"Listen, Rog," Duran began, "I'll try to get to see you tomorrow before I leave. Remember that your mother and I are both on your side, without qualification. You've done a pretty terrible thing, of course. But I have to admit, at the same time, that I'm really rather proud of you. Does that make sense?" "Sure," said Roger huskily, "I guess so." * * * * * The flight home was a quiet one. Duran found himself with many thoughts to think, not the least of which was what his wife's reaction would be. The difficulty lay in the fact that their married life had been too easy, too free of tragedy, to enable him to foresee her response. But life would not be quite the same now, even if Roger escaped the more concrete forms of punishment. And perhaps it would be the most difficult for Ernest, who would forever be expected either to live up to or down to his older brother's reputation. When all poor Ernest seemed to want these days was to play the saxophone. And then there was his own political future to consider. This would certainly not help it. But perhaps the affair would be forgotten in the next three years. After all, it might have been far worse. It might have happened in a campaign year. This way he still had a fighting chance. Three sessions with a good record might overbalance the loss in public confidence this would incur. And then he thought of the Mars colony mess and winced. Telling his wife about the matter was not nearly so difficult as the senator had feared. She had been ready for news of a crime of passion, or at least of armed robbery. What her husband had to relate stunned her at first. But once she had ridden out the shock, she recovered quickly. "You don't have to go tonight, Molly," Duran told her. "You think it might look better if I didn't?" she asked gently. "That wasn't what I was getting at," he said. He thought it over for a moment, then added, "No, I don't. In fact, I think it would look better if we both went to the Governor's. Roger is not a juvenile delinquent. That, I believe, is understood. If we must accept some of the responsibility for what he did today, then let's do so gracefully. Were you to stay home tonight, it might appear to some that you had reason to be ashamed of the business, which you don't." "It might also look as if I were afraid that Ernest might do something similar, as if I felt I had to watch him," she said. "Oh, people can be so ridiculous! Why wasn't Millie Gorton's boy in on it?" Duran smiled at the idea of the Governor's tubby, obtuse son involved in the construction of anything more demanding than a paper glider. * * * * *