“It was only a moth,” I said. “That was the first time I ever saw a violent death,” he told me. “I’d heard of it, but only as it happens on your world. You see, we’ve studied you, far across space, but we didn’t know you had these little living things--moths, as you call them.” Looking at him, I wondered if he really was what he claimed to be--an inhabitant of another world. “I’ll convince you,” he read my mind again, “and you’ll help me convince others. I have thought of a way to make you believe--a scientific way. Gold-making puzzles you, doesn’t it?” He seated himself at the kitchen table, and drew toward him a tarnished fork. From his belt-pouch he took a small object resembling a salt-shaker and sprinkled dull dust on the utensil. Pouching the shaker, he produced a tiny black vial and carefully trickled liquid on the dust. He twiddled the fork briefly, then held it out. It gleamed yellow, and weighed heavy in my hand. To outward appearance, at least, it was gold. “What else?” he asked. “Restoring the dead to life?” Again he produced a vial, and shook a single drop of yellow liquid on the crushed body of the moth. From a tiny syringe, he blew a cloud of vapor. Finally he turned a red glow, like a miniature flashlight, on the insect. Then he shrank back in his chair, for the moth had stirred, and was fluttering up to the light. Again I swiftly caught and crushed it, and he relaxed. “You’re afraid of your own gift of life,” I said. He shook his big head. “We’ve studied only your civilized race. We knew of no other living things--uncivilized, uncontrolled. Forgive me if I seem nervous.” “How did you study us?” I asked. Close-mouthed, he smiled. “We use mechanisms of awareness. Without optical or auditory experience of you we have familiarized ourselves with even your slipshod, fantastic notions about other worlds. That is why I look and speak as I do, to conform with your notions. I even rigged my vehicle to resemble your mental picture of a spaceship, recognizable to your preconception. I can even achieve complete invisibility. I’ll show myself only to scholars and scientists of your choosing.” “What name shall I give you?” I asked. “You could not speak my real name. You may call me Provvorr. That sounds like the name of someone from another world--to you.” “Where is your world, Provvorr?” I asked. “What is it like?” “It’s far from your System. We’ll reach a point of en rapportment which will enable you to understand its location. But it is more important that I first know about you.” I sat down opposite him. “Do you intend to make war upon us?” I asked. “Have you drawn up a plan of conquest?” Shaking his head, he smiled again. “We have no such plan. We don’t understand killing and conquering. But when I bring my people back, we must understand how to survive here. Our world is overcrowded, exhausted. We’ll colonize this one.” “But you just said,” I reminded him gently, “that you didn’t want to conquer us.”