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"And what, then, is a snake?" demanded President O'Hanrahan oratorically. "It's a creature that sneaks about upon the ground and poisons by its bite when it's not blarneyin' unwise females into tasting' apples. Do the black creatures here do anything of that sort? They do not! They go about their business plain and open, givin' a half of the road and a how'd'y-do to those they meet.
"Ah, they do, do they!" said the president with tender reverence. "But I have to tell you, Moira, that " "And I proved it!" said Moira, searching his face with her eyes. "If you change a stimulus and a specimen reacts, then its reaction is to the change. So I made the metal smell stronger." President O'Hanrahan blinked at her. "I ... heated it," said Moira. "You know how hot metal smells.
He looked neither to right nor left. He was headed for the presidential mansion, there to strangle President O'Hanrahan in the most lingering possible manner. But there came a roar of rejoicing which penetrated even his single-tracked, murder-obsessed brain. He turned, purple-face and explosive, to see what the obscene sound could mean. He saw.
One of them was a ship builder and the other a manufacturer of precision machinery, elected to the Dail for no special reason. They'd come on this junket partly to get away from their troubles and their wives. The shortage of high-precision tools was a trouble to both of them, but they were forgetting it fully. "So the causeway was built," explained President O'Hanrahan.
President O'Hanrahan of the planetary government of Eire listened unhappily to his official guest. He had to, because Sean O'Donohue was chairman of the Dail of Eire on Earth Committee on the Condition of the Planet Eire. He could cut off all support from the still-struggling colony if he chose.
"Moira darlin'," said President O'Hanrahan gently, "you don't lock up dinies. They gnaw through steel safes. They make tunnels and nests in electric dynamos. You don't lock up dinies, darlin'!" "But I did!" she insisted. "They're still locked up. I looked just before we started for here!" The president looked at her very unhappily. "There's no need for shenanigans between us, Moira!"
President O'Hanrahan held himself with some dignity in the tumble-down reception hall of the presidential mansion. Moira gazed proudly at him. The two still-active members of the Dail Committee looked uncomfortably around them. The cabinet of Eire was assembled. "It's sorry I am," said the President of Eire, "to have to issue a defiance to the Eire on Earth we owe so much to.
"You'd be bound to learn it. D'you know what the dinies' teeth are made of?" "It's been said," said President O'Hanrahan, "that it's bor ... boron carbide in organic form. What that means I wouldn't know, but we've got a fine crop of it!" "It's the next hardest substance to diamond," said the committeeman dourly. "It's even been guessed that an organic type might be harder.
"Hm-m-m," said Sean O'Donohue. "That's better. The Dail's not immune to blarney when it's needful to accept it and Eire back on Earth is hard put for breathin' room you say can be had from now on. What would be the reason for Moira standin' so close to you?" "She's marryin' me," said President O'Hanrahan firmly. Sean O'Donohue's voice was waspish. "But I forbid it!" it said sharply.
With an air of offended dignity, the snake slithered into the dark opening. "Now what's the meeting for?" he demanded. "I'll tell you immediate that if money's required it's impractical." President O'Hanrahan said morbidly: "'Twas called, it seems, to put the curse o' Cromwell on whoever let the black snakes loose.
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