Angel sought escape from confusion in a fact he could understand. He said pathetically, "You killed the real Professor? He was a guy who wouldn't have hurt anybody. You killed him?"
"Of course. I've killed much better and more important people than he would ever be."
"He's right, Angel, he's an experienced killer. But all his killing won't help him now. He needs me to open and operate the ship. And I'm not cooperating."
Angel held fast to what he could understand. He muttered to himself, "The dirty killer. The rat."
The little man ignored him. He said, "You were very wise, Tlaxon—you remember your name now?—you were very wise, when you saw that a crash threatened, to lock the ship's machinery so that only your own personal characteristic motions would open it again. That was too much for even me to mimic. Your cleverness left me helpless to escape from the planet without you. After we finally crashed, and I recovered from the shock, I examined the ship's machinery. There seemed to be no serious damage. But I couldn't operate it. I needed your help. And you were unconscious. Sitting at the controls, you had received a much more severe shock than I had. You didn't recover for many hours. And after you did, you remembered nothing. You were still unable to be of use to me.
"I was enraged, but there was nothing I could do. I tried to keep you in the ship, but once, while I was asleep, you awoke and stumbled out. I had no choice then but to follow you in order to protect you. The ship locked automatically behind me, leaving me worse off than ever. But I had to follow because my escape depended on your own. It was then that Professor discovered you and I discovered him. I had to kill him. I think you can see why."
"Yes, I see now."
"Once our return to the ship was blocked off, we had to hide. I had to discard our old clothes and steal clothes that would be less conspicuous. As it was, we ourselves were conspicuous enough. In the world of ordinary men, we would have been subject to immediate investigation. It was only among such outcasts as Angel and his friends that we could to some extent pass ourselves off as natives. When they met us, the others thought that Angel had at last found friends of his own kind. Angel, of course, thought he had found the Professor. He was overjoyed to see me, and his enthusiasm was our passport. Moreover, in their world, it was not customary to ask questions that a man was not inclined to answer. There were too many embarrassing secrets on all sides.
"I was continually on tenter-hooks with regard to you. I was hoping that you would remember enough to help operate the ship and escape from the planet, but not enough to recall who I was. Meanwhile, I watched with interest how even in your amnesiac state you absorbed the English language. With our people, Tlaxon, language learning is much more of a reflex process than it is with these Earthlanders. You learned without knowing that you were doing so. All the same, your racial peculiarities prevented you from speaking exactly as the natives do."