Dors said to Raindrop Forty-Three in a soft voice, "Have you ever met a tribesman before, Sister, or a tribeswoman?"

A long hesitation and then a slow negative shake of the head.

Seldon threw out his arms. "Well, there you are. If there is a rule of silence, it applies only to the Brothers. Would they have sent these young women-these Sisters-to deal with us if there was any rule against speaking to tribesmen?"

"It might be, Hari, that they were meant to speak only to me and I to you."

"Nonsense. I don't believe it and I won't believe it. I am not merely a tribesman, I am an honored guest in Mycogen, asked to be treated as such by Chetter Hummin and escorted here by Sunmaster Fourteen himself. I will not be treated as though I do not exist. I will be in communication with Sunmaster Fourteen and I will complain bitterly."

Raindrop Forty-Five began to sob and Raindrop Forty-Three, retaining her comparative impassivity, nevertheless flushed faintly.

Dors made as though to appeal to Seldon once again, but he stopped her with a brief and angry outward thrust of his right arm and then stared Toweringly at Raindrop Forty-Three.

And finally she spoke and did not twitter. Rather, her voice trembled hoarsely, as though she had to force it to sound in the direction of a male being and was doing so against all her instincts and desires.

"You must not complain of us, tribesman. That would be unjust. You force me to break the custom of our people. What do you want of me?"

Seldon smiled disarmingly at once and held out his hand. "The garment you brought me. The kirtle."

Silently, she stretched out her arm and deposited the kirtle in his hand.

He bowed slightly and said in a soft warm voice, "Thank you, Sister." He then cast a very brief look in Dors's direction, as though to say: You see? But Dors looked away angrily.

The kirtle was featureless, Seldon saw as he unfolded it (embroidery and decorativeness were for women, apparently), but it came with a tasselled belt that probably had some particular way of being worn. No doubt he could work it out.

He said, "I'll step into the bathroom and put this thing on. It won't take but a minute, I suppose."

He stepped into the small chamber and found the door would not dose behind him because Dors was forcing her way in as well. Only when the two of them were in the bathroom together did the door close.

"What were you doing?" Dors hissed angrily. "You were an absolute brute, Hari. Why did you treat the poor woman that way?

Seldon said impatiently, "I had to make her talk to me. I'm counting on her for information. You know that. I'm sorry I had to be cruel, but how else could I have broken down her inhibitions?" And he motioned her out.

When he emerged, he found Dors in her kirtle too.

Dors, despite the bald head the skincap gave her and the inherent dowdiness of the kirtle, managed to look quite attractive. The stitching on the robe somehow suggested a figure without revealing it in the least. Her belt was wider than his own and was a slightly different shade of gray from her kirtle. What's more, it was held in front by two glittering blue stone snaps. (Women did manage to beautify themselves even under the greatest difficulty, Seldon thought.) Looking over at Hari, Dors said, "You look quite the Mycogenian now. The two of us are fit to be taken to the stores by the Sisters."

"Yes, " said Seldon, "but afterward I want Raindrop Forty-Three to take me on a tour of the microfarms."

Raindrop Forty-Three's eyes widened and she took a rapid step backward.

"I'd like to see them, " said Seldon calmly.

Raindrop Forty-Three looked quickly at Dors. "Tribeswoman--"

Seldon said, "Perhaps you know nothing of the farms, Sister."

That seemed to touch a nerve. She lifted her chin haughtily as she still carefully addressed Dors. "I have worked on the microfarms. All Brothers and Sisters do at some point in their lives."

"Well then, take me on the tour, " said Seldon, "and lets not go through the argument again. I am not a Brother to whom you are forbidden to speak and with whom you may have no dealings. I am a tribesman and an honored guest. I wear this skincap and this kirde so as not to attract undue attention, but I am a scholar and while I am here I must learn. I cannot sit in this room and stare at the wall. I want to see the one thing you have that the rest of the Galaxy does not have . . . your microfarms. I should think you'd be proud to show them."

"We are proud, " said Raindrop Forty-Three, finally facing Seldon as she spoke, "and I will show you and don't think you will learn any of our secrets if that is what you are after. I will show you the microfarms tomorrow morning. It will take time to arrange a tour."

Seldon said, "I will wait till tomorrow morning. But do you promise? Do I have your word of honor?"

Raindrop Forty-Three said with clear contempt, "I am a Sister and I will do as I say. I will keep my word, even to a tribesman."

Her voice grew icy at the last words, while her eyes widened and seemed to glitter. Seldon wondered what was passing through her mind and felt uneasy.

43.

Seldon passed a restless night. To begin with, Dors had announced that she must accompany him on the tour of the microfarm and he had objected strenuously.

"The whole purpose, " he said, "is to make her talk freely, to present her with an unusual environment-alone with a male, even if a tribesman. Having broken custom so far, it will be easier to break it further. If you're along, she will talk to you and I will only get the leavings."

"And if something happens to you in my absence, as it did Upperside?"

