"Pardon me," he said, "but-"
"Ssh!" The figure was hunched down low in the seat. "Were you followed?"
"Should I have been?"
"Don't be funny. Go straight ahead. Turn when I tell you…My goodness, what are you waiting for?"
He knew the voice. A hood had shifted down to the shoulders, and light brown hair was showing. Dark eyes were gazing at him.
"You'd better move on," she said softly.
He did, and for fifteen minutes, except for an occasional muffled but curt direction, she said nothing. He stole glances at her and thought, with a sudden pleasure, that she was even prettier than he had remembered her. Strange that now he felt no resentment.
They stopped-or Arvardan did, at the girl's direction-at the corner of an unpeopled residential district. After a careful pause the girl motioned him ahead once more and they inched down a drive that ended in the gentle ramp of a private garage.
The door closed behind them and the light in the car was the only source of illumination.
And now Pola looked at him gravely and said, "Dr. Arvardan, I'm sorry that I had to do this in order to speak to you privately. I know that I have no standing in your good opinion to lose-"
"Don't think that," he said awkwardly.
"I must think that. I want you to believe that I fully realize how small and vicious I was that night. I don't have the proper words to apologize-"
"Please don't." He glanced away from her. "I might have been a little more diplomatic."
"Well…" Pola paused a few moments to regain a certain minimal composure. "It's not what I've brought you here for. You're the only Outsider I've ever met that could be kind and noble-and I need your help."
A cold pang shot through Arvardan. Was this what it was all about? He packed that thought into a cold "Oh?"
And she cried, "No," in return. "It is not for me, Dr. Arvardan. It is for all the Galaxy. Nothing for myself. Nothing!"
"What is it?"
"First-I don't think anyone followed us, but if you hear any noise at all, would you-would you"-her eyes dropped-"put your arms about me, and-and-you know."
He nodded his head and said dryly, "I believe I can improvise without any trouble. Is it necessary to wait for noise?"
Pola reddened. "Please don't joke about it, or mistake my intentions. It would be the only way of avoiding suspicion of our real intentions. It is the one thing that would be convincing."
Arvardan said softly, "Are things that serious?"
He looked at her curiously. She seemed so young and so soft. In a way he felt it to be unfair. Never in his life did he act unreasoningly. He took pride in that. He. was a man of strong emotions, but he fought them and beat them. And here, just because a girl seemed weak, he felt the unreasoning urge to protect her.
She said, "Things are that serious. I'm going to tell you something, and I know you won't believe it at first. But I want you to try to believe it. I want you to make up your mind that I'm sincere. And most of all I want you to decide that you will stick with us after I tell you and see it through. Will you try? I'll give you fifteen minutes, and if you think at the end of that time that I'm not worth trusting or bothering with, I'll leave, and that's the end of it."
"Fifteen minutes?" His lips quirked in an involuntary smile, and he removed his wrist watch and put it before him. " All right."
She clasped her hands in her lap and looked firmly ahead through the windshield that afforded a view only of the blank wall of the garage ahead.
He watched her thoughtfully-the smooth, soft line of her chin, belying the firmness into which she was attempting to force it, the straight and thinly drawn nose, the peculiarly rich overtone to the complexion, so characteristic of Earth.
He caught the corner of her eye upon him. It was hastily withdrawn.
"What's the matter?" he said.
She turned to him and caught her underlip in two teeth. "I was watching you."
"Yes, I could see that. Smudge on my nose?"
"No." She smiled tinily, the first since she had entered his car. He was becoming absurdly conscious of little things about her: the way her hair seemed to hover and float gently each time she shook her head. "It's just that I've been wondering ever since-that night-why you don't wear that lead clothing, if you're an Outsider. That's what fooled me. Outsiders generally look like sacks of potatoes."
"And I don't?"
"Oh no"-and there was a sudden tinge of enthusiasm in her voice-"you look-you look quite like an ancient marble statue, except that you're alive and warm…I'm sorry. I'm being impertinent."
"You mean you think that it's my opinion you're an Earthgirl who doesn't know your place. You'll have to stop thinking that of me, or we can't be friendly…I don't believe in the radioactivity superstition. I've measured the atmospheric radioactivity of Earth and I've conducted laboratory experiments on animals. I'm quite convinced that under ordinary circumstances the radiations won't hurt me. I've been here two months and I don't feel sick yet. My hair isn't falling out"-he pulled at it-"my stomach isn't in knots. And I doubt that my fertility is being endangered, though I will admit to taking slight precautions in that respect. But lead-impregnated shorts, you see, don't show."
He said that gravely, and she was smiling again. "You're slightly mad, I think," she said.
"Really? You'd be surprised how many very intelligent and famous archaeologists have said that-and in long speeches, too."
And she said suddenly, "Will you listen to me now? The fifteen minutes are up."
"What do you think?"
"Why, that you might be. If you weren't, you wouldn't still be sitting here. Not after what I've done."
He said softly, "Are you under the impression that I have to force myself very hard to sit here next to you? If you do, you're wrong…Do you know, Pola, I've never seen, I really believe I've never seen, a girl quite as beautiful as yourself."
She looked up quickly, with fright in her eyes. "Please don't. I'm not trying for that. Don't you believe me?"
"Yes, I do, Pola. Tell me whatever it is you want to. I'll believe it and I'll help you." He believed himself, implicitly. At the moment Arvardan would cheerfully have undertaken to unseat the Emperor. He had never been in love before, and at that point he ground his thoughts to a halt. He had not used that word before.
Love? With an Earthgirl?
"You've seen my father, Dr. Arvardan?"
"Dr. Shekt is your father?…Please call me Bel. I'll call you Pola."
"If you want me to, I'll try. I suppose you were pretty angry with him."
"He wasn't very polite."
"He couldn't be. He's being watched. In fact, he and I arranged in advance that he was to get rid of you and I was to see you here. This is our house, you know… You see"-her voice dropped to a tight whisper-"Earth is going to revolt."
Arvardan couldn't resist a moment of amusement.
"No!" he said, opening his eyes wide. "All of it?"
But Pola flared into instant fury. "Don't laugh at me. You said you would listen and believe me. Earth is going to revolt, and it is serious, because Earth can destroy all the Empire."
"Earth can do that?" Arvardan struggled successfully against a burst of laughter. He said gently, "Pola, how well do you know your Galactography?"
"As well as anybody, teacher, and what has that to do with it, anyway?"
"It has this to do with it. The Galaxy has a volume of several million cubic light-years. It contains two hundred million inhabited planets and an approximate population of five hundred quadrillion people. Right?"
"I suppose so, if you say so."
"It is, believe me. Now Earth is one planet, with a population of twenty millions, and no resources besides. In other words, there are twenty-five billion Galactic citizens for every single Earthman. Now what harm can Earth do against odds of twenty-five billion to one?"
For a moment the girl seemed to sink into doubt, then she emerged. "Bel, " she said firmly, "I can't answer that, but my father can. He has not told me the crucial details. because he claims that that would endanger my life. But he will now, if you come with me. He's told me that Earth knows a way by which it can wipe out all life outside Earth, and he must be right. He's always been right before."