 Why did Lawrence close his eyes and toddle around in a 360-degree rotation?
My three staff men, Auchinleck, Stebbins and Ludlow, walked shieldwise in front of me. The aliens came in every shape and form, in all colors and textures—and all of them eager for a Corrigan contract. The Galaxy is full of bizarre beings, but there's barely a species anywhere that can resist the old exhibitionist urge. I thought of it privately as MacTavish IV and referred to it publicly as Ghryne. Stuff like this: Want to visit Earth—see the Galaxy's most glittering and exclusive world? J. F. Corrigan will hold interviews in person on Ghryne from Thirdday to Fifthday of Tenmonth. His last visit to the Caledonia Cluster until 2937, so don't miss your chance! Broadsides like that, distributed wholesale in half a thousand languages, always bring them running. It's the best of its kind, the only really decent place where Earthmen can get a gander at the other species of the universe. He was a globular creature about the size of a big basketball, yellowish-green, with two spindly double-kneed legs and five double-elbowed arms, the latter spaced regularly around his body. There was a lidless eye at the top of his head and five lidded ones, one above each arm. The being closed his eyes and toddled around in a 360-degree rotation, remaining in place. The spherical creature clapped his hands in joy, three hands clapping on one side, two on the other. We needed a green Regulan in our show; the last one had quit four years ago. But just because we needed him didn't mean we had to be extravagant in hiring him. Our outfit has all the ursinoids it needs or is likely to need in the next few decades, and so I got rid of him in a couple of minutes. I passed him along to Auchinleck to sign at anything short of top rate. It was the isolationism of the late 29th century that turned me into the successful proprietor of Corrigan's Institute, after some years as an impoverished carnival man in the Betelgeuse system. Before then, anyone could visit Earth. Every alien wants to see Earth once in his lifetime, and there's only one way he can do it. At the same time, we had turned away a dozen ursinoids, fifty of the reptilian natives of Ghryne, seven Sirian spiders, and no less than nineteen chlorine-breathing Procyonites wearing gas masks. "I've never been within a dozen parsecs of Earth," he said smoothly.
 That was a sign that he was giving an apologetic smile.
 That was a sign that he was happy.  That was a sign that he was irritated with the recruiter's decision.  That was a sign that he was giving an apologetic smile.  He was disoriented.