o be
surrounded by a zone of fog that tangled and confused and deflected it.
He could not find Shearing.

"We've been here for hours," he said. "Where is he?"

"Probably talking a deal with Mr. Bellaver. I wouldn't worry. As I was
saying, Bellaver Incorporated is interested in men like you. We're the
largest builders of spacecraft in the System, and we can afford--"

"I know all about it," said Hyrst impatiently. "Old Quentin Bellaver
was busy swallowing up his rivals when I went through the door."

"Then," said Vernon imperturbably, "you should realize how much we can
do for you. Electronics is a vital branch--"

Hyrst moved erratically around the room, looking at things and not
really seeing them, hearing Vernon's voice but not understanding what it
said. He was growing more and more uneasy. It was as though someone was
calling to him, urgently, but just out of earshot. He kept straining,
with his ears and his mind, and Vernon's voice babbled on, and the
barrier was like a wall around his thoughts.

They had been aboard this ship for a long time now, and he had not seen
Shearing since they came through the hatch. It was not really a ship, of
course. It had no power of its own, depending on powerful tugs to tow
it. It was Walter Bellaver's floating pleasure-palace, and the damnedest
thing Hyrst had ever seen. Vernon said it could and often did accommodate
three or four hundred guests in the utmost luxury. There was nobody
aboard it now but Bellaver, Vernon, Hyrst and Shearing, the three very
accurate men, and perhaps a dozen others including stewards and the
crews of the tugs and Bellaver's yacht. It was named the _Happy Dream_,
and it was presently drifting in an excessively lonely orbit high above
the ecliptic, between nothing and nowhere.

Vernon had been with him almost constantly. He was getting tired of
Vernon. Vernon talked too much.

"Listen," he said. "You can stop selling Bellaver. I'm not looking for a
job. Where's Shearing?"

"Oh, forget Shearing," said Vernon, impatient in his turn. "You never
heard of him until a few days ago."

"He helped me."

"For reasons of his own."

"What's _your_ reason? And Bellaver's?"

"Mr. Bellaver is interested in all social problems. And I'm a Lazarite
myself, so naturally I have a sympathy for others like me." Vernon sat
up, putting his glass aside on a low table. He had drunk hardly any of
the contents.

"Shearing," he said, "is a member of a gang who some