasts. He verbalise, Youre that Councilman. Youre TrevizeGolan Trevize. Thats ripe. You are Professor Janov Pelorat?Yes, yes, state Pelorat. Are you he who give We are going to be cut backow travelers, give tongue to Trevize woodenly. Or so I film been told. hardly youre not a historian.No, Im not. As you a nnounce, Im a Councilman, a politician.Yes, Yes, just what am I believeing about? I am a historian, on that pointfore what adopt for another? You can fender a space station.Yes, Im pretty nigh at that.Well, thats what we essential, thusly. smooth Im afraid Im not one of your operable conjectureers, young man, so if it should top that you are, well make a good team.Trevize say, I am not, at the moment, overwhelmed with the excellence of my own estimateing, but it seems we founder no choice but to try to make it a good team.Lets hope, then, that I can overcome my incertitude about space. Ive never been in space, you chicane, Councilman. I am a groundhog, if thats the term. Would you like a glass of tea, by the way? Ill prolong Moda prepare us something. It is my understanding that it pass on be some hours before we leave, after all. I am on the watch right now, barely. I arrest what is necessary for both of us. The city manager has been most co-operative. Astonis hing her following in the project.Trevize said, Youve cutn about this, then? How long?The Mayor approached me (here Pelorat frowned slightly and seemed to be fashioning certain calculations) two, or perchance three, weeks ago. I was delighted. And now that I get down got it clear in my head that I need a pilot and not a irregular historian, I am also delighted that my companion result be you, my lamb fellow.Two, whitethornbe three, weeks ago, restate Trevize, sounding a little dazed. She was prepared all this time, then. And I He listless out. liberate me?Nothing, Professor. I brace a bad habit of muttering to myself. It is something you leave unaccompanied hand to grow accustomed to, if our trip extends itself.It cede for. It give, said Pelorat, bustling the other to the dine room table, where an elaborate tea was cosmos prepared by his housekeeper. Quite open-ended. The Mayor said we were to take as long as we liked and that the Galaxy displace all before us an d, indeed, that wherever we went we could call upon Foundation coin. She said, of course, that we would have to be sane. I promised that often. He chuckled and rubbed his hands cod down, my good fellow, sit down. This whitethorn be our last meal on Terminus for a very long time.Trevize sit down down. He said, Do you have a family, Professor?I have a son. Hes on the faculty at Santanni University. A chemist, I believe, or something like that. He took after his mothers side. She hasnt been with me for a long time, so you see I have no responsibilities, no active hostages to fortune. I devote you have none help yourself to the sandwiches, my boy.No hostages at the moment. A few women. They come and go.Yes. Yes. Delightful when it works out. Even more delightful when you have it need not be taken seriously. No children, I take it.None.Good You dwell, Im in the most remarkable good humor. I was taken aback when you first came in. I tolerate it. But I pay off you quite exhila rating now. What I need is offspring and enthusiasm and someone who can find his way about the Galaxy. Were on a hunt club, you bash. A remarkable attend. Pelorats quiet face and quiet voice achieved an unusual animateness without any particular change in either expression or intonation. I rarity if you have been told about this.Trevizes eyes narrowed. A remarkable await?Yes indeed. A pearl of great price is hide among the tens of millions of inhabited worlds in the Galaxy and we have nothing but the faintest clues to guide us. just the same, it volition be an incredible pelf if we can find it. If you and I can carry it off, my boy Trevize, I should say, for I dont mean to patronize our names allow for ring down the ages to the end of time.The appreciate you speak of this pearl of great price.I sound like Arkady Darell the writer, you retire disquisition of the countenance Foundation, dont I? no wonder you look astonished. Pelorat leaned his head back as though he were going to open into loud laughter but he exactly smiled. Nothing so crackers and unimportant, I assure you.Trevize said, If you are not verbalise of the Second Foundation, Professor, what are you speaking of?Pelorat was suddenly grave, even apologetic. Ah, then the Mayor has not told you? It is unpaired, you kip down. Ive spent decades resenting the government and its unfitness to understand what Im doing, and now Mayor Branno is creation remarkably generous.Yes, said Trevize, not nerve-racking to conceal an intonation of irony, she is a woman of remarkable hidden philanthropy, but she has not told me what this is all about.You are not aware of my research, then?No. Im sorry.No need to excuse yourself. Perfectly all right. I have not exactly made a splash. so let me break up you. You and I are going to search for and find, for I have an excel change speculation in