sed to, whenever I can. When I can't, the kids will shift in
automatically." The kids were the five assistants among whom her duties
had been divided in her absence.

"Major Quillan called me up to Mantelish's lab around ten," she went on.
"They wanted to see Repulsive, so I took him up there. Then it turned
out Mantelish wanted to take Repulsive along on a field trip this
afternoon."

Holati looked startled. "He can't do that, and he knows it!" He reached
for the desk transmitter.

"Don't bother, Commissioner. I told Mantelish I'd been put in charge of
Repulsive, and that he'd lose an arm if he tried to walk out of the lab
with him."

Holati cleared his throat. "I see! How did Mantelish react?"

"Oh, he huffed a bit. Like he does. Then he calmed down and agreed he
could get by without Repulsive out there. So we stood by while he
measured and weighed the thing, and so on. After that he got friendly
and said you'd asked him to fill me in on current plasmoid theory."

"So I did," said Holati. "Did he?"

"He tried, I think. But it's like you say. I got lost in about three
sentences and never caught up." She looked curiously at the
Commissioner. "I didn't have a chance to talk to Major Quillan alone, so
I'm wondering why Mantelish was told the I-Fleets in the Vishni area are
hunting for planets with plasmoids on them. I thought you felt he was
too woolly-minded to be trusted."

"We couldn't keep that from him very well," Holati said. "He was the boy
who thought of it."

"You didn't have to tell him they'd found some possibles did you?"

"He did, unfortunately. He's had those plasmoid detectors of his for
about a month, but he didn't happen to think of mentioning them. The
reason he was to come back to Manon originally was to sort over the
stuff the Fleets have been sending back here. It's as weird a collection
of low-grade life-forms as I've ever seen, but not plasmoid. Mantelish
went into a temper and wanted to know why the idiots weren't using
detectors."

"Oh, Lord!" Trigger said.

"That's what it's like when you're working with him," said the
Commissioner. "We started making up detectors wholesale and rushing them
out there, but the new results haven't come in yet."

"Well, that explains it." Trigger looked down at the desk a moment, then
glanced up and met the Commissioner's eye. She colored slightly.

"Incidentally," she said, "I did take the opportunity to apologize to
Major Quillan for clipping him