ff: she didn't like it. Out of the corner of his eye, he
saw Mike and Mitzi, Flora and Fauna scampering around and up the steps
behind the bench. When he looked again, they were all up on it, and Mitzi
was showing the court what she had in her shoulder bag.

He got up, with Mamma and Baby, and crossed to where Leslie Coombes was
sitting. By this time, somebody was bringing in a coffee urn from the
cafeteria. Fuzzies ought to happen oftener in court.

* * * * *

The gavel tapped slowly. Little Fuzzy scrambled up onto Jack Holloway's
lap. After five days in court, they had all learned that the gavel meant
for Fuzzies and other people to be quiet. It might be a good idea, Jack
thought, to make a little gavel, when he got home, and keep it on the
table in the living room for when the family got too boisterous. Baby, who
wasn't gavel-trained yet, started out onto the floor; Mamma dashed after
him and brought him back under the table.

The place looked like a courtroom again. The tables were ranged in a neat
row facing the bench, and the witness chair and the jury box were back
where they belonged. The ashtrays and the coffee urn and the ice tubs for
beer and soft drinks had vanished. It looked like the party was over. He
was almost regretful; it had been fun. Especially for seventeen Fuzzies
and a Baby Fuzzy and a little black-and-white kitten.

There was one unusual feature; there was now a fourth man on the bench, in
gold-braided Navy black; sitting a little apart from the judges, trying to
look as though he weren't there at all--Space Commodore Alex Napier.

Judge Pendarvis laid down his gavel. "Ladies and gentlemen, are you ready
to present the opinions you have reached?" he asked.

Lieutenant Ybarra, the Navy psychologist, rose. There was a reading screen
in front of him; he snapped it on.

"Your Honors," he began, "there still exists considerable difference of
opinion on matters of detail but we are in agreement on all major points.
This is quite a lengthy report, and it has already been incorporated into
the permanent record. Have I the court's permission to summarize it?"

The court told him he had. Ybarra glanced down at the screen in front of
him and continued:

"It is our opinion," he said, "that sapience may be defined as differing
from nonsapience in that it is characterized by conscious thought, by
ability to think in logical sequence and by ability to think in terms
oth