l grimaced sickly, revolted by the thought. "A pet farm? God, what
a diet to feed them!"

* * * * *

Xavier came up from the galley, carrying a tray with three steaming
coffee-bulbs. Farrell, still pondering the problem of balance between
dominant and dominated species, found himself wondering for the
thousandth time what went on in the alert positronic brain behind the
mechanical's featureless face.

"What do you think, Xav?" he demanded. "What sort of motive would you
say prompted the Hymenops to set up such a balance?"

"_Evaluation of alien motivations, conversely_," the mechanical said,
finishing the Reclamations Handbook quotation which Stryker had begun
much earlier, "_is essentially impossible because there can be no common
ground of comprehension_."

It centered the tray neatly on the charting table and stood back in
polite but unmenial deference while they sucked at their coffee-bulbs.

"A greater mystery to me," Xavier went on, "is the congenital
restlessness that drives men from their own comfortable worlds to such
dangers as you have met with here. How can I understand the motivations
of an alien people? I do not even understand those of the race that
built me."

The three men looked at each other blankly, disconcerted by the ancient
problem so unexpectedly posed.

It was Stryker who sheepishly answered it.

"That's nothing for you to worry about, Xav," he said wryly. "Neither do
we."

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