advertise for bids."

"Why, that would mean absolute control----"

"Of the nonworking vote, yes. And I'll guarantee, personally, that in
five years the politics of Odin will have become so unbearably corrupt
and abusive that the intellectuals, the technicians, the business
people, even the nobility, will be flocking to the polls to vote, and if
only half of them turn out, they'll snow the nonworkers under. And
that'll mean, eventually, an end to vote-selling, and the nonworkers'll
have to find work. We'll find it for them."

"Great and frightening changes." Yorn Travann laughed; he recognized the
phrase. Probably started it himself. Paul lifted his glass. "To the
Minister of Disturbance!"

"Your Majesty!" They drank to each other, and then Yorn Travann said,
"We had a lot of wild dreams, when we were boys; it looks as though
we're starting to make some of them come true. You know, when we were in
the University, the students would never have done what they did today.
They didn't even do it ten years ago, when Vann Evaratt was dismissed."

"And Van Evaratt's pupil came back to Odin and touched this whole thing
off." He thought for a moment. "I wonder what Faress has, in that
anticipation effect."

"I think I can see what can come out of it. If he can propagate a wave
that behaves like those micropositos, we may not have to depend on ships
for communication. We may be able, some day, to screen Baldur or Vishnu
or Aton or Thor as easily as you screened Dorflay, up in the mountains."
He thought silently for a moment. "I don't know whether that would be
good or bad. But it would be new, and that's what matters. That's the
only thing that matters."

"Flower Festivals," Paul said, and, when Yorn Travann wanted to know
what he meant, he told him. "When Princess Olva's Empress, she's going
to curse the name of Klenn Faress. Flower Festivals, all around the
galaxy, without end."

THE END

+--------------------------------------------------------------+
| |
| Transcriber's Note & Errata |
| |
| There were 2 instances of 'cooking-robot' and one of |
| 'cooking robot' |
| |
| There was one instance of 'patriarchial' which was not |
| corrected.