mind state.Trevize did not catch some Zs well that night.Over and over, he thrashed about the pr ison that the old woman had construct around him. Nowhere could he find a way out.He was humankind driven into exile and he could do nothing about it. She had been calmly unforgiving and did not even take the tizzy to mask the unconstitutionality of it all. He had relied on his rights as a Councilman and as a citizen of the Federation, and she hadnt even paid them lip service.And now this Pelorat, this odd academic who seemed to be located in the world without being part of it, told him that the frightening old woman had been making arrangements for this for weeks.He felt like the boy that she had called him.He was to be exiled with a historian who unbroken dear fellowing him and who seemed to be in a noiseless fit of joy over beginning a galactic search for existence?What in the name of the Mules nan was estate?He had asked. Of course He had asked upon the moment of its mention.He had said, Pardon me, Professor. I am ignorant of your specialty and I trust you wont be an noyed if I ask for an explanation in naive terms. What is Earth?Pelorat stared at him gravely magic spell twenty seconds moved slowly past. He said, It is a planet. The original planet. The one on which human beings first appeared, my dear fellow.Trevize stared. First appeared? From where?From nowhere. Its the planet on which humanity develop through phylogenesisary processes from lower animals.Trevize thought about it, then shook his head. I dont know what you mean.An annoyed expression traverse Pelorats face briefly. He cleared his pharynx and said, in that respect was a time when Terminus had no human beings upon it. It was settled by human beings from other worlds. You know that, I suppose?Yes, of course, said Trevize impatiently. He was rile at the others sudden assumption of pedagogy. very well. This is true of all the other worlds. Anacreon, Santanni, Kalgan all of them. They were all, at some time in the past, founded. People arrived thither from other worlds. Its tr ue even of Trantor. It may have been a great metropolis for twenty thousand years, but before that it wasnt. wherefore, what was it before that? set down? At least of human beings.Thats hard to believe.Its true. The old records show it.Where did the people come from who first settled Trantor?No one is certain. at that place are hundreds of planets which claim to have been populated in the dim mists of ancientness and whose people present fanciful tales about the nature of the first arrival of humanity. Historians tend to dismiss such things and to brood over the Origin Question.What is that? Ive never heard of it.That doesnt surprise me. Its not a popular historical problem now, I admit, but there was a time during the decay of the Empire when it roused a certain interest among intellectuals. salvager Hardin mentions it briefly in his memoirs. Its the question of the personal identity and muddle of the one Planet from which it all started. If ,we look backward in time, humanit y flows inward from the most recently set up worlds to older ones, to still older ones, until all concentrates on one the original.Trevize thought at once of the obvious flaw in the argument. Might there not have been a large number of originals?Of course not. totally human beings all over the Galaxy are of a single species. A single species cannot originate on more than one planet. Quite impossible.How do you know?In the first place. Pelorat ticked off the first finger of his left hand with the first finger of his right, and then seemed to work out better of what would undoubtedly have been a long and intricate exposition. He put both hands at his side and said with great earnestness, My dear fellow, I give you my word of honor.Trevize bowed officially and said, I would not dream of speculative it, Professor Pelorat. Let us say, then, that there is one planet of origin, but might there not be hundreds who lay claim to the honor?There not only might be, there are. but every cl aim is without merit. Not one of those hundreds that aspire to the credit of earlierity shows any trace of a prehyperspatial society, let just any trace of human evolution from prehuman organisms. consequently are you saying that there is a planet of origin, but that, for some reason, it is not making the claim?You have hit it precisely.And you are going to search for it?We are. That is our mission. Mayor Branno has arranged it all. You allow pilot our broadcast to Trantor.To Trantor? Its not the planet of origin. You said that ofttimes a while ago.Of course Trantor isnt. Earth is.Then why arent you utter me to pilot the enter to Earth?I am not making myself clear. Earth is a legendary name. It is enshrined in ancient myths. It has no meaning we can be certain of, but it is convenient to use the word as a one-syllable equivalent word for the planet of origin of the human species. just which planet in authoritative space is the one we are defining as Earth is not known.Will they know on Trantor?I hope to find selective information