“It doesn’t exactly help mine,” replied Karellen with some spirit. “I wish people would stop thinking of me as a dictator, and remember I’m only a civil servant trying to administer a colonial policy in whose shaping I had no hand.”
That, thought Stormgren, was quite an engaging description. He wondered just how much truth it held.
“Can’t you at least give us some reason for your concealment? Because we don’t understand it, it annoys us and gives rise to endless rumours.”
Karellen gave that rich, deep laugh of his, just too resonant, to be altogether human.
“What am I supposed to be now? Does the robot theory still hold the field? I’d rather be a mass of electron tubes than a thing like a centipede — oh yes, I’ve seen that cartoon in yesterday’s Chicago Tribune! I’m thinking of requesting the original.”
Stormgren pursed his lips primly. There were times, he thought, when Karellen took his duties too lightly.
“This is serious,” he said reprovingly.
“My dear Rikki,” Karellen retorted, “it’s only by not taking the human race seriously that I retain what fragments of my once considerable mental powers I still possess!”
Despite himself Stormgren smiled.
“That doesn’t help me a great deal, does it? I have to go down there and convince my fellow men that although you won’t show yourself, you’ve got nothing to hide. It’s not an easy job. Curiosity is one of the most dominant of human characteristics. You can’t defy it forever.”