n't known me long, and I
know I'm not an accepted member of your group, but maybe somebody will
give me a job raking lawns or washing windows or hoeing corn long enough
for me to prove that I am not in the least antisocial; and maybe, in
time, you yourself will get to know me well enough to realize that while
I have a weakness for blondes who look like Grecian goddesses, I have no
taste whatever for redheads, brunettes, or Cutty Sark. In any event, I
have burned my bridges behind me, and whether I ever become a resident
of Pfleugersville or not, I have already become a resident of Sirius
XXI."

Judith Darrow was silent for some time. Then, "This morning," she said,
"I wanted to ask you to join us, but I couldn't for two reasons. The
first was your commitment to sell our houses, the second was my
bitterness toward men. You have eliminated the first, and the second
seems suddenly inane." She raised her eyes. "Philip, please join us. I
want you to."

Zarathustra, whose real name was Siddenon Phenphonderill, left them
standing there in each other's arms and trotted down the street and out
of town. He covered the ground in easy lopes that belied his three
hundred and twenty-five years, and soon he arrived at the Meeting Place.
The mayors of the other villages had been awaiting him since early
morning and were shifting impatiently on their haunches. When he
clambered up on the rostrum they extended their audio-appendages and
retractile fingers and accorded him a round of applause. He extended his
own "hands" and held them up for silence, then, retracting them again,
he seated himself before the little lectern and began his report, the
idiomatic translation of which follows forthwith:

"Gentlemen, my apologies for my late arrival. I will touch upon the
circumstances that were responsible for it presently.

"To get down to the matter uppermost in your minds: Yes, the experiment
was a success, and if you will use your psycho-transmutative powers to
remodel your villages along the lines my constituents and I remodeled
ours and to build enough factories to give your 'masters' that sense of
self-sufficiency so essential to their well-being, and if you will
'plant' your disassembled Multiple Moebius-Knot Dynamos in such a way
that the resultant fields will be ascribed to accidental causes, you
will have no more trouble attracting personnel than we did. Just make
sure that your 'masters' quarters are superior to your own, and tha