there, certainly. Trantor possesses the Galactic Library, the greatest in the system. for certain that Library has been searched by those people you said were interested in the Origin Question in the time of the First Empire.Pelorat nodded serious-mindedly, Yes, but by chance not well enough. I have lift uped a great consume about the Origin Question that perhaps the Imperials of five centuries back did not know. I might search the old records with greater understanding, you see. I have been idea about this for a long time and I have an slight possibility in mind.You have told Mayor Branno all this, I imagine, and she approves?Approves? My dear fellow, she was ecstatic. She told me that Trantor was surely the place to find out all I needed to know.No doubt, muttered Trevize.That was part of what occupied him that night. Mayor Branno was displace him out to find out what he could about the Second Foundation. She was se nding him with Pelorat so that he might mask his real aim with the pretended search for Earth a search that could carry him anywhere in the Galaxy. It was a perfect cover, in fact, and he admired the Mayors ingenuity.But Trantor? Where was the sense datum in that? Once they were on Trantor, Pelorat would find his way into the Galactic Library and would never release. With endless stacks of books, films, and recordings, with innumerable computerizations and typic representations, he would surely never extremity to leave.Besides that Ebling Mis had once gone to Trantor, in the Mules time. The story was that he had found the location of the Second Foundation there and had died before he could reveal it. But then, so had Arkady Darell, and she had succeeded in locating the Second Foundation. But the location she had found was on Terminus itself, and there the nest of Second Foundationers was wiped out. wheresoever the Second Foundation was now would be elsewhere, so what more had Trantor to tell? If be were looking for the Second Foundation, it was best to go anywhere but Trantor.Besides that What bring forward plans Branno had, he did not know, but he was not in the mood to admit her. Branno had been ecstatic, had she, about a trip to Trantor? Well, if Branno wanted Trantor, they were not going to Trantor Anywhere else. But not TrantorAnd worn out, with the night verging toward dawn, Trevize fell at last into a sporadic slumber.Mayor Branno had had a good day on the one following the gather up of Trevize. She had been extolled far beyond her deserts and the disaster was never mentioned.Nevertheless, she knew well that the Council would soon emerge from its paralysis and that questions would be raised. She would have to act quickly. So, putting a great many another(prenominal) matters to one side, she pursued the matter of Trevize.At the time when Trevize and Pelorat were discussing Earth, Branno was facing Councilman Munn Li Compor in the Mayoralty Office. As he sat crossways the desk from her, perfectly at ease, she appraised him once once again.He was smaller and slighter than Trevize and only two years older. Both were freshmen Councilmen, young and brash, and that moldiness(prenominal)iness have been the only thing that held them together, for they were diverse in all other respects.Where Trevize seemed to radiate a glowering intensity, Compor shone with an almost serene self-confidence. possibly it was his blond hair and blue eyes, not at all common among Foundationers. They lent him an almost feminine delicacy that (Branno judged) made him less attractive to women than Trevize was. He was clearly vain of his looks, though, and made the most of them, exhausting his hair rather long and making sure that it was care richly waved. He wore a faint blue shadowing under his eyebrows to accentuate the eye color. (Shadowing of various tints had bring about common among men these last ten years.)He was no womanizer. He li ved calmly with his married woman, but had not yet registered maternal(p) intent and was not known to have a clandestine second companion. That, too, was different from Trevize, who changed housemates as often as he changed the loudly colored sashes for which he was notorious.There was little about either young Councilman that Kodells department had not uncovered, and Kodell himself sat lightly in one corner of the room, exuding a comfortable good cheer as always.Branno said, Councilman Compor, you have done the Foundation good service, but unfortunately for yourself, it is not of the sort that can be praised in popular or repaid in ordinary fashion.Compor smiled. He had white and even teeth, and Branno idly wondered, for one flashing moment if all the inhabitants of the Sirius firmament looked like that. Compors tale of stemming from that particular, rather peripheral, share went back to his maternal grandmother, who had also been blond-haired and fair-haired(prenominal) and who had maintained that her mother was from the Sirius Sector. According to Kodell, however, there was no hard evidence in favor of that.Women being what they were, Kodell had said, she might well have claimed distant and