When Rupert Boyce sent out the invitations for his party, the total mileage involved was impressive. To list only the first dozen guests, there were the Fosters from Adelaide, the Shoenbergers from Haiti, the Farrans from Stalingrad, the Moravias from Cincinnati, the Ivankos from Paris, and the Sullivans from the general vicinity of Easter Island, but approximately four kilometres down on the ocean bed. It was a considerable compliment to Rupert that although thirty guests had been invited, over forty turned up -- which was about the percentage he had expected. Only the Krauses let him down, and that was simply because they forgot about the International Date Line and arrived twenty-four hours late.

By noon an imposing collection of flyers had accumulated in the park, and the later arrivals would have quite a distance to walk once they had found somewhere to land. At least, it would seem quite a distance to them, under this cloudless sky and with the mercury at a hundred and ten. The assembled vehicles ranged from one-man Flitterbugs to family Cadillacs which were more like air-borne palaces than sensible flying machines. In this age, however, nothing could be deduced concerning the social status of the guests from their modes of transport.

"It's a very ugly house," said Jean Morrel as the Meteor spiraled down. "It looks rather like a box that somebody's stepped on."

"It's hardly fair to judge the place from this angle," he replied, sensibly enough. "From ground level it may look quite different. Oh dear!"

"What's the matter?"

"The Fosters are here. I'd recognize that colour-scheme anywhere."

George Greggson, who had an old-fashioned dislike of automatic landings, readjusted the rate-of-descent control before answering.

George had selected a landing place and was now diving purposefully towards it. They floated to rest between another Meteor and something that neither of them could identify. It looked very fast and, Jean thought, very uncomfortable. One of Rupert's technical friends, she decided, had probably built it himself. She had an idea that there was a law against that sort of thing.

"Well, there's no need to talk to them if you don't want to. That's one advantage of Rupert's parties -- you can always hide in the crowd."

The heat hit them like a blast from a blow-torch as they stepped out of the flyer. It seemed to suck the moisture from their bodies, and George almost imagined that he could feel his skin cracking. It was partly their own fault, of course.

"So it is," replied George. "This was all desert once -- and look at it now. Come on -- it'll be all right indoors!"

They had left Alaska three hours before, and should have remembered to adjust the cabin temperature accordingly.

Rupert's voice, slightly larger than life, boomed cheerfully in their ears. Their host was standing beside the flyer, a glass in each hand, looking down at them with a roguish expression. He looked down at them for the simple reason that he was about twelve feet tall; he was also semi-transparent. One could see right through him without much difficulty.

"Don't worry!" laughed Rupert. "Just give your order now, and it'll be ready by the time you arrive."

"This is a fine trick to play on your guests!" protested George. He grabbed at the drinks, which he could just reach. His hand, of course, went right through them. "I hope you've got something more substantial for us when we reach the house!"

"What a place to live!" gasped Jean. "I thought this climate was supposed to be controlled."

"Two large beers, cooled in liquid air," said George promptly. "We'll be right there."

"Well!" said Jean. "That's the first time I've seen one of those gadgets in action. How did Rupert get hold of it? I thought only the Overlords had them."

The sun put an end to further conversation until they had reached the house. As they approached the front door (which was not very easy to distinguish from the rest of the glass wall facing them) it swung automatically open with a fanfare of trumpets. Jean guessed, correctly, that she would be heartily sick of that fanfare before the day was through.

"Have you ever known Rupert not to get anything he wanted?" replied George. "That's just the toy for him. He can sit comfortably in his studio and go wandering round half of Africa. No heat, no bugs, no exertion -- and the icebox always in reach. I wonder what Stanley and Livingstone would have thought?"

Rupert nodded, put down one of his glasses on an invisible table, adjusted an equally invisible control, and promptly vanished from sight.

"You're Jean and George, aren't you?" she said, holding out her hand. "I'm so pleased to meet you. Rupert is doing something complicated with the drinks -- come along and meet everybody."

