broke into it, loud, fast and frightened.

"Your pardon, Lord, I did not think ... certes, the gravity ... I'll
attend to it on the instant." He whipped a hand and half a head back
through the screen, but without looking back and snapped his fingers,
and before I could blink, Kaby had put the Minor Maintainer in his hand.

Sid went completely out of sight then and the howling stopped, and I
thought that if that was the way a Lord Spider expressed his annoyance
at being subjected to incorrect gravity, I hoped the bosses wouldn't
start any conversations with me.

Erich pursed his lips and threw the other Soldiers a nod and the four of
them marched through the screen as if they'd drilled a lifetime for this
moment. I had the wild idea that Erich might give me his arm, but he
strode past me as if I were ... an Entertainer.

I hesitated a moment then, but I had to see what was happening outside,
even if I got eaten up for it. Besides, I had a bit of the thought that
if these formalities went on much longer, even a Lord Spider was going
to discover just how immune he was to confined atomic blast.

I walked through the screen with Lili beside me.

* * * * *

The Soldiers had stopped a few feet in front of it. I looked around
ahead for whatever it was going to turn out to be, prepared to drop a
curtsy or whatever else, bar nothing, that seemed expected of me.

I had a hard time spotting the beast. Some of the others seemed to be
having trouble too. I saw Doc weaving around foolishly by the control
divan, and Bruce and Beau and Sevensee and Maud on their feet beyond it,
and I wondered whether we were dealing with an invisible monster; ought
to be easy enough for the bosses to turn a simple trick like
invisibility.

Then I looked sharply left where everyone else, even glassy-eyed Doc,
was coming to look, into the Door sector, only there wasn't any monster
there or even a Door, but just Siddy holding the Minor Maintainer and
grinning like when he is threatening to tickle me, only more fiendishly.

"Not a move, masters," he cried, his eyes dancing, "or I'll pin the pack
of you down, marry and amen I will. It is my firm purpose to see the
Place blasted before I let this instrument out of my hands again."

My first thought was, "'Sblood but Siddy is a real actor! I don't care
if he didn't study under anyone later than Burbage, that just proves how
good Burbage is."

Sid had convinced us n