The Dictator's eyes glowed with a sudden energy. "When the Popo admits a mistake, there's really been one!" His breath whistled between his teeth. "I--begin to--see." He started pacing up and down the room. "The perfect weapon--an intelligent virus!" "Not intelligent," denied Euge heavily. "The day we develop a thinking virus here--a thing I do not believe possible--I will call for an atomic bomb to be dropped on the laboratory. RM4, evolved from an encephalitic measles strain, attacks primarily the brain--as it seems now, only certain types of brains. Of course, the data are insufficient. Some of the lower animals tested were immune--but you can't draw safe analogies between animals and men. I'll need more human material." "You'll get it!" The Dictator halted and stood very straight, glittering impressively in his uniform. "How many--" "This time I will need a control...." 3 So twenty-five healthy privates of the Dictator's Honor Guard, handpicked for courage, rigid honesty and selfless loyalty to the leader, were hospitalized and injected with potent doses of viciously lethal culture RM4-2197. They were told that it was a new immunization which would soon become regulation throughout the armed forces. And twenty-five prisoners, likewise healthy save for the twist in their minds that made them seditionists and rebels instead of Honor Guardsmen, received the same injection and were told the same story. The results were almost fantastically satisfactory. The twenty-five convicts died, one and all, with the uncontrolled spasms and twitchings, lapsing into stupor, that told of the virus' progress in the higher nerve centers. Their isolated barracks, together with the unimportant orderlies who had cared for it and the victims, were sterilized, almost obliterated by caustic chemicals and flame. Meantime the Honor Guard in their separate quarantine rolled dice and exchanged dirty jokes and felt no ill effects. The Dictator had commanded that he be first to know the outcome; he, who fancied himself as a poet of human destiny, also liked to think that he had a scientific mind, and in this matter, on which the world's future might hinge, he wished to make his own observations and draw his own conclusions. But promptly after receiving the news he visited Euge again to shower him with jubilant congratulations. "Now," he announced fervently, "we must have a final experiment, to be wholly sure. One on a far grander scale than before--than any experiment ever was before! I want a large supply of Virus RM4, in sealed cylinders of five or six liters each, under pressure. Prepared as for military use, you understand. The rest I will take care of." Euge bowed his head in acquiescence, and refrained from mentioning his mice. * * * * *