y said. "I don't get it."

"At least there's food in the kitchen."

"All right. Let's eat."

There were two windows in the room, but when Ramsey looked out he saw
they were at least four stories up. They'd just have to wait for Margot
Dennison.

It took the Vegan girl some time to prepare the unfamiliar Earth-style
food with which Margot Dennison's kitchen was stocked. Ramsey used the
time to prowl around the apartment. It was furnished in Sirian-archaic,
a mode of furniture too feminine to suit Ramsey's tastes. But then, the
uni-sexual Sirians, of course, often catered to their own feminine
taste.

Ramsey found nothing in Margot Dennison's apartment which indicated she
had done any acting on Irwadi, and that surprised him, for he'd assumed
she had plied her trade here as elsewhere. He felt a little guilty about
his snooping, then changed his mind when he remembered that Margot had
locked them in.

In one of the slide compartments of what passed for a bureau in
Sirian-archaic, he found a letter. Since it was the only piece of
correspondence in the apartment, it might be important to Margot
Dennison, thought Ramsey. And if it were important to her....

Ramsey opened the letter and read it. Dated five Earth months before, it
ran:

_My darling Margot: By the time you read this I shall be dead.
Ironical, isn't it? Coming so close--with death in the form of
an incurable cancer intervening._

_As you know, Margot, I always wished for a son but never had
one. You'll have to play that role, I'm afraid, as you always
have. Here is the information I told you I would write down.
Naturally, if you intend to do anything about it, you'll guard
it with your life._

* * * * *

_Apparently the hyper-space pattern from Irwadi to Earth is the
one I was looking for. The proto-men, if I may be bold enough to
call them that, first left hyper-space at that point, perhaps a
million, perhaps five million, Earth years ago. I don't have to
tell you what this means, my child. I've already indicated it to
you previously. It suffices to remind you that, in what science
has regarded as the most amazing coincidence in the history of
the galaxy, humanoid types sprang up on some three thousand
stellar worlds simultaneously between one and five million years
ago. I say simultaneously although there is the possibility of a
four mi