Her voice was a rich contralto that sent little shivers running up and down George's back, as if someone was playing on his spine like a flute. He looked nervously at Jean, who had managed to force a somewhat artificial smile, and finally recovered his voice.

There was only one adjective that adequately described her. She was distracting. Even in a world where beauty was almost commonplace, men would turn their heads when she entered the room. She was, George guessed, about one quarter Negro; her features were practically Grecian and her hair was long and lustrous. Only the dark, rich texture of her skin -- the overworked word "chocolate" was the only one that described it -- revealed her mixed ancestry.

The current Mrs. Boyce greeted them in the delicious coolness of the hall. She was, if truth be known, the main reason for the good turn-out of guests. Perhaps half of them would have come in any case to see Rupert's new house; the waverers had been decided by the reports of Rupert's new wife.

"It's -- it's very nice to meet you," he said lamely. 'We've been looking forward to this party."

"You'll find plenty more over there," he said, waving one hand vaguely behind him while he adjusted controls with the other. "Just make yourselves at home. You know most of the people here -- Maia will introduce you to the rest. Good of you to come."

"Rupert always gives such nice parties," put in Jean. By the way she accented the "always", one knew perfectly well she was thinking "Every time he gets married". George flushed slightly and gave Jean a glance of reproof, but there was no sign that their hostess noticed the barb. She was friendliness itself as she ushered them into the main lounge, already half packed with a representative collection of Rupert's numerous friends. Rupert himself was sitting at the console of what seemed to be a television engineer's control unit; it was, George assumed, the device that had projected his image out to meet them. He was busily demonstrating it by surprising two more arrivals as they descended into the parking place, but paused just long enough to greet Jean and George and to apologize for having given their drinks to somebody else.

George quickly came back to normal as they investigated the wonders of Rupert's new abode. The house seemed very large for two people, but this was just as well in view of the frequent overloads it would have to handle. There were two stories, the upper considerably larger so that it overhung and provided shade around the ground floor. The degree of mechanization was considerable, and the kitchen closely resembled the cockpit of an airliner.

"Good of you to invite us," said Jean, without much conviction. George had already departed towards the bar and she made her way after him, occasionally exchanging greetings with someone she recognized. About three-quarters of those present were perfect strangers, which was the normal state of affairs at one of Rupert's parties.

"Let's explore," she said to George when they had refreshed themselves and waved to everyone they knew. "I want to look at the house."

George, with a barely concealed backward look at Maia Boyce, followed after her. There was a faraway look in his eyes that Jean didn't like in the least. It was such a nuisance that men were fundamentally polygamous. On the other hand, if they weren't. Yes, perhaps it was better this way, after all.

This was such common knowledge that Jean could hardly contradict it, so she changed the subject.

"From what I've heard," replied George, who had no great sympathy for the last Mrs. Boyce, "she's perfectly happy with her Australian boy-friend."

George was sufficiently alert to avoid the trap.

"Which you don't, I take it," said Jean sweetly.

"She's awfully pretty, isn't she?"

"It must be up here; there's no more room down below. Besides, that fits in with the general design. All the living, eating, sleeping and so on's relegated to the ground floor. This is the fun and games department -- though I still think it's a crazy idea having a swimming-pool upstairs."

"Oh, I suppose so," he replied indifferently. "That is, of course, if one likes brunettes."

"Don't be jealous, dear," chuckled George, stroking her platinum hair. "Let's go and look at the library. What floor do you think that will be on?"

"I guess there's some reason for it," said George, opening a door experimentally. "Rupert must have had skilled advice when he built this place. I'm sure he couldn't have done it himself."

"Poor Ruby!" said Jean. "She would have loved this place."

"You're probably right. If he had, there'd have been rooms without doors, and stairways leading nowhere. In fact, I'd be afraid to step inside a house that Rupert had designed all by himself."

"Here we are," said George, with the pride of a navigator making landfall, "the fabulous Boyce collection in Its new home. I wonder just how many of them Rupert has really read."

