When the twenty-seven independent Trading worlds, united only by their distrust of the mother planet of the Foundation, concert an assembly among themselves, and each is big with a pride grown of its smallness, hardened by its own insularity and embittered by eternal danger ?there are preliminary negotiations to be overcome of a pettiness sufficiently staggering to heartsicken the most persevering.

It is not enough to fix in advance such details as methods of voting, type of representation ?whether by world or by population. These are matters of involved political importance. It is not enough to fix matters of priority at the table, both council and dinner, those are matters of involved social importance.

It was the place of meeting ?since that was a matter of overpowering provincialism. And in the end the devious routes of diplomacy led to the world of Radole, which some commentators had suggested at the start for logical reason of central position.

Radole was a small world ?and, in military potential, perhaps the weakest of the twenty-seven. That, by the way, was another factor in the logic of the choice.

It was a ribbon world ?of which the Galaxy boasts sufficient, but among which, the inhabited variety is a rarity for the physical requirements are difficult to meet. It was a world, in other words, where the two halves face the monotonous extremes of heat and cold, while the region of possible life is the girdling ribbon of the twilight zone.

Such a world invariably sounds uninviting to those who have not tried it, but there exist spots, strategically placed ?and Radole City was located in such a one.

It spread along the soft slopes of the foothills before the hacked-out mountains that backed it along the rim of the cold hemisphere and held off the frightful ice. The warm, dry air of the sun-half spilled over, and from the mountains was piped the water-and between the two, Radole City became a continuous garden, swimming in the eternal morning of an eternal June.

Each house nestled among its flower garden, open to the fangless elements. Each garden was a horticultural forcing ground, where luxury plants grew in fantastic patterns for the sake of the foreign exchange they brought ?until Radole had almost become a producing world, rather than a typical Trading world.

So, in its way, Radole City was a little point of softness and luxury on a horrible planet ?a tiny scrap of Eden ?and that, too, was a factor in the logic of the choice.

The strangers came from each of the twenty-six other Trading worlds: delegates, wives, secretaries, newsmen, ships, and crews ?and Radole's population nearly doubled and Radole's resources strained themselves to the limit. One ate at will, and drank at will, and slept not at all.

Yet there were few among the roisterers who were not intensely aware that all that volume of the Galaxy burnt slowly in a sort of quiet, slumbrous war. And of those who were aware, there were dime classes. First, there were the many who knew little and were very confident.

Such as the young space pilot who wore the Haven cockade on the clasp of his cap, and who managed, in holding his glass before his eyes, to catch those of the faintly smiling Radolian girl opposite. He was saying:

"We came fight through the war-zone to get here-on purpose. We traveled about a light-minute or so, in neutral, right past Horleggor?

"Horleggor?" broke in a long-legged native, who was playing host to that particular gathering. "That's where the Mule got the guts beat out of him last week, wasn't it?"

"Where'd you hear that the Mule got the guts beat out of him?" demanded the pilot, loftily.

"Foundation radio."

"Yeah? Well, the Mule's got Horleggor. We almost ran into a convoy of his ships, and that's where they were coming from. It isn't a gut-beating when you stay where you fought, and the gut-beater leaves in a hurry."

Someone else said in a high, blurred voice, "Don't talk like that. Foundation always takes it on the chin for a while. You watch; just sit tight and watch. Ol' Foundation knows when to come back. And then ?pow!" The thick voice concluded and was succeeded by a bleary grin.

"Anyway." said the pilot from Haven, after a short pause, "As I say, we saw the Mule's ships, and they looked pretty good, pretty good. I tell you what ?they looked new."

"New?" said the native, thoughtfully. "They build them themselves?" He broke a leaf from an overhanging branch, sniffed delicately at it, then crunched it between his teeth, the bruised tissues bleeding greenly and diffusing a minty odor. He said, "You trying to tell me they beat Foundation ships with homebuilt jobs? Go on."

"We saw them, doc. And I can tell a ship from a comet, too, you know."

The native leaned close. "You know what I think. Listen, don't kid yourself. Wars don't just start by themselves, and we have a bunch of shrewd apples running things. They know what they're doing."

The well-unthirsted one said with sudden loudness, "You watch ol' Foundation. They wait for the last minute, then ?pow!" He grinned with vacuously open mouth at the girl, who moved away from him.

The Radolian was saying, "For instance, old man, you think maybe that this Mule guy's running things. No-ooo." And he wagged a finger horizontally. "The way I hear it, and from pretty high up, mind you, he's our boy. We're paying him off, and we probably built those ships. Let's be realistic about it ?we probably did. Sure, he can't beat the Foundation in the long run, but he can get them shaky, and when he does ?we get in."

The girl said, "Is that all you can talk about, Klev? The war? You make me tired."

The pilot from Haven said, in an access of gallantry,

"Change the subject. Can't make the girls tired."

The bedewed one took up the refrain and banged a mug to the rhythm. The little groups of two that had formed broke up with giggles and swagger, and a few similar groups of twos emerged from the sun-house in the background.

The conversation became more general, more varied, more meaningless.

Then there were those who knew a little more and were less confident.

Such as the one-armed Fran, whose large bulk represented Haven as official delegated, and who lived high in consequence, and cultivated new friendships ?with women when he could and with men when he had to.

It was on the sun platform of the hilltop home, of one of these new friends, that he relaxed for the first of what eventually proved to be a total of two times while on Radole. The new friend was Iwo Lyon, a kindred soul of Radole. Iwo's house was apart from the general cluster, apparently alone in a sea of floral perfume and insect chatter. The sun platform was a grassy strip of lawn set at a forty-five degree angle, and upon it Fran stretched out and fairly sopped up sun.

He said, "Don't have anything like this on Haven."

Iwo replied, sleepily, "Ever seen the cold side. There's a spot twenty miles from here where the oxygen runs like water. "

"Go on.

"Fact."

"Well, I'll tell you, Iwo-In the old days before my arm was chewed off I knocked around, see ?and you won't believe this, but" ?The story that followed lasted considerably, and Iwo didn't believe it.

Iwo said, through yawns, "They don't make them like in the old days, that's the truth."

"No, guess they don't. Well, now," Fran fired up, "don't say that. I told you about my son, didn't I? He's one of the old school, if you like. He'll make a great Trader, blast it. He's his old man up and down. Up and down, except that he gets married."

"You mean legal contract? With a girl?"

"That's right. Don't see the sense in it myself. They went to Kalgan for their honeymoon."

"Kalgan? Kalgan? When the Galaxy was this?"

Fran smiled broadly, and said with slow meaning, "Just before the Mule declared war on the Foundation."

"That so?"

Fran nodded and motioned Iwo closer with his head. He said, hoarsely, "In fact, I can tell you something, if you don't let it go any further. My boy was sent to Kalgan for a purpose. Now I wouldn't like to let it out, you know, just what the purpose was, naturally, but you look at the situation now, and I suppose you can make a pretty good guess. In any case, my boy was the man for the job. We Traders needed some sort of ruckus." He smiled, craftily. "It's here. I'm not saying how we did it, but ?my boy went to Kalgan, and the Mule sent out his ships. My son!"

Iwo was duly impressed. He grew confidential in his turn, "That's good. You know, they say we've got five hundred ships ready to pitch in on our own at the right time. "

Fran said authoritatively, "More than that,............