Foundation

"You don't intend. You don't. And who are you? And may I ask what you meant by blowing off your mouth about our nuclear-power plant? Why, it's just the thing that would make us a military target."

"Yes," gri

"And that was what?"

"That Anacreon no longer has a nuclear-power economy. If they had, our friend would undoubtedly have realized that plutonium, except in ancient tradition is not used in power plants. And therefore it follows that the rest of the Periphery no longer has nuclear power either. Certainly Smyrno hasn't, or Anacreon wouldn't have won most of the battles in their recent war. Interesting, wouldn't you say?"

"Bah!" Pire

He threw his cigar away and looked up at the outstretched Galaxy. "Back to oil and coal, are they?" he murmured - and what the rest of his thoughts were he kept to himself.

When Hardin denied owning the Journal, he was perhaps technically correct, but no more. Hardin had been the leading spirit in the drive to incorporate Terminus into an autonomous municipality-he had been elected its first mayor-so it was not surprising that, though not a single share of Journal stock was in his name, some sixty percent was controlled by him in more devious fashions.

There were ways.

Consequently, when Hardin began suggesting to Pire

And, eventually, Pire

Hardin, as he sat at the foot of the table, speculated idly as to just what it was that made physical scientists such poor administrators. It might be merely that they were too used to inflexible fact and far too unused to pliable people.

In any case, there was Tomaz Sutt and Jord Fara on his left; Lundin Crast and Yate Fulham on his fight; with Pire

Hardin had dozed through the initial formalities and then perked up when Pire

"I find it very gratifying to be able to inform the Board that since our last meeting, I have received word that Lord Dorwin, Chancellor of the Empire, will arrive at Terminus in two weeks. It may be taken for granted that our relations with Anacreon will be smoothed out to our complete satisfaction as soon as the Emperor is informed of the situation. "

He smiled and addressed Hardin across the length of the table. "Information to this effect has been given the Journal. "

Hardin snickered below his breath. It seemed evident that Pire

He said evenly: "Leaving vague expressions out of account, what do you expect Lord Dorwin to do?"

Tomaz Sutt replied. He had a bad habit of addressing one in the third person when in his more stately moods.

"It is quite evident," he observed, "that Mayor Hardin is a professional cynic. He can scarcely fail to realize that the Emperor would be most unlikely to allow his personal rights to be infringed."

"Why? What would he do in case they were?"

There was an a

"Am I to consider myself answered?"

"Yes! If you have nothing further to say-"

"Don't jump to conclusions. I'd like to ask a question. Besides this stroke of diplomacy - which may or may not prove to mean anything - has anything concrete been done to meet the Anacreonic menace?"

Yate Fulham drew one hand along his ferocious red mustache. "You see a menace there, do you?"

"Don't you?"

"Scarcely"- this with indulgence. "The Emperor-"

"Great space!" Hardin felt a

"Now, get this. We've had two months' grace so far, mainly because we've given Anacreon the idea that we've got nuclear weapons. Well, we all know that that's a little white lie. We've got nuclear power, but only for commercial uses, and darn little at that. They're going to find that out soon, and if you think they're going to enjoy being jollied along, you're mistaken."

"My dear sir-"

"Hold on: I'm not finished." Hardin was warming up. He liked this. "It's all very well to drag chancellors into this, but it would be much nicer to drag a few great big siege guns fitted for beautiful nuclear bombs into it. We've lost two months, gentlemen, and we may not have another two months to lose. What do you propose to do?"

Said Lundin Crast, his long nose wrinkling angrily: "If you're proposing the militarization of the Foundation, I won't hear a word of it. It would mark our open entrance into the field of politics. We, Mr. Mayor, are a scientific foundation and nothing else."

Added Sutt: "He does not realize, moreover, that building armaments would mean withdrawing men - valuable men - from the Encyclopedia. That ca

"Very true," agreed Pire

Hardin groaned in spirit. The Board seemed to suffer violently from Encyclopedia on the brain,

He said icily: "Has it ever occurred to this Board that it is barely possible that Terminus may have interests other than the Encyclopedia?"

Pire

"I didn't say the Foundation; I said Terminus. I'm afraid you don't understand the situation. There's a good million of us here on Terminus, and not more than a hundred and fifty thousand are working directly on the Encyclopedia. To the rest of us, this is home. We were born here. We're living here. Compared with our farms and our homes and our factories, the Encyclopedia means little to us. We want them protected-"

He was shouted down.

"The Encyclopedia first," ground out Crast. "We have a mission to fulfill."

"Mission, hell," shouted Hardin. "That might have been true fifty years ago. But this is a new generation."

"That has nothing to do with it," replied Pire

And Hardin leaped through the opening. "Are you, though? That's a nice hallucination, isn't it? Your bunch here is a perfect example of what's been wrong with the entire Galaxy for thousands of years. What kind of science is it to be stuck out here for centuries classifying the work of scientists of the last mille

"If you ask me," he cried, "the Galactic Empire is dying!"

He paused and dropped into his chair to catch his breath, paying no attention to the two or three that were attempting simultaneously to answer him.

Crast got the floor. "I don't know what you're trying to gain by your hysterical statements, Mr. Mayor. Certainly, you are adding nothing constructive to the discussion. I move, Mr. Chairman, that the speaker's remarks be placed out of order and the discussion be resumed from the point where it was interrupted."

Jord Fara bestirred himself for the first time. Up to this point Fara had taken no part in the argument even at its hottest. But now his ponderous voice, every bit as ponderous as his three-hundred-pound body, burst its bass way out.

"Haven't we forgotten something, gentlemen?"

"What?" asked Pire

"That in a month we celebrate our fiftieth a

"What of it?"

"And on that a

"I don't know. Routine matters. A stock Speech of congratulations, perhaps. I don't think any significance need be placed on the Vault - though the Journal "- and he glared at Hardin, who gri

"Ah," said Fara, "but perhaps you are wrong. Doesn't it strike you" - he paused and put a finger to his round little nose -"that the Vault is opening at a very convenient time?"

"Very inconvenient time, you mean," muttered Fulham. "We've got some other things to worry about."

"Other things more important than a message from Hari Seldon? I think not." Fara was growing more pontifical than ever, and Hardin eyed him thoughtfully. What was he getting at?

"In fact," said Fara, happily, "you all seem to forget that Seldon was the greatest psychologist of our time and that he was the founder of our Foundation. It seems reasonable to assume that he used his science to determine the probable course of the history of the immediate future. If he did, as seems likely, I repeat, he would certainly have managed to find a way to warn us of danger and, perhaps, to point out a solution. The Encyclopedia was very dear to his heart, you know."

An aura of puzzled doubt prevailed. Pire