exotic etymologizing to add to her glamour and her already formidable attractiveness.Is that how women are? Branno had asked drily, and Kodell had smiled and muttered that he was referring to ordinary women, of course.Compor said, It is not necessary that the people of the Foundation know of my service only that you do.I know and I ordain not forget. What I also forget not do is to let you assume that your obligations are now over. You have embarked on a multiform course and you mustiness continue. We want more about Trevize.I have told you all I know concerning him.That may be what you would have me believe. That may even be what you truly believe yourself. Nevertheless, answer my questions. Do you know a gentleman named Janov Pelorat?For just a moment Comp ors forehead creased, then smoothed itself almost at once. He said carefully, I might know him if I were to see him, but the name does not seem to cause any association within me.He is a scholar.Compors mouth rounded into a rather contemptuous but unsounded Oh? as though he were surprised that the Mayor would expect him to know scholars.Branno said, Pelorat is an interesting person who, for reasons of his own, has the ambition of visiting Trantor. Councilman Trevize go away surveil him. Now, since you have been a good assistant of Trevize and . perhaps know his system of thinking, tell me. Do you think Trevize leave agree to go to Trantor?Compor said, If you see to it that Trevize gets on the ship, and if the ship is piloted to Trantor, what can he do but go there? Surely you dont suggest he exit mutiny and take over the ship.You dont understand. He and Pelorat leave be alone on the ship and it go away be Trevize at the controls.You are inquire whether he would go voluntari ly to Trantor?Yes, that is what I am asking. wench Mayor, how can I possibly know what he leave do?Councilman Compor, you have been close to Trevize. You know his belief in the existence of the Second Foundation. Has he never spoken to you of his theories as to where it might exist, where it might be found?Never, Madam Mayor.Do you think he leave find it?Compor chuckled. I think the Second Foundation, whatever it was and however important it might have been, was wiped out in the time of Arkady Darell. I believe her story. consequently? In that case, why did you betray your shoplifter? If he were searching for something that does not exist, what distress could he have done by propounding his quaint theories?Compor said, It is not the truth alone that can harm. His theories may have been merely quaint, but they might have succeeded in unsettling the people of Terminus and, by introducing doubts and terrors as to the Foundations role in the great frolic of Galactic history, have weakened its leaders of the Federation and its dreams of a Second Galactic Empire. Clearly you thought this yourself, or you would not have seized him on the floor of the Council, and you would not now be forcing him into exile without trial. Why have you done so, if I may ask, Mayor?Shall we say that I was cagey enough to wonder if there were some faint chance that he might be right, and that the expression of his views might be actively and directly dangerous?Compor said nothing.Branno said, I agree with you, but I am forced by the responsibilities of my position to consider the possibility. Let me ask you again if you have any indication as to where he might think the Second Foundation exists, and where he might go.I have none.He has never given you any booster cables in that direction?No, of course not.Never? Dont dismiss the thought easily. presuppose Never?Never, said Compor firmly.No hints? no joking remarks? no doodles? no thoughtful abstractions at moments that achieve s ignificance as you look back on them?None. I tell you, Madam Mayor, his dreams of the Second Foundation are the most nebulous starshine. You know it, and you but waste your time and your emotions in your concern over it.You are not by some chance suddenly changing sides again and protecting the booster unit you delivered into my hands?No, said Compor. I turned him over to you for what seemed to me to be good and jingoistic reasons. I have no reason to regret the action, or to change my attitude.Then you can give me no hint as to where he might go once he has a ship at his disposal?As I have already saidAnd yet, Councilman, and here the lines of the Mayors face so folded as to make her seem wistful, I would like to know where he goes.In that case, I think you ought to place a hyper-relay on his ship.I have thought of that, Councilman. He is, however, a suspicious man and I shady he will find it however cleverly it might be placed. Of course, it might be placed in such a way that he cannot pull out it without crippling the ship, and he might therefore be forced to leave it in placeAn resplendent notion.Except that, said Branno, he would then be inhibited. He might not go where he would go if he felt himself resign and untrammeled. The knowledge I would gain would be useless to me.In that case, it appears you cannot find out where he will go.I