Hardin had been able to snatch only half an hour from a haggard and harriedVerisof before his ambassador was forced to rush off to supervise stillanother temple festival. But the half-hour was a most profitable one, andHardin prepared himself for the night's fireworks well satisfied.
In all, he acted as an observer, for he had no stomach for the religioustasks he would undoubtedly have had to undertake if his identity becameknown. So, when the palace's ballroom filled itself with a glittering hordeof the kingdom's very highest and most exalted nobility, he found himselfhugging the wall, little noticed or totally ignored.

He had been introduced to Lepold as one of a long line of introducees, andfrom a safe distance, for the king stood apart in , surrounded by his deadly blaze of radioactive aura. And in lessthan an hour this same king would take his seat upon the massive throne ofrhodium-iridium alloy with jewel-set gold chasings, and then, throne andall would rise maestically into the air, skim the ground slowly to hoverbefore the great window from which the great crowds of common folk couldsee their king and shout themselves into near apoplexy. The throne wouldnot have been so massive, of course, if it had not had a shielded nuclearmotor built into it.

It was past eleven. Hardin fidgeted and stood on his toes to better hisview. He resisted an impulse to stand on a chair. And then he saw Wienisthreading through the crowd toward him and he relaxed.
Wienis' progress was slow. At almost every step, he had to pass a kindlysentence with some revered noble whose grandfather had helped Lepold'sgrandfather brigandize the kingdom and had received a dukedom therefor.

And then he disentangled himself from the last uniformed peer and reachedHardin. His smile crooked itself into a smirk and his black eyes peeredfrom under grizzled brows with glints of satisfaction in them.

"My dear Hardin," he said, in a low voice, "you must expect to be bored,when you refuse to announce your identity.""I am not bored, your highness. This is all extremely interesting. We haveno comparable spectacles on Terminus, you know.""No doubt. But would you care to step into my private chambers, where wecan speak at greater length and with considerably more privacy?""Certainly."With arms linked, the two ascended the staircase, and more than one dowagerduchess stared after them in surprise and wondered at the identity of thisinsignificantly dressed and uninteresting-looking stranger on whom suchsignal honor was being conferred by the prince regent.