Foundation's Edge (28 page)

They walked into the building, which was not as large as the façade had led them to believe. ft was certainly not busy inside.

There were a series of waiting booths, one of which was occupied by a man reading the news-strips emerging from a small ejector; another contained two women who seemed to be playing some intricate game with cards and tiles. Behind a counter too large for him, with winking computer controls that seemed far too complex for him, was a bored-looking Sayshellian functionary wearing what looked like a multicolored checkerboard.

Pelorat stared and whispered, “This is certainly a world of extroverted garb.”

“Yes,” said Trevize, “I noticed. Still, fashions change from world to world and even from region to region within a world sometimes. And they change with time. Fifty years ago, everyone on Sayshell might have worn black, for all we know. Take it as it comes, Janov.”

“I suppose I’ll have to,” said Pelorat, “but I prefer our own fashions. At least, they’re not an assault upon the optic nerve.”

“Because so many of us are gray on gray? That offends some people. I’ve heard it referred to as ‘dressing in dirt.’ Then too, it’s Foundation colorlessness that probably keeps these people in their rainbows—just to emphasize their independence. It’s all what you’re accustomed to, anyway. —Come on, Janov.”

The two headed toward the counter and, as they did so, the man in the booth forsook his news items, rose, and came to meet them, smiling as he did so. His clothing was in shades of gray.

Trevize didn’t look in his direction at first, but when he did he stopped dead.

He took a deep breath, “By the Galaxy— My friend, the traitor!”

AGENT

MUNN LI COMPOR, COUNCILMAN OF TERMINUS, LOOKED UNCERTAIN as he extended his right hand to Trevize.

Trevize looked at the hand sternly and did not take it. He said, apparently to open air, “I am in no position to create a situation in which I may find myself arrested for disturbing the peace on a foreign planet, but I will do so anyway if this individual comes a step closer.”

Compor stopped abruptly, hesitated, and finally said in a low voice after glancing uncertainly at Pelorat, “Am I to have a chance to talk? To explain? Will you listen?”

Pelorat looked from one to the other with a slight frown on his long face. He said, “What’s all this, Golan? Have we come to this far world and at once met someone you know?”

Trevize’s eyes remained firmly fixed on Compor, but he twisted his body slightly to make it clear that he was talking to Pelorat. Trevize said, “This—human being—we would judge that much from his shape—was once a friend of mine on Terminus. As is my habit with my friends, I trusted him. I told him my views, which were perhaps not the kind that should have received a general airing. He told them to the authorities in great detail, apparently, and did not take the trouble to tell me he had done so. For that reason, I walked neatly into a trap and now I find myself in exile. And now this—human being—wishes to be recognized as a friend.”

He turned to Compor full on and brushed his fingers through his hair, succeeding only in disarranging the curls further. “See here, you. I do have a question for you. What are you doing here? Of all the worlds in the Galaxy on which you could be, why are you on this one? And why now?”

Compor’s hand, which had remained outstretched throughout Trevize’s speech, now fell to his side and the smile left his face. The air of self-confidence, which was ordinarily so much a part of him, was gone and in its absence he looked younger than his thirty-four years and a bit woebegone. “I’ll explain,” he said, “but only from the start!”

Trevize looked about briefly. “Here? You really want to talk about it here? In a public place? You want me to knock you down here after I’ve listened to enough of your lies?”

Compor lifted both hands now, palms facing each other. “It’s the safest place, believe me.” And then, checking himself and realizing what the other was about to say, added hurriedly, “Or don’t believe me, it doesn’t matter. I’m telling the truth. I’ve been on the planet several hours longer than you and I’ve checked it out. This is some particular day they have here on Sayshell. It’s a day for meditation, for some reason. Almost everyone is at home—or should be. —You see how empty this place is. You don’t suppose it’s like this every day.”

Pelorat nodded and said, “I was wondering why it was so empty, at that.” He leaned toward Trevize’s ear and whispered, “Why not let him talk, Golan? He looks miserable, poor chap, and he may be trying to apologize. It seems unfair not to give him the chance to do so.’,

Trevize said, “Dr. Pelorat seems anxious to hear you. I’m willing to oblige him, but you’ll oblige me if you’re brief about it. This may be a good day on which to lose my temper. If everyone is meditating, any disturbance I cause may not produce the guardians of the law. I may not be so lucky tomorrow. Why waste an opportunity?”

