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matter might collapse before the strain.
"What's the latest about the building?" Hedrock asked.
Cadron was more cheerful. "It's still within its critical limits. We've got to make
our decision before it reaches the danger stage."
Hedrock was silent. The matter of what the decision should be was a sore point
with him, who was obviously not going to be asked. He said finally. "What about
the men who are working on the problem of slowing the swings and bringing the
seesaw back this way?"
Another man answered that. "The research is abandoned. Science four thousand
seven hundred and eighty-four has no answer. We're lucky enough to have made
one of our shops the fulcrum. We can set off the explosion anywhere in the past
or future. But which? And when? Particularly when?"
The shadows on that cartograph made no movement, gave no sign. Their time of
action was not yet.
CHAPTER XI
THE STRAIN attendant on watching another swing faded. The men were turning
away from the map, and there was a murmur of conversation. Somebody said
something about using the opportunity to acquire all the possible data on time
travel. Councilor Kendlon remarked that the body's accumulation of energy was
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fairly convincing proof that time travel would never be popular.
It was Dresley, the precise, the orderly, who finally remarked, "Gentlemen, we are
here as delegates of the Council to listen to Mr. Hedrock's report of the
counterattack against the empress. In his report some weeks ago he was able to
give us administrative details. And you will recall that we found his organization
set-up to be efficient in the extreme. Mr. Hedrock, will you now bring us up to
date?"
Hedrock glanced from person to person thoughtfully. He saw that they were
watching him, and that raised his necessity level. His problem, it seemed to him,
was to make up his own mind about the seesaw, then carry out his decision
without regard for the attitude of his nominal superiors. It would be difficult.
He began succinctly, "Since the first directive was given me, we have set up one
thousand two hundred and forty-two new shops, primarily in small villages, and
three thousand eight hundred and nine contacts have been established, however
tenuous in some cases, with Imperial government personnel, both military and
civil."
He explained briefly his system of classifying the various individuals into groups
on the basis of vocation, degree of importance and, what was more important,
pitch of enthusiasm .for the venture into which the empress had precipitated her
adherents.
"From three scientists," Hedrock went on, "who regard the weapon shops as an
integral part of Isher civilization, we gained in the first ten days the secret of the
science behind the time-energy machine in so far as that science is known to the
government. We discovered that, of the four generals in charge of the enterprise,
two were opposed to it from the beginning, a third was won over when the
building disappeared-but the fourth, General Doocar, the man in charge,
unfortunately will not abandon the attack until she does. He is an empress man
in the sense of personal loyalty transcending his own feelings, and opinions."
He paused, expecting them to comment. But no one said anything. Which was
actually the most favorable response of all. Hedrock continued, "Some thousands
of officers have deserted the Imperial forces, but only one member of the
Imperial Council, Prince del Curtin, openly opposed the attack after the execution
of Banton Vickers who, as you knew, criticized the whole plan. And the prince's
method of disapproval has been to withdraw from the palace while the attack is in
progress.
"Which brings us," said Hedrock, "to the empress herself." He summarized her
character for them. The glorious Innelda, an orphan since her eleventh birthday,
had been crowned when she was eighteen and was now twenty-five. "An age,"
said Hedrock grimly, "which is an in-between stage in the development of the
animal man to human man levels."
He saw that they were puzzled by his reiteration of facts they all knew. But he had
no intention of condensing his account. He had his own formula for defeating the
empress and he wanted to state it at least once in as skillful a fashion as possible.
"At twenty-five," he said, "our Innelda is emotional, unstable, brilliant,
implacable, impatient of restrictions on her desires and just a bit unwilling to
grow up. As the thousands of reports came in, it seemed to me finally that our
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