“Oh, I don’t know. I was scared at first, but I’m not any more.”

“And this is your hostess, Mary Noyes.”

“Hello, Canapes?”

“Thank you. They look delicious, Mrs. Powell.”

“Now how about a game?” Powell interposed quickly. “Rebus, anyone?”

Outside, huddled in the shadow of the limestone arch, Jerry Church pressed against the garden door of Powel’s house, listening with all his soul. He was cold, silent, immobile, and starved. He was resentful, hating, contemptuous, and starved. He was an Esper 2 and starved. The bend sinister of ostracism was the source of his hunger.

Through the thin maple panel filtered the multiple TP pattern of the party; a weaving, ever-changing, exhilarating design. And Church, Esper 2, living on a sub-marginal diet of words for the past ten years, was starved for his own people — for the Esper world he had lost.

“The reason I mentioned D’Courtney is that I’ve just come across a case that might be similar.”

That was Augustus Tate, sucking up to @kins.

“Oh really? Very interesting. I’d like to compare notes. Matter of fact, I made the trip to Terra because D’Courtney is coming here. Too bad D’Courtney won’t — well, be available.” @kins was obviously being discreet and it smelled as though Tate was after something. Maybe not, Church speculated, but there was some elegant block and counter-blocking going on, like duellists fencing with complicated electrical circuits.

“Look here, peeper, I think you’ve been pretty snotty to that poor girl.”

“Listen to him shoot off his mind,” Church muttered. “Powell, that holy louse who had me kicked out, preaching down his big nose at the lawyer.”

“Poor girl? You mean dumb girl, Powell. My God! How gauche can you get?”

“She’s only a 3^rd. Be fair.”

“She gives me a pain.”

“Do you think it’s decent… marrying a girl when you feel that way about her?”

“Don’t be a romantic ass, Powell. We’ve got to marry peepers. I might as well settle for a pretty face.”

The Rebus game was going on in the living room. The Noyes girl was busy building a camouflaged image with an old poem:

What the devil was that? An eye in a glass? Eh? Oh. Not a glass. A stein. Eye in a stein. Einstein. Easy.

“What d’you think of Powell for the job, Ellery?” That was Chervil with his phoney smile and his big fat pontifical belly.

“For Guild President?”

“Yes.”

“Damned efficient man. Romantic but efficient. The perfect candidate if only he’d get married.”

“That’s the romance in him. He’s having trouble locating a girl.”

“Don’t all you deep peepers? Thank God I’m not a 1^st.”

And then a smash of glass crashing in the kitchen and Preacher Powell again, lecturing that little snot, Gus Tate.

“Never mind the glass, Gus. I had to drop it to cover for you. You’re radiating anxiety like a nova.”

“The devil I am, Powell.”

“The devil you’re not. What’s all this about Ben Reich?”