Eventually he gave way to his feelings and bawled, "What d'you think this is, a leper colony?"

A momentary silence fell before Mayor Bouchaine asked, "Couldn't your leader come to see us out here?"

"No, Pop. I don't give him orders. He gives them to me. He's just told me to bring you to the chartroom. Are you coming or not?"

"At my age what have I to lose?" remarked the Mayor, commencing to climb the gangway. Five of the councilors reluctantly followed. The sixth sat down on his hams and assumed the expression of a determined non-starter.

"Mayor, I'm not prepared to accept the risk of contamination."

"You do as you please, Gerpongo," said the Mayor, going up.

"You do as you please, Gerpongo," echoed Gleed as unpleasantly as possible. "You squat on your fundament, Gerpongo, and be happy. Let the fresh, clean air play around your chassis, Gerpongo, and you'll be topnotch."

"That ought everyone to do," said Gerpongo pointedly. "And that is my intention."

Somewhat disgruntled, Gleed led the way through the ship, the others padding after him in single file. He noticed that they maintained complete silence, exchanging no remarks, and got the idea that they were trying to avoid breathing any more than was absolutely necessary. Reaching the chartroom, he showed them inside and went away muttering to himself. "Gerpongo," he said. It sounded like an alien cuss-word.

Within the room the Mayor stroked his beard and looked in turn at the Ambassador, Captain Grayder, Colonel Shelton and Major Hame, decided to address himself to the former.

"Health be yours."

"Thank you," said the Ambassador, relishing a fragment of courtesy.

"This is the first ship to come here from the old world since we became established," the Mayor went on. "Naturally we have taken it for granted that Terra isn't interested in us. We've had every reason to do so. But now it seems that we were wrong. The government has told me to seek an interview and ask the purpose of this visit."

"Oh, so you have been in touch with your government already?"

"Of course. I phoned through to Radiant City immediately you landed."

"Well, now," said the Ambassador, highly pleased, "it would simplify matters if we could deal direct with your chief officials." He turned to Grayder. "The pictures, Captain." From a drawer Grayder extracted the enormously enlarged photographs and spread them on his desk. The Ambassador suggested to Mayor Bouchaine, "Now if you will be so good as to show us the precise location of Radiant City we'll move the ship there and thus save you a lot of time and trouble."

"You mean you want me to point to our seat of government?"

"That's right"

"I am not authorized to do so."

The Ambassador eyed him with surprise. "Why not?"

"I shall have to consult them first," insisted the Mayor.

"But why on earth shouldn't you tell us where your government is? What possible harm can it do? You don't think we're scheming to overthrow it, do you?"

"I cannot accept the responsibility of transferring a potential epidemic to our

capital," said the Mayor flatly.

"An epidemic?" The Ambassador gazed bewilderedly around the room. "An epidemic of what?"

"We want no Terran diseases here," the Mayor informed. "If a center of infection

is positioned adjacent to Radiant City it must be with official permission."

"Frankly, I can't imagine what you're talking about," exclaimed the Ambassador.

"After all, you people are of Terran origin and therefore it follows that any sickness you may have must also be Terran."

"We don't have illnesses apart from the common cold," said the Mayor.

"And lumbago," contributed a councilor.

"And an occasional bellyache," offered another, then hurriedly added,

"Attributable to a mistake in diet. People should not make such errors. If they do they must expect to suffer. Diet is very important."

"That's right, Rampot," approved a third. "A healthy mind in a healthy body." "Look," chipped in the Ambassador, "I want to come to an understanding with your government."

"About what?" inquired the Mayor, fingering his beard and looking foxy. "About making a military agreement."

"Military?" Mayor Bouchaine screwed up his eyes until they almost disappeared. He had a period of strenuous thought before he admitted, "I've come across that word somewhere, probably in our history books. But for the We of me I can't remember what it means?"

"So you have no army, no soldiers?"

"Army? Soldiers?"

"No warriors, no fighters?"

"Ah, yaz, fighters." The Mayor's whiskery face showed sudden understanding.

"We have boxers and wrestlers in great number. Strong, athletic and highly skilled, I assure you. I once saw one throw four Douks into the river and did they get wet! Let me tell you-"

Colonel Shelton, who had been listening with incredulity, interrupted by asking, "When you chased out the Doukhobors did you ever kill one?""Hear that?" the Mayor said to his councillors who were mutually appalled. He looked around as if seeking somewhere to vomit.

"Well, what did you do to them?" persisted Shelton.

"We smacked their bottoms," informed the Mayor as though mentioning the obvious.

Openly disgusted, Shelton said, "What would you do if attacked by a lifeform so

alien and bizarre that you couldn't tell its bottom from its top?"

"Which lifeform is that?"

"One that may come upon you suddenly and without warning."

"From where?"

"From anywhere out of the cosmos."

"Faulty diet and unhealthy living creates bad dreams," remarked the Mayor virtuously. "We never have bad dreams."

"It'll be more than a bad dream when it really happens," Shelton persisted.

"It hasn't happened in the last four hundred years and we've no reason to suppose it will happen in the next four thousand."

"You're in poor position to do any supposing," Shelton pointed out. "You've no ships, you're doing no cosmic exploration. You're just sitting around in yours skins and waiting for the blow to fall."

