Trevize frowned. "Is it that she's trying to get rid of you, Janov. She promised me-"
"No, you don't understand. Please listen to me, Golan. You do have this uncomfortable explosive way of jumping to conclusions before you hear one out. It's your specialty, I know, and I seem to have a certain difficulty in expressing myself concisely, but-"
"Well," said Trevize gently, "suppose you tell me exactly what it is that Bliss has on her mind in just any way you please, and I promise to be very patient."
"Thank you, and as long as you're going to be patient, I think I can come out with it right away. You see, Bliss wants to come, too."
"Bliss wants to come?" said Trevize. "No, I'm exploding again. I won't explode. Tell me, Janov, why would Bliss want to come along? I'm asking it quietly."
"She didn't say. She said she wants to talk to you."
"Then why isn't she here, eh?"
Pelorat said, "I think-I say I think-that she is rather of the opinion that you are not fond of her, Golan, and she rather hesitates to approach you. I have done my best, old man, to assure her that you have nothing against her. I cannot believe anyone would think anything but highly of her. Still, she wanted me to broach the subject with you, so to speak. May I tell her that you'll be willing to see her, Golan?"
"Of course, I'll see her right now."
"And you'll be reasonable? You see, old man, she's rather intense about it. She said the matter was vital and she must go with you."
"She didn't tell you why, did she?"
"No, but if she thinks she must go, so must Gaia. "
"Which means I mustn't refuse. Is that right, Janov?"
"Yes, I think you mustn't, Golan."
3.
FOR THE FIRST time during his brief stay on Gaia, Trevize entered Bliss's house-which now sheltered Pelorat as well.
Trevize looked about briefly. On Gaia, houses tended to be simple. With the all-but-complete absence of violent weather of any kind, with the temperature mild at all times in this particular latitude, with even the tectonic plates slipping smoothly when they had to slip, there was no point in building houses designed for elaborate protection, or for maintaining a comfortable environment within an uncomfortable one. The whole planet was a house, so to speak, designed to shelter its inhabitants.
Bliss's house within that planetary house was small, the windows screened rather than glassed, the furniture sparse and gracefully utilitarian. There were holographic images on the walls; one of them of Pelorat looking rather astonished and self-conscious. Trevize's lips twitched but he tried not to let his amusement show, and he fell to adjusting his waist-sash meticulously.
Bliss watched him. She wasn't smiling in her usual fashion. Rather, she looked serious, her fine dark eyes wide, her hair tumbling to her shoulders in a gentle black wave. Only her full lips, touched with red, lent a bit of color to her face.
"Thank you for coming to see me, Trev."
"Janov was very urgent in his request, Blissenobiarella."
Bliss smiled briefly. "Well returned. If you will call me Bliss, a decent monosyllable, I will try to say your name in full, Trevize." She stumbled, almost unnoticeably, over the second syllable.
Trevize held up his right hand. "That would be a good arrangement. I recognize the Gaian habit of using one-syllable name-portions in the common interchange of thoughts, so if you should happen to call me Trev now and then I will not be offended. Still, I will be more comfortable if you try to say Trevize as often as you can-and I shall say Bliss."
Trevize studied her, as he always did when he encountered her. As an individual, she was a young woman in her early twenties. As part of Gaia, however, she was thousands of years old. It made no difference in her appearance, but it made a difference in the way she spoke sometimes, and in the atmosphere that inevitably surrounded her. Did he want it this way for everyone who existed? No! Surely, no, and yet-
Bliss said, "I will get to the point. You stressed your desire to find Earth-"
"I spoke to Dom," said Trevize, determined not to give in to Gaia without a perpetual insistence on his own point of view.
"Yes, but in speaking to Dom, you spoke to Gaia and to every part of it, so that you spoke to me, for instance."
"Did you hear me as I spoke?"
"No, for I wasn't listening, but if, thereafter, I paid attention, I could remember what you said. Please accept that and let us go on. You stressed your desire to find Earth and insisted on its importance. I do not see that importance but you have the knack of being right so I/we/Gaia must accept what you say. If the mission is crucial to your decision concerning Gaia, It is of crucial importance to Gaia, and so Gaia must go with you, if only to try to protect you."
"When you say Gaia must go with me, you mean you must go with me. Am I correct?"
"I am Gaia," said Bliss simply.
"But so is everything else on and in this planet. Why, then, you? Why not some other portion of Gaia?"
"Because Pel wishes to go with you, and if he goes with you, he would not be happy with any other portion of Gaia than myself."
Pelorat, who sat rather unobtrusively on a chair in another corner (with his back, Trevize noted, to his own image) said softly, "That's true, Golan. Bliss is my portion of Gaia."
Bliss smiled suddenly. "It seems rather exciting to be thought of in that way. It's very alien, of course."
"Well, let's see." Trevize put his hands behind his head and began to lean backward in his chair. The thin legs creaked as he did so, so that he quickly decided the chair was not sturdy enough to endure that game and brought it down to all four feet. "Will you still be part of Gaia if you leave her?"