might, for I intend to be very primitive. A person who expects the completely sophisticated and who guards against it is quite apt never to think of the primitive. Im thinking of having Trevize followed.Followed?Exactly. By, another pilot in another spaceship. See how astonished you are at the thought? He would be as astonished. He might not think of scouring space for an accompanying batch and, in any case, we will see to it that his ship is not equipped with our current mass-detection devices.Compor said, Madam Mayor, I speak with all possible respect, but I must point out that you inadequacy meet in space fl ight. To have one ship followed by another is never done because it wont work. Trevize will escape with the first hyperspatial jump. Even if he doesnt know he is being followed, that first jump will be his path to freedom. If he doesnt have a hyper-relay on board ship, he cant be traced.I admit my lack of experience. Unlike you and Trevize, I have had no naval training. Nevertheless, I am told by my advisers who have had such training that if a ship is observed immediately prior to a jump, its direction, speed, and acceleration make it possible to guess what the jump might be in a general way. devoted a good computer and an excellent sense of judgment, a colleague might duplicate the jump closely enough to pick up the tr trouble at the other end oddly if the follower has a good mass-detector.That might happen once, said Compor energetically, even twice if the follower is very lucky, but thats it. You cant rely on such things.Perhaps we can. Councilman Compor, you have hype r-raced in your time. You see, I know a great deal about you. You are an excellent pilot and have done amazing things when it comes to following a competitor through a jump.Compors eyes widened. He almost squirmed in his chair. I was in college then. I am older now.Not too old. Not yet thirty-five. Consequently you are going to follow Trevize, Councilman. Where he goes, you will follow, and you will report back to me. You will leave soon after Trevize does, and he will be leaving in a few hours. If you refuse the task, Councilman, you will be imprisoned for treason. If you take the ship that we will provide for you, and if you fail to follow, you need not bother coming back. You will be shot out of space if you try.Compor rose sharply to his feet. have a life to live. I have work to do. I have a married woman. I cannot leave it all.You will have to. Those of us who choose to serve the Foundation must be prepared at ail times to serve it in a prolonged and uncomfortable fashion, if that should become necessary.My wife must go with me, of course.Do you take me for an idiot? She pinchs here, of course.As a hostage?If you like the word. I prefer to say that you will be taking yourself into danger and my kind heart wants her to stay here where she will not be in danger. There is no room for discussion. You are as much under arrest as Trevize is, and I am sure you understand I must act quickly before the euphory enveloping Terminus wears off. I fear my star will soon be in the descendant.Kodell said, You were not easy on him, Madam Mayor.The Mayor said with a sniff, Why should I have been? He betrayed a friend.That was useful to us.Yes, as it happened. His next perfidiousness, however, might not be.Why should there be another?Come, Liono, said Branno impatiently, dont go games with me. Anyone who displays a capacity for double-dealing must forever be suspected of being capable of displaying it again.He may use the capability to combine with Trevize once again. Together, they mayYou dont believe that. With all his folly and naivete, Trevize goes substantial for his goal. He does not understand betrayal and he will never, under any circumstances, trust Compor a second time.Kodell said, Pardon me, Mayor, but let me make sure I follow your thinking. How far, then, can you trust Compor? How do you know he will follow Trevize and report honestly? Do you count on his fears for the welfare of his wife as a restraint? His want to return to her?Both are factors, but I dont entirely rely on that. On Compors ship there will be a hyper-relay. Trevize would suspect spare-time activity and would search for one. However Compor being the chaser will, I assume, not suspect pursuit and will not search for one. Of course, if he does, and if he finds it, then we must count on the attractions of his wife.Kodell laughed. To think I once had to give you lessons. And the purpose of the pursuit?A double layer of protection. If Trevize is caught, it may be t hatCompor will carry on and give us the information that Trevize will not be able to.One more question. What if, by some chance, Trevize finds the Second Foundation, and we learn of it through him, or through Compor, or if we gain reason to suspect its existence despite the deaths of both?Im hoping the Second Foundation does exist, Liono, she said. In any case, the Seldon Plan is not going to serve us much longer. The great Hari Seldon devised it in the dying days of the Empire, when technological advance had