Prelude to Foundation

“We can’t see much through the snow,” said Leggen.

“I know that. If it wasn’t snowing, we’d have seen him by now. I’m sure of it. As it is, it may take a few minutes. We can stand that.” She was by no means as confident as her words made it appear.

She began to walk, swinging her arms, playing the light over as large a field as she could, straining her eyes for a dark blotch against the snow.

And, as it happened, it was Benastra who first said, “What’s that?” and pointed.

Dors overlapped the two founts, making a bright cone of light in the indicated direction. She ran toward it, as did the other two. They had found him, huddled and wet, about ten meters from the door, five from the nearest meteorological device. Dors felt for his heartbeat, but it was not necessary for, responding to her touch, Seldon stirred and whimpered.

“Give me the blanket, Dr. Benastra,” said Dors in a voice that was faint with relief. She flapped it open and spread it out in the snow. “Lift him onto it carefully and I’ll wrap him. Then we’ll carry him down.”

In the elevator, vapors were rising from the wrapped Seldon as the blanket warmed to blood temperature.

Dors said, “Once we have him in his room, Dr. Leggen, you get a doctor-a good one-and see that he comes at once. If Dr. Seldon gets through this without harm, I won’t say anything, but only if he does. Remember-”

“You needn’t lecture me,” said Leggen coldly. “I regret this and I will do what I can, but my only fault was in allowing this man to come Upperside in the first place.”

The blanket stirred and a low, weak voice made itself heard. Benastra started, for Seldon’s head was cradled in the crook of his elbow. He said, “He’s trying to say something.”

Dors said, “I know. He said, ‘What’s going on?’ ”

She couldn’t help but laugh just a little. It seemed such a normal thing to say.

28.

The doctor was delighted.

“I’ve never seen a case of exposure,” he explained. “One doesn’t get exposed on Trantor.”

“That may be,” said Dors coldly, “and I’m happy you have the chance to experience this novelty, but does it mean that you do not know how to treat Dr. Seldon?”

The doctor, an elderly man with a bald head and a small gray mustache, bristled. “Of course, I do. Exposure cases on the Outer Worlds are common enough-an everyday affair-and I’ve read a great deal about them.” Treatment consisted in part of an antiviral serum and the use of a microwave wrapping.

“This ought to take care of it,” the doctor said. “On the Outer Worlds, they make use of much more elaborate equipment in hospitals, but we don’t have that, of course, on Trantor. This is a treatment for mild cases and I’m sure it will do the job.”

Dors thought later, as Seldon was recovering without particular injury, that it was perhaps because he was an Outworlder that he had survived so well. Dark, cold, even snow were not utterly strange to him. A Trantorian probably would have died in a similar case, not so much from physical trauma as from psychic shock.

She was not sure of this, of course, since she herself was not a Trantorian either.

And, turning her mind away from these thoughts, she pulled up a chair near to Hari’s bed and settled down to wait.

29.

On the second morning Seldon stirred awake and looked up at Dors, who sat at his bedside, viewing a book-film and taking notes. In a voice that was almost normal, Seldon said, “Still here, Dors?”

She put down the book-film. “I can’t leave you alone, can I? And I don’t trust anyone else.”

“It seems to me that every time I wake up, I see you. Have you been here all the time?”

“Sleeping or waking, yes.”

“But your classes?”

“I have an assistant who has taken over for a while.” Dors leaned over and grasped Hari’s hand. Noticing his embarrassment (he was, after all, in bed), she removed it.

“Hari, what happened? I was so frightened.”

Seldon said, “I have a confession to make.”

“What is it, Hari?”

“I thought perhaps you were part of a conspiracy-”

“A conspiracy?” she said vehemently.

“I mean, to maneuver me Upperside where I’d be outside University jurisdiction and therefore subject to being picked up by Imperial forces.”

“But Upperside isn’t outside University jurisdiction. Sector jurisdiction on Trantor is from the planetary center to the sky.”

“Ah, I didn’t know that. But you didn’t come with me because you said you had a busy schedule and, when I was getting paranoid, I thought you were deliberately abandoning me. Please forgive me. Obviously, it was you who got me down from there. Did anyone else care?”

“They were busy men,” said Dors carefully. “They thought you had come down earlier. I mean, it was a legitimate thought.”

“Clowzia thought so too?”

“The young intern? Yes, she did.”

“Well, it may still have been a conspiracy. Without you, I mean.”

“No, Hari, it is my fault. I had absolutely no right to let you go Upperside alone. It was my job to protect you. I can’t stop blaming myself for what happened, for you getting lost.”