Amaryl arrived a few minutes before 1400, looking warily about. His hair was neat and his thick mustache was combed and turned up slightly at the edges. His T-shirt was startlingly white. He did smell, but it was a fruity odor that undoubtedly came from the slightly over-enthusiastic use of scent. He had a bag with him.

Seldon, who had been waiting outside for him, seized one elbow lightly, while Dors seized the other, and they moved rapidly into the elevator. Having reached the correct level, they passed through the apartment into Seldon’s room.

Amaryl said in a low hangdog voice, “Nobody home, huh?”

“Everyone’s busy,” said Seldon neutrally. He indicated the only chair in the room, a pad directly on the floor.

“No,” said Amaryl. “I don’t need that. One of you two use it.” He squatted on the floor with a graceful downward motion.

Dors imitated the movement, sitting on the edge of Seldon’s floor-based mattress, but Seldon dropped down rather clumsily, having to make use of his hands and unable, quite, to find a comfortable position for his legs.

Seldon said, “Well, young man, why do you want to see me?”

“Because you’re a mathematician. You’re the first mathematician I ever saw—close up—so I could touch him, you know.”

“Mathematicians feel like anyone else.”

“Not to me, Dr. … Dr. … Seldon?”

“That’s my name.”

Amaryl looked pleased. “I finally remembered. —You see, I want to be a mathematician too.”

“Very good. What’s stopping you?”

Amaryl suddenly frowned. “Are you serious?”

“I presume something is stopping you. Yes, I’m serious.”

“What’s stopping me is I’m a Dahlite, a heatsinker on Dahl. I don’t have the money to get an education and I can’t get the credits to get an education. A real education, I mean. All they taught me was to read and cipher and use a computer and then I knew enough to be a heatsinker. But I wanted more. So I taught myself.”

“In some ways, that’s the best kind of teaching. How did you do that?”

“I knew a librarian. She was willing to help me. She was a very nice woman and she showed me how to use computers for learning mathematics. And she set up a software system that would connect me with other libraries. I’d come on my days off and on mornings after my shift. Sometimes she’d lock me in her private room so I wouldn’t be bothered by people coming in or she would let me in when the library was closed. She didn’t know mathematics herself, but she helped me all she could. She was oldish, a widow lady. Maybe she thought of me as a kind of son or something. She didn’t have children of her own.”

(Maybe, thought Seldon briefly, there was some other emotion involved too, but he put the thought away. None of his business.)

“I liked number theory,” said Amaryl. “I worked some things out from what I learned from the computer and