"David, are you sure about those last lines?" She smiled apologetically. "I know I'm old-fashioned, but couldn't you change that? It seems so ... so harsh. And I think you may have unconsciously borrowed it from someone else. I can't help thinking I've heard it before, somewhere? Don't you think so?" "I don't know, dear. You may be right about that word, but it doesn't really matter, does it? I mean, I'm not going to try to get it published, or anything." "_I_ know, dear, but still--" He was looking at her desperately. "I'm sorry, dear!" she said contritely. "Please go on. Don't pay any attention to my stupid comments." "They're not stupid--" "Please, dear. Go on." His fingers clamped on the edge of the notebook. "_Unnumbered we must wander, Break, and bleed, and die. Implacable as ocean, Our tide must drown the sky._ "_What is our expiation, For what primeval crime, That we must go on marching Until the crash of time?_ "_What hand has shaped so cruelly? What whim has cast such fate? Where is, in our creation, The botch that makes us great?_" "Oh, that's good, darling! That's very good. I'm proud of you, David." "I think it stinks," he said evenly, "but, anyway, there are two more verses." "_David!_" Grimly, he spat out the last eight lines. "_Why are we ever gimleted By empire's irony? Is discontent the cancered price Of Earthman's galaxy?_" Leonora, recoiling from his cold fury, was a shaking pair of shoulders and a mass of lank hair supported by her hands on her face while she sobbed. "_Are our souls so much perverted? Can we not relent? Or are the stars the madman's cost For his inborn discontent?_ "Good night, Leonora." VI. The light flickered on Marlowe's interphone. "Good morning, Mr. Secretary." "Good morning, Mary. What's up?" "Harrison's being deported from Dovenil, sir. There's a civil crime charged against him. Quite a serious one." Marlowe's eyebrows went up. "How much have we got on it?" "Not too much, sir. Harrison's report hasn't come in yet. But the story's on the news broadcasts now, sir. We haven't been asked to comment yet, but Emigration has been called by several news outlets, and the Ministry for Education just called here and inquired whether it would be all right to publish a general statement of their exchange students' careful instructions against violating local customs." Marlowe's glance brooded down on the mass of papers piled in the tray of his IN box. "Give me a tape of a typical broadcast," he said at last. "Hold everything else. Present explanation to all news outlets: None now, statement forthcoming after preliminary investigation later in the day. The Ministry regrets this incident deeply, and will try to settle matters as soon and as amicably as possible, et cetera, et cetera. O.K.?" "Yes, sir."