Hari Seldon walked into the Galactic Library (limping a little, as he did more and more often these days) and made for the banks of skitters, the little vehicles that slid their way along the interminable corridors of the building complex.
    He was held up, however, by the sight of three men seated at one of the galactography alcoves¹, with the Galactograph showing the Galaxy² in full three-dimensional representation and, of course, its worlds slowly pinwheeling around its core, spinning at right angles to that as well.
    From where Seldon stood he could see that the border Province of Anacreon was marked off in glowing red  It skirted the edge of the Galaxy and took up a great volume, but it was sparsely³ populated with stars. Anacreon was not remarkable⁴ for either wealth or culture but was remarkable for its distance from Trantor: ten thousand parsecs away.
    Seldon acting⁵ on impulse, took a seat at a computer console near the three and set up a random⁶ search he was sure would take an indefinite period  Some instinct told him that such an intense interest in Anacreon must be political in nature-its position in the Galaxy made it one of the least secure holdings of the current Imperial regime. His eyes remained on his screen, but Seldon's ears were open for the discussion near him. One didn't usually hear political discussions in the Library. They were, in point of fact, not supposed to take place.
    Seldon did not know any of the three men. That was not entirely⁷ surprising. There were habitues of the Library, quite a few, and Seldon knew most of them by sight-and some even to talk to-but the Library was open to all citizens. No qualifications. Anyone could enter and use its facilities. (For a limited period of time, of course. Only a select few, like Seldon were allowed to "set up shop" in the Library. Seldon had I1uen granted the use of a locked private office and complete access to Library resources.)

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