Zolto put the paper down. "This is the one," he said to his wife. "There can be no doubt that this person has found it." "I knew it was no longer in the alley," said Pojim. Ordinarily a comely female, she was now deep in thought, and succeeded in looking beautiful and pensive at the same time. "How are we to get it back without exciting unwelcome attention?" "Frankly," said Zolto, "I don't know. But we'd better think of a way. He must have mistaken it for a nut and swallowed it. Undoubtedly the hospital attendants will take X-rays of him and discover it." "They won't know what it is." "They will operate to remove it, and then they will find out." Pojim nodded. "What I don't understand," she said, "is why it had this effect. When we lost it, it was locked." "He must have opened it by accident. Some of these creatures, I have noticed, have a habit of trying to crack nuts with their teeth. He must have bitten on the proper switch." "The one for inanimate matter? I think, Zolto, that you're right. The stomach contents are collapsed and passed into our universe through the transfer. But the stomach itself, being part of a living creature, cannot pass through the same switch. And the poor creature continually loses weight because of metabolism. Especially, of course, when he eats." "Poor creature, you call him? You're too soft-hearted, Pojim. What do you think we'll be if we don't get the transfer back?" He hunched up his shoulders and laughed. Pojim said, "Control yourself, Zolto. When you laugh, you don't look human, and you certainly don't sound it." "What difference does it make? We're alone." "You can never tell when we'll be overheard." "Don't change the subject. What are we supposed to do about the transfer?" "We'll think of a way," said Pojim, but he could see she was worried. * * * * * In the hospital, they had put Ollie into a bed. They had wanted a nurse to bathe him, but he had objected violently to this indignity, and finally they had sent in a male orderly to do the job. Now, bathed, shaven and wearing a silly little nightgown that made him ashamed to look at himself, he was lying in bed, slowly starving to death. A dozen empty plates, the remains of assorted specialties of the hospital, filled with vitamins and other good things, lay around him. Everything had tasted fine while going down, but nothing seemed to have stuck to him. All he could do was brood about the puzzled and anxious looks on the doctors' faces when they examined him. The attack came without warning. One moment Ollie was lying there unhappily, suffering hunger pangs, and the next moment somebody had punched him in the stomach. The shock made him start and then look down. But there was nobody near him. The doctors had left him alone while they looked up articles in textbooks and argued with each other. He felt another punch, and then another and another. He yelled in fright and pain.