"Boss!"

"Yes, Dorcas?"

"Here come two more loads."

Jubal got up from the telephone chair. "Hold for continuation. Miriam, sit down at the phone." He went to the window, saw the two air cars Dorcas had spotted, decided that they could be squad cars, and might be about to land on his property. "Larry, bolt the door to this room. Anne, put on your robe. Watch them but stand back from the window; I want them to think the house is empty. Jill, you stick close to Mike and don't let him make any hasty moves. Mike, you do what Jill tells you to."

"Yes, Jubal. I will do."

"Jill, don't turn him loose unless you have to. To keep one of us from being shot, I mean. If they bust down doors, let them - I rather hope they do. Jill, if it comes to scratch, I'd much rather he snatched just the guns and not the men."

"Yes, Jubal."

"Make sure he understands. This indiscriminate elimination of cops has got to stop."

"Telephone, Boss!"

"Coming." Jubal went unhurriedly back to the phone. "All of you stay out of pickup. Dorcas, you can take a nap. Miriam, note down another title for later: 'I Married a Human.' " He slid into the seat as Miriam vacated it and said, "Yes?"

A blandly handsome man looked back at him. "Doctor Harshaw?"

"Yes."

"Please hold on. The Secretary General will speak with you." The tone implied that a genuflection was in order.

"Okay."

The screen flickered, then rebuilt in the tousled image of His Excellency the Honorable Joseph Edgerton Douglas, Secretary General of the World Federation of Free Nations. "Dr. Harshaw? Understand you need to speak with me. Shoot."

"No, sir."

"Eh? But I understood-"

"Let me rephrase it precisely, Mr. Secretary. You need to speak with me."

Douglas looked surprised, then grinned. "Pretty sure of yourself, aren't you? Well, Doctor, you have just ten seconds to prove that. I have other things to do."

"Very well, sir. I am attorney for the Man from Mars."

Douglas suddenly stopped looking tousled. "Repeat that."

"I am attorney for Valentine Michael Smith, known as the Man from Mars. Attorney with full power. In fact, it may help to think of me as defacto Ambassador from Mars� in the spirit of the Larkin Decision, that is to say."

Douglas stared at him. "Man, you must be out of your mind!"

"I've often thought so, lately. Nevertheless I am acting for the Man from Mars. And he is prepared to negotiate."

"The Man from Mars is in Ecuador."

"Please, Mr. Secretary. This is a private conversation. He is not in Ecuador, as both of us know. Smith - the real Valentine Michael Smith, not the one who has appeared in the newscasts - escaped from confinement - and, I should add, illegal confinement - at Bethesda Medical Center on Thursday last, in company with Nurse Gillian Boardman. He kept his freedom and is now free - and he will continue to keep it. If any of your large staff of assistants has told you anything else, then someone has been lying to you� which is why I am speaking to you yourself. So that you can straighten it out."

Douglas looked very thoughtful. Someone apparently spoke to him from off screen, but no words came over the telephone. At last he said, "Even if what you said were true, Doctor, you can't be in a position to speak for young Smith. He's a ward of the State."

Jubal shook his head. "Impossible. The Larkin Decision."

"Now see here, as a lawyer myself, I assure you-"

"As a lawyer myself, I must follow my own opinion - and protect my client."

"You are a lawyer? I thought that you meant that you claimed to be attorney-in-fact, rather than counsellor."

"Both. You'll find that I am an attorney at law, in good standing, and admitted to practice before the High Court. I don't hang my shingle these days, but I am." Jubal heard a dull boom from below and glanced aside. Larry whispered, "The front door, I think. Boss- Shall I go look?"

Jubal shook his head in negation and spoke to the screen. "Mr. Secretary, while we quibble, time is running out. Even now your men - your S.S. hooligans - are breaking into my house. It is most distasteful to be under siege in my own home. Now, for the first and last time, will you abate this nuisance? So that we can negotiate peaceably and equitably? Or shall we fight it out in the High Court with all the stink and scandal that would ensue?"

Again the Secretary appeared to speak with someone off screen. He turned back, looking troubled. "Doctor, if the Special Service police are trying to arrest you, it is news to me. I do not see-"

"If you'll listen closely, you'll hear them tromping up my staircase, sir! Mike! Anne! Come here." Jubal shoved his chair back to allow the camera angle to include three people. "Mr. Secretary General Douglas - the Man from Mars!" He did not, of course, introduce Anne, but she and her white cloak of probity were fully in view.

Douglas stared at Smith; Smith looked back at him and seemed uneasy. "Jubal-"

"Just a moment, Mike. Well, Mr. Secretary? Your men have broken into my house - I hear them pounding on my study door this moment." Jubal turned his head. "Larry, unbolt the door. Let them in." He put a hand on Mike. "Don't get excited, lad, and don't do anything unless I tell you to."

"Yes, Jubal. That man. I have know him."

"And he knows you." Over his shoulder Jubal called out to the now open door, "Come in, Sergeant. Right over here."

The S.S. sergeant standing in the doorway, mob gun at the ready, did not come in. Instead he called out, "Major! Here they are!"

Douglas said, "Let me speak to the officer in charge of them, Doctor." Again he spoke off screen.

Jubal was relieved to see that the major for whom the sergeant had shouted showed up with his sidearm still in its holster; Mike's shoulder had been trembling under Jubal's hand ever since the sergeant's gun had come into view - and, while Jubal lavished no fraternal love on these troopers, he did not want Smith to display his powers� and cause awkward questions.

The major glanced around the room. "You're Jubal Harshaw?"

"Yes. Come over here. Your boss wants you."

"None of that. You come along. I'm also looking for-"

"Come here! The Secretary General himself wants a word with you - on this phone."

The S.S. major looked startled, then came on into the study, around Jubal's desk, and in sight of the screen - looked at it, suddenly came smartly to attention and saluted. Douglas nodded. "Name, rank, and duty."

"Sir, Major C. D. Bloch, Special Service Squadron Cheerio, Maryland Enclave Barracks."

"Now tell me what you are doing where you are, and why."

"Sir, that's rather complicated. I-"

"Then unravel it for me. Speak up, Major."

"Yes, sir. I came here pursuant to orders. You see-"

"I don't see."

"Well, sir, about an hour and a half ago a flying squad was sent here to make several arrests. They didn't report in when they should have and when we couldn't raise them by radio, I was sent with the reserve squad to find them and render assistance as needed."

"Whose orders?"

"Uh, the Commandant's, sir."

"And did you find them?"

"No, sir. Not a trace of them."

Douglas looked at Harshaw. "Counsellor, did you see anything of another squad, earlier?"

"It's no part of my duties to keep track of your servants, Mr. Secretary. Perhaps they got the wrong address. Or simply got lost."

"That is hardly an answer to my question."

"You are correct, sir. I am not being interrogated. Nor will I be, other than by due process. I am acting for my client; I am not nursemaid to these uniformed, uh, persons. But I suggest, from what I have seen of them, that they might not be able to find a pig in a bath tub."

"Mmm� possibly. Major, round up your men and return. I'll confirm that via channels."