Arthur had no idea what this was meant to mean to him.

“Movie camera,” said Ford. “Recording the historic movement.”

“Well, I don’t know about you,” said Ford again after a moment, “but I’m off.”

He sat a while in silence.

After a while this seemed to require comment.

“Er, when you say you’re off, what do you mean exactly?” said Arthur.

“Good question,” said Ford, “I’m getting total silence.”

Looking over his shoulder Arthur saw that he was twiddling with knobs on a small box. Ford had already introduced this box as a Sub-Etha Sens-O-Matic, but Arthur had merely nodded absently and not pursued the matter. In his mind the Universe still divided into two parts-the Earth, and everything else. The Earth having been demolished to make way for a new hyperspace bypass meant that this view of things was a little lopsided, but Arthur tended to cling to that lopsidedness as being his last remaining contact with his home. Sub-Etha Sens-O-Matics belonged firmly in the “everything else” category.

“Not a sausage,” said Ford, shaking the thing.

Sausage, thought Arthur to himself as he gazed listlessly at the primitive world about him, what I wouldn’t give for a good Earth sausage.

“Would you believe,” said Ford in exasperation, “that there are no transmissions of any kind within light years of this benighted tip? Are you listening to me?”

“What?” said Arthur.

“We’re in trouble,” said Ford.

“Oh,” said Arthur. This sounded like month-old news to him.

“Until we pick up anything on this machine,” said Ford, “our chances of getting off this planet are zero. It may be some freak standing wave effect in the planet’s magnetic field-in which case we just travel round and round till we find a clear reception area. Coming?”

He picked up his gear and strode off.

Arthur looked down the hill. The man with the movie camera had struggled back up to his feet just in time to film one of his colleagues collapsing.

Arthur picked a blade of grass and strode off after Ford.

Chapter 27

“I trust you had a pleasant meal?” said Zarniwoop to Zaphod and Trillian as they rematerialized on the bridge of the starship Heart of Gold and lay panting on the floor.

Zaphod opened some eyes and glowered at him.

“You,” he spat. He staggered to his feet and stomped off to find a chair to slump into. He found one and slumped into it.

“I have programmed the computer with the Improbability Coordinates pertinent to our journey,” said Zarniwoop, “we will arrive there very shortly. Meanwhile, why don’t you relax and prepare yourself for the meeting?”

Zaphod said nothing. He got up again and marched over to a small cabinet from which he pulled a bottle of old Janx spirit. He took a long pull at it.

“And when this is all done,” said Zaphod savagely, “it’s done, alright? I’m free to go and do what the hell I like and lie on beaches and stuff?”

“It depends what transpires from the meeting,” said Zarniwoop.

“Zaphod, who is this man?” said Trillian shakily, wobbling to her feet, “What’s he doing here? Why’s he on our ship?”

“He’s a very stupid man,” said Zaphod, “who wants to meet the man who rules the Universe.”

“Ah,” said Trillian taking the bottle from Zaphod and helping herself, “a social climber.”

Chapter 28

The major problem-one of the major problems, for there are several-one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them.

To summarize: it is a well known fact, that those people who most want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem.

And so this is the situation we find: a succession of Galactic Presidents who so much enjoy the fun and palaver of being in power that they very rarely notice that they’re not.

And somewhere in the shadows behind them-who?

Who can possibly rule if no one who wants to do it can be allowed to?

Chapter 29

On a small obscure world somewhere in the middle of nowhere in particular-nowhere, that is, that could ever be found, since it is protected by a vast field of unprobability to which only six men in this galaxy have a key-it was raining.

It was bucketing down, and had been for hours. It beat the top of the sea into a mist, it pounded the trees, it churned and slopped a stretch of scrubby land near the sea into a mudbath.

The rain pelted and danced on the corrugated iron roof of the small shack that stood in the middle of this patch of scrubby land. It obliterated the small rough pathway that led from the shack down to the seashore and smashed apart the neat piles of interesting shells which had been placed there.

The noise of the rain on the roof of the shack was deafening within, but went largely unnoticed by its occupant, whose attention was otherwise engaged.

He was a tall shambling man with rough straw-coloured hair that was damp from the leaking roof. His clothes were shabby, his back was hunched, and his eyes, though open, seemed closed.

In his shack was an old beaten-up armchair, an old scratched table, an old mattress, some cushions and a stove that was small but warm.

There was also an old and slightly weatherbeaten cat, and this was currently the focus of the man’s attention. He bent his shambling form over it.

“Pussy, pussy, pussy,” he said, “coochicoochicoochicoo… pussy want his fish? Nice piece of fish… pussy want it?”

The cat seemed undecided on the matter. It pawed rather condescendingly at the piece of fish the man was holding out, and then got distracted by a piece of dust on the floor.

“Pussy not eat his fish, pussy get thin and waste away, I think,” said the man. Doubt crept into his voice.

“I imagine this is what will happen,” he said, “but how can I tell?”

He proffered the fish again.

“Pussy think,” he said, “eat fish or not eat fish. I think it is better if I don’t get involved.” He sighed.

“I think fish is nice, but then I think that rain is wet, so who am I to judge?”

He left the fish on the floor for the cat, and retired to his seat.

“Ah, I seem to see you eating it,” he said at last, as the cat exhausted the entertainment possibilities of the speck of dust and pounced on to the fish.

“I like it when I see you eat the fish,” said the man, “because in my mind you will waste away if you don’t.”

He picked up from the table a piece of paper and the stub of a pencil. He held one in one hand and the other in the other, and experimented with the different ways of bringing them together. He tried holding the pencil under the paper, then over the paper, then next to the paper. He tried wrapping the paper round the pencil, he tried rubbing the stubby end of the pencil against the paper and then he tried rubbing the sharp end of the pencil against the paper. It made a mark, and he was delighted with the discovery, as he was every day. He picked up another piece of paper from the table. This had a crossword on it. He studied it briefly and filled in a couple of clues before losing interest.

He tried sitting on one of his hands and was intrigued by the feel of the bones of his hip.