Sethos frowned. The idea that the world was so large fascinated him. As his contemporaries and their ancestors for unknown generations, Sethos had passed from dreamy childhood directly into the dream of adult life. He could barely recall the days of education, when drugged smoke and liquor were withheld, and life consisted of a different fairy world. How he had loved the gay mechanoid nurses, with their tinkling arms and bright colors! But of their world, the vast reaches of the planet outside the tiny circle of men, he knew very little. One fact was plain to him: it was unthinkably huge. Sudden music poured from the house, gay and fast. "Ha! The dancers!" exclaimed Paton, seeing the rows of gyrating figures beyond a pink translucent wall. "You must excuse me. I promised Matya I would watch her dance tonight." Paton hurried away, leaving Sethos to wander along the dimly lighted terrace. The party had lightened his senses as expected, yet his thoughts were heavy. He remembered the library, and the strange legends in the books. Legends of ancient cities of men, over all the earth, and of the prehistoric machines used by men to travel great distances. And always in the old legends men were very much like the industrious mechanoids--ever building, ever moving.... How he wished he might live in those days! He knew the pleasure of creating, for he had been acclaimed a genius in music before he was twenty, and his mastery of painting and architecture had won the admiration of all the human zone. Still, he was not satisfied, and often lay awake in the early hours of morning after a stirring party, dreaming of those long-gone days of empire, when he could have ridden with the ancients through the sky on their winged craft, see their cities rise toward the clouds, experience the exciting pace of that life. What remarkable ambitions they must have had! * * * * * As Sethos reached the end of the terrace, he was hailed by a garmenter named Brin, standing with a group of men around a light projector. The colors sprayed up about their faces, matching the gaudy orange of Brin's trousers and the blue of his little plumed hat. "Greetings, Sethos! How are the crops up North? Still live with Ela?" "They're fine, Brin. Live with Ela? No more than anyone else these days." Brin chuckled. "A neat remark, Seth--I must remember it to your true love the next time I have reason to see her." The men laughed appreciatively, the colors wheeling in rhythm across their grinning faces. Suddenly three young women converged on the group, having spied Sethos from inside. "Oh, Sethos!" one cried. "How wonderful you're here!" "Are you still composing that _magnificent_ diphonic music?" asked another breathlessly.