"That's right," chimed in the Ambassador for good measure. "There might have been a non-human people native to this planet; it'd have been wholly their own fault if they'd been taken by surprise when you poured in from Terra. Surely you can see that what you have done others can do equally as well? If another intelligence should suddenly expand into the starfield and take a liking to Hygeia--"

The Mayor thought it over. "Yaz, that is true. What we have done somebody else could do-if there is a somebody else to do it. But it is not for me to consider such a hypothetical problem. I'll pass it along to our government."

"Good!" said the Ambassador.

"But," continued Mayor Bouchaine, "they will want to know what all this has to do with Terra. What am I to say?"

"Tell them that a ruthless enemy could swiftly conquer a few weak, independent worlds one at a time. It would be a vastly different matter to take on a powerful confederation, in close communication, united in resolve to beat off the common foe. So Terra thinks it high time steps were taken to reach a mutual understanding."

"What steps?"

"Just for a start," informed the Ambassador as glibly as possible, "we would like to establish a consul upon Hygeia. He would function as our representative, a mere token of Terran authority. Of course we'd have to provide him with a small staff to deal with routine matters. And a bodyguard."

"A bodyguard? What for?"

"To protect him against outside attack. Such protection is his entitlement and our responsibility, you understand?"

Just a company of forty or fifty troops armed with modern weapons. They'd be quite an asset to your own defenses, too." He bestowed a smile of pure benevolence. "We'd also like to leave a couple of powerful long-range transmitters with enough technicians to keep them in operation."

"Putting us in permanent contact with Terra?" suggested the Mayor, hinting at a skunk in the bed.

"Yes, of course. Swift communication is essential in space-war. How can we rush to your aid unless we know that you need it?"

"I don't know," admitted the Mayor, unable to find a satisfactory answer but convinced that he was seeing the thin end of the wedge. "I'll phone through to headquarters. It's up to them to make the decisions."

"You do that," approved the Ambassador.

Gleed conducted them through the airlock, watched them go down the gangway. Gerpongo got off his hams, fumbled in his shoulder-bag, produced a thing resembling a fire-extinguisher. The others stood in line and held their jaws wide open while Gerpongo sprayed each in turn. He made a thorough job of it, tending first to their mouths and then to their bodies, front and back. An odor faintly reminiscent of coal-tar and cinnamon drifted up to the airlock. First Mate Morgan joined Gleed as that worthy snorted his disgust.

"So the confab is finished?" said Morgan.

"Yes. They're now busy killing brasshat lice or something. Don't want to go home with Terran passengers in their hair."

"If the Captain is disengaged I'd better see him about this first roster. You're on it, aren't you?"

"I am. But I don't know whether it's worth it."

"Not worth getting away from this metal can for a few hours? Not worth treading good, solid earth, going to town, seeing the bright lights and having a wonderful time? Are you sickening for something?"

"I'm suspicious," said Gleed.

"Of what?"

"That everyone in that place will carefully keep their distance. And that if anyone does speak to us he or she will do so from ten yards away while fanning the air towards us."

"Then fan it back," advised Morgan. "The answer to an implied smell is an imaginary stench."

"Some spree, eh?" said Gleed. "The pinnacle of gay abandon. Everyone wafting the atmosphere at everyone else. Man, the prospect thrills me so that I can hardly wait."

"It'd be exercise if nothing else," opined Morgan. "I'm going to see Grayder." Leaving the airlock, he trudged along corridors, reached the chartroom, knocked and entered. He laid a paper on the Captain's desk. "First leave roster, sir. Do you approve it?"

Grayder sighed wearily. "Mr. Morgan, the basic rule is that everyone on leave must at all times comport himself in a spacemanlike manner, observe and respect all local customs and conventions and do nothing to earn the antagonism of the inhabitants."

"Yes, sir," agreed Morgan. "I'll give them a stiff warning about getting drunk and rowdy."

"I am not bothered about their sobriety or lack of it, Mr. Morgan. I am thinking about their attire."

"Sergeant Major Bidworthy and I invariably check the men for smartness as they go out," Morgan assured. "Any man who has not made himself a credit to the ship is promptly--"

"There are different ideas of what constitutes credit," said Grayder. "Physique, for instance."

"Yes, sir," said Morgan, not seeing what the other was getting at Grayder put it bluntly. "Mr. Morgan, I am afraid that the men will have to go out unclothed."

"Without clothes?" An expression of inutterable horror bloomed into Morgan's features. "Naked?"

"That's how it is, Mr. Morgan. These Hygeians are determined faddists. They think it healthier and more decent to go around in the raw. We are not yet in a position to impose better ideas upon them. Therefore we must accept their customs and adapt our own behavior accordingly. Any men who wish to go to town must do so unclothed."

"But, sir--" "I am not forbidding leave," Grayder emphasized. "I am conceding the men's right to take time off in a non-hostile world. But I cannot allow a riot to start over the question of somebody's pants. The men must take their liberty in their birthday suits and that's an order."

"Good God!" said Morgan, gulping.

"They can wear boots," put in the Ambassador. "The Hygeians were using sandals."