Crandon sighed. "I forgot how little you know, Don. I have a long story to tell you. You'll find it hard to believe at first. But try to trust me. Try to believe me, as you once did. When I say that much of what POSAT does is illegal, I do not mean immoral. We're probably the most moral organization in the world. Get over the idea that you have stumbled into a den of thieves." Crandon paused as though searching for words with which to continue. "Did you notice the paintings in the waiting room as you entered?" Don nodded, too bewildered to speak. "They were donated by the founder of our Organization. They were part of his personal collection--which, incidentally, he bought from the artists themselves. He also designed the atomic reactor we use for power here in the laboratory." "Then the pictures are modern," said Don, aware that his mouth was hanging open foolishly. "I thought one was a Titian--" "It is," said Crandon. "We have several original Titians, although I really don't know too much about them." "But how could a man alive _today_ buy paintings from an artist of the Renaissance?" "He is not alive today. POSAT is actually what our advertisements claim--an _ancient_ secret society. Our founder has been dead for over four centuries." "But you said that he designed your atomic reactor." "Yes. This particular one has been in use for only twenty years, however." Don's confusion was complete. Crandon looked at him kindly. "Let's start at the beginning," he said, and Don was back again in the classroom with the deep voice of Professor Crandon unfolding the pages of knowledge in clear and logical manner. "Four hundred years ago, in the time of the Italian Renaissance, a man lived who was a super-genius. His was the kind of incredible mentality that appears not in every generation, or even every century, but once in thousands of years. "Probably the man who invented what we call the phonetic alphabet was one like him. That man lived seven thousand years ago in Mesopotamia, and his discovery was so original, so far from the natural course of man's thinking, that not once in the intervening seven thousand years has that device been rediscovered. It still exists only in the civilizations to which it has been passed on directly. "The super-genius who was our founder was not a semanticist. He was a physical scientist and mathematician. Starting with the meager heritage that existed in these fields in his time, he began tackling physical puzzles one by one. Sitting in his study, using as his principal tool his own great mind, he invented calculus, developed the quantum theory of light, moved on to electromagnetic radiation and what we call Maxwell's equations--although, of course, he antedated Maxwell by centuries--developed the special and general theories of relativity, the tool of wave mechanics, and finally, toward the end of his life, he mathematically derived the packing fraction that describes the binding energy of nuclei--"