“Well . . . at least draw up such a contract,” he said. “I suppose I couldn’t expect you to sign it. But . . . at least I’d have something.”

“You’d have something that could possibly cause me some slight embarrassment,” said William. “I hope you realize it’d do nothing more than that—in the face of my denial of ever having discussed the matter with you.”

“I’d feel more secure if the terms were laid out ahead of time,” said Donal, almost humbly. William shrugged, not without a touch of scorn.

“Come on then,” he said; and led the way across the room to a desk. He pressed a stud on it and indicated a grille. “Dictate,” he said.

Later, leaving William’s suite of rooms with the unsigned contract in his pocket, Donal came out into the general hotel corridor outside so swiftly that he almost trod upon the heels of Anea, who seemed also to be leaving.

“Where away?” he said. She turned on him.

“None of your business!” she snapped; but an expression which the inescapable honesty of her face would not permit her to hide, aroused his sudden suspicions. He reached out swiftly and caught up her right hand, which was clenched into a fist. She struggled, but he lifted the fingers easily back. Tucked into the nest of her palm was a tiny contact snooper mike.

“You will continue to be a fool,” he said, wearily, dropping her hand with the mike still in it. “How much did you hear?”

“Enough to confirm my opinion of you!” she hissed.

“Bring that opinion to the next session of the Conference, if you can get in,” he said. And went off. She stared after him, shaken with a fury, and a sudden pain of betrayal for which she could find no ready or sensible explanation.

She had, she told herself through that afternoon and the evening that followed, no intention of watching the next session personally. Early the next morning, however, she found herself asking Galt if he would get her a visitor’s pass to the Conference room.

The marshal was obliged to inform her that at William’s request, this session of the Conference was to be a closed one. He promised, however, to bring her what news he could; and she was forced to rest uneasily content with that.

As for Galt, himself, he went on to the Conference, arriving some few minutes late and discovering that the session had already started. William himself had begun the proposal of a plan that made the Dorsai Marshal of Freiland stiffen to attention, even as he was sitting down on his float at the Conference table.