r mother's
circle of acquaintances--a senior diplomat, a man not easy to impress.
It was a safe bet that he'd had her brought out to his balcony office
only to keep her occupied while Halet was quietly informed where the
Amberdon problem child was and requested to come over and take charge.

What she had to tell him now would have sounded rather wild even if
presented by a presumably responsible adult. She could provide proof,
but until the Moderator was already nearly sold on her story, that
would be a very unsafe thing to do. Old Iron Thoughts was backing her
up, but if it didn't look as if her plans were likely to succeed, he
would be willing to ride herd on his devil's pack just so long....

Better start the ball rolling without any preliminaries, Telzey
decided. The Moderator's picture of her must be that of a spoiled,
neurotic brat in a stew about the threatened loss of a pet animal. He
expected her to start arguing with him immediately about Tick-Tock.

She said "Do you have a personal interest in keeping the Baluit crest
cats from becoming extinct?"

Surprise flickered in his eyes for an instant. Then he smiled.

"I admit I do, Miss Amberdon," he said pleasantly. "I should like to
see the species re-established. I count myself almost uniquely
fortunate in having had the opportunity to bag two of the magnificent
brutes before disease wiped them out on the planet."

[Illustration]

The last seemed a less than fortunate statement just now. Telzey
felt a sharp tingle of alarm, then sensed that in the minds which were
drawing the meaning of the Moderator's speech from her mind there had
been only a brief stir of interest.

She cleared her throat, said, "The point is that they weren't wiped
out by disease."

He considered her quizzically, seemed to wonder what she was trying to
lead up to. Telzey gathered her courage, plunged on, "Would you like
to hear what did happen?"

"I should be very much interested, Miss Amberdon," the Moderator said
without change of expression. "But first, if you'll excuse me a
moment...."

There had been some signal from his desk which Telzey hadn't noticed,
because he picked up a small communicator now and said "Yes?" After a
few seconds, he resumed, "That's rather curious, isn't it?... Yes, I'd
try that.... No, that shouldn't be necessary.... Yes, please do.
Thank you." He replaced the communicator, his face very sober; then,
his eyes flicking for an instant to TT, he drew on