It was not till late afternoon that they had made their way out to the university, worked their way through its maze, and found themselves in an anteroom, waiting for a young woman who had gone off in search of information and who might - or might not - lead them to Quintesetz.
"I wonder," said Pelorat uneasily, "how much longer we'll have to wait. It must be getting toward the close of the schoolday."
And, as though that were a cue, the young lady whom they had last seen half an hour before, walked rapidly toward them, her shoes glinting red and violet and striking the ground with a sharp musical tone as she walked. The pitch varied with the speed and force of her steps.
Pelorat winced. He supposed that each world had its own ways of assaulting the senses, just as each had its own smell. He wondered if, now that he no longer noticed the smell, he might also learn not to notice the cacophony of fashionable young women when they walked.
She came to Pelorat and stopped. "May I have your full name, Professor?"
"It's Janov Pelorat, miss."
"Your home planet?"
Trevize began to lift one hand as though to enjoin silence, but Pelorat, either not seeing or not regarding, said, "Terminus."
The young woman smiled broadly, and looked pleased. "When I told Professor Quintesetz that a Professor Pelorat was inquiring for him, he said he would see you if you were Janov Pelorat of Terminus, but not otherwise."
Pelorat blinked rapidly. "You - you mean, he's heard of me?"
"It certainly seems so."
And, almost creakily, Pelorat managed a smile as he turned to Trevize. "He's heard of me. I honestly didn't think... I mean, I've written very few papers and I didn't think that anyone..." He shook his head. "They weren't really important."
"Well then," said Trevize, smiling himself, "stop hugging yourself in an ecstasy of self-underestimation and let's go." He turned to the woman. "I presume, miss, there's some sort of transportation to take us to him?"
"It's within walking distance. We won't even have to leave the building complex and I'll be glad to take you there. - Are both of you from Terminus?" And off she went.
The two men followed and Trevize said, with a trace of annoyance, "Yes, we are. Does that make a difference?"
"Oh no, of course not. There are people on Sayshell that don't like Foundationers, you know, but here at the university, we're more cosmopolitan than that. Live and let live is what I always say. I mean, Foundationers are people, too. You know what I mean?"
"Yes, I know what you mean. Lots of us say that Sayshellians are people."
"That's just the way it should be. I've never seen Terminus. It must be a big city."
"Actually it isn't," said Trevize matter-of-factly. "I suspect it's smaller than Sayshell City."
"You're tweaking my finger," she said. "It's the capital of the Foundation Federation, isn't it? I mean, there isn't another Terminus, is there?"
"No, there's only one Terminus, as far as I know, and that's where we're from - the capital of the Foundation Federation."
"Well then, it must be an enormous city. - And you're coming all the way here to see the professor. We're very proud of him, you know. He's considered the biggest authority in the whole Galaxy."
"Really?" said Trevize. "On what?"
Her eyes opened wide again, "You are a teaser. He knows more about ancient history than - than I know about my own family." And she continued to walk on ahead on her musical feet.
One can only be called a teaser and a finger-tweaker so often without developing an actual impulse in that direction. Trevize smiled and said, "The professor knows all about Earth, I suppose?"
"Earth?" She stopped at an office door and looked at them blankly.
"You know. The world where humanity got its start."
"Oh, you mean the planet-that-was-first. I guess so. I guess he should know all about it. After all, it's located in the Sayshell Sector. Everyone knows that! - This is his office. Let me signal him."
"No, don't," said Trevize. "Not for just a minute. Tell me about Earth."
"Actually I never heard anyone call it Earth. I suppose that's a Foundation word. We call it Gaia, here."
Trevize cast a swift look at Pelorat. "Oh? And where is it located?"
"Nowhere. It's in hyperspace and there's no way anyone can get to it. When I was a little girl, my grandmother said that Gaia was once in real space, but it was so disgusted at the..."
"Crimes and stupidities of human beings," muttered Pelorat, "that, out of shame, it left space and refused to have anything more to do with the human beings it had sent out into the Galaxy."
"You know the story, then. See? - A girlfriend of mine says it's superstition. Well, I'll tell her. If it's good enough for professors from the Foundation..."
A glittering section of lettering on the smoky glass of the door read: SOTAYN QUINTESETZ ABT in the hard-to-read Sayshellian calligraphy - and under it was printed, in the same fashion: DEPARTMENT OF ANCIENT HISTORY.
The woman placed her finger on a smooth metal circle. There was no sound, but the smokiness of the glass turned a milky white for a moment and a soft voice said, in an abstracted sort of way, "Identify yourself, please."
"Janov Pelorat of Terminus," said Pelorat, "with Golan Trevize of the same world." The door swung open at once.
The man who stood up, walked around his desk, and advanced to meet them was tall and well into middle age. He was light brown in skin color and his hair, which was set in crisp curls over his head, was iron-gray. He held out his hand in greeting and his voice was soft and low. "I am S. Q. I am delighted to meet you, Professors."