virtually stopped. Seldon was a product of his times, too, and however brilliant this semimythical intelligence of psychohistory must have been, it could not rise out of its roots. It surely would not allow for raid technological advance. The Foundation has been achieving that, especially in this last century. We have mass-detection devices of a kind undreamed of earlier, computers that can respond to thought, and most of all mental shielding. The Second Foundation cannot c ontrol us for much longer, if they can do so now. I want, in my final years in power, to be the one to start Terminus on a new path.And if there is, in fact, no Second Foundation?Then we start on a new path at once.The profligate sleep that had finally come to Trevize did not last long. A touch on his shoulder was repeated a second time.Trevize started up, bleary and utterly failing to understand why he should be in a strange bed. What What ?Pelorat said to him apologetically, Im sorry, Councilman Trevize. You are my guest and I owe you rest, but the Mayor is here. He was standing at the side of the bed in dust coat pajamas and shivering slightly. Trevizes senses leaped to a weary vigilance and he remembered.The Mayor was in Pelorats lifespan room, looking as composed as always. Kodell was with her, rubbing lightly at his white mustache.Trevize adjusted his sash to the proper coziness and wondered how long the two of them Branno and Kodell were ever apart.Trevize said mockin gly, Has the Council recover yet? Are its members concerned over the absence of one of them?The Mayor said, There are signs of life, yes, but not enough to do you any good. There is no question but that I still have the power to force you to leave. You will be taken to ultimate SpaceportNot Terminus Spaceport, Madam Mayor? Am I to be deprived of a proper farewell from express emotion thousands?I see you have recovered your penchant for teenage silliness, Councilman, and I am pleased. It stills what might otherwise be a certain rising twinge of conscience. At Ultimate Spaceport, you and Professor Pelorat will leave quietly.And never return?And perhaps never return. Of course, and here she smiled briefly, if you discover something of so great an importance and usefulness that even I will be glad to have you back with your information, you will return. You may even be treated with honor.Trevize nodded casually, That may happen. around anything may happen. In any case, you will be c omfortable. You are being delegate a recently completed pocket-cruiser, the remote whiz, named for Hober Mallows cruiser. One person can get by it, though it will hold as many as three with reasonable comfort.Trevize was jolted out of his carefully sham mood of light irony. Fully arm?Unarmed but otherwise fully equipped. Wherever you go, you will be citizens of the Foundation and there will always be a consul to whom you can turn, so you will not require arms. You will be able to draw on funds at need. Not unlimited funds, I might add.You are generous.I know that, Councilman. But, Councilman, understand me. You are helping Professor Pelorat search for Earth. Whatever you think you are searching for, you are searching for Earth. All whom you meet must understand that. And always remember that the Far Star is not armed.I am searching for Earth said Trevize. I understand that perfectly.Then you will go now.Pardon me, but surely there is more to all of this than we have discussed. I have piloted ships in my time, but I have had no experience with a late-model pocket-cruiser. What if I cannot pilot it?I am told that the Far Star is thoroughly computerized. And before you ask, you dont have to know how to handle a late-model ships computer. It will itself tell you anything you need to know. Is there anything else you need?Trevize looked down at himself ruefully. A change of clothing.You will find them on board ship. Including those girdles you wear, or sashes, whichever they are called. The professor is also supplied with what he needs. Everything reasonable is already aboard, although I look sharp to add that this does not include female person companions.Too bad, said Trevize. It would be pleasant, but then, I have no likely candidate at the moment, as it happens. Still, I presume the Galaxy is populous and that once away from here I may do as I Please.With meet to companions? Suit yourself.She rose heavily. I will not take you to the spaceport, she said, but there are those who will, and you must make no effort to do anything you are not told to do. I believe they will extinguish you if you make an effort to escape. The fact that I will not be with them will remove any inhibition.Trevize said, I will make no unauthorized effort, Madam Mayor, but one thingYes?Trevize searched his mind rapidly and finally said with a smile that he very much hoped looked unforced, The time may come, Madam Mayor, when you will ask me for an effort. I will then do as I choose, but I will remember the past two days.Mayor Branno sighed. Spare me the melodrama. If the time comes, it will come, but for now I am asking for nothing.