Troubled Star A Novel by GEORGE O. SMITH [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Startling Stories, February 1953. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] FOREWARD--EN SAGA At least once in every generation there turns up a person who is embarrassing to the Custodians of History. With neither talent nor ambition, nor studious application nor admirable character, this person succeeds where the bright and the studious and the intellectually honest would have failed miserably. Stubborn, egocentric, vain--often stupid--our person blunders in where the wise and the sincere would not dare. His hide is thicker than that of the rhinoceros. He is not abashed to tell the surgeon where to ply his scalpel, or to instruct the statesman on a course of diplomacy. His little knowledge is a dangerous thing--for other people. His success is due to the law of averages. History holds many accounts where the brave and the brilliant have stepped in at the right time to avoid disaster. Yet there are more bums than geniuses, more cowards than heroes and more laziness than ambition in our human race, so it is not surprising that there should be occasions when a bum or a self-centered braggart should find that history has a special niche waiting for him. I They were parked on the dark side of Mercury, snug and comfortable in their hemisphere of force that kept out the cold and kept in the air. At one side where force met ground, a tall silvery spacecraft rose like a chimney. They were three: Chat Honger was tall, red-headed, and thin faced. He looked as though he were incapable of quieting down, but he was really the type of person who has an incredible amount of patience for things which cannot be performed in a hurry. Bren Fallow was shorter than Chat Honger, darker, stouter, more round of face and more amiable. Definitely, Bren was the methodical type. The third man was Scyth Radnor. Scyth was the kind of man who is quick to grasp a new idea and as quick to reduce it to practise. His failing was that he seldom looked deep or planned far ahead. Being quick of mind he preferred to play everything by ear because planning required study, and Scyth felt that study for the sake of study consumed too much time--time that could better be spent in the pursuit of fun and games. Teach them the language and drop them in Greater New York and they would be lost among Manhattan's millions. Better change their clothing, though. Striped shorts, Greek sandals, a Sam Browne belt across a bare chest, and a Roman toga of iridescent changing hues is not the kind of costume seen on Fifth Avenue.