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before conveying this information to your father—who couldn’t have made much use of it anyway. There would remain then a physical fact, a bit of flesh which had been sent off to the Tleilaxu. There was only one way for it to be sent, of course, on a heighliner. We of the Guild naturally know every cargo we transport. Learning of this one, would we not think it additional wisdom to purchase the ghola as a gift befitting an Emperor?”
    “You’ve done it then,” Irulan said.
    Scytale, who had resumed his roly-poly first appearance, said: “As our long-winded friend indicates, we’ve done it.”
    “How has Idaho been conditioned?” Irulan asked.
    “Idaho?” Edric asked, looking at the Tleilaxu. “Do you know of an Idaho, Scytale?”
    “We sold you a creature called Hayt,” Scytale said.
    “Ah, yes—Hayt,” Edric said. “Why did you sell him to us?”
    “Because we once bred a kwisatz haderach of our own,” Scytale said.
    With a quick movement of her old head, the Reverend Mother looked up at him. “You didn’t tell us that!” she accused.
    “You didn’t ask,” Scytale said.
    “How did you overcome your kwisatz haderach?” Irulan asked.
    “A creature who has spent his life creating one particular representation of his selfdom will die rather than become the antithesis of that representation,” Scytale said.
    “I do not understand,” Edric ventured.
    “He killed himself,” the Reverend Mother growled.
    “Follow me well, Reverend Mother,” Scytale warned, using a voice mode which said: You are not a sex object, have never been a sex object, cannot be a sex object.
    The Tleilaxu waited for the blatant emphasis to sink in. She must not mistake his intent. Realization must pass through anger into awareness that the Tleilaxu certainly could not make such an accusation, knowing as he must the breeding requirements of the Sisterhood. His words, though, contained a gutter insult, completely out of character for a Tleilaxu.
    Swiftly, using the mirabhasa placative mode, Edric tried to smooth over the moment. “Scytale, you told us you sold Hayt because you shared our desire on how to use him.”
    “Edric, you will remain silent until I give you permission to speak,” Scytale said. And as the Guildsman started to protest, the Reverend Mother snapped: “Shut up, Edric!”
    The Guildsman drew back into his tank in flailing agitation.
    “Our own transient emotions aren’t pertinent to a solution of the mutual problem,” Scytale said. “They cloud reasoning because the only relevant emotion is the basic fear which brought us to this meeting.”
    “We understand,” Irulan said, glancing at the Reverend Mother.
    “You must see the dangerous limitations of our shield,” Scytale said. “The oracle cannot chance upon what it cannot understand.”
    “You are devious, Scytale,” Irulan said.
    How devious she must not guess, Scytale thought. When this is done, we will possess a kwisatz haderach we can control. These others will possess nothing.
    “What was the origin of your kwisatz haderach?” the Reverend Mother asked.
    “We’ve dabbled in various pure essences,” Scytale said. “Pure good and pure evil. A pure villain who delights only in creating pain and terror can be quite educational.”
    “The old Baron Harkonnen, our Emperor’s grandfather, was he a Tleilaxu creation?” Irulan asked.
    “Not one of ours,” Scytale said. “But then nature often produces creations as deadly as ours. We merely produce them under conditions where we can study them.”
    “I will not be passed by and treated this way!” Edric protested. “Who is it hides this meeting from—”
    “You see?” Scytale asked. “Whose best judgment conceals us? What judgment?”
    “I wish to discuss our mode of giving Hayt to the Emperor,” Edric insisted. “It’s my understanding that Hayt reflects the old morality that the Atreides learned on his birthworld. Hayt is supposed to make it easy for the Emperor to