"That's none of your business."
"It is my business. If the Agents are going to sit by and let the biggest case of time-tinkering go on right in front of their noses, it's got to be someone's business. I take it you know my father's theory. All the most powerful dictators through history have not worked alone. Someone in our own time—we don't know who—has been helping them. If he could control the most powerful rulers in history, he could control the entire time-stream from the dawn of civilization to our own age. Labor, raw material, armies—all the world would be under his control. You found something in the twentieth century which substantiates that."
"Maybe," said Tedor.
"Maybe nothing. You found the Russians were getting outside aid—from our century."
"Even if I did—all right, I did—1955 is still the crucial year. I'm no different from anyone else. I can't enter 1955."
"Not in a time-conveyor, you can't. But you could set yourself down in the latter part of '54 and simply wait for '55 to roll around."
Tedor gasped audibly. "I never thought of that! No one did."
"My father did. He's there now. Listen to me, Barwan! There's so much going on that you Century Agents either know nothing about or do nothing about."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Clearly, this monopolist is a big-shot in our own day, with plenty of power."