Whyte's eager-beaver attitude did not change; his face reflected nothing of what Kinnison thought of this callous speech. For Kinnison did know exactly what a space-louse was. More, he knew exactly what turned a man into one. Ex-meteor miner himself, he knew what the awesome depths of space, the ever-present dangers, the privations, the solitude, the frustrations, did to any mind not adequately integrated. He knew that only the strong survived; that the many weak succumbed. From sickening memory he knew just what pitiful wrecks those many became. Nevertheless, and despite the fact that the information was not necessary: "Where is this Eddie now?" "That's him, over there in the corner. By the way he's acting, he'll have another fit pretty quick now." The shambling travesty of a man accepted avidly the invitation to table and downed at a gulp the proffered drink. Then, as though the mild potion had been a trigger, his wracked body tensed and his features began to writhe. "Cateagles!" he screamed; eyes rolling, breath coming in hard, frantic gasps. "Gangs of cateagles! Thousands! They're clawing me to bits! And the Lensman! He's sicking them on! OW!! Yow!!!" He burst into unintelligible screams and threw himself to the floor. There, rolling convulsively over and over, he tried the impossible feat of covering simultaneously with his two clawlike hands his eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and throat. Ignoring the crowding spectators, Kinnison invaded the helpless mind before him. He winced mentally as he photographed upon his own brain the whole atrocious enormity of what was there. Then, while Whyte busily scribbled notes, he shot a thought to distant Klovia. * * * * * "Cliff! I'm here in Jack's Haven, and I've got Eddie's data. What did you and Conklin make of it? You agree, of course, that the Lensman is the crux." "Definitely. Everything else is hop-happy space-drift. The fact that there are not--there _can't_ be--any such Lensman as Eddie imagined, makes him space-drift, too, in our opinion. We called you in on the millionth chance--sorry that we sent you out on a false alarm, but you said we had to be sure." "You needn't be sorry." Kinnison's thought was the grimmest Clifford Maitland had ever felt. "Eddie isn't an ordinary space-louse. You see, I happen to know one thing that you and Conklin don't, since you've never been there. Did you happen to notice a woman in the picture? Very faint; decidedly in the background?" "Now that you mention her--yes, there was one. So far in the background and so faint that it never occurred to either Conklin or me that she could be connected. How can she possibly have any bearing, Kim? Most every spaceman has a woman--or a lot of different ones--more or less on his mind all the time, you know. Definitely immaterial and not germane, I'd say." "So would I, maybe, except for the fact that she isn't really a woman at all, but a Lyranian--"