The library ran the whole width of the house, but was virtually divided into half a dozen small rooms by the great bookcases extending across it. These held, if George remembered correctly, some fifteen thousand volumes -- almost everything of importance that had ever been published on the nebulous subjects of magic, psychic research, divining, telepathy, and the whole range of elusive phenomena lumped in the category of paraphysics. It was a very peculiar hobby for anyone to have in this age of reason. Presumably it was simply Rupert's particular form of escapism.

George noticed the smell the moment he entered the room. It was faint but penetrating, not so much unpleasant as puzzling. Jean had observed it too; her forehead was wrinkled in the effort of identification. Acetic acid, thought George -- that's the nearest thing to it. But it's got something else as well…

"I hope we haven't disturbed you, sir," he said politely. "We'd no idea that there was anyone here. Rupert never told us…"

"My name is Rashaverak," said the Overlord amiably. "I'm afraid I'm not being very sociable, but Rupert's library is a difficult place from which to escape."

Jean gave a little gasp and clutched at George's hand. Her reaction was, perhaps excusable. It was one thing to watch a television picture, quite another to meet the reality. George, who was seldom surprised by anything, rose to the occasion at once.

The Overlord put down the book, looked at them closely, then commenced reading again. There was nothing impolite about the action, coming as it did from a being who could read, talk, and probably do several other things at the same time. Nevertheless, to human observers the spectacle was disturbingly schizophrenic.

The library terminated in a small open space just large enough for a table, two chairs and some cushions. This, presumably, was where Rupert did most of his reading. Someone was reading there now, in an unnaturally dim light.

Jean managed to suppress a nervous giggle. Their unexpected fellow guest was, she noticed, reading at the rate of a page every two seconds. She did not doubt that he was assimilating every word, and she wondered if he could manage to read a book with each eye. "And then, of course," she thought to herself, "he could go on to learn braille so he could use his fingers. " The resulting mental picture was too comic to be comfortable, so she tried to suppress it by entering into the conversation. After all, it was not every day that one had a chance of talking to one of the masters of Earth.

George let her chatter on, after he had made the introductions, hoping that she wouldn't say anything tactless. Like Jean, he had never seen an Overlord in the flesh. Though they mixed socially with government officials, scientists and others who dealt with them in the course of business, he had never heard of one being present at an ordinary private party. One inference was that this party was not as private as it seemed. Rupert's possession of a piece of Overlord equipment also hinted at this, and George began to wonder, in capital letters, just What Was Going On. He would have to tackle Rupert about this when he could get him into a corner.

There was nothing really anthropomorphic about Rashaverak. George could understand the way in which, if seen from a distance by ignorant, terrified savages, the Overlords could be mistaken for winged men, and so could have given rise, to the conventional portrait of the Devil. From as close as this, however, some of the illusion vanished. The little horns (what function did they serve? wondered George) were as per specification, but the body was neither like that of a man nor of any animal Earth had ever known. Coming from a totally alien evolutionary tree, the Overlords were neither mammals, insects, nor reptiles. It was not even certain that they were vertebrates: their hard, external armour might well be their only supporting framework.

Since the chairs were too small for him, Rashaverak was sitting on the floor, apparently quite at ease since he had ignored the cushions only a metre away. As a result his head was a mere two metres from the ground, and George had a unique chance of studying extra-terrestrial biology. Unfortunately, as he knew little about terrestrial biology, he was not able to learn much that he did not already know. Only the peculiar, and by no means unpleasant, acid odour was new to him. He wondered how humans smelt to the Overlords, and hoped for the best.

Rupert's voice suddenly bellowed from a concealed speaker.

Rashaverak's wings were folded so that George could not see them clearly, but his tail, looking like a piece of armoured hose-pipe, lay neatly curled under him. The famous barb was not so much an arrowhead as a large, flat diamond. Its purpose, it was now generally accepted, was to give stability in flight, like the tail-feathers of a bird. From scanty facts and suppositions such as these, scientists had concluded that the Overlords came from a world of low gravity and very dense atmosphere.

