"Certainly not--what do you mean?" "Huh? Don't you know even that she's a Boskonian agent of some kind?" "Man, you're crazy! She isn't an agent, she can't be. Why, she's the daughter of a Planetary Councillor, the wife of one of our most loyal officers." "She would be. That's the type they like to get hold of." "Prove it!" the Admiral snapped. "Prove it or retract it!" He almost lost his poise, almost looked toward the distant corner in which the bewhiskered gentleman was sitting so idly. "QX. If she isn't an agent, why is she wearing a thought-screen? You haven't tested her, of course." Of course not. The amenities, as has been said, demanded that certain reserves of privacy remain inviolate. The Tellurian went on: "You didn't, but I did. On this job I can recognize nothing of good taste, of courtesy, of chivalry, or even of ordinary common decency. I suspect _everyone_ who does not wear a Lens." "A thought-screen!" exclaimed Gerrond. "How could she, without armor?" "It's a late model--brand new. Just as good and just as powerful as the one I myself am wearing," Kinnison explained. "The mere fact that she's wearing it gives me a lot of highly useful information." "What do you want me to do about her?" the Admiral asked. He was mentally asquirm, but he was a Lensman. "Nothing whatever--except possibly, for our own information, to find out how many of her friends have become thionite-sniffers lately. If you do anything, you may warn them, although I know nothing definite about which to caution you. I'll handle her. Don't worry too much, though; I don't think she's anybody we really want. Afraid she's small fry--no such luck as that I'd get hold of a big one so soon." "I hope she's small fry." Gerrond's thought was a grimace of distaste. "I hate Boskonia as much as anybody does, but I don't relish the idea of having to put that girl into the Chamber." "If my picture is half right she can't amount to much," Kinnison replied. "A good lead is the best I can expect. I'll see what I can do." For days, then, the searching Lensman pried into minds: so insidiously that he left no trace of his invasions. He examined men and women, of high and of low estate. Waitresses and ambassadors, flunkies and bankers, ermined prelates and truck drivers. He went from city to city. Always, but with only a fraction of his brain, he played the part of Chester Q. Fordyce; ninety-nine percent of his stupendous mind was probing, searching and analyzing. Into what charnel pits of filth and corruption he delved, into what fastnesses of truth and loyalty and high courage and ideals, must be left entirely to the imagination; for the Lensman never has spoken and never will speak of these things.