that is Jennings. His unattainable delight was the pun. My only clear memory of him is his occasional attempts to perpetrate puns. I enjoy puns, I adore puns, but Jennings-yes, I remember him well now-was atrocious at it.
Either that, or distressingly obvious at it, as in this case. He lacked all talent for puns, yet craved them so much--'
Ashley suddenly broke in. This message consists entirely of a kind of wordplay, Dr. Urth. At least, we believe so, and that fits in with what you say.'
'Ah!' Urth adjusted his glasses and peered through them once more at the card and the symbols it carried. He pursed his plump lips, then said cheerfully, 'I make nothing of it.'
'In that case--' began Ashley, his hands balling into fists.
'But if you tell me what it's all about,' Urth went on, 'then perhaps it might mean something.'
Davenport said quickly, 'May I, sir? I am confident that this man can be relied on-and it may help.'
'Go ahead,' muttered Ashley. 'At this point, what can it hurt?'
Davenport condensed the tale, giving it in crisp, telegraphic sentences, while Urth listened carefully, moving his stubby fingers over the shining milk-white desktop as though he were sweeping up invisible cigar ashes. Toward the end of the recital, he hitched up his legs and sat with them crossed like an amiable Buddha.
When Davenport was done, Urth thought a moment, then said, 'Do you happen to have a transcript of the conversation reconstructed by Ferrant?'
'We do,' said Davenport. 'Would you like to see it?'
'Please.'
Urth placed the strip of microfilm in a scanner and worked his way rapidly through it, his lips moving unintelligibly at some points. Then he tapped the reproduction of the cryptic message. 'And this, you say, is the key to the entire matter? The crucial clue?'
'We think it is, Dr. Urth.'
'But it is not the original. It is a reproduction.'
'That is correct.'
The original has gone with this man, Ferrant, and you believe it to be in the hands of the Ultras.'
'Quite possibly.'
Urth shook his head and looked troubled. 'Everyone knows my sympathies are not with the Ultras. I would fight them by all means, so I don't want to seem to be hanging back, but-what is there to say that this mind-affecting object exists at all? You have only the ravings of a psychotic and your dubious deductions from the reproduction of a mysterious set of marks that may mean nothing at all.'
'Yes, Dr. Urth, but we can't take chances.'
'How certain are you that this copy is accurate? What if the original has something on it that this lacks, something that makes the message quite clear, something without which the message must remain impenetrable?'
'We are certain the copy is accurate.'
'What about the reverse side? There is nothing on the back of this reproduction. What about the reverse of the original?'
'The agent who made the reproduction tells us that the back of the original was blank.'
'Men can make mistakes.'
'We have no reason to think he did, and we must work on At least until such time as the original is regained.'
'Then you assure me,' said Urth, 'that any interpretation to be made of this message must be made on the basis of exactly what one sees here.'
'We think so. We are virtually certain,' said Davenport with a sense of ebbing confidence.
Urth continued to look troubled. He said, 'Why not leave the instrument where it is? If neither group finds it, so much the better. I disapprove of any tampering with minds and would not contribute to making it possible.'
Davenport placed a restraining hand on Ashley's arm sensing the other was about to speak. Davenport said, 'Let me put it to you. Dr. Urth, that the mind-tampering aspect is not the whole of the Device.
Suppose an Earth expedition to a distant primitive planet had dropped an old-fashioned radio there, and suppose the native population had discovered electric current had been not yet developed the vacuum tube.
The population might discover that if the radio was hooked up to a current, certain glass objects within it would grow warm and would glow, but of course they would receive no intelligible sound, merely, at best, some buzzes and crackles. However, if they dropped the radio into a bathtub while it was plugged in, a person in that tub might be electrocuted. Should the people of this hypothetical planet therefore conclude that the device they were studying was designed solely for the purpose of tilling people?'