“Yes. Plainly,” Atvar said. “And we shall have to see about that, too. Indeed we shall. I thank you, Senior Science Officer. I believe you may well have done the Race a great service.” He listened with some small part of one hearing diaphragm to Tsalas’ thanks, then broke the connection and shouted, “Pshing!”

His adjutant rushed into the office. “What is it, Exalted Fleetlord?”

“Summon the American ambassador to me this instant. This instant, do you hear?” Atvar said. “I do not care what that Big Ugly is doing. I do not care if he is eating. I do not care if he is mating. I do not care if he is standing in front of a mirror and watching his hair grow. I want him here at once. No delay, no excuse, is to be tolerated. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Exalted Fleetlord. It shall be done, Exalted Fleetlord.” Pshing fled.

Henry Cabot Lodge arrived quite promptly, even if not so soon as Atvar might have wished. “I greet you, Exalted Fleetlord,” he said, his accent thick but understandable. “What can I do for you today? I gather from your adjutant that the business is urgent, whatever it may be.”

“You might say so,” Atvar answered. “Yes, you might say so. How does the United States dare to prepare to bombard Tosev 3 from the belt of minor planets between Tosev 4 and Tosev 5?”

He wondered if Lodge would have the nerve to deny the charge. But the Big Ugly said, “We are a free and independent not-empire. We are entitled to take whatever steps we choose to protect ourselves. So long as we are not at war with the Race, we do not have to make an accounting of our actions to you.”

“Do you recall how close you came to being at war with the Race not long ago?” the fleetlord demanded.

“Yes. And I also recall the price we paid to avoid it,” Henry Cabot Lodge replied. “It was just that we should pay it then, for we were in the wrong. But we are not in the wrong here, Exalted Fleetlord, and you have no right to protest our legitimate research in space.”

Lodge was never a male to bluster and threaten. But he sounded determined here. Even Atvar, no great expert on Tosevite intonation, could tell as much. He said, “Regardless of whatever installations you devise out there, Ambassador, the Race remains able to destroy your not-empire many times over.”

“I understand that,” the Big Ugly said steadily. “We are now able to treat with you on more fully equal terms, however.”

And that, unfortunately, was a big, ugly, unpalatable truth. “We could wreck this entire planet, if necessary, to keep you Tosevites from escaping your solar system.” Atvar had had that thought before. Now, suddenly, it seemed much more urgent-and also much harder to do. Could he give such an order, slaying all the colonists along with the Big Uglies? He wondered.

He or his successors would have to be the ones to do it, if anyone did. By the time he sent a query Home and waited for a reply at the laggard speed of light, that reply would come far, far too late to do any good. Not even the Emperors had borne such responsibility, not since before the days when Home was unified.

Henry Cabot Lodge said, “That is madness, and you know it perfectly well.”

“Truth: it is madness,” Atvar agreed. “But Tosev 3 is a world of madness, so who knows whether a mad answer might not be the best?” To that, the American Big Ugly had not a single word to say.