g."

They went upstairs together, on tip-toe. Ramsey's room was on the third
floor, with a besooted view of the industrial complex on the river by
day. The narrow hall was dark and silent. Behind one of the closed doors
an outworlder cried out in his sleep. Ramsey had to cup a hand over the
Vegan girl's mouth so she wouldn't scream in empathic fear. He opened
the door of his room, surprised that it was not locked. He thought he
had left it locked.

At once he was wary. It was dark in the hall, just as dark in the room.
He could see nothing. The door hinges squeaked.

"Come in, Captain Ramsey," a voice said. "I thought you would never get
here."

He stood on the threshold, uncertain. The voice had spoken not
Interstellar _Coine_, but English. It had spoken English, without a
foreign accent.

And it was a girl's voice.

* * * * *

Still, it could have been an elaborate trick. It was unlikely, but not
impossible, that Garr Symm had learned Ramsey's identity already and had
sent an operative here to await him. Ramsey and the Vegan girl had come
on foot. It was a long walk.

"I'm armed," Ramsey lied. "Come over here. Slowly. Don't put any lights
on." He could feel the Vegan girl trembling next to him. Not able to
understand English, she didn't know what was going on.

"You're armed," the unseen girl's voice said in crisp, amused English,
"like I'm a six-legged Antarean spider-man. You have an m.g. gun,
Ramsey. It's in this room. I have it. That's all you have. No, don't try
to lie to me. I'm a telepath. I can read you. Come in and put the light
on and shut the door. You may bring the girl with you if you want.
Brother, is she ever radiating fear! It's practically drowning your own
mind out."

The unseen girl wasn't kidding, Ramsey knew. She could read minds. She
had proved it to him. Which left him this choice: he could grab the
Vegan girl's arm again and get the heck out of there, or do what the
unseen Earth girl told him to do. He wanted that m.g. gun. He took the
Vegan girl's hand and advanced over the threshold and closed the door
and switched on the light.

The girl was sitting on the bed. She was an Earthgirl, all right. She
had come in a toggle-cloak of green Irwadian fur, which was folded
neatly at her side on the bed. Under it she wore a daring net halter of
the type then fashionable on Earth but which had not yet taken over the
outworlds. It left her shoulders bare and