learned--among other things--his
atrocious accent. He was--

She had ignored his question, so he asked another one. "Where is the
war?"

"War?" Julia repeated. She frowned delicately. "There's no war. Not right
now. The international situation is getting better, I think." War? she
asked herself. He's got a lot of misinformation about us.

She kept trying to _see_ into the physical structure of his brain. Ah,
she thought, yes. Right there--

A bridge there, all right.

It's probably an easy mutation, she thought. Probably latent in
everyone's genes. The next development of man? (But how many centuries
will it take for it to come out again?) How did the collectors produce
the mutation in the first place--assuming they did produce (as well as
harvest) it?

Could, she thought, a surgeon--operate, as it were--on an adult brain to
produce the bridge?... I'll have to take up surgery. A few months to
learn technique. I think I could. It's easy to heal, because of the
subconscious pattern (the cellular pattern?) but to--operate--to
change--to build into a different structure, so that would require
experiments and study, perhaps actual knife work....

"There _has_ to be a war," Walt said. "Forential told us there was."

"There isn't. Not now." Forential? A non-human? An alien?

"He told us," Walt said.

"He lied," Julia said.

"He doesn't lie."

Julia shrugged. Walt is a loyal follower, she thought. "There's no war.
Maybe he meant there would be one shortly; maybe it was a premature
announcement." Lord! do these aliens have some way of prodding the
Russian bear? she thought. Or how the devil are they--Forentials,
wherever they are--thinking of starting a war?

Walt refused to consider her denial. He did not look her in the face. "I
like you," he said. He was desperate to change the subject. "Your smile.
You're so ... so ..." _nice_. He thought the last word; he took the risk
that she might peep his other thoughts. He was almost certain she could
not; he hoped to peep hers if she thought a reply. Forential couldn't be
a liar!

Julia knew they were both incorrect: his statement and his conviction.
But she liked to hear him say he liked her. I guess, she thought, he's
trying to lull my suspicions. Maybe I better lull his, too....

She smiled sweetly.

"You see, I've never seen a Lyrian female before," Walt said.
"... except one on the ship just the other day; but just one, before."

Is Lyria supposed to be a _