Yugo Amaryl said, “Here you are again, Dors.”

“Sorry, Yugo. I’m bothering you twice this week. Actually you don’t see anyone very often, do you?”

Amaryl said, “I don’t encourage people to visit me, no. They tend to interrupt me and break my line of thought. —Not you, Dors. You’re altogether special, you and Hari. There’s never a day I don’t remember what you two have done for me.”

Dors waved her hand. “Forget it, Yugo. You’ve worked hard for Hari and any trifling kindness we did for you has long been overpaid. How is the Project going? Hari never talks about it—not to me, anyway.”

Amaryl’s face lightened and his whole body seemed to take on an infusion of life. “Very well. Very well. It’s difficult to talk about it without mathematics, but the progress we’ve made in the last two years is amazing—more than in all the time before that. It’s as though, after we’ve been hammering away and hammering away, things have finally begun to break loose.”

“I’ve been hearing that the new equations worked out by Dr. Elar have helped the situation.”

“The achaotic equations? Yes. Enormously.”

“And the Electro-Clarifier has been helpful, too. I spoke to the woman who designed it.”

“Cinda Monay?”

“Yes. That’s the one.”

“A very clever woman. We’re fortunate to have her.”

“Tell me, Yugo— You work at the Prime Radiant virtually all the time, don’t you?”

“I’m more or less constantly studying it. Yes.”

“And you study it with the Electro-Clarifier.”

“Certainly.”

“Don’t you ever think of taking a vacation, Yugo?”

Amaryl looked at her owlishly, blinking slowly. “A vacation?”

“Yes. Surely you’ve heard the word. You know what a vacation is.”

“Why should I take a vacation?”

“Because you seem dreadfully tired to me.”

“A little, now and then. But I don’t want to leave the work.”

“Do you feel more tired now than you used to?”

“A little. I’m getting older, Dors.” “You’re only forty-nine.”

“That’s still older than I’ve ever been before.”

“Well, let it go. Tell me, Yugo—just to change the subject. How is Hari doing at his work? You’ve been with him so long that no one could possibly know him better than you do. Not even I. At least, as far as his work is concerned.”

“He’s doing very well, Dors. I see no change in him. He still has the quickest and brightest brain in the place. Age is having no effect on him—at least, not so far.”

“That’s good to hear. I’m afraid that his own opinion of himself is not as high as yours is. He’s not taking his age well. We had a difficult time getting him to celebrate his recent birthday. Were you at the festivities, by the way? I didn’t see you.”

“I attended part of the time. But, you know, parties of that kind are not the sort of thing I feel at home with.”

“Do you think Hari is wearing out? I’m not referring to his