Trevize said sardonically, "Endanger the Foundation, but keep ourselves safe. That's good patriotic stuff."
"That would be at the worst. I was counting on the best." His forehead had become a little damp. He seemed to be straining against Trevize's immovable contempt.
"And you didn't tell me of this clever plan of yours, did you?"
"No, I didn't and I'm sorry about that, Trevize. The Mayor ordered me not to. She said she wanted to know everything you knew but that you were the sort of person who would freeze if you knew that your remarks were being passed on."
"How right she was!"
"I didn't know - I couldn't guess - I had no way of conceiving that she was planning to arrest you and throw you off the planet."
"She was waiting for the right political moment, when my status as Councilman would not protect me. You didn't foresee that?"
"How could I? You yourself did not."
"Had I known that she knew my views, I would have." Compor said with a sudden trace of insolence, "That's easy enough to say - in hindsight."
"And what is it you want of me here? Now that you have a bit of hindsight, too."
"To make up for all this. To make up for the harm I unwittingly - unwittingly - did you."
"Goodness," said Trevize dryly. "How kind of you! But you haven't answered my original question. How did you come to be here? How do you happen to be on the very planet I am on?"
Compor said, "There's no complicated answer necessary for that. I followed you!"
"Through hyperspace? With my ship making Jumps in series?" Compor shook his head. "No mystery. I have the same kind of a ship you do, with the same kind of computer. You know I've always had this trick of being able to guess in which direction through hyperspace a ship would go. It's not usually a very good guess and I'm wrong two times out of three, but with the computer I'm much better. And you hesitated quite a bit at the start and gave me a chance to evaluate the direction and speed in which you were going before entering hyperspace. I fed the data - together with my own intuitive extrapolations - into the computer and it did the rest."
"And you actually got to the city ahead of me?"
"Yes. You didn't use gravitics and I did. I guessed you would come to the capital city, so I went straight down, while you..." Compor made a short spiral motion with his finger as though it were a ship riding a directional beam.
"You took a chance on a run-in with Sayshellian officialdom."
"Well..." Compor's face broke into a smile that lent it an undeniable charm and Trevize felt himself almost warming to him. Compor said, "I'm not a coward at all times and in all things."
Trevize steeled himself. "How did you happen to get a ship like mine?"
"In precisely the same way you got a ship like yours. The old lady - Mayor Branno - assigned it to me."
"Why?"
"I'm being entirely frank with you. My assignment was to follow you. The Mayor wanted to know where you were going and what you would be doing."
"And you've been reporting faithfully to her, I suppose. - Or have you been faithless to the Mayor also?"
"I reported to her. I had no choice, actually. She placed a hyperrelay on board ship, which I wasn't supposed to find, but which I did find."
"Well?"
"Unfortunately it's hooked up so that I can't remove it without immobilizing the vessel. At least, there's no way I can remove it. Consequently she knows where I am - and she knows where you are."
"Suppose you hadn't been able to follow me. Then she wouldn't have known where I was. Had you thought of that?"
"Of course I did. I thought of just reporting I had lost you - but she wouldn't have believed me, would she? And I wouldn't have been able to get back to Terminus for who knows how long. And I'm not like you, Trevize. I'm not a carefree person without attachments. I have a wife on Terminus - a pregnant wife - and I want to get back to her. You can afford to think only of yourself. I can't. - Besides, I've come to warn you. By Seldon, I'm trying to do that and you won't listen. You keep talking about other things."
"I'm not impressed by your sudden concern for me. What can you warn me against? It seems to me that you are the only thing I need be warned about. You betray me, and now you follow me in order to betray me again. No one else is doing me any harm."
Compor said earnestly, "Forget the dramatics, man. Trevize, you're a lightning rod! You've been sent out to draw Second Foundation response - if there is such a thing as the Second Foundation. I have an intuitive sense for things other than hyperspatial pursuit and I'm sure that's what she's planning. If you try to find the Second Foundation, they'll become aware of it and they'll act against you. If they do, they are very likely to tip their hand. And when they do, Mayor Branno will go for them."
"A pity your famous intuition wasn't working when Branno was planning my arrest."
Compor flushed and muttered, "You know it doesn't always work."
"And now it tells you she's planning to attack the Second Foundation. She wouldn't dare."
"I think she would. But that's not the point. The point is that right now she is throwing you out as bait."
"So?"
"So by all the black holes in space, don't search for the Second Foundation. She won't care if you're killed in the search, but I care. I feel responsible for this and I care."
"I'm touched," said Trevize coldly, "but as it happens I have another task on hand at the moment."