"Perhaps I'd better go too," said Rashaverak, putting his book back on the shelf. He did that quite easily, without moving from the floor, and George noticed for the first time that he had two opposed thumbs, with five fingers between them. I'd hate to do arithmetic, George thought to himself, in a system based on fourteen.

"Jean! George! Where the hell are you hiding? Come down and join the party. People are beginning to talk."

Rashaverak getting to his feet was an impressive sight, and as the Overlord bent to avoid the ceiling it became obvious that, even if they were anxious to mix with human beings, the practical difficulties would be considerable.

"It gave me claustrophobia when he was standing. I wonder how Rupert got hold of him -- this looks like being an interesting party."

Rashaverak, his tail draped over his shoulder, moved across the room like an icebreaker worrying its way through a pack. As he sat down beside Rupert, the room seemed to become much larger again and George let out a sigh of relief.

"Fancy Rupert addressing him like that, in public too. But he didn't seem to mind. It's all very peculiar."

Several more cargoes of guests had arrived in the last half hour, and the room was now quite crowded. Rashaverak's arrival made matters a good deal worse, because everyone in the adjacent rooms came running in to see him. Rupert was obviously very pleased with the sensation. Jean and George were much less gratified, as no one took any notice of them. Indeed, few people could see them, because they were standing behind the Overlord.

"Come over here, Rashy, and meet some of the folks," shouted Rupert. "Sit on the divan -- then you can stop scraping the ceiling."

"I bet you he did mind. The trouble with Rupert Is that he likes to show oft; and he's got no tact. And that reminds me -- some of those questions you asked!"

"Such as?"

"Well --'How long have you been here? 'How do you get on with Supervisor Karellen? 'Do you like it on Earth? Really, darling! You just don't talk to Overlords that way!"

"I don't see why not. It is about time someone did."

Before the discussion could get acrimonious, they were accosted by the Shoenbergers and fission rapidly occurred. The girls went off in one direction to discuss Mrs. Boyce; the men went in another and did exactly the same thing, though from a different viewpoint. Benny Shoenberger, who was one of George's oldest friends, had a good deal of information on the subject.

"I think," George remarked enviously, "that she's much too good for Rupert. However, it can't possibly last. She'll soon get fed up with him." This thought seemed to cheer him considerably.

"For heaven's sake don't tell anyone," he said. "Ruth doesn't know this, but I introduced her to Rupert."

George felt rather sorry for Maia. This should have been her day, but Rashaverak had partially eclipsed her.

Benny chuckled.

"Don't you believe it! Besides being a beauty, she's a really nice person. It's high time someone took charge of Rupert, and she's just the girl to do it." Both Rupert and Maia were now sitting beside Rashaverak, receiving their guests in state. Rupert's parties seldom had any focal point, but usually consisted of half a dozen independent groups intent on their own affairs. This time, however, the whole gathering was polarized towards a centre of attraction.

"Look," said George, nibbling at a sandwich. "How the devil has Rupert got hold of an Overlord? I've never heard of such a thing -- but he seems to take it for granted. He never even mentioned it when he invited us."

"Heck, that's different! Rupert's a perfectly ordinary citizen."

"Just another of his little surprises. You'd better ask him about it. But this isn't the first time it's happened, after all. Karellen's been to parties at the White House and Buckingham Palace, and --"

"I will," said George, "just as soon as I can get Rupert by himself."

"And maybe Rashaverak's a very minor Overlord. But you'd better ask them."

Benny was right, but as the party was now warming up it was easy to be patient. The slight paralysis which the appearance of Rashaverak had cast over the assembly had now vanished. There was still a small group around the Overlord, but elsewhere the usual fragmentation had taken place and everyone was behaving quite naturally. Sullivan, for example, was describing his latest submarine research to an interested audience.

"Ugh! It gives me the creeps just to think about it! You must be terribly brave."

"Then you'll have to wait a long time."

There was a squeal of horror from one of the women.

"We're not sure, yet," he said, "just how big they grow. There's a canyon not far from our base where a real giant lives. I've caught a glimpse of it once, and I'd say that its tentacle-spread is the best part of thirty metres. I'm going in after it next week. Anyone like something really novel in the way of pets?"

