"What?" Herb asked.
"Make him tell us. How we can keep them from setting off the explosion!" Norma said.
The Oligarch wanted to talk, and he made a motion—a feeble one—to silence them both. The girl's pathetic conviction that the explosion could be prevented infuriated the Oligarch. There was nothing she could do. The cleverness with which he had executed his mission defied time and eternity.
"It won't be set off in the big ship," the Oligarch said. "I had intended to leave you at the site, Herb, to trigger it personally." He spoke English and was disappointed to see that his vision began to mist. He would have liked to watch the girl's face. "But your later dream forms made me deny you martyrdom. I think I might have done it any way, if you hadn't left. You have the idealism. You were the one I had counted on. And after you, of course, there was only Bud."
Norma choked weakly and her knees half gave way. The sound was satisfying to the Oligarch.
"I told Bud the explosion was planted," the Oligarch said. "Then I ... I told him...." He coughed again. "I told him that I had mailed his brother's head along with his confession to ... to.... Then I gave him a telephone number. He phones long distance, gives the number. At the bomb site, the receiver ... lifts automatically.... He says, 'Frank Council' ... his brother's name ... the key.... The trigger falls." The Oligarch's hands scrabbled on the desk. "Don't you think he'll do it, in the knowledge of his own personal destruction?... Oh, he will, yes.... And this is the final...." Blood dribbled from the Oligarch's mouth. "I didn't mail his brother's head.... I lied to him. Don't you see what a beautiful ... what a satisfying lie that was?" He laughed, coughed again, and slumped forward. And the chase ended.
And Herb, looking at death, grabbed Norma by the arm and ran toward the control room.
... And back on Earth, Bud Council sat sick and trembling, his eyes fastened on the telephone beside him....
CHAPTER XIV