"Aren't you missing the motivation?" asked Majors.
"Not at all, I just stated it. His subconscious mind knew that the only way to stop this catastrophe was to try the products of an untrammelled imagination."
"Rather complex, don't you think?"
"Not to the mind. It is all self-justification. Remember the attack on Rita? Her ribs constricted by a heavy leather strap? A normal man with the impulse to kill doesn't go to such bizarre lengths. A shot, a stab, a bit of poison.
"Also," added the psychologist, "it is commentary on the mind of the paranoid that cruel and unusual forms of torture and death are uppermost. Since in Carroll's deluded mind this attack was to be used as proof of the alien culture, the crime must be made to look alien and unearthly.
"Well," said Pollard with a deep sigh, "We have smoked him out at last. We have uncovered the hidden truth in Carroll's mind. Rita, we need you again."
"I know," she said quietly.
"You forgive him?"
"Of course," she said. "And if I did not I should cover it. After all, this is no longer a matter of men and women and minor hates. This is Man against the Universe. And if I must sacrifice myself to see that Sol remains I shall, and gladly."
"How about your brother?"