Flinders was quite far from Rodriguez, having been placed midway down the table. A large lady sat on Flinders’s right, and Addison had naturally been seated opposite. There were some fifteen other members of the meeting, and Flinders found that he was not the only expert reporting that afternoon. On his left, a shock-headed young man named Edrich, back from a three-year assignment as a Civic Coordination expert in the Eastern Mediterranean, was leafing confidently through an envelope of documents. Senior members of DALTO were taking their seats, and there were, in addition, representatives from political departments of the Organization—a thin gentleman with a tremor from the Section on Forceful Implementation of Peace Treaties, and a young woman in a sari from Peaceful Uses of Atomic Weapons. A secretary was distributing pads of white paper and stunted yellow pencils. The room was low-ceilinged, without windows, and carpeted in yellowish-green. At one end of it stood a small movie-screen and at the other a projector. At Flinders’s back, a bookcase contained a 1952 Who’s Who, and a great number of Organization documents.

Flinders, having turned to look at the bookcase, soon turned back to the table. By assuming an alert expression he tried to include himself in various conversations taking place around him, but no one paid him any attention. A young man next to Addison said, “These problems are substantive, of course, not operational,” and Addison replied, “Obviously.” “Essential elements,” declared a Japanese, and “Local infrastructure,” responded a Yugoslav. The Forceful Implementation man looked very angry, and the girl from Peaceful Uses put her hand on his arm and murmured, “Under great pressure.” Someone else said soothingly, “We’ll put a Rush on it.”

When all the places were taken, Rodriguez-O’Hearn coughed for silence, welcomed the two experts to Headquarters, and introduced them to the meeting. The large lady leaned across Flinders to ask Edrich a question, but Edrich was nodding around the table and did not see her. Edrich, Flinders noted enviously, seemed to know everybody and had greeted several people by first name. Apart from Addison, who had gone into temporary eclipse behind the leaning lady, Flinders knew no one at all.

Mr. Rodriguez-O’Hearn called on Edrich to describe his work to the meeting; he then leaned back in his chair and took off his glasses.