"Nothing will happen. Please! If you want to help me, stay away. If not, I will have nothing further to do with you. I mean it, Dors. This is important to me. Much as I've grown fond of you, you cannot come ahead of this."

She agreed with enormous reluctance and said only, "Promise me you'll at least be nice to her, then."

And Seldon said, "Is it me you must protect or her? I assure you that I didn't treat her harshly for pleasure and I won't do so in the future."

The memory of this argument with Dors-their first helped keep him awake a large part of the night; that, together with the nagging thought that the two Sisters might not arrive in the morning, despite Raindrop Forty-Three's promise.

They did arrive, however, not long after Seldon had completed a spare breakfast (he was determined not to grow fat through overindulgence) and had put on a kirtle that fitted him precisely. He had carefully organized the belt so that it hung perfectly.

Raindrop Forty-Three, still with a touch of ice in her eye, said, "if you are ready, Tribesman Seldon, my sister will remain with Tribeswoman Venabili." Her voice was neither twittery nor hoarse. It was as though she had steadied herself through the night, practicing, in her mind, how to speak to one who was a male but not a Brother.

Seldon wondered if she had lost sleep and said, "I am quite ready."

Together, half an hour later, Raindrop Forty-Three and Hari Seldon were descending level upon level. Though it was daytime by the clock, the light was dusky and dimmer than it had been elsewhere on Trantor.

There was no obvious reason for this. Surely, the artificial daylight that slowly progressed around the Trantorian sphere could include the Mycogen Sector. The Mycogenians must want it that way, Seldon thought, clinging to some primitive habit. Slowly Seldon's eyes adjusted to the dim surroundings.

Seldon tried to meet the eyes of passersby, whether Brothers or Sisters, calmly. He assumed he and Raindrop Forty-Three would be taken as a Brother and his woman and that they would be given no notice as long as he did nothing to attract attention.

Unfortunately, it seemed as if Raindrop Forty-Three wanted to be noticed. She talked to him in few words and in low tones out of a clenched mouth. It was clear that the company of an unauthorized male, even though only she knew this fact, raved her self-confidence. Seldon was quite sure that if he asked her to relax, he would merely make her that much more uneasy. (Seldon wondered what she would do if she met someone who knew her. He felt more relaxed once they reached the lower levels, where human beings were fewer.) The descent was not by elevators either, but by moving staired ramps that existed in pairs, one going up and one going down. Raindrop FortyThree referred to them as "escalators." Seldon wasn't sure he had caught the word correctly, never having heard it before.

As they sank to lower and lower levels, Seldon's apprehension grew. Most worlds possessed microfarms and most worlds produced their own varieties of microproducts. Seldon, back on Helicon, had occasionally shopped for seasonings in the microfarms and was always aware of an unpleasant stomach-turning stench.

The people who worked at the microfarms didn't seem to mind. Even when casual visitors wrinkled their noses, they seemed to acclimate themselves to it. Seldon, however, was always peculiarly susceptible to the smell. He suffered and he expected to suffer now. He tried soothing himself with the thought that he was nobly sacrificing his comfort to his need for information, but that didn't keep his stomach from turning itself into knots in apprehension.

After he had lost track of the number of levels they had descended, with the air still seeming reasonably fresh, he asked, "When do we get to the microfarm levels?"

"We're there now."

Seldon breathed deeply. "It doesn't smell as though we are."

"Smell? What do you mean?" Raindrop Forty-Three was Offended enough to speak quite loudly.

"There was always a putrid odor associated with microfarms, in my experience. You know, from the fertilizer that bacteria, yeast, fungi, and saprophytes generally need."

"In your experience?" Her voice lowered again. "Where was that?"

"On my home world."

The Sister twisted her face into wild repugnance. "And your people wallow in gabelle?"

Seldon had never heard the word before, but from the look and the intonation, he knew what it meant.

He said, "It doesn't smell like that, you understand, once it is ready for consumption."

"Ours doesn't smell like that at any time. Our biotechnicians have worked out perfect strains. The algae grow in the purest light and the most carefully balanced electrolyte solutions. The saprophytes are fed on beautifully combined organics. The formulas and recipes are something no tribespeople will ever know. -Come on, here we are. Sniff all you want. You'll find nothing offensive. That is one reason why our food is in demand throughout the Galaxy and why the Emperor, we are told, eats nothing else, though it is far too good for a tribesman if you ask me, even if he calls himself Emperor."

She said it with an anger that seemed directly aimed at Seldon. Then, as though afraid he might miss that, she added, "Or even if be calls himself an honored guest."

They stepped out into a narrow corridor, on each side of which were large thick glass tanks in which roiled cloudy green water full of swirling, growing algae, moving about through the force of the gas bubbles that streamed up through it. They would be rich in carbon dioxide, he decided.

Rich, rosy light shone down into the tanks, light that was much brighter than that in the corridors. He commented thoughtfully on that.

"Of course, " she said. "These algae work best at the red end of the spectrum."