"I'd never thought about that," he said. "Of course, I take suitable precautions, but I've never been in any real danger. The squids know that they can't eat me, and as long as I don't go too close they never take the slightest notice. Most sea-creatures leave you alone unless you interfere with them."

Sullivan looked quite surprised.

"Oh," replied Sullivan airily, "that happens now and then. I try not to hurt them, because after all I'm anxious to make friends. So I just turn the jets full on and it usually takes only a minute or two to pull free. If I'm too busy to stop and play, I may tickle them up with a couple of hundred volts. That settles the matter and they never bother me again."

You certainly met some interesting people at Rupert's parties, thought George as he moved on to the next group. Rupert's literary tastes might be specialized, but his friendships were wide-ranging. Without bothering to turn his head, George could see a famous film producer, a minor poet, a mathematician, two actors, an atomic power engineer, a game warden, the editor of a weekly news magazine, a statistician from the World Bank, a violin virtuoso, a professor of anthropology and an astrophysicist. There were no other representatives of George's own profession, television studio design -- which was a good thing, as he wanted to get away from shop. He loved his work; indeed, in this age, for the first time in human history, no one worked at tasks they did not like. But George was content to mentally lock the studio doors behind him at the end of the day.

"But surely," someone asked, "sooner or later you're bound to run up against one that thinks you're edible?"

"Don't hedge, and don't pretend you're not still sober, because I know perfectly well you are. Where does your Overlord friend come from, and what's he doing here?"

He finally trapped Rupert in the kitchen, experimenting with drinks. It seemed a pity to bring him back to earth when he had such a far-away look in his eye, but George could be ruthless when necessary.

"Um," said Rupert thoughtfully, rolling his tongue round his mouth. "Just a teeny bit too much gin, I'm afraid."

"Look here, Rupert," he began, perching himself on the nearest table. "I think you owe us all some explanation."

"Why?"

"Didn't I tell you?" said Rupert. "I thought I'd explained it to everybody. You couldn't have been around -- of course, you were hiding up in the library." He chuckled in a manner which George found offensive. "It's the library, you know, that brought Rashy here."

"How extraordinary!"

"Er -- well, when you consider what the Overlords know about science, I should hardly think they'd be interested in psychic phenomena and all that sort of nonsense."

George paused, realizing that this would require tact. Rupert was very proud of his peculiar collection.

"Nonsense or not," replied Rupert, "they're interested in human psychology, and I've got some books that can teach them a lot. Just before I moved here some Deputy Under-Overlord, or Over-Underlord, got in touch with me and asked if they could borrow about fifty of my rarest volumes. One of the keepers of the British Museum Library had put him on to me, it seemed. Of course, you can guess what I said."

"I can't imagine."

"Frankly," he said, "my opinion of the Overlords goes down. I thought they had better things to do with their time."

"Well, I replied very politely that it had taken me twenty years to get my library together. They were welcome to study my books, but they'd darn well have to read them here. So Rashy came along and has been absorbing about twenty volumes a day. I'd love to know what he makes of them."

"You're an incorrigible materialist, aren't you? I don't think Jean will agree at all. But even from your oh-so-practical viewpoint, it still makes sense. Surely you'd study the superstitions of any primitive race you were having dealings with!"

George thought this over, then shrugged his shoulders in disgust.

"Hey!" protested George, "just before you disappear there's one other question. How did you get hold of that two-way television gadget you tried to frighten us with?"

"Forgive me for being so obtuse, but what is your new job? I suppose, of course, it's something to do with animals."

"I suppose so," said George, not quite convinced. The table-top was feeling hard, so he rose to his feet. Rupert had now mixed the drinks to his satisfaction and was heading back to his guests. Querulous voices could already be heard demanding his presence.

"That's right. I'm a super-vet. My practice covers about ten thousand square kilometres of jungle, and as my patients won't come to me, I've got to look for them."

