asked, still facing the pool.

"The same, Your Illustrious Sublimity."

"Let us dispense with formality. Tell me how you did it."

"It is simple ... in a way. But it requires the use of a not-so-simple
instrument."

"Such as I?" he asked, apparently intent upon the water.

"I did not mean Your Illustrious--I did not mean it that way. It is a
little triumph of our Jursan technicians, which will shortly be at
your disposal. I used it to force an illusion upon you."

"And very cleverly, I admit. Do you have it with you?"

"Yes. It is compact. It merely operates upon the idea that other
forces can be used to produce hypnosis besides lights, drugs, and
soothing sounds."

"Turn it on!" ordered Vyrtl.

* * * * *

He waited a moment, then twisted around on the stone to face her.
There was no sign of the woman he had seen crossing the field. Before
him seemed to stand the black-haired, lithe girl.

The only change was in her eyes, which no longer smiled into his so
provocatively.

_Funny_, thought Vyrtl. _When we actually were strangers, she seemed
so intimate. Only now does she look at me so coldly._

"You see?" she said, and started to reach for some switch or button
concealed by the jewel at her breast.

Vyrtl stopped her with a gesture.

"You must also be skilled in the sciences of the mind," he remarked.
"What I mean is ... I suppose you never really looked like that?"

She shook her head a trifle ruefully.

"Not quite. Most of it is in your own imagination. We know a good deal
about you, Your--"

"You deduced somehow what I would look for," interrupted Vyrtl,
nodding. "I can see how a study of the things I chose to have about
me--paintings, statues, furnishings, even people--might yield keys to
my preferences. You did remarkably well."

He tossed another pebble and stared at the ripples.

"I suppose every man has his ideal of a woman," he said. "I doubt that
any man has _seen_ his absolute ideal--except me. I wonder if you know
what it does to one?"

He chose a flat pebble and sent it skipping across the surface with a
vicious snap of his wrist. It bounced three ... four ... five times,
and sank.

"I presume," said Daphne Foster, breaking a tight little silence,
"that you will grant me time to set my affairs in order?"

Vyrtl weighed a pebble in his hand.

"You expect to be executed," he stated flatly.

"Naturally, we knew all along that someone would have to