The little man led him down a dim corridor into a side room, one entire wall of which was an unlit video screen. "You'll have total privacy in here," Martinez assured him. He did things to a dial set in the right-hand wall, and murmured a few words. The screen began to glow. "You can call me when you're through," Martinez said. He seemed to glide out of the room, leaving Walton alone with Fred. The huge screen was like a window directly into Fred's cell. Walton met his brother's bitter gaze head on. Fred looked demonic. His eyes were ringed by black shadows; his hair was uncombed, his heavy-featured face unwashed. He said, "Welcome to my palatial abode, dearest brother." "Fred, don't make it hard for me. I came here to try to clarify things. I didn't _want_ to stick you away here. I _had_ to." Fred smiled balefully. "You don't need to apologize. It was entirely my fault. I underestimated you; I didn't realize you had changed. I thought you were the same old soft-hearted dope I grew up with. You aren't." "Possibly." Walton wished he had taken that benzolurethrin after all. Every nerve in his body seemed to be jumping. He said, "I found out today that Lamarre's dead." "So?" "So there's no possible way for Popeek to obtain the immortality serum except through you. Fred, I need that serum. I've promised it to the alien in exchange for colonization rights on Procyon VIII." "A neat little package deal," Fred said harshly. "_Quid pro quo._ Well, I hate to spoil it, but I'm not going to tell where the _quo_ lies hidden. You're not getting that serum out of me." "I can have you mind blasted," Walton said. "They'll pick your mind apart and strip it away layer by layer until they find what they want. There won't be much of _you_ left by then, but we'll have the serum." "No go. Not even you can swing that deal," Fred said. "You can't get a mind-pick permit on your lonesome: you need the President's okay. It takes at least a day to go through channels--half a day, if you pull rank. And by that time, Roy, I'll be out of here." "What?" "You heard me clear enough. _Out._ Seems you're holding me here on pretty tenuous grounds. Habeas corpus hasn't been suspended yet, Roy, and Popeek isn't big enough to do it. I've got a writ. I'll be sprung at 1500 today." "I'll have you back in by 1530," Walton said angrily. "We're picking up di Cassio and that whole bunch. That'll be sufficient grounds to quash your habeas corpus." "Ah! Maybe so," Fred said. "But I'll be out of here for half an hour. That's long enough to let the world know how you exercised an illegal special privilege and spared Philip Prior from Happysleep. Wiggle out of that one, then." Walton began to sweat. Fred had him neatly nailed this time.