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An official touched Dirrul’s arm. “You must take the salute of our work-leaders now.”

Dirrul was pushed back against the stone railing as an orderly mob filed past, blank-faced and chattering with meaningless pleasure. Many of them pressed forward to touch his hand before the guards tactfully hurried them on. When the organized confusion was at its height a tiny square of paper was slipped into his hand.

Dirrul had no idea which of the mob had given it to him and he dared not glance at it. But he managed to hide the paper in the band of his tunic.

Hour by hour the throng filed past, endless and meaningless. It was an agony for Dirrul. For the first time he looked into the face of his dream and saw the reality of Vinin–order, discipline, efficiency–and utter blankness. Unhappily he recalled one of Dr. Kramer’s lectures.

“… Defiance of convention, confusion, frustration, stubbornness–yes and a touch of the neurotic too–these goad the individual into solving problems. And problem solving is progress. An orderly society that asks no questions of itself, a society that has no doubts, is a dying society….”

Dirrul understood the professor at last. He looked squarely at the fact of what he was, a traitor to his own people, on the verge of betraying them. He had been wonderfully deluded by his own self-deception.

But the job wasn’t quite finished. The Vininese would not have gone to take Glenna from the hospital if they had understood his teleray. Let them splurge on their reception! He was unimpressed. When the time came for questions to be answered he would conveniently forget why he had been sent to Vinin. Nothing they could do would drag it out of him.

The crowd thinned and Dirrul was taken inside the building, where his Vininese host awaited him. Sighing deeply the Vininese stood up. “These public displays do take so much of our time,” he said, “but it’s over now.” This last seemed to amuse him and he repeated it softly before adding, “The Chief’s ready to see you.”

Remembering the note and the flimsy possibility that it might suggest a way out, Dirrul answered quickly, “But, sir, I really ought to clean up first.”

“You Agronians have such weird notions of propriety!”

“I would feel more presentable to your Chief if–if I could have a bath. Perhaps I might even borrow a change of clothing.”

The Vininese fingered his chin thoughtfully. “It might be more amusing. Yes, the Chief can wait a few minutes longer for you to satisfy your vanity.”

He summoned a blank-faced liveried servant and asked for a clean worker’s suit for Dirrul. Then he took Dirrul to the wall tube and they shot noiselessly to an upper floor. As he left Dirrul at the door of a luxurious suite, the Vininese said, “When you change your clothes, my friend, don’t forget to take the disk out of your tunic. The Chief will want it when you see him.”

When he was sure he was alone Dirrul spread open the note. It was a crude drawing of a hearing aid and beneath it a cryptic sentence written in Agronian,

I lost mine and so has Glenna now.

The signature was unmistakably Hurd’s but the note made no sense. Hurd’s hearing was as sound as Dirrul’s. He had never used a mechanical device–how could he have lost it then? So has Glenna –that must be the key. Hurd somehow knew about the vagabond raiding party that had rescued Glenna from the mental hospital. He must have escaped from the Vininese earlier himself. He was probably hiding somewhere in the capital.

Working on this hypothesis Dirrul made a guess that the thing Hurd had lost was his illusion about the Vininese system. The hearing aid symbolized what Hurd had been told about it, as opposed to the reality which he saw with his own eyes.