Compor said in a strained voice, “Look, if you want to take a poke at me, do so. I won’t even defend myself, see? Go ahead, hit me—but listen!”

“Go ahead and talk, then. I’ll listen for a while.”

“In the first place, Golan—”

“Address me as Trevize, please. I am not on first-name terms with you.”

“In the first place, Trevize, you did too good a job convincing me of your views—”

“You hid that well. I could have sworn you were amused by me.”

“I tried to be amused to hide from myself the fact that you were being extremely disturbing. —Look, let us sit down up against the wall. Even if the place is empty, some few may come in and I don’t think we ought to be needlessly conspicuous.”

Slowly the three men walked most of the length of the large room. Compor was smiling tentatively again, but remained carefully at more than arm’s length from Trevize.

They sat each on a seat that gave as their weight was placed upon it and molded itself into the shape of their hips and buttocks. Pelorat looked surprised and made as though to stand up.

“Relax, Professor,” said Compor. “I’ve been through this already. They’re in advance of us in some ways. It’s a world that believes in small comforts.”

He turned to Trevize, placing one arm over the back of his chair and speaking easily now. “You disturbed me. You made me feel the Second Foundation did exist, and that was deeply upsetting. Consider the consequences if they did. Wasn’t it likely that they might take care of you somehow? Remove you as a menace? And if I behaved as though I believed you, I might be removed as well. Do you see my point?”

“I see a coward.”

“What good would it do to be storybook brave?” said Compor warmly, his blue eyes widening in indignation. “Can you or I stand up to an organization capable of molding our minds and emotions? The only way we could fight effectively would be to hide our knowledge to begin with.”

“So you hid it and were safe? —Yet you didn’t hide it from Mayor Branno, did you? Quite a risk there.”

“Yes! But I thought that was worth it. Just talking between ourselves might do nothing more than get ourselves mentally controlled

—or our memories erased altogether. If I told the Mayor, on the other hand— She knew my father well, you know. My father and I were immigrants from Smyrno and the Mayor had a grandmother who—”

“Yes yes,” said Trevize impatiently, “and several generations farther back you can trace ancestry to the Sirius Sector. You’ve told all that to everyone you know. Get on with it, Compor!”

“Well, I had her ear. If I could convince the Mayor that there was danger, using your arguments, the Federation might take some action. We’re not as helpless as we were in the days of the Mule and —at the worst—this dangerous knowledge would be spread more widely and we ourselves would not be in as much specific danger.”

Trevize said sardonically, “Endanger the Foundation, but keep ourselves safe. That’s good patriotic stuff.”

“That would be at the worst. I was counting on the best.” His forehead had become a little damp. He seemed to be straining against Trevize’s immovable contempt.

“And you didn’t tell me of this clever plan of yours, did you?”

“No, I didn’t and I’m sorry about that, Trevize. The Mayor ordered me not to. She said she wanted to know everything you knew but that you were the sort of person who would freeze if you knew that your remarks were being passed on.”

“How right she was!”

“I didn’t know—I couldn’t guess—I had no way of conceiving that she was planning to arrest you and throw you off the planet.”

“She was waiting for the right political moment, when my status as Councilman would not protect me. You didn’t foresee that?”

“How could I? You yourself did not.”

“Had I known that she knew my views, I would have.” Compor said with a sudden trace of insolence, “That’s easy enough to say—in hindsight.”

“And what is it you want of me here? Now that you have a bit of hindsight, too.”

“To make up for all this. To make up for the harm I unwittingly

—unwittingly—did you.”

“Goodness,” said Trevize dryly. “How kind of you! But you haven’t answered my original question. How did you come to be here? How do you happen to be on the very planet I am on?”

Compor said, “There’s no complicated answer necessary for that. I followed you!”

