“Well,” she began, marshalling her thoughts and words with care, “I was sound asleep in my beautypad when I got a call on the communicator. It must have been just about three a.m. It was one of the girls in compo-filing. She was watching a night club mike-jockey and she told me that Sven Ryan had just appeared on the screen, and wasn’t he supposed to be in Antarctica? It seems she filed your restraining message yesterday afternoon.” “Good girls, both of you,” said Hamilton warmly. To his surprise, Miss Alderman choked on her coffee. For some reason, her reaction reminded him of Ian Harris’ inexplicable embarrassment in his office earlier. When she had recovered herself, Miss Alderman said, “I’m sorry, Chief. But I think you’ll understand when I tell you that by the time I got myself together and over to the club our crazy genius was sitting at a table swathed in three of Molly Sadler’s choicest items--one blonde, one redhead, and one brunette. You never saw such--er--figures.” Hamilton could not help smiling. His use of the phrase _good girls_ in even remote connotation with any of Molly Sadler’s justly renowned Cyprians was more than amusing. He said, “You underrate me, Nancy. How did Ryan react when he saw you?” “It was odd.” She told him. “Mind you, he was very drunk, and by the time I managed to get him halfway reassembled he couldn’t remember any of it. But I’d be willing to swear he said, ‘Lord! Another vulture! And I fled Antarctica to get away from all of you. But where’s your black mustache?’” She stroked her perfectly smooth upper lip, looking faintly troubled. Then she said, “I don’t have a mustache, do I, Chief?” He replied, “No, of course not, but Ia--” He caught it barely in time. And, in spite of himself, he grimaced, envisioning what must have happened. Evidently Ryan, loaded and ready for “tiger hunting,” had headed for Molly Sadler’s famous non-home and discovered the impeccable, imperturbable, and immovable Ian Harris already there. “What’s the matter, Chief?” Miss Alderman stared at him with curiosity snapping in her wide-set black eyes. “Nothing,” said Alderman. “Tell you later. How did you manage to get him away from the bevy? From what I’ve heard about Molly’s girls--” He let it hang. “Chief, all I can tell you after last night is that everything you hear isn’t half the truth,” she said solemnly. “If I had a quarter of the--well, I’ll just say that if I had a certain kind of glamor I’d never have wasted a fourth of my life becoming college-trained to spend the best years of my youth behind a desk--even a very nice desk.” “You’ll do--anywhere,” he told her. Then, frowning, “Among the interesting things I’ve heard about Molly’s girls is that some of them have college degrees too. Was Ryan talking?” “He certainly was,” said Miss Alderman promptly. “He was beguiling his harem with promises to ship each of them an Antarctic rock-diamond every week, by instant teleportation.”