"My plan is to--you understand it's not just my plan, but only a small part in a great plan, a plan to save us all--my plan is to kidnap Prince Let from the palace. That's the part that we must do. Are you with me, friends?" A yell rose, and somebody had started a friendly fight at the end of the bar. Then Geryn's voice suddenly broke through the sound, low, in a grating whisper that silenced them for seconds. "Because you must be with me! The time is tonight. I have ... I have it planned." The voices halted, and then heaved to a roar. "Tonight," repeated Geryn, though hardly anyone could hear him. "I have it planned. Only you've got to be ... be with me." Tel frowned and Alter shook her head. The old man had closed his eyes for a moment. Rara was beside him, her hand on his shoulder. "You're going to get yourself sick with all this yelling. Let me get you up to your room." As she turned him toward the stairs, the scarred giant who had been given a drink, now rose from the table, looked straight at Geryn, then drained his glass. Geryn nodded, drew a breath through his teeth, and then allowed Rara to lead him up the stairs as Tel and Alter watched. The noise among the drinking men and women at the bar increased. CHAPTER IV She made a note on her pad, put down her slide rule, and picked up a pearl snap with which she fastened together the shoulder panels of her white dress. The maid said, "Ma'am, shall I do your hair now?" "One second," Clea said. She turned to page 328 of her integral tables, checked the increment of sub-cosine A plus B over the _n_th root of A to the _n_th plus B to the _n_th, and transferred it to her notebook. "Ma'am?" asked the maid. She was a thin woman, about thirty. The little finger of her left hand was gone. "You can start now." Clea leaned back in the beauty-hammock and lifted the dark mass of her hair from her neck. The maid caught the ebony wealth with one hand and reached for the end of the four yards of silver chain strung with alternate pearls and diamonds each inch and a half. "Ma'am?" asked the maid again. "What are you figuring on?" "I'm trying to determine the inverse sub-trigonometric functions. Dalen Golga, he was my mathematics professor at the university, discovered the regular ones, but nobody's come up with the inverses yet." "Oh," said the maid. She ceased weaving the jeweled chain a moment, took a comb, and whipped it through a cascade of hair that fell back on Clea's shoulder. "Eh ... what are you going to do with them, once you find them?" "Actually," said Clea. "Ouch ..." "Oh, pardon me, I'm sorry, please ..."