"I presume, " said Seldon, "that everything is automated."

She shrugged, but did not respond.

"I don't see quantities of Brothers and Sisters in evidence, " Seldon said, persisting.

"Nevertheless, there is work to be done and they do it, even if you don't see them at work. The details are not for you. Don't waste your time by asking about it."

"Wait. Don't be angry with me. I don't expect to be told state secrets. Come on, dear." (The word slipped out.) He took her arm as she seemed on the point of hurrying away. She remained in place, but he felt her shudder slightly and he released her in embarrassment.

He said, "It's just that is seems automated."

"Make what you wish of the seeming. Nevertheless, there is room here for human brains and human judgment. Every Brother and Sister has occasion to work here at some time. Some make a profession of it."

She was speaking more freely now but, to his continuing embarrassment, he noticed her left hand move stealthily toward her right arm and gently rub the spot where he had touched her, as though he had stung her.

"It goes on for kilometers and kilometers, " she said, "but if we turn here there'll he a portion of the fungal section you can see."

They moved along. Seldon noted how clean everything was. The glass sparkled. The tiled floor seemed moist, though when he seized a moment to bend and touch it, it wasn't. Nor was it slippery -unless his sandals (with his big toe protruding in approved Mycogenian fashion) had nonslip soles.

Raindrop Forty-Three was right in one respect. Here and there a Brother or a Sister worked silently, studying gauges, adjusting controls, sometimes engaged in something as unskilled as polishing equipment-always absorbed in whatever they were doing.

Seldon was careful not to ask what they were doing, since he did not want to cause the Sister humiliation in having to answer that she did not know or anger in her having to remind him there were things he must not know.

They passed through a lightly swinging door and Seldon suddenly noticed the faintest touch of the odor he remembered. He looked at Raindrop Forty-Three, but she seemed unconscious of it and soon he too became used to it.

The character of the light changed suddenly. The rosiness was gone and the brightness too. All seemed to be in a twilight except where equipment was spotlighted and wherever there was a spot light there seemed to be a Brother or a Sister. Some wore lighted headbands that gleamed with a pearly glow and, in the middle distance, Seldon could see, here and there, small sparks of light moving erratically.

As they walked, he case a quick eye on her profile. It was all he could really judge by. At all other times, he could not cease being conscious of her bulging bald head, her bare eyes, her colorless face. They drowned her individuality and seemed to make her invisible. Here in profile, however, he could see something. Nose, chin, full lips, regularity, beauty. The dim light somehow smoothed out and softened the great upper desert.

He thought with surprise: She could be very beautiful if she grew her hair and arranged it nicely.

And then he thought that she couldn't grow her hair. She would be bald her whole life.

Why? Why did they have to do that to her? Sunmaster said it was so that a Mycogenian would know himself (or herself) for a Mycogenian all his (or her) life. Why was that so important that the curse of hairlessness had to be accepted as a badge or mark of identity?

And then, because he was used to arguing both sides in his mind, he thought: Custom is second nature. Be accustomed to a bald head, sufficiently accustomed, and hair on it would seem monstrous, would evoke nausea. He himself had shaved his face every morning, removing all the facial hair, uncomfortable at the merest stubble, and yet he did not think of his face as bald or as being in any way unnatural. Of course, he could grow his facial hair at any time he wished--but he didn't wish to do so.

He knew that there were worlds on which the men did not shave; in some, they did not even clip or shape the facial hair but let it grow wild. What would they say if they could see his own bald face, his own hairless chin, cheek, and lips?

And meanwhile, he walked with Raindrop Forty-Three-endlessly, it seemed--and every once in a while she guided him by the elbow and it seemed to him that she had grown accustomed to that, for she did not withdraw her hand hastily. Sometimes it remained for nearly a minute.

She said, "Here! Come here!"

"What is that?" asked Seldon.

They were standing before a small tray filled with little spheres, each about two centimeters in diameter. A Brother who was tending the area and who had just placed the tray where it was looked up in mild inquiry.

Raindrop Forty-Three said to Seldon in a low voice, "Ask for a few."

Seldon realized she could not speak to a Brother until spoken to and said uncertainly, "May we have a few, B-brother?"

"Have a handful, Brother, " said the other heartily.

Seldon plucked out one of the spheres and was on the point of handing it to Raindrop Forty-Three when he noticed that she had accepted the invitation as applying to herself and reached in for two handfuls.

The sphere felt glossy, smooth. Seldon said to Raindrop FortyThree as they moved away from the vat and from the Brother who was in attendance, "Are these supposed to be eaten?" He lifted the sphere cautiously to his nose.

"They don't smell, " she said sharply.

"What are they?

"Dainties. Raw dainties. For the outside market they're flavored in different ways, but here in Mycogen we eat them unflavored -- the only way."

She put one in her mouth and said, "I never have enough."

Seldon put his sphere into his mouth and felt it dissolve and disappear rapidly. His mouth, for a moment, ran liquid and then it slid, almost of its own accord, down his throat.