en they think that I am weak and
will overlook treason."

"Your generosity is a byword, Leader Marley," said Wong. "But some
people are incapable of acting for their best interests even when you
have defined it for them. Who are these latest traitors?"

"Oh, nobody really important, of course, except as they waste time which
they owe to the State. Just attempts at illegal study. An Office
Category who had found a basement room in a deserted building and was
spending all his evening hours there practicing the violin. A Theater
man who was illegally trying to learn carpentry. And a teacher of
mathematics who had forged a key to the Linguistics library, and had
been getting in every night to study a dead language--Cuneiform, Latin,
something like that, utterly without practical value. This last one is
an old man, too, and ought to have known better. People must be made to
realize that if they want the privilege of useless study, they will have
to earn it. And I am very broadminded in such cases."

"Nobody has better reason to know that than I, Leader Marley, and I am
always grateful to you."

Marley coughed and straightened the jacket over his bearlike chest as he
put back his needler.

"Now to business. Where's that memorandum, Lanza?"

Dr. Lanza handed him the paper, then sat down beside the Leader.

"First. When Dr. Lanza called on you last week, he found the door to
your office locked. What explanation do you have?"

David smiled and spread his hands. "My explanation is the generosity of
Leader Marley. You have so many affairs to occupy your attention that it
is not surprising that you do not remember rewarding me with a Free
Choice some years ago, for my work on Martian Blue. I chose, as I am
sure you remember now, an occasional hour of Privacy."

The Leader blinked. "That's right. I had forgotten. Well, the Leader
never goes back on his word. Though why in the name of Marley you
fellows want a crazy thing like that is beyond me. What do you _do_,
behind a locked door, that you don't want anyone to see?"

"Do you doubt my loyalty, Leader Marley?"

"I doubt everything. What do you _want_ with Privacy?"

Lanza broke in amiably. "I'm afraid we just have to accept such wishes
as one of the harmless abnormalities of the Research mind, Leader. Since
I grew up in that Category, I understand it to some extent."

"You're right in calling it abnormal. I think perhaps I'd better remove
that from the possible Choic