As Phil's foot touched the roof, Sacheverell Akeley darted up to him, sweat pouring off his ruddy-bronze forehead.
"What are you doing here?" Phil asked sharply. "How did you get away from them—Romadka's friends, I mean."
"They raced off a couple of hours after Romadka left," Sacheverell answered quickly. "Got a phone call. Incidentally, Romadka abducted three of our cats. As for me, I've worked here for ages. The important point is," he continued in an intense whisper, "that he's here, isn't he? I mean the Green One. I've never esped like this before, even at stars."
But before Phil could answer, Frobisher and da Silva glanced at them inquisitively. Phil and Sacheverell followed them down the metal staircase.
Reaching the top floor they found Opperly deep in conversation with a man who looked at least half out of this world. He was fat and had a beard, but his dull eyes seemed to be seeing twice as much as he was looking at. Sacheverell tugged at Phil's sleeve guardedly. "Garnett's frightfully espy," he whispered, his lips next to Phil's ear.
"But Winnie, how do you explain it?" Opperly was saying. "Why all this success with esping, in practically all your projects, all of a sudden?"
Garnett frowned. "Well, there is one unusual circumstance. Our lab technicians claim to have found hormones, or some sort of specialized protein molecules floating around in the air."
"What hormones?" Opperly asked quickly.
"Well," Garnett said, "they have had some difficulty identifying them." He hesitated. "The hormones seem to show a tremendous variability—almost chameleon-like."
Opperly smiled and threw Phil a twinkling gaze.