view-point, sir," she said finally. "As it always is. To them, females
are for breeding only, to keep their war machine well stocked. From
what Kriijorl said, they do not understand love as we do. There's
simply one purpose...."

"Well, that's why I think the whole thing is--well, as you say,
inconceivable from our point of view. Our culture, our women just
aren't conditioned for such an existence."

"Think back two centuries, sir."

"You don't have to keep calling me 'sir' like that!" Mason said,
feeling a sudden warmth at the back of his neck as he said it. And
then, "Two centuries back. Yes. After every war, Earth's birth rate
would go crazy. Mother Nature ruled the roost in those days, didn't
she? Supply and demand, cause and effect. It's a wonder Man ever got
anywhere."

"More wonder some men do--"

Mason looked up. But Judith's face was, as usual, quite calm and
detached. "You say something?"

"I said I'd like to have you get Kriijorl to demonstrate that
teleprobe thing of his for us, if you can, s---- Lance. How did he say
it worked?"

"I still don't get it completely. A peculiar mixture of radio and the
electroencephalograph, I think. He said it replaced radio on Ihelos
and Thrayx centuries ago. You can communicate to a group or an
individual with it in language, or in basic thought pictures. That's
what they use it mostly for, of course, and as such, it's termed a
mentacom. But he told me that it can also be used as it was on us as a
teleprobe when the subject isn't screened. They use a specially tuned
carrier wave of some sort, he said, that impinges on a thought wave
pattern, but instead of registering the pattern's electronic impulse
equivalents as does the electroencephalograph, it 'reflects' them.
Like a basic radar system. And the receiver, it's a tiny thing, breaks
the reflected pattern down into values equivalent to those in which
the 'listener' thinks; amplifies, and that's it! Mind reading made
easy, I guess."

Judith squirmed a little uneasily. "I'm glad they're not natural
telepaths, anyway," she answered. "And even with a gimmick like
that--"

And then the conversation was lost as Kriijorl, flanked by two New-UN
guides, strode from the building. The stiff breeze at three hundred
stories of what had once been called Nob Hill flicked his scarlet
short-cape behind him and rippled the broad front of his black and
silver tunic.

He climbed into the helio with a smiled greeting, seated him