And still sat.

And remained seated.

Deere walked over to him and looked down. "What is the fifth act of madness?"

"There isn"t any."

More quickly than anyone could follow, he had swiveled back and his head had revolved on his head in a blur, "There isn"t any?"

"I"m going to sit here and not do any more."

The crowd murmured again. "What?" cried Deere. "What do you mean, you won"t do any more? We set you five. You"ve done four. Why no fifth?"

"Because if I don"t do a fifth, you"ll kill me, and I think that"s mad enough even for you."Though Deere"s back was turned and he was walking away, Themus was certain he heard, "Five," from somewhere.

"They want you to come back here again after you"ve seen my uncle," said Darfla, a definite chill in her voice.

They were walking briskly down a moving traverseway, the girl a few steps ahead of the Watcher.

Themus knew he had a small problem on his hands.

"Look, Darfla, I"m sorry about that back there, but it was my life or a little embarra.s.sment for you. It was the first thing I could bring to mind, and I had to stall for time. I"m really sorry, but I"m sure they"ve seen a woman naked before, and you must have been naked before a man before so it shouldn"t-"

Themus fell silent. The continued down the traverseway, Darfla striding forward, anger evident in each long step.

Finally the girl came to an intersection of belt-strips and agilely swung across till she was on the slowest moving outer belt. She stepped off, took several rapid steps to lose momentum, and turned to Themus.

"We"d better stop in here for a moment and get you something to wear over that Watcher uniform. It isn"t hard to avoid the Stuffed-Shirts, " she said, looking at him with disparagement, "but there"s no sense taking foolish chances."

She indicated a small shop that was all window and no door, with a hastily painted message across one of the panes. ELGIS THE COSTUMER and IF WE DON"T GOT IT, IT AIN"T WORTH HAVING! They entered through a cleverly designed window that spun on a center-pin.

Inside the shop Darfla spoke briefly to a tall, thin Crackpot in black half-mask and body-tight black suit. He disappeared down a shaft in the floor from which stuck a shining pole.

The girl pulled a bolt of cloth off a corner of the counter and perched herself, with trim legs crossed. Themus stood looking at the shop.

It was a costumer"s all right, and with an arrangement and selection of fantastic capacities. Clothing ranged from rustic Kyben farmgarb to the latest spun plastene fibers from allover the Galaxy. He was marveling at the endless varieties of clothing when the tall, thin Crackpot slid back up the pole.

He stepped off onto the floor, much to Themus" amazement, and no elevator-disc followed him. It appeared that the man had come up the pole the same way he had gone down, without mechanical a.s.sistance. Themus was long past worrying over such apparent inconsistencies. He shrugged and looked at the suit the fellow had brought up with him.

Ten minutes later he looked at the suit on himself, in a full-length mirror-cube, and smiled at his sudden change from Undercla.s.s Watcher Themus to a sheeted and fetish-festooned member of the Toad-Revelers cult found on Fewb-huh IV.

His earrings hung in shining loops to his shoulders, and the bag of toad-shavings on his belt felt heavier than he thought it should. He pulled the drawstring on the bag and gasped. They were toad-shavings. He tucked the bottom folds of the multi-colored sheet into his boot-tops, swung the lantern onto his back, and looked at Darfla in expectation.

He caught her grinning, and when he, too, smiled, her face went back to its recent stoniness.

Darfla made some kind of arrangement with Elgis, shook his hand, bit his ear, said, "How are the twins, Elgis?" to which the costumer replied, "Eh"" in a lackadaisical tone, and they left.

The rest of the trip through the patchwork-quilt of Valasah was spent in silence.

The Crackpots were not what they seemed. Of that Themus was certain. He had been very stupid not to notice it before, and he thought the Watchers must be even mote stupid for not having seen it in all their hundreds of years on Kyba.

But there was a factor he did not possess. Garbage and water that ran in different directions through the same pipe, a beggar that knew how many coins he had in his pocket, a girl who could rip out the innards of a dicto-box, leaving it so it would work-and somehow he was now certain it would work-without a human behind it, and a full-sized cave built inside a concrete block. These were not the achievements of madmen.

