Kantum Shogan raised his hand in a gesture that enjoined silence. "I repeat," he said, "that we regret the necessity, but there is nothing more to be said upon the subject. Your accomplishments are not such as to outweigh your inherited defects. This is unfortunate, but of course Havatoo cannot be expected to suffer because of it." * * * * * So I was to die! After all that I had passed through it verged upon the ridiculous that I should die thus tamely simply because one of my ancestors failed to exercise a little intelligence in the selection of his bride. And to come all this long way just to die! It made me smile. "Why do you smile?" inquired a member of the board. "Does death seem an amusing thing to you? Or do you smile because you expect to escape death through some ruse?" "I smile," I replied, "when perhaps I should weep--weep at the thought of all the toil and knowledge and energy that were wasted to transport me twenty-six million miles just to die because five men of another world believe that I have inherited some bad genes." "Twenty-six million miles!" exclaimed a member of the board; and a second: "Another world! What do you mean?" "I mean that I came here from another world twenty-six million miles from Amtor," I replied. "A world much further advanced in some respects than yours." The members of the board stared at each other. I heard one of them remark to another: "This bears out the theory that many of us have long held." "Most interesting, and not improbable," said another. "You say that Amtor is not the only world?" demanded Kantum Shogan; "that there is another?" "The heavens are filled with countless worlds," I replied. "Your world and mine and at least eight other worlds revolve around a great ball of flaming gases that we call a sun, and this sun with its worlds or planets is called a solar system. The illimitable void of the heavens is starred with countless other suns, many of which are the centers of other solar systems; and no man knows how many worlds there are." "Wait!" said Kantum Shogan. "You have said enough to suggest that our examination of you may have been faulty in that it presumed that we possessed the sum total of available human knowledge. Now it appears that you may possess knowledge of such vast importance as to outweigh the biological inadequacies inherent in you. "We shall question you further upon the subject of this theory which you have propounded, and in the meantime the execution of our sentence is postponed. Our final decision as to your future will depend upon the outcome of this further questioning. Science may ignore no possible source of knowledge, and if your theory is sound and opens a new field to science, you shall be free to enjoy Havatoo for life; nor shall you go unhonored."