"I've gotten into most of my trouble because of an inner drive too great for my own good. I always had to try to change the status quo, to incite unrest and rebellion among the natives of the occupied worlds, to steal the unstealable, to pit one world against another. Is that the kind of man you're seeing now?"
"No, it isn't," Tang said thoughtfully. "I'd best describe you now as a contented man. If I didn't know better, I'd say you hadn't a care in the world."
"And you'd be right," Lutscher said, leaning forward in his desire to emphasize his sincerity. "You haven't been here long enough to feel it, but this planet does something to you. I don't know what it is. I've gained twenty pounds in the two months I've been here. I've lost my unrest, my drive to change things. I'm happy now. Why should I want to return to the outside where life is like a thin crust that you walk on carefully, always afraid of breaking through? And some morning you'll wake up and you'll have the key, the answer to the universe, and you won't want to leave either."
"I've wondered briefly about you, myself," Tang said. "And I'll admit you're not the type of man I expected to find. But I've formed conclusions different than yours. And I don't envy you. A dope addict has the same feeling you have when he's under the influence of the drug. But I don't envy him. What have you been eating since you've been here? Anything at all native to this planet?"
Lutscher nodded. "You may be right about that," he said. "I'm not so stupid that I've missed thinking of it myself. At first I thought the good feeling might be just the lethargy induced by the atmosphere's high oxygen content and the greater gravity.
"But my final conclusion was pretty much the same as yours. During the past month and a half I've lived exclusively on the diet of the mahutes—that's the shoots you saw one of them gathering. But what do I care about the source of my well-being? The only thing that concerns me is that it's there."
"I'm afraid that to me the source would be more important," Tang said, "and I'll stick to my own food. Right now everything looks very rosy to you. But if it turns out that you've been eating a dangerous drug and it begins to wreck your system, how will it look then? Especially if you find that you can't break the habit?"
"But it's not dangerous," Lutscher insisted, "and I'll prove it to you. Tomorrow we'll take a stroll through the village. I'll point out a few things that will surprise you. I presume you'll be spending the night with me?"
Tang nodded.