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"Oona has a brilliant mind. Her one weakness is that she thinks that Terrans in pretty, gold-braided uniforms are wonderful. You snubbed her. Shreen noticed. I noticed."

"As far as I'm concerned," said Grimes, "Oona can be Her Imperial Highness on whatever world she comes from, but I don't have to like her."

Professor Tolliver, casually clad in a rather grubby toga, smoking a pipe even fouler than Grimes's, joined the discussion. He remarked, "Young Grimes has a point . . . "

"Too right I have," agreed Grimes. "As far as I'm concerned, people are people—it doesn't matter a damn if they're humanoid, arachnoid, saurian or purple octopi from the next galaxy but three. If they're our sort of people, I like 'em. If they ain't—I don't."

"Oona's our sort of people," insisted Selma.

"She doesn't smell like it."

The girl laughed. "And how do you think she enjoys the stink of your pipe—and, come to that, Peter's pipe?"

"Perhaps she does enjoy it," suggested Grimes.

"As a matter of fact she does," said Professor Tolliver.

"Men . . ." muttered Selma Madigan disgustedly.

Tolliver drifted off then, and Grimes walked with the girl to the table on which stood a huge punchbowl. He ladled out drinks for each of them. He raised his own glass in a toast. "Here's to integration!"

"I wish that you really meant that."

"Perhaps I do . . ." murmured Grimes, a little doubtfully. "Perhaps I do. After all, we've only one Universe, and we all have to live in it. It's not so long ago that blacks and whites and yellows were at each other's throats on the Home Planet—to say nothing of the various subdivisions within each color group. Von Tannenbaum—that's him over there, the Blond Beast we call him. He's an excellent officer, a first class shipmate, and a very good friend. But his ancestors were very unkind to mine, on my mother's side. And mine had quite a long record of being unkind to other people. I could be wrong—but I think that much of Earth's bloody history was no more—and no less—than xenophobia carried to extremes . . ."

"Quite a speech, John." She sipped at her drink. "It's a pity that the regulations of your Service forbid you to play any active part in politics."

"Why?"

"You'd make a very good recruit for the new Party we're starting. LL . . ."

"LL . . . ?"

"The obvious abbreviation. The League of Life. You were talking just now of Terran history. Even when Earth's nations were at war there were organizations—religions, political parties, even fraternal orders—with pan-national and pan-racial memberships. The aim of the League of Life is to build up a membership of all intelligent species."

"Quite an undertaking."

"But a necessary one. Doncaster could be said to be either unfortunately situated, or otherwise, according to the viewpoint. Here we are, one Man-colonized planet on the borders of no less than two . . . yes, I'll use that word, much as I dislike it . . . no less than two alien empires. The Hallichek Hegemony, the Shaara Super-Hive. We know that Imperial Earth is already thinking of establishing Fortress Doncaster, converting this world into the equivalent of a colossal, impregnably armored and fantastically armed dreadnought with its guns trained upon both avian and arthroped, holding the balance of power, playing one side off against the other and all the rest of it. But there are those of us who would sooner live in peace and friendship with our neighbors. That's why Duncannon University has always tried to attract non-Terran students—and that's why the League of Life was brought into being." She smiled. "You could, I suppose call it enlightened self-interest."

"Enlightened," agreed Grimes.

He liked this girl. She was one of those women whose physical charm is vastly enhanced by enthusiasm. She did far more to him, for him, than the sort of female equally pretty or prettier, whom he usually met.

She said, "I've some literature at home, if you'd like to read it."

"I should—Selma."

She took the use of her given name for granted. Was that