But they were mad!

They had to be. All the things which seemed mysterious and superhuman were offset by a million acts of out-and-out insanity. They lived in a world of no standardization, no conformity at all. There was no way to gauge the way these people would act, as you could with the Kyben of the stars. It was-it was-well, insane!

Themus" nose itched in confusion, but he refrained from unseemly scratching.

"Don"t I look like Santa Claus?" he said.

"Who?" asked Themus, looking at the roly-poly florid face and bushy beard. He tried to ignore the jaggedly yellow scar that reached from temple to temple.

"Santa Claus, Santa Claus, you lout? Haven"t you ever heard of the Earthmen"s mythical hero, Santa Claus?

He was the hero of the Battle of the Alamo, he discovered what they call The Great Pyramid of Gizeh, he was the greatest drinker of milk out of wooden shoes that planet ever knew!"

"What"s milk?" asked Themus.

"Lords, what a clod!" He screwed up his lips in a childish pout. "I did immense research work on the subject.

Immense!" Then he muttered, under his breath, almost an afterthought, "Immense."

The old man was frightened. It showed, even through the joviality of his garb and appearance.Themus could not understand the old man. He looked as though he would be quite the maddest of the lot, but he talked in a soft, almost whispering voice, lucidly, and for the most part of familiar things. Yet there was something about him which set him apart from the other Crackpots. He did not have the wild-eyed look.

No one was saying anything and the sounds of their breathing in the bas.e.m.e.nt hide-out was loud in Themus"

ears. " Are you Boolbak, the steel-pincher?" the Watcher asked, to make conversation. It seemed like the thing to say.

The bearded oldster shifted his position on the coal pile on which he was sitting, blackening his beard, covering his red suit with dust. His voice changed from a whisper to a shrill. " A spy! A spy! They"ve come after me.

You"ll do it to me! You"ll bend it! Get away from me, get away from me, gedda way from me, geddawayfromee!" The old man was peering out from over the top of the pile, pointing a shaking finger at Themus.

"Uncle Boolbak!" Darfla"s brows drew down and she clapped her hands together. The old man stopped shouting and looked at her.

"What?" he asked, pouting childishly.

"He"s no spy, whatever he is," she said, casting a definitely contemptuous glance at Themus. "He was a Watcher alerted to find you. I liked him," she said looking toward the ceiling to find salvation for such a foul deed, "and I thought that it was about time you stopped this nonsense of yours and spoke to one of them. So I brought him here."

"Nonsense? Nonsense, is it! Well, you"ve sealed my doom, girl! Now they"ll bend it around your poor uncle"s head as sure as Koobis and Poorah rise every morning. Oh, what have you done ?"

The girl shook her head sadly, "Oh, stop it, will you. No one wants to hurt you. Show him your steel-pinching."

"No!" he answered, pouting again. Themus watched in amazement. The man was senile. He was a tottering, doddering child. Of what possible use could he be ? Of what possible interest could he be to both the Watchers and the Crackpots, who had tried to stop Darfla"s bringing him here?

Suddenly the old man smiled secretly and moved in closer, sidling up to the Watcher as though he had a treasure everyone was after. He made small motions with his pudgy fingers, indicating he wanted Themus" attention, his patience, his silence, and his ear, in that order. It was a most eloquent motioning, and Themus found he was complying, though no vocal request had been made. He bent closer.

Uncle Boolbak dug into a pocket of the red coal-coated jacket, and fished out a cane-shaped, striped piece of candy. "Want a piece of candy? Huh, want it, huh?"

Themus felt an urge to bolt and run, but he summoned all his dignity and said, "I"m Themus, Undercla.s.s Watcher, and I was told you-pitch steel. Is that right?"

