He sank back into his chair again, and his mind swiftly reviewed the pitifully small bits of information he had been able to glean from the deranged mind of his friend Hooper.
Someone, or something, or some group, who were the main support of this opposition, had a mental ability Hanlon thought he knew the Estrellans did not have. At least, he had not found any traces of it anywhere here. Or, wait now. Did the Rulers have it? Was this one of the traits and abilities especially bred into them in the course of making them capable of handling their tremendous task of being Planetary Ruler? Could be. He had not yet had the chance to scan mentally Elus Amir, the present Ruler, except for that one night at the theatre, and then he had not really tried to see what the man had in the way of mental equipment. Hanlon had been so relieved to find he and the audience were applauding, instead of booing, that he had not tried to do so.
If Elus Amir as Ruler had it, did Adwal Irad as Second-In-Line also have those mental powers?
Whoever or whatever it was—and that would have to be studied more thoroughly later—some mind or minds had forced the other three secret servicemen to go to a certain place ... at present unknown to Hanlon ... and had there imprisoned them and tried to extract information from their minds.
Information about what ... and why? What could these unknowns want to know that couldn't be learned by asking direct questions? For the Federation statesmen and Survey men had been glad and anxious to answer fully and truthfully every question that had been asked of them.
And that puzzling thought Hooper had said they received when Manning died. "Your nerve sensitivity is greater than ours—we had not realized it would kill you to be thus interrogated." Or words to that effect. As far as Hanlon knew, the native Estrellans did not have unusual resistance to pain. He had had several encounters with them so far, and had known cases where they were hurt or wounded, and had not noticed any great immunity to pain. Was this, then, another special attribute of the Rulers? But Egon, or Irad, had certainly felt pain when Ebony scratched his chin, and had made quite a fuss about it. Was it real—or was he "putting on an act" to conceal his immunity? Somehow, Hanlon was not willing to accept that last.
Dimly, in the back of his mind, there seemed to be another puzzling thought. What was it? Hanlon worried at it like one of the roches might worry a bone ... and finally it struck him—hard.
If the other three had been captured, why hadn't he?
At its multiphased scanner in the spaceship high above, the being stiffened suddenly. For long minutes the mind concentrated on this new problem. The plan put into operation that morning had been partially successful. The "location" of that unreadable mind before noticed, found once and then lost—was now known again.