you?”

“I hope so,” Bullard said, wringing his hands. “But we have a couple of other problems. Number one, Captain Fromer has an extremely important passenger aboard. None other than His Exalted Excellency, R’thagna Bar. He is—or was—on his way home after concluding a treaty of friendship with the President of the Federation.”

Hansen managed a whistle.

“Furthermore,” Bullard continued, “His Excellency has to be home soon to get there in time for the mating season. This occurs once in a lifetime, I’m told, and this is his only chance to continue the ancestral rule—”

“Wait a minute,” Hansen said. “Are you trying to say that you can’t solve a simple problem like getting him home and getting him out of the ship? You can always cut it in two, can’t you?”

“These ships were made to last forever,” Bullard explained. “The hull is, of course, pseudo-met, but, not the kind of pseudo-met used for other applications. In short, about the only way you’ll get in that ship is to vaporize it.”

“But can’t you simply disassemble the door mechanism? My God, how complicated can it be?”

“We’re going to try to do just that,” Bullard said without a trace of confidence. “As far as the complication goes, let me say just this: it’s full of moving parts.”

“What are you getting at?” Hansen asked.

“Just this. These ships are perfect mechanisms. There is hardly anything in them that could be called a moving part. Now a door has to open and close. Sure, we devised a simple, safe way to do it a few hundred years after the original fleet was built. The men who designed the original door mechanism felt, perhaps, that it was incongruous to include it in the first place. Maybe that is why they threw away the plans. God knows, it is incongruous. Look! Here’s a photo we took of one in a ship back at base.”

Hansen scanned the photograph. It was a meaningless jumble. He handed it back. “Well, make yourself at home. I’m afraid that the only thing I can help with will be radio communication to Captain Fromer’s ship.”

“Good enough,” Bullard said. “I’m expecting someone else tomorrow. After you bring him down, feel free to drop over and see me anytime.”

Bullard went back to his ship, and Hansen went to bed. He dreamed of His Exalted Excellency R’thagna Bar, growing angrier day by day as the time of mating came closer. In his dream he suddenly came upon a magnificent solution to the problem, a solution involving a telepathic system of fertilization. He woke up before he had completely worked out the details.

Bullard’s friend arrived the same morning. He was a small, dark active little man whom Hansen immediately disliked.

“Meet Dr. Quemos,” Bullard said when Hansen dropped in on them. “Dr. Quemos is a specialist in the history of technology. He thinks he knows how our cute little door mechanism is made.”

“Can’t say for sure,” Quemos said, “but I’d guess that those components are made of metal—real metal.”

“I thought that metal was used only in jewelry,” Hansen said.

Dr. Quemos grinned slyly. “That’s what most people think. Actually, refined metal of various types was used in large masses, formed masses, for thousands of years. Historically speaking, the pseudo-mets are relatively new.”

“It’s difficult to imagine metal functioning as machinery,” Hansen mused.

“And you say that this door mechanism has moving parts, lots of them?”

“Moving parts are nothing to be afraid of,” Quemos said. “Here, look at this.” He put something small on the table, much in the manner of a young boy dropping a garter snake in the midst of school girls. Bullard and Hansen crowded around. “Now, take turns,” said Quemos sharply, “and don’t drop