"Oh, of course it isn't practical to bother about the small fry. Just lions, elephants, rhinos, and so on. Every morning I set the controls for a height of a hundred metres, sit down in front of the screen and go cruising over the countryside. When I find anyone in trouble I climb into my flyer and hope my bedside manner will work. Sometimes it's a bit tricky. Lions and such-like are easy -- but trying to puncture a rhino from the air with an anesthetic dart is the devil of a job."

"Just a bit of bargaining. I pointed out how valuable it would be for a job like mine, and Rashy passed the suggestion on to the right quarters."

"Rather a full-time job."

One reached the roof by taking the escalator to the first floor and then climbing the spiral stairway round the intake of the air-conditioning plant. This led, through a hatchway, out on to the wide, flat roof. Rupert's flyer was parked at one end; the centre area was a garden -- already showing signs of running wild -- and the rest was simply an observation platform with a few deck chairs placed on it. George flopped into one of these and regarded his surroundings with an imperial eye. He felt very much monarch of all he surveyed.

"RUPERT!" yelled someone from the next room.

"Now look what you've done! You've made me forget my guests. There -- you take that tray. Those are the ones with vermouth -- I don't want to get them mixed up."

It was just before sunset that George found his way up to the roof. For a number of excellent reasons he had a slight headache and felt like escaping front the noise and confusion downstairs. Jean, who was a much better dancer than he was, still seemed to be enjoying herself hugely and refused to leave. This annoyed George, who was beginning to feel alcoholically amorous, and he decided to have a quiet sulk beneath the stars.

It was, to put it mildly, quite a view. Rupert's house had been built on the edge of a great basin, which sloped downwards towards the east into swamplands and lakes five kilometres away. Westwards the land was flat and the jungle came almost to Rupert's back-door. But beyond the jungle, at a distance that must have been at least fifty kilometres, a line of mountains ran like a great wall out of sight to north and south.

Their summits were streaked with snow, and the clouds above them were turning to fire as the sun descended on the last few minutes of its daily journey. As he looked at those remote ramparts, George felt awed into a sudden sobriety. The stars that sprang out in such indecent haste the moment the sun had set were completely strange to him. He looked for the Southern Cross, but without success. Though he knew very little of astronomy, and could recognize only a few constellations, the absence of familiar friends was disturbing. So were the noises drifting in from the jungle, uncomfortably close at band. Enough of this fresh air, thought George. I'll go back to the party before a vampire bat, or something equally pleasant, comes flying up to investigate.

By the flame of the lighter -- George was fond of such antiques -- he could now recognize his fellow-guest, a strikingly handsome young negro whose name George had been told but had immediately forgotten, like those of the twenty other complete strangers at the party. However, there seemed something familiar about him, and suddenly George guessed the truth.

"Have a cigarette," said George.

"Thanks."

He was just starting to walk back when another guest emerged from the hatchway. It was now so dark that George could not see who it was, so he called out, "Hello, there. Have you had enough of it too?" His invisible companion laughed. "Rupert's starting to show some of his movies. I've seen them all before."

"I don't think we've really met," he said, "but aren't you Rupert's new brother-in-law?"

George wondered whether to commiserate with Jan for his newly acquired relative. He decided to let the poor fellow find out for himself; after all, it was just possible that Rupert would settle down this time.

"That's right. I'm Jan Rodricks. Everyone says that Maia and I look rather alike."

"And not only humans," added George. "This is the first chance I've had of meeting an Overlord socially."

"Yes. You certainly meet a lot of new people this way."

"I'm George Greggson. This is the first time you've been to one of Rupert's famous parties?"

"I've never seen one before, either -- except of course on TV." There the conversation languished, and after a moment George realized that Jan wanted to be alone. It was getting cold, anyway, so he took his leave and rejoined the party.

The jungle was quiet now; as Jan leaned against the curving wall of the air intake, the only sound he could hear was the faint murmur of the house as It breathed through its mechanical lungs. He felt very much alone, which was the way he wanted to be. He also felt highly frustrated -- and that was something he had no desire to be at all.

The other hesitated for a moment before replying, and George wondered what sensitive spot he had struck. But the answer revealed nothing.