"Enough! Enough!" Ryt hit the desk before him a ponderous blow. "Silence, fool, while I think!" * * * * * Krembyl turned a sickly shade of green and let the document close in weary hands. Sol III had been a particularly painful lancet in his side, even more so than had yet been guessed. He hoped the inspector would probe no deeper. But even as his hopes kindled, they became but ashes. "There are a few more things I do not understand about this," Inspector Ryt was saying. "When this planet was formed from the elements of space, there was no contamination. It was virgin. And, yet, it is now contaminated. Why?" Krembyl felt his inners churning fearfully. His whole body was so filled with trembling that he could not bring himself to fashion words. Ryt's body grew blacker in the silence. "_Why?_" The word was lightning from the Stygian depths. "WHY?" Krembyl's body rent asunder, and the effort of reknitting himself so weakened him that his voice was scarcely a whisper. "They--they came from Sol V, sir." The thunderous blow upon the desk top mingled with Ryt's bellow of fury. Together, the sounds shook the room and nearly disintegrated Krembyl's hastily reassembled body. "Dolt! Ass!" screamed Ryt, his body assuming the blackness of the dust cloud of Orion. "You failed to stop them on Sol V! You not only let them blow the planet into tiny bits, but you also let them escape to Sol III! And here all your efforts of extermination have failed again and again!" He wheeled to look through the lens again. Three brilliant flashes, greater than the others, sparkled almost simultaneously upon the planet's troubled surface, sent up mushrooms of dust and shattered atoms. "And is this what happened on Sol V?" "Y-yes," stammered Krembyl. "The same thing. Just before ... just before...." He could not bring himself to complete the statement. Ryt leaped from the seat at the desk, his body black and bloated. "Then there is not a moment to lose! Exterminate before this planet is destroyed! And let none escape!" "But, sir," pleaded Krembyl, "I have tried everything--fire, floods, ice...." "Then try something else!" Ryt roared. Krembyl drifted slowly towards the door. "Wait!" Krembyl stopped obediently. "What about Sol IV?" "Oh, Sol IV is all right, sir." Krembyl brightened a shade as he turned. "There is not the slightest trace of contamination. That planet must have been on the far side of Sol when--when they escaped Sol V. I am certain, sir, you will find the rest of the system quite in order...." "Enough! Begin the extermination! And this time employ drastic measures. Take the planet to the rim of Sol itself and bake it to a crisp before they infest the entire galaxy." "Yes, sir. Immediately, sir." Krembyl turned again to the door, thankful his fate had not been worse.