imes
even surpass them. Never mind the audience, he thought. The jest was the
thing!

It was an hour earlier in Los Angeles and Dr. Wallace Fincher was at
home. Dane disguised his voice--he did a lot of University Theater work
and this kind of thing came to him easily. He listened first to Dr.
Fincher's arid, humorless, "Hello. Dr. Fincher speaking." Then he heard
the preliminary clicking, just as the FBI man had predicted.

"Thandor," said Professor Dane, "this is Klon calling."

"I beg your pardon?" said Doctor Fincher.

"The jig's up," said Professor Dane. "Captain Ixl in propul-cruiser
nine-nine-seven-three will never be able to break through. The
Earthlings have set up a close watch--they're suspicious."

"Who is this?" Doctor Fincher sounded startled. "Who the devil is this
calling?"

Dane could barely keep his laughter from breaking into his voice.
"Thandor, we can come to no conclusion but that the Terrestrials are
definitely hostile. We should have expected that from their primitive
stage of development. They have orders to shoot any of our
propul-cruisers they can catch. I suggest that we withdraw all ships of
the Franistan class immediately from their free orbits and send them on
a standard Keplerian course to the home planet for further
consultation."

"_Is this some kind of joke?_" Fincher sounded as if he were almost
panicky.

"Furthermore," said Dane, "I recommend that we withdraw all agents from
Earth. We can't conceal our superior mental development and advanced
technology much longer.

"Someone's bound to catch on pretty soon. I was against this plan in the
Galactic Council in the first place, you'll remember. Well, farewell,
Thandor! I'll be seeing you soon in space!"

And Professor Dane hung up before he exploded with laughter.

* * * * *

He laughed until the tears came to his eyes. He held his stomach with
both hands. He was weak. He supported himself on the stair railing and
for minutes was unable to take the first tread. With his lively
scientist's imagination he could picture the completely bewildered look
on the young FBI man's face when he listened to this conversation on the
tape recorder or whatever it was they used.

He was certainly going to have to try to get that recording from them.
Play it back for Fincher some time--Lordy, Fincher would have apoplexy
every time he heard it!

He finally gained enough strength to climb the stairs. He wen