For a moment the old man looked unhappy that the Watcher did not want any candy, then suddenly his face hardened. The eyes lost their twinkle and looked like two cold diamonds blazing at him. Boolbak"s voice, too, became harder, more mature, actually older. "Yes, that"s right, I "pinch" steel, as you put it. You wonder what that means, eh?"

Themus found himself unable to talk. The man"s whole demeanor had changed. The Watcher suddenly felt like a child before a great intellect. He could only nod.

"Here. Let me show you." The old man went behind the furnace and brought out two plates of steel. From a workbench along one wall he took a metal punch and double-headed hammer. He threw down one of the plates, and handed Themus the punch and hammer.

"Put a hole in this with that punch," he said, motioning Themus toward the other plate, which he had laid flat on the workbench.

Themus hesitated. ""Come, come, boy. Don"t dawdle."

The Watcher stepped to the workbench, set the punch on the plate and tapped lightly till he had a hole started. Then he placed the punch in it again and brought the hammer down on its head with two swift strokes. The clangs rang loud in the dim bas.e.m.e.nt. The punch sank through the plate and went a quarter-inch into the table. "I didn"t hit it very hard," Themus explained, looking over his shoulder at "Santa Claus,"

"That"s all right. It"s very soft steel. Too many impurities. Kyben s.p.a.cecraft are made of a steel which isn"t too much better than this, though they back it with strong reinforcers. Now watch."

He took the plate in his hand, holding it between thumb and forefinger at one comer, letting it hang down, With the other hand he pinched it at the opposite comer, pressing thumb and forefinger together tightly.

The plate crumbled to dust, drifting down over the old man"s pinching hand in a bright stream.

Themus" mouth opened of its own accord, his chest tightened. Such a thing wasn"t possible. The old man was a magician.

The dust glowed up at him from the floor. It was slightly luminous. He goggled, unable to help himself.

"Now," said Boolbak, talking the other plate. "Put a hole in this one."

Themus found he was unable to lift the hammer. His hands refused to obey. One did not see such things and remain untouched.

"Snap out of it, boy! Come on, punch!" The old man"s voice was commanding; Themus broke his trance.

He placed the punch on the second plate and in three heavy blows had gone through it and into the table again.

"Fine, fine," said Uncle Boolbak, holding the second plate as he had the first. He pinched it, with a slight revolving movement of the fingers.

The steel seemed to change. It stayed rigid in shape, but the planes of it darkened, ran together. It was a Oat piece of metal, but suddenly it seemed to have depths, other surfaces.Boolbak held it out to Themus, "put another hole in it."

Themus took it, wonderingly, and laid it down on the workbench. It seemed heavier than before. He brought the hammer down sharply, three times.

The metal was unmarred.

He set the punch and hammered again, harder, half a dozen times. He took the punch away. Its point was dulled, the punch shank was slightly bowed. The metal was unscarred.

"It"s-it"s-" he began, his tongue abruptly becoming a wad of cotton batting in his mouth.

Boolbak nodded, "It"s changed, yes. It is now harder than any steel ever made. It can withstand heat or cold that would either melt to paste or shatter to splinters any other metal. It is impregnable. It is the ideal war-metal. With it an army is invincible. It is the closest thing to an ultimate weapon ever devised, for it is unstoppable.

"A tank composed of this metal would be a fearsome juggernaut. A s.p.a.ceship of it could pierce the corona of a sun. A soldier wearing body armor of it would be a superman." He stood back, his lips a thin line, letting Themus look dumfoundedly at the plate he held.

"But how do you-how can you-it"s impossible! How can you make this? What have you done to it?" Themus felt the room swirl around him, but that defied the laws of the universe.

"Sit down. I want to talk to you. I want to tell you some things. " He put one arm around Themus" shoulders, leading him to a flight of stairs, to sit down.

Themus looked at Darfla. She was biting her lip. Was this the talk the Crackpots did not want him to have with Uncle Boolbak?

Themus sensed: this is it. This is an answer. Perhaps not the answer to all that troubled him, but it was, unquestionably, an answer.