“Through hyperspace? With my ship making Jumps in series?” Compor shook his head. “No mystery. I have the same kind of a ship you do, with the same kind of computer. You know I’ve always had this trick of being able to guess in which direction through hyperspace a ship would go. It’s not usually a very good guess and I’m wrong two times out of three, but with the computer I’m much better. And you hesitated quite a bit at the start and gave me a chance to evaluate the direction and speed in which you were going before entering hyperspace. I fed the data—together with my own intuitive extrapolations—into the computer and it did the rest.”

“And you actually got to the city ahead of me?”

“Yes. You didn’t use gravitics and I did. I guessed you would come to the capital city, so I went straight down, while you—” Compor made a short spiral motion with his finger as though it were a ship riding a directional beam.

“You took a chance on a run-in with Sayshellian officialdom.”

“Well—” Compor’s face broke into a smile that lent it an undeniable charm and Trevize felt himself almost warming to him. Compor said, “I’m not a coward at all times and in all things.”

Trevize steeled himself. “How did you happen to get a ship like mine?”

“In precisely the same way you got a ship like yours. The old lady —Mayor Branno—assigned it to me.”

“Why?”

“I’m being entirely frank with you. My assignment was to follow you. The Mayor wanted to know where you were going and what you would be doing.”

“And you’ve been reporting faithfully to her, I suppose. —Or have you been faithless to the Mayor also?”

“I reported to her. I had no choice, actually. She placed a hyperrelay on board ship, which I wasn’t supposed to find, but which I did find.”

“Well?”

“Unfortunately it’s hooked up so that I can’t remove it without immobilizing the vessel. At least, there’s no way I can remove it. Consequently she knows where I am—and she knows where you are.”

“Suppose you hadn’t been able to follow me. Then she wouldn’t have known where I was. Had you thought of that?”

“Of course I did. I thought of just reporting I had lost you—but she wouldn’t have believed me, would she? And I wouldn’t have been able to get back to Terminus for who knows how long. And I’m not like you, Trevize. I’m not a carefree person without attachments. I have a wife on Terminus—a pregnant wife—and I want to get back to her. You can afford to think only of yourself. I can’t.  —Besides, I’ve come to warn you. By Seldon, I’m trying to do that and you won’t listen. You keep talking about other things.”

“I’m not impressed by your sudden concern for me. What can you warn me against? It seems to me that you are the only thing I need be warned about. You betray me, and now you follow me in order to betray me again. No one else is doing me any harm.”

Compor said earnestly, “Forget the dramatics, man. Trevize, you’re a lightning rod! You’ve been sent out to draw Second Foundation response—if there is such a thing as the Second Foundation. I have an intuitive sense for things other than hyperspatial pursuit and I’m sure that’s what she’s planning. If you try to find the Second Foundation, they’ll become aware of it and they’ll act against you. If they do, they are very likely to tip their hand. And when they do, Mayor Branno will go for them.”

“A pity your famous intuition wasn’t working when Branno was planning my arrest.”

Compor flushed and muttered, “You know it doesn’t always work.”

“And now it tells you she’s planning to attack the Second Foundation. She wouldn’t dare.”

“I think she would. But that’s not the point. The point is that right now she is throwing you out as bait.”

“So?”

“So by all the black holes in space, don’t search for the Second Foundation. She won’t care if you’re killed in the search, but I care. I feel responsible for this and I care.”

“I’m touched,” said Trevize coldly, “but as it happens I have another task on hand at the moment.”

“You have?”

“Pelorat and I are on the track of Earth, the planet that some think was the original home of the human race. Aren’t we, Janov?”

Pelorat nodded his head. “Yes, it’s a purely scientific matter and a long-standing interest of mine.”

Compor looked blank for a moment. Then, “Looking for Earth? But why?”

“To study it,” said Pelorat. “As the one world on which human beings developed—presumably from lower forms of life, instead of, as on all others, merely arriving ready-made—it should be a fascinating study in uniqueness.”

“And,” said Trevize, “as a world where, just possibly, I may learn more of the Second Foundation. —Just possibly.”

Compor said, “But there isn’t any Earth. Didn’t you know that?”

“No Earth?” Pelorat looked utterly blank, as he always did when