"The task?"
"Ultimately your task will be as I have outlined it for you, the return to the Eastern Hemisphere to obtain those sires of future generations of Americans. But now, before that can be possible, you must salvage Anstruther for me."
"But you yourself, Father, told me Anstruther was mad."
"Demented, yes, by the vision of the woman Nedra. But he can be salvaged. He must be salvaged. For if I lose you, O'Hara—should something go wrong during your flight back into the Eastern Hemisphere—I will have at least Anstruther. And I have no time now to depend on the chance again that some adventurous or befuddled pilot of the International Patrol will crash through the Curtain."
"You'd risk a madman with the task you set for me?"
"Only if I must. I don't belittle that risk. But for that matter, how sure am I of you? Once beyond the Curtain, what pledges your return except the woman you love? And that reed is too thin to be my sole reliance. You must reclaim Anstruther for me, you must bring him to me, where I can get at him."
"I am to be his Judas, is that it?"
The Father's voice, a silken whisper in that glittering corridor, lashed out, "Your posturings annoy me. We are not discussing morals, we are discussing what you will do. Have you so soon forgotten the months you spent alone in that magnificent little room? And Nedra and your baby?"
"Whom you dare not harm! They are your only hold on me."
"Don't underestimate what I dare, O'Hara. Nor overestimate your value to me. I could decide, if I must, to work with lesser tools if necessary. But as for your scruples, if I had wished to destroy Anstruther, he would be dissolved by now. I can do it at this moment, simply by touching the key beneath my finger. No, you would not be destroying him by bringing him to me. You would in fact relieve me of the possible necessity of eliminating him."