“No indeed!” said Jonnie. This was all going somewhere that was going to wind up as bad news. He could feel it despite their smiles.

“Precisely,” said Dries. “Where was l? Any way– and this will amuse you-they were not interested in us really for we did not have any metals to amount to anything. Being mostly water, our planets would have presented formidable mining problems.

“We needed metals and the Psychlos needed some computer technology we had, and so we became a market. This was something brand-new in Psychlo experience. They had a lot to learn about finance and that sort of thing. So we taught them.

“internally, they were pretty bad off. They breed like...what's some fish of this planet you'd know...like herrings! They have always been terrified of founding actual Psychlo colonies for fear they'd rise and revolt against the home planet. They had mobs and unemployment. Heavy, heavy depressions. They were an economic mess.

“So we helped them build markets for metals. With their teleportation shipping arrangements, it was very easy for them to do this. They became prosperous and developed even more ways to mine and we saw to it they were economically stable.

“Then suddenly, from the Psychlo viewpoint, an awful thing happened. It terrified them. That was about two hundred thousand years ago.”

“Two hundred nine thousand, four hundred sixty-two," corrected Lord Voraz.

“Thank you. Another race stole or invented teleportation!"

“The Boxnards, Universe Six,” said

Lord Voraz.

“It is unclear what happened then,” said Dries. “We don't always have access to military files and we never had access to these, not ever. But I think the Boxnards tried to put teleportation to military use. The Psychlos got there first and the entire seven planets of the Boxnards and every single Boxnard were wiped out. It took the Psychlos years.”

“Three years and sixteen days,” said Lord Voraz.

“They even slaughtered people and races which had been associated with or allied with the Boxnards, for we never afterwards found any trace of them.

“That war,” said Dries, “also seemed to change the Psychlos. For nearly half a century they all but cut contact with other worlds. It was a bad time

for us as well. Our economy was wrapped up in their concerns. They also must have engaged in some internal slaughter because the next records we have show their own population to have decreased by six elevenths.

“It took another century for the Psychlos to become busy again. But they were a very changed people.”

Aha, thought Jonnie. I have the time they began to use those capsules in baby Psychlos' heads! And why. To protect their teleportation technology and mathematics.

“They had burned all their books,” said Dries. “They had lost any aesthetic arts they had had. You can tell from their dictionaries that the language they had accumulated over the ages ceased to be in full use. They dropped words like 'compassion' or 'pity' and it even seemed they had dropped the term 'good sense.'

“Although we refer to them now as 'Psychlos,' that name didn't come into use until that time. Previously they called themselves after whatever king might chance to be on the imperial Throne.

“Anyway, not to bore you for I see you know something of this, the ensuing centuries were very, very bad for everyone, especially the

Psychlos. They built a reputation of being the cruelest, most sadistic oppressors any universe had ever seen.

“But they were in internal trouble. Their population was bursting. They were in economic chaos. They were nine parts in eleven unemployed. The royal house was terrified of revolution and as a matter of fact, experienced, I think, four assassinations of princes-”

“Seven,” said Lord Voraz. “And two queens.”

“Thank you,” continued Dries. “And in total desperation, they came to the Gredides and actually begged the Selachees for help. They wanted money to hire soldiers and buy arms. But our parliament, the Creditable Body, along with every other race in sixteen universes, wanted nothing to do with them and it looked like outright war. But somebody in the

Creditable Body-'

“Lord Finister," said Lord Voraz.

“Thank you. Had the good sense to turn them over to us. We were as big a bank then. The current head of it-'

“Lord Loonger," said Lord Voraz.

“Thank you. Brought them to the bargaining table and really got them on the signature line! The bank would handle all economic connections they had with other races, handle all transfers of Psychlo funds, handle all peace conferences. And in return every Selachee would be held inviolate, the Selachee planets and the Gredides System were totally hands off, and the Psychlos would furnish teleportation facilities throughout the universes for the bank. They signed, they got their money, they stabilized.”

Lord Voraz spoke up, “The only two times they ever sought to violate those agreements, they went into a nose-dive splash and they hastily reformed at once.”

“So there,” said Dries Gloton, “you have the whole background of the Galactic Bank. We call it 'Galactic,' you know, even though it should be 'Pan-Galactic,' covering sixteen universes as it does. But 'Galactic' makes customers look on it as their galaxy's bank. More neighborly, don't you think?”

What Jonnie thought was that he was dealing with an outfit more powerful than the Psychlos. With the galactic organization that could give orders to monsters and be obeyed. He was very alert. There was trouble here somewhere.

“Then possibly,” said Jonnie, “you want to talk with the government here about teleportation service.”

Dries and Lord Voraz looked at each other and then back at Jonnie.

“Not with the government,” said Lord Voraz. “I doubt it owns any of that. Teleportation would be quite another subject and really we aren't engaged in having a talk to arrange a talk about it just now. You see, there is space travel. It is slow and time-consuming but it does exist.”

Jonnie felt he was not saying everything but he wouldn't push that. It evidently wasn't where the danger lay– for certainly it lay someplace! He could feel it. He sat easily and said, “Maybe it's about the payment of fees for this conference. They might be much larger than we had anticipated.”

“Oh, heavens, no!” scoffed Dries. And he went to work with a ring he wore. The fingers flew, a thread came out and popped into an expanded tape, and he looked at it. “Negligible. The fees vary for emissaries because their governments vary in size and even pay them differently. But they only add up to about C85,000-it could, of course, be more if they delay. But not much. The bank fee is standard: only C25,000. There is of course the matter of my yacht-'

“The bank,” said Lord Voraz, “pays the space yacht expenses when he uses it on bank business. I think it would be fair, Dries, for you to charge up all the months you searched-”

Dries cut him off sharply. “The yacht would only be charged from the Batafor planet of Balor– that's the Galactic Bank branch office for this sector,” he added for Jonnie's benefit. “It’s a Hawvin planet. They're not such bad people really. Honest enough individually. So call it C60,000. The total is only around C 170,000.”

They had that much, thought Jonnie.

But Dries was hesitating. “We're not entirely sure yet that you would get this bill. It sort of depends on the outcome of the conference.”

Something here, Jonnie told himself. He was now getting a finger on it.