“And you actually got to the city ahead of me?”

“Yes. You didn't use gravitics and I did. I guessed you would come to the capital city, so I went straight down, while you…” Compor made a short spiral motion with his finger as though it were a ship riding a directional beam.

“You took a chance on a run-in with Sayshellian officialdom.”

“Well…” Compor's face broke into a smile that lent it an undeniable charm and Trevize felt himself almost warming to him. Compor said, “I'm not a coward at all times and in all things.”

Trevize steeled himself. “How did you happen to get a ship like mine?”

“In precisely the same way you got a ship like yours. The old lady—Mayor Branno—assigned it to me.”

“Why?”

“I'm being entirely frank with you. My assignment was to follow you. The Mayor wanted to know where you were going and what you would be doing.”

“And you've been reporting faithfully to her, I suppose.—Or have you been faithless to the Mayor also?”

“I reported to her. I had no choice, actually. She placed a hyperrelay on board ship, which I wasn't supposed to find, but which I did find.”

“Well?”

“Unfortunately it's hooked up so that I can't remove it without immobilizing the vessel. At least, there's no way I can remove it. Consequently she knows where I am—and she knows where you are.”

“Suppose you hadn't been able to follow me. Then she wouldn't have known where I was. Had you thought of that?”

“Of course I did. I thought of just reporting I had lost you—but she wouldn't have believed me, would she? And I wouldn't have been able to get back to Terminus for who knows how long. And I'm not like you, Trevize. I'm not a carefree person without attachments. I have a wife on Terminus—a pregnant wife—and I want to get back to her. You can afford to think only of yourself. I can't.—Besides, I've come to warn you. By Seldon, I'm trying to do that and you won't listen. You keep talking about other things.”

“I'm not impressed by your sudden concern for me. What can you warn me against? It seems to me that you are the only thing I need be warned about. You betray me, and now you follow me in order to betray me again. No one else is doing me any harm.”

Compor said earnestly, “Forget the dramatics, man. Trevize, you're a lightning rod! You've been sent out to draw Second Foundation response—if there is such a thing as the Second Foundation. I have an intuitive sense for things other than hyperspatial pursuit and I'm sure that's what she's planning. If you try to find the Second Foundation, they'll become aware of it and they'll act against you. If they do, they are very likely to tip their hand. And when they do, Mayor Branno will go for them.”

“A pity your famous intuition wasn't working when Branno was planning my arrest.”

Compor flushed and muttered, “You know it doesn't always work.”

“And now it tells you she's planning to attack the Second Foundation. She wouldn't dare.”

“I think she would. But that's not the point. The point is that right now she is throwing you out as bait.”

“So?”

“So by all the black holes in space, don't search for the Second Foundation. She won't care if you're killed in the search, but I care. I feel responsible for this and I care.”

“I'm touched,” said Trevize coldly, “but as it happens I have another task on hand at the moment.”

“You have?”

“Pelorat and I are on the track of Earth, the planet that some think was the original home of the human race. Aren't we, Janov?”

Pelorat nodded his head. “Yes, it's a purely scientific matter and a long-standing interest of mine.”

Compor looked blank for a moment. Then, “Looking for Earth? But why?”

“To study it,” said Pelorat. “As the one world on which human beings developed—presumably from lower forms of life, instead of, as on all others, merely arriving ready-made—it should be a fascinating study in uniqueness.”

“And,” said Trevize, “as a world where, just possibly, I may learn more of the Second Foundation.—Just possibly.”

Compor said, “But there isn't any Earth. Didn't you know that?”

“No Earth?” Pelorat looked utterly blank, as he always did when he was preparing to be stubborn. “Are you saying there was no planet on which the human species originated?”

“Oh no. Of course, there was an Earth. There's no question of that! But there isn't any Earth now. No inhabited Earth. It's gone!”

Pelorat said, unmoved, “There are tales…”

“Hold on, Janov,” said Trevize. “Tell me, Compor, how do you know this?”

“What do you mean, how? It's my heritage. I trace my ancestry from the Sirius Sector, if I may repeat that fact without boring you. We know all about Earth out there. It exists in that sector, which means it's not part of the Foundation Federation, so apparently no one on Terminus bothers with it. But that's where Earth is, just the same.”

“That is one suggestion, yes,” said Pelorat. “There was considerable enthusiasm for that 'Sirius Alternative,' as they called it, in the days of the Empire.”

Compor said vehemently. “It's not an alternative. It's a fact.”

Pelorat said, “What would you say if I told you I know of many different places in the Galaxy that are called Earth—or were called Earth—by the people who lived in its stellar neighborhood?”

“But this is the real thing,” said Compor. “The Sirius Sector is the longest-inhabited portion of the Galaxy. Everyone knows that.”

“The Sirians claim it, certainly,” said Pelorat, unmoved.

Compor looked frustrated. “I tell you…”

But Trevize said, “Tell us what happened to Earth. You say it's not inhabited any longer. Why not?”

“Radioactivity. The whole planetary surface is radioactive because of nuclear reactions that went out of control, or nuclear explosions—I'm not sure—and now no life is possible there.”

The three stared at each other for a while and then Compor felt it necessary to repeat. He said, “I tell you, there's no Earth. There's no use looking for it.”

Janov Pelorat's face was, for once, not expressionless. It was not that there was passion in it—or any of the more unstable emotions. It was that his eyes had narrowed—and that a kind of fierce intensity had filled every plane of his face.

He said, and his voice lacked any trace of its usual tentative quality, “How did you say you know all this?”

“I told you,” said Compor. “It's my heritage.”

“Don't be silly, young man. You are a Councilman. That means you must be born on one of the Federation worlds—Smyrno, I think you said earlier.”

“That's right.”

“Well then, what heritage are you talking about? Are you telling me that you possess Sirian genes that fill you with inborn knowledge of the Sirian myths concerning Earth.”

Compor looked taken aback. “No, of course not.”

“Then what are you talking about?”

Compor paused and seemed to gather his thoughts. He said quietly, “My family has old books of Sirian history. An external heritage, not an internal one. It's not something we talk about outside, especially if one is intent on political advancement. Trevize seems to think I am, but, believe me, I mention it only to good friends.”

There was a trace of bitterness in his voice. “Theoretically all Foundation citizens are alike, but those from the old worlds of the Federation are more alike than those from the newer ones—and those that trace from worlds outside the Federation are least alike of all. But, never mind that. Aside from the books, I once visited the old worlds. Trevize—hey, there…”

Trevize had wandered off toward one end of the room, looking out a triangular window. It served to let in a view of the sky and to diminish the view of the city—more light and more privacy. Trevize stretched upward to look down.

He returned through the empty room. “Interesting window design,” he said. “You called me, Councilman?”