Foundation's Edge - Isaac Asimov [103]
"By all the stars," Trevize went on with a marked air of grievance, "I can even follow this back to graduation. I didn't go on tour with him. I remember not wanting to. Wasn't that a matter of his influence? He had to be alone. Where was he really going?"
Pelorat pushed away the dishes before him, as though he wanted to clear a space about himself in order to have room to think. It seemed to be a gesture that signaled the busboy-robot, a self-moving table that stopped near them and waited while they placed their dishes and cutlery upon it.
When they were alone, Pelorat said, "But that's mad. Nothing has happened that could not have happened naturally. Once you get it into your head that somebody is controlling events, you can interpret everything in that light and find no reasonable certainty anywhere. Come on, old fellow, it's all circumstantial and a matter of interpretation. Don't yield to paranoia."
"I'm not going to yield to complacency, either."
"Well, let us look at this logically. Suppose he was an agent of the Second Foundation. Why would he run the risk of rousing our suspicions by keeping the tourist center empty? What did he say that was so important that a few people at a distance--who would have been wrapped in their own concerns anyway--would have made a difference?"
"There's an easy answer to that, Janov. He would have to keep our minds under close observation and he wanted no interference from other minds. No static. No chance of confusion."
"Again, just your interpretation. What was so important about his conversation with us? It would make sense to suppose, as he himself insisted, that he met us only in order to explain what he had done, to apologize for it, and to warn us of the trouble that might await us. Why would he have to look further than that?"
The small card-receptacle at the farther rim of the table glittered unobtrusively and the figures representing the cost of the meal flashed briefly. Trevize groped beneath his sash for his credit card which, with its Foundation imprint, was good anywhere in the Galaxy--or anywhere a Foundation citizen was likely to go. He inserted it in the appropriate slot. It took a moment to complete the transaction and Trevize (with native caution) checked on the remaining balance before returning it to its pocket.
He looked about casually to make sure there was no undesirable interest in him on the faces of any of the few who still sat in the restaurant and then said, "Why look further than that? Why look further? That was not all he talked about. He talked about Earth. He told us it was dead and urged us very strongly to go to Comporellon. Shall we go?"
"It's something I've been considering, Golan," admitted Pelorat.
"Just leave here?"
"We can come back after we check out the Sirius Sector."
"It doesn't occur to you that his whole purpose in seeing us was to deflect us from Sayshell and get us out of here? Get us anywhere but here?"
"Why?"
"I don't know. See here, they expected us to go to Trantor. That was what you wanted to do and maybe that's what they counted on us doing. I messed things up by insisting we go to Sayshell, which is the last thing they wanted, and so now they have to get us out of here."
Pelorat looked distinctly unhappy. "But Golan, you are just making statements. Why don't they want us on Sayshell?"
"I don't know, Janov. But it's enough for me that they want us out. I'm staying. I'm not going to leave."
"But--but--Look, Golan, if the Second Foundation wanted us to leave, wouldn't they just influence our minds to make us want to leave? Why bother reasoning with us?"
"Now that you bring up the point, haven't they done that in your case, Professor?" and Trevize's eyes narrowed in sudden suspicion. "Don't you want to leave?"
Pelorat looked at Trevize in surprise. "I just think there's some sense to it."
"Of course you would, if you've been influenced."
"But I haven't been--"
"Of course you would swear you hadn't been if you had been."
Pelorat said, "If you box me in this way, there is no way of disproving