with a sort of
automatic abstractedness. The air conditioner was pouring sweet, cool,
fresh air into the room; the windows--heavy, thick slabs of paraglass
welded directly into the wall--admitted the light from the courtyard
outside, but admitted nothing else. There was no need for them to open,
because of the air conditioning. A century before, some buildings still
had fire escapes running down their outsides, but modern fireproofing
had rendered such anachronisms unnecessary.

But his mind was only partly on his surroundings. He went into the
bedroom, sat down on the edge of the bed, took a long drink from the
cold glass in his hand, and then put it on the nightstand. Absently he
began pulling off his boots. His thoughts were on the Executive Session
he had attended that afternoon.

_"How much longer, do you think, Colonel?"_

_"A few weeks, sir. Perhaps less."_

_"There was another raid in Miami, Colonel. Another man died. We could
have prevented that death, Colonel. We could have prevented a great many
deaths in the past six years."_

And what answer was there to that? The Executive Council knew that the
deaths were preventable in only one way--by killing the Nipe. And they
had long ago agreed that the knowledge in that alien mind was worth the
sacrifice. But, as he had known would happen when they made the decision
six years before, there were some of them who had, inevitably, weakened.
Not all--not even a majority--but a minority that was becoming stronger.

It had been, to a great degree, Mannheim's arguments that had convinced
them then, and now they were tending to shift the blame for their
decision to Mannheim's shoulders.

Most of the Executives were tough-minded, realistic men. They were not
going to step out now unless there were good reason for it. But if the
subtle undercutting of the vacillating minority weakened Mannheim's own
resolve, or if he failed to give solid, well-reasoned answers to their
questions, then the whole project would begin to crumble rapidly.

He had not directly answered the Executive who had pointed out that many
lives could have been saved if the Nipe had been killed six years ago.
There was no use in fighting back on such puerile terms.

_"Gentlemen, within a few weeks, we will be ready to send Stanton in
after the Nipe. If that fails, we can blast him out of his stronghold
within minutes afterwards. But if we stop now, if we allow our judgment
to be colored at this poin