Suddenly he didn"t want to know. He was afraid; terribly afraid. He stammered. "Do-do you think you should? I"m a Watcher, you know, and I don"t want to-"

The old man cut him off with a wave of his hand, and pushed him down firmly.

"You think you"re watching us, don"t you?" began Boolbak. "I mean, you think the Watcher Corps was a.s.signed here to keep an eye on all the loonies, don"t you? To keep the black sheep in the asylum so the star-flung Kyben don"t lose face or esteem in the Galaxy, isn"t that it?"

Themus nodded, reluctantly, not wanting to insult the old man.

Boolbak laughed. "Fool! We want you here. Do you think for a moment we"d allow you blundering pompous snoopers around if we didn"t have a use for you?

"Let me tell you a story,"" the old man went on. "Hundreds of years ago, before what you blissfully call the Kyben Explosion into s.p.a.ce, both Crackpots and Stuffed-Shirts lived here, though they weren"t divided that way, back then. The Stuffed-Shirts were the administrators, the implements of keeping everything neatly filed, and everyone in line. That type seems to gravitate toward positions of influence and power.

"The Crackpots were the nonconformists. They were the ones who kept coming up with the new ideas. They were the ones who painted the great works of art. They were the ones who composed the most memorable music. They were the ones who overflowed the lunatic asylums. They thought up the great ideas, true, but they were a thorn in the side of the Stuffs, because they couldn"t be predicted. They kept running off in all directions at once. They were a regimental problem. So the Stuffs tried to keep them in line, gave them tedious little ch.o.r.es to do, compartmentalized them in thought, in habits, in att.i.tudes. The noncons snapped. There is no record of it, but there was almost a war on this planet that would have wiped out every Kyben-of both breeds-to the last man."

He rubbed a hand across his eyes, as if to wipe away unpleasant images.

Themus and Darfla listened, intently, their eyes fastened to those of the old man in his ridiculous costume.

Themus knew Darfla must have heard the story before, but still she strained to catch every sound Boolbak made.

"Luckily, the cooler heads won. An alternate solution was presented, and carried out. You"ve always thought the Kyben left their misfits, the Crackpots, behind. That we were left here because we weren"t good enough, that we would disgrace our hard-headed pioneers before the other races, isn"t that the story you"ve always heard? That we are the black sheep of the Kyben?"

He laughed, shaking his head.

"Fools! We threw you out! We didn"t want you tripping all over our heels, annoying us. We weren"t left behind-you were thrown away!"

Themus"s breath caught in his throat. It was true. He knew it was true. He had no doubts. It was so. In the short s.p.a.ce of a few seconds the whole structure of his life had been inverted. He was no longer a member of the elite corps of the elite race of the universe; he was a clod, an unwanted superfluousity, a tin soldier, a carbon copy.

He started to say something, but Boolbak cut him off. "We have nothing against ruling the Galaxy. We like the idea, in fact. Makes things nice when we want something unusual and it takes influence to get it quickly. But why should we bother doing the work when we can pull a string or two and one of you armor-plated puppets will perform the menial tasks.

"Certainly we allow you to rule the Galaxy. It keeps you out of trouble, and out of our hair. You rule the Galaxy, but we rule you!"

Thunder rolled endlessly through the Watcher"s head. He was being bombarded with lightning, and he was certain any moment he would rip apart. It was too much, all too suddenly.

Boolbak was still talking: "We keep the Watcher Corps on other worlds both for spying purposes and as a cover-up, So we can have a Watcher Corps here on Kyba without attracting any attention to ourselves. A fewhundred of you aren"t that much bother, and it"s ridiculously easy to avoid you when we wish to. Better than a whole planet of you insufferable bores...

He stopped again, and pointed a pudgy finger at Themus" chest armor.

"We established the Watcher Corps as a liaison between us, when we had innovations, new methods, concepts ready for use, and you, with your graspy little hands always ready to accept what the "lunatics back home"

had come up with.

"Usually the ideas were put into practice and you never knew they originated here.