The _Pleiades_ had landed at ten o'clock in the forenoon, local time; the banquet did not come to an end until long after midnight. Throughout all this time the four Galaxians carried on, without a slip, the act that all this was, to them, old stuff. It was just a little before daylight when they returned, exhausted, to the ship. ComOff Flurnoy went with them. She was still agog at the wonder of it all as Belle and Brownie showed her to her quarters. CHAPTER 7 Since everyone, including the ebullient ComOff, slept late the following morning, they all had brunch instead of breakfast and lunch. All during the meal Garlock was preoccupied and stern. "Hold everything for a while, Jim," he said, when everyone had eaten. "Before we move, Belle and I have got to have a conference." "Not a Fatso Ferber nine-o'clock type, I hope." James frowned in mock reproach and ComOff Flurnoy cocked an eyebrow in surprise. "Monkey-business on company time is only for Big Shots like him; not for small fry such as you." "Well, it won't be exclusively monkey-business, anyway. While we're gone you might clear with the control tower and take us up into take-off position. Come on, Belle." He took her by one elbow and led her away. "Why, _Doctor Garlock_." Mincing along beside him, pretending high reluctance, she looked up at him wide-eyed. "I'm _surprised_, I really am. I'm _shocked_, too. I'm _not_ that kind of a _girl_, and if I wasn't _afraid_ of losing my _job_ I would _scream_. I _never_ even _suspected_ that _you_ would use your _position_ as my _boss_ to _force_ your _unwelcome attentions_ on a _poor_ and _young_ and _innocent_ and _suffering_...." [Illustration: In an unparalleled blast of Gunther power the primes of many worlds head toward the meeting on Tellus.] Inside his room Garlock, who had been grinning, sobered down and checked every Gunther block--a most unusual proceeding. * * * Belle stopped joking in the middle of the sentence. "Yeah, _how_ you suffer," he said. "I was just checking to be sure we're prime-proof. I'm not ready for Deggi Delcamp yet. That guy, Belle, as you probably noticed, has got one God-awful load of stuff." "Not as much as you have, Clee. Nor as much push behind what he has got. And his shield wouldn't make patches for yours." "Huh? How sure are you of that?" "I'm positive. I'm the one who is going to get bumped, I'm afraid. That Fao Talaho is a hard-hitting, hard-boiled hellcat on wheels." "I'll be damned. You're wrong. I checked her from stem to gudgeon and you lay over her like a circus tent. What's the answer?" "Oh? Do I? I'm mighty glad ... funny, both of us being wrong ... it must be, Clee, that it's sex-based differences. We're used to each other, but neither of us has ever felt a Prime of the same sex before, and there must be more difference between Ops and Primes than we realized. Suppose?"