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Bigman&039;s eyes sparkled "It&039;s never too late once Lucky gets going Where do we start, Lucky?"

Lucky said quietly, "With Lou Evans I&039;ve been waiting for you to mention hiether; his plump face contracted into a frown "You&039;re his friend You want to defend him, I know It&039;s not a pleasant story It wouldn&039;t be if it involved any councilman at all-but a friend at that"

Lucky said, "I a out of sentiment only, Dr Morriss I knew Lou Evans as well as oneto hare for yourself For most of Evans&039;s tour of duty here on Venus, he acco A &039;trouble shooter&039; they called hi"

"No offense, Dr Morriss, but did you resent his arrival?"

"No, of course not I just saw no point in it We here have grown old on Venus We have the experience What do they expect a youngster, new from Earth, to accomplish?"

"A fresh approach is helpful sometimes"

"Nonsense I tell you, Lucky, the trouble is that Earth headquarters don&039;t consider our probleive it a quick glance, ash it, and return to tell the"

"I know the Council on Earth better than that You do, too"

But the gruo, thisyeast-strain growth The men in the industry objected"

"Objected?" said Lucky "It was a councilman&039;s request"

"True, but yeast-strain men are secretive You don&039;t make requests like that Even councilmen don&039;t They asked Evans why he wanted the information He refused to tell them They forwarded his request to rounds?" demanded Lucky

"He wouldn&039;t tell me his reasons either, and while I&039;anization will have secrets fro I had not expected He stole the data He used his position as councilet inside a restricted area in the yeast-research plants, and he left with ood reason"

"He did," said Morriss, "he did The microfilms dealt with the nutrient formulas required for the nourishment of a new and very tricky strain of yeast Two days later a work up one component of that mixture introduced a trace of mercury salt The yeast died, and six months&039; as ruined The work, but he had Our psychiatrists psychoprobed hiood notion of what to expect He&039;d had a blackout period The enemy still hasn&039;t stolen the strain of yeast, but they&039;re getting closer Right?"

Lucky&039;s brown eyes were hard "I can see the obvious theory Lou Evans had deserted to the enemy, whoever he is"

"Sirians," blurted Morriss "I&039;m sure of it"

"Maybe," admitted Lucky The inhabitants of the planets of Sirius had, for centuries now, been Earth&039;s most fervent enemies It was easy to blame thereed to get data for them that would enable them to start trouble inside the yeast factories Little, troubles at first, which would pave the way for larger troubles"

"Yes, that&039;s my theory Can you propose any other? "Couldn&039;t Councilman Evans himself be under mental domination?"

"Not likely, Lucky We have many cases in our files now No one who has suffered froer than half an hour, and all gave clear indication under the psychoprobe of periods of total amnesia Evans would have had to be under mental doave no signs of amnesia"

"He was examined?"

"He certainly was When a ht in the act, as it were-steps have to be taken I wouldn&039;t care if he were a hundred times a councilman He was examined, and I, personally, put hie on his own equipment, we tapped his scrambler and made sure he&039;d do it nowhatever he sent or received Thewith hiI should have done before this, and I&039; his removal from office and trial for corruption, or, perhaps, for treason"

"Before you do that" said Lucky

"Yes?"

"Letironically "You wish to? Certainly I&039;ll take you to hi In fact, I&039;d like to have you hear his defense"

They passed up a ra

Bigman stared at them curiously "Is this a prison or what?"

"It&039;s a kind of prison on these levels," said Morriss "We s serve many purposes on Venus"

They stepped into a shter

Lucky, unable to repress a s much," panted the little fellow, his eyesthere with your bare upper lip hanging out After all those , you look deforun and blown off the mustache you should have had"

Morriss srizzled mustache with the back of his hand, self-consciously and a little proudly

Lucky&039;s s exactly the saman"

Morriss said, "We&039;ll wait here They&039;re bringing Evans now" His finger nal

Lucky looked about the room It was smaller than Morriss&039;s own room, more impersonal Its only furniture consisted of several upholstered chairs plus a sofa, a low table in the center of the rooher tables near the false s Behind each of the false as a cleverly done seascape On one of the two high tables was an aquariu sreasy substance

Big Lucky&039;s about the room

He said, suddenly, "Say, Lucky, what&039;s this?

He half-ran to the aquariu into its depths "Look at it, will you?"

"It&039;s just one of the pet V-frogs the ood specimen Haven&039;t you ever seen one?"

"No," said Lucky He joined Bigman at the aquarium, which o feet square and about three feet deep The water in it was criss-crossed with feathery fronds of weed

Big, does it?" He was stirring the water with a forefinger and bending close to peer inside

Lucky&039;s head ca stared back at theht inches long, with a triangular head into which two bulging black eyes were set It rested on six little padded feet drawn up close to its body Each foot had three long toes in front and one behind Its skin was green and froglike, and there were frilly fins, which vibrated rapidly, running down the center line of its back In place of a , curved and parrotlike

As Lucky and Big in the water Its feet res stretched out like extendible stilts, as its nu just as its head was about to pierce the surface

Morriss, who had joined the fondly at the little beast, said, "It doesn&039;t like to get out of the water Too en, but only in s"

Bighted There was virtually no native ani creatures of this sort were a real novelty to him

"Where do they live?" he asked

Morriss put a finger down into the water and stroked the V-frog&039;s head The V-frog perht have uess

Morriss said, "They congregate in the seaweed in fairly large nuh it were a forest Their long toes can hold individual stehest fronds They could probably er, but I&039;ve never known one of them to bite I&039;m amazed you haven&039;t seen one yet The hotel has a whole collection of theroups, on display You haven&039;t seen it?"