“That’s what I mean. From our viewpoint, there’s no sense to it. We do things illogically, but only because they tell us to. Everything we do, almost, is pure illogic. Poe’s _Imp of the Perverse_—you could give it another name beginning with M. Martian, I mean. It’s all very well for psychologists to explain why a murderer wants to confess, but it’s still an illogical reaction. Unless a Martian commands him to.” “You can’t be hypnotized into doing anything that violates your moral sense,” the brown man said triumphantly. * * * * * Lyman frowned. “Not by another human, but you can by a Martian. I expect they got the upper hand when we didn’t have more than ape-brains, and they’ve kept it ever since. They evolved as we did, and kept a step ahead. Like the sparrow on the eagle’s back who hitch-hiked till the eagle reached his ceiling, and then took off and broke the altitude record. They conquered the world, but nobody ever knew it. And they’ve been ruling ever since.” “But—” “Take houses, for example. Uncomfortable things. Ugly, inconvenient, dirty, everything wrong with them. But when men like Frank Lloyd Wright slip out from under the Martians’ thumb long enough to suggest something better, look how the people react. They hate the thought. That’s their Martians, giving them orders.” “Look. Why should the Martians care what kind of houses we live in? Tell me that.” Lyman frowned. “I don’t like the note of skepticism I detect creeping into this conversation,” he announced. “They care, all right. No doubt about it. They _live_ in our houses. We don’t build for our convenience, we build, under order, for the Martians, the way they want it. They’re very much concerned with everything we do. And the more senseless, the more concern. “Take wars. Wars don’t make sense from any human viewpoint. Nobody really wants wars. But we go right on having them. From the Martian viewpoint, they’re useful. They give us a spurt in technology, and they reduce the excess population. And there are lots of other results, too. Colonization, for one thing. But mainly technology. In peace time, if a guy invents jet-propulsion, it’s too expensive to develop commercially. In war-time, though, it’s got to be developed. Then the Martians can use it whenever they want. They use us the way they’d use tools or—or limbs. And nobody ever really wins a war—except the Martians.” The man in the brown suit chuckled. “That makes sense,” he said. “It must be nice to be a Martian.” “Why not? Up till now, no race ever successfully conquered and ruled another. The underdog could revolt or absorb. If you know you’re being ruled, then the ruler’s vulnerable. But if the world doesn’t know—and it doesn’t—