f-defense, since the forester
had drawn a gun and was ready to fire. Nobody can blame the late Wang
Kulichenko for that, but nobody can blame the Nipe, either."

They all looked for a moment in silence at the violet eyes that gazed at
them from the screen.

"For nearly three weeks," the speaker went on, "humans and Nipe tried to
arrive at a meeting of minds, and, just when it would seem that such a
meeting was within grasp, it would fade away into mist. It was only
three days ago that the Russian psychologists and psychiatrists realized
that the reason the Nipe had come to them was because he had thought
that the Board of Regents of the hospital was the ruling body of that
territory."

Someone chuckled, but there was no humor in it.

"Now we come to yesterday morning," said the speaker. "This is the
important part at this very moment, because it explains why I feel we
must immediately take steps to tell the public what has happened, why I
feel that it is necessary to put a man like Colonel Walther Mannheim in
charge of the Nipe affair and keep him in charge until the matter is
cleared up. Because the public is going to be scared witless if we don't
do something to reassure them."

"What happened yesterday morning, Mr. President?" one of the men asked.

"The Nipe got angry, lost his temper, went mad--whatever you want to
call it. At the morning meeting he simply became more and more
incomprehensible. The psychologists were trying to see if the Nipe had
any religious beliefs, and, if so, what they were. One of them, a Dr.
Valichek, was explaining the various religious sects and rites here on
Earth. Suddenly, with no warning whatever, the Nipe chopped at
Valichek's throat with an open-hand judo cut, killing him. He killed two
more men before he leaped out of the window and vanished.

"No trace of him was found until late last night. He killed another man
in Leningrad--we have since discovered that it was for the purpose of
stealing his personal flyer. The Nipe could be anywhere on Earth by
now."

"How was the man killed, Mr. President? With bare hands, as the others
were?"

"We have no way of knowing. Identification of the body was made
difficult by the fact that every shred of flesh had been stripped away.
It had been gnawed--literally _eaten_--to the bone!"

_FIRST INTERLUDE_

The big man with the tiny child on his shoulder pushed through the air
curtain that kept the warm humid air out of the shop.