"I realize quite well," said Towne, frostily. "You're fighting an Alien who has slipped into our population, somehow, and just vanished. There's no way to tell what he wants or what he's doing. The potential danger of his presence is staggering. And you've fumbled and groaned for three weeks without even turning up a hot trail. You haven't even a coherent description of him--" "We're fighting a telepath," Roberts said softly. "An Alien with telepathic powers like nothing we've ever dreamed of. That's what we're fighting. And we're losing, too." The girl across the room stirred uneasily. Ben Towne's green eyes shot over to her viciously. "And you're using freaks like her to help him hide, I suppose." "Jean Sanders is not a freak." Roberts' voice grated in the still air of the room. "She's Psi-High, and she's the most valuable asset we've got in this search at the present moment. It's a real pity there aren't more Psi-Highs that have had her training." "And you sit there and tell me you'd dare use Psi-Highs in an investigation as critical as this?" Roberts sighed in disgust. "Councilman, you don't have any idea what you're saying." "I beg to differ," Towne's eyes flashed. "I happen to be aware that there are a group of individuals wandering around loose who will have this country in chains in a hundred years if they're allowed to develop as they please. Psi-Highs are a vicious menace, nothing more nor less. We can't help it that we have them. The fools in the government were blind two hundred years ago when they first started appearing, and psi-factors are gene-controlled. But they can't use their extra-sensory powers without training." He picked up the cane and leaned forward at Roberts. "Thanks to Reuben Abram's meddling over at the Hoffman Center, some of them are already developing their psi-faculties, learning to use a treacherous power that has no place in civilized society. Well, _I don't want them working in Security_! Is that clear enough?" Roberts sighed tiredly and leaned back in his chair. "You're confused a little," he said. "This is not the Rotary Club. It's not a Federal Isolationist rally, and it's not the Senate floor, either. It's just me you're talking to. And to my knowledge, you haven't succeeded as yet in removing all Psi-High rights. You've gotten laws through Congress to make them take tests and submit to registration; you've passed laws to prevent them from marrying; you've blocked their education and hamstrung their training and developement, but you _haven't_, as yet, been able to strip them of their citizenship--" "Not as yet," said Ben Towne. "And you can't, as yet, dictate the activities of the Federal Security Commission." "Not as yet."