Foundation and Empire

His eyes were on Bayta now, and didn't leave. He spoke to her more softly, "I have the crystal of you right here - and it's good, but I can see the fellow who took it was an amateur."

He had the small cube of transparency out of his jacket pocket and in the light the laughing little face within sprang to vivid colored life as a miniature Bayta.

"That one!" said Bayta. "Now I wonder why Toran should send that caricature. I'm surprised you let me come near you, sir."

"Are you now? Call me Fran. I'll have none of this fancy mess. For that, I think you can take my arm, and we'll go on to the car. Till now I never did think my boy knew what he was ever up to. I think I'll change that opinion. I think I'll have to change that opinion."

Toran said to his half uncle softly, "How is the old man these days? Does he still hound the women?"

Randu puckered up all over his face when he smiled. "When he can, Toran, when he can. There are times when he remembers that his next birthday will be his sixtieth, and that disheartens him. But he shouts it down, this evil thought, and then he is himself. He is a Trader of the ancient type. But you, Toran. Where did you find such a pretty wife?"

The young man chuckled and linked arms. "Do you want a three years' history at a gasp, uncle?"

It was in the small living room of the home that Bayta struggled out of her traveling cloak and hood and shook her hair loose. She sat down, crossing her knees, and returned the appreciative stare of this large, ruddy man.

She said, "I know what you're trying to estimate, and I'll help you; Age, twenty-four, height, five-four, weight, one-ten, educational specialty, history." She noticed that he always crooked his stand so as to hide the missing arm. But now Fran leaned close and said, "Since you mention it - weight, one-twenty."

He laughed loudly at her flush. Then he said to the company in general, "You can always tell a woman's weight by her upper arm - with due experience, of course. Do you want a drink, Bay?"

"Among other things," she said, and they left together, while Toran busied himself at the book shelves to check for new additions.

Fran returned alone and said, "She'll be down later."

He lowered himself heavily into the large comer chair and placed his stiff-jointed left leg on the stool before it. The laughter had left his red face, and Toran turned to face him.

Fran said, "Well, you're home, boy, and I'm glad you are. I like your woman. She's no whining ninny."

"I married her," said Toran simply.

"Well, that's another thing altogether, boy." His eyes darkened. "It's a foolish way to tie up the future. In my longer life, and more experienced, I never did such a thing."

Randu interrupted from the comer where he stood quietly. "Now Franssart, what comparisons are you making? Till your crash landing six years ago you were never in one spot long enough to establish residence requirements for marriage, And since then, who would have you?"

The one-armed man jerked erect in his seat and replied hotly, "Many, you snowy dotard-"

Toran said with hasty tact, "It's largely a legal formality, Dad. The situation has its conveniences."

"Mostly for the woman," grumbled Fran.

"And even if so," agreed Randu, "it's up to the boy to decide. Marriage is an old custom among the Foundationers."

"The Foundationers are not fit models for an honest Trader," smoldered Fran.

Toran broke in again, "My wife is a Foundationer." He looked from one to the other, and then said quietly, "She's coming."

The conversation took a general turn after the evening meal, which Fran had spiced with three tales of reminiscence composed of equal parts of blood, women, profits, and embroidery. The small televisor was on, and some classic drama was playing itself out in an unregarded whisper. Randu had hitched himself into a more comfortable position on the low couch and gazed past the slow smoke of his long pipe to where Bayta had knelt down upon the softness of the white fur mat brought back once long ago from a trade mission and now spread out only upon the most ceremonious occasions.

"You have studied history, my girl?" he asked, pleasantly.

Bayta nodded. "I was the despair of my teachers, but I learned a bit, eventually."

"A citation for scholarship," put in Toran, smugly, "that's all!"

"And what did you learn?" proceeded Randu, smoothly.

"Everything? Now?" laughed the girl.

The old man smiled gently. "Well then, what do you think of the Galactic situation?"

"I think," said Bayta, concisely, "that a Seldon crisis is pending - and that if it isn't then away with the Seldon plan altogether. It is a failure."

("Whew," muttered Fran, from his comer. "What a way to speak of Seldon." But he said nothing aloud.)

Randu sucked at his pipe speculatively. "Indeed? Why do you say that? I was to the Foundation, you know, in my younger days, and I, too, once thought great dramatic thoughts. But, now, why do you say that?"