"It's pretty badly swollen," the girl said, moving it gently. "Does that
hurt? I thought so."
Bart set his teeth against a cry. "It's all right, I tell you. Just
because it's black and blue--"
He heard her breath jolt out, her fingers clenched painfully on his
wounded wrist. She did not hear his cry this time. "And the sun was nice
and green," she whispered. "What are you?"
Bart felt himself slip sidewise; he thought for a moment that he would
faint where he sat. Terrified, he looked up at Meta. Their eyes met, and
she said, hardly moving her pale lips, "Your eyes--they're like mine.
Your eyelashes--dark, not white. You're not a Lhari!"
The pain in his wrist suddenly blurred everything else, but Meta
suddenly realized she was gripping it; she gave a little, gentle cry,
and cradled the abused wrist in her palm.
"No wonder you didn't want it X-rayed," she whispered. Biting her lip,
she glanced, terrified, at Karol, unconscious in the bunk. "No, he can't
hear us; I gave him a heavy shot of hypnin, poor fellow."
"Go ahead," Bart said bitterly, "yell for your keepers."
Her gray eyes blazed at him for a moment; then, gently, she laid his
wrist on the table, went to the infirmary door and locked it on the
inside. She turned around, her face white; even her lips had lost their
color. "Who are you?" she whispered.
"Does it matter now?"
Shocked comprehension swept over her face. "You don't think I'd tell
them," she whispered. "I heard talk, in the Procyon port, of a spy that
had managed to get through on a Lhari ship." Her face twisted. "You--you
must know about the man on the Multiphase, you know they'll--make sure
I can't--hide anything dangerous to the Lhari at the end of the voyage."
"Meta--" concern for her swept over him--"what will they do to you when
they find out that you know and--didn't tell?"
Her gray eyes were wide as a kitten's. "Why, nothing. The Lhari would
never hurt anyone, would they?"
Brainwashed? He set his mouth grimly. "I hope you never find out
different."
"Why would they need to?" she asked, reasonably. "They could just erase
the memory. I never heard of a Lhari actually hurting anyone. But
something like this--" She wavered, looking at him. "You look so much
like a Lhari! How was it done? How could they do it? Poor fellow, you
must be the--the loneliest man in the Universe!"