e guards were sent out as reinforcements,
until they had cleared a space for the ship and a lane to the hall
entrance.

"Mars greets the distinguished guests from our sister planet!" boomed
the giant loudspeaker in the tower. Immediately afterward came the
strains of the song--"Terrestria--Fair Green Terrestria"--in a rushing
torrent of sound. But the frank and fluent melody was strangely
distorted, with unpleasant minor turns and harsh whisperings of
menace, and the tower psychologist noted a further rise of the needle.

There was a diversion of interest now. The mob of first arrivals, as
well as the ever-freshening stream of newcomers, was moving toward the
teletabloids and the more conservative stereo-screens. On this
occasion they were both carrying the same message, however. Sira heard
the propaganda division's latest fabrication about her alleged
kidnaping by terrestrial agents. She needed no radiation meter to tell
her of the intense wave of hatred for the Earth that swept over the
densely packed area. And this was followed by another emotion--a wave
of cupidity--set up by the offer of 100,000 I. P. dollars reward for
her return. She saw about her faces greedy, faces wistful, even
compassionate faces. But outnumbering them by far were faces set in
truculent mold.

* * * * *

Sira moved restlessly from place to place, feeling more deeply
depressed with every moment. She felt as if she had been left entirely
out of life, friendless, alone. Among all these thousands she had no
friend. It seemed to her that never before had there been such a
paucity of monarchists. Sharp-featured, with a wire-drawn manner of
efficiency and resolution about them, they had constituted almost
another race among this practically enslaved people, maintaining for
themselves a tolerable position despite the opposition of the
oligarchy. Now, however, they seemed to have vanished. All that
morning Sira had not seen one. She would not have disclosed her
identity, but it would have been comforting to see one of those
friends of old.

She was stopped by a jam. Looking between the bodies of two large and
sweaty men, she realized that someone was standing on a surveyor's
marking block, delivering a speech.

"The great Pantheus has so decreed it," the speaker was shouting in a
cracked voice that at times dribbled into a whine. "We must shake off
forever this menace from the green planet--this planet dominated