TERRITORY

Joyce Davisson awoke as if she had been stabbed.

The whistle came again, strong enough to penetrate

mortar and metal and insulation, on into her eardrums.

She sat up in the dark with a gasp of recognition. When

last she heard that wildcat wail, it was in the Chabanda,

and it meant that two bands were hunting each other.

But then she had been safely aloft in a flitter, armed men

on either side of her and a grave Ancient for guide. What

she saw and heard came to her amplified by instruments

that scanned the ice desert glittering beneath. Those tiger-

striped warriors who slew and died were only figures in a

screen. She had felt sorry for them, yet somehow they

were not quite real: individuals only, whom she had

never met, atoms that perished because their world was

perishing. Her concern was with the whole.

Now the whistle was against her station.

It couldn't be!

An explosion went crump. She heard small things rat-

tle on her desk top and felt her bed shaken. Suddenly the

glissandos were louder in her head, and a snarl of drum-

taps accompanied them, a banging on metal and a crash-

ing as objects were knocked off shelves. The attackers

must have blown down the door of the machine section

and swarmed through. Only where could they have gotten

the gunpowder?

Where but in Kusulongo the City?

That meant the Ancients had decided the humans were

better killed. The fear of death went through Joyce in a

wave. It passed on, leaving bewilderment and pain, as if

she were a child struck for no reaSon. Why had they done

this to her, who came for nothing but to help them?

Feet pounded in the hall just outside the Terrestrialized

section of the dome. The mission's native staff had roused

and were coming out of their quarters with weapons to

hand. She heard savage yells. Then, farther off among

the machines, combat broke loose. Swords clattered, tom-

ahawks cracked on bone, the pistol she had given Uulobu

spoke with an angry snap. But her gang couldn't hold out

long. The attackers had to be Shanga, from the camp in

the oasis just under Kusulongo the Mountain. No other

clan was near, and the Ancients themselves never fought

aggressively. But there were hundreds of male Shanga in

the oasis, while the mission had scarcely two dozen trust-

worthy t'Kelans.

Heavily armored against exterior conditions, the human

area would not be entered as easily as the outside door of

the machine section had been destroyed. But once the

walls were cracked-

Joyce bounded to her feet. One hand passed by the

main switch plate on its way to her gear rack, and the

lights came on. The narrow, cluttered room, study as well

as sleeping place, looked somehow distorted in that white

glow. Because I'm scared, she realized. I'm caught in a

living nightmare. Nerve and muscle carried on without

her mind~ She leaped into the form-fitting Long John

and the heavy fabricord suit. Drawing the skin-thin gloves

over her hands, she connected their wiring to the electric

net woven into the main outfit. Now: kerofoamsoled

boots; air renewal tank and powerpack on the back; pis-

tol and bandolier; pouched belt of iron rations; minicom

in breast pocket; vitryl helmet snugged down on the

shoulders but faceplate left open for the time being.

Check all fasteners, air system, heat system, everything.

The outdoors is lethal on t'Kela. The temperature, on this

summer night in the middle latitudes, is about sixty de-

grees below zero Celsius. The partial pressure of nitrogen

will induce narcosis, the ammonia will bum out your

lungs. There is no water vapor that your senses can detect;

the air will suck you dry. None of these factors differ

enough from Earth to kill you instantly. No, aided by an

oxygen content barely sufficient to maintain your life,

you will savor the process for minutes before you even lose

unsciousness.

And the Shanga out there, ncw busily killing your native

assistants, have gunpowder to break down these walls.

Joyce whirled about. The others! There was no inter-

com; two dozen people in one dome didn't need any. She

snatched at the door of the room adjoining hers. Nothing

happened. "Open up, you idiot!" she heard herself

scream above the noise outside. "Come along! We've got to

get away-"

A hoarse basso answered through the panels, "What you

mean, open up? You locked yourself in, by damn!"

Of course, of course, Joyce's mind fumbled. Her pulse

and the swelling racket of battle nearly drowned thought.

She'd fastened this door on her own side. During her time

with the mission itself, there had never been any reason

to do so. But then Nicholas van Rijn landed, and got him-

self quartered next to her, and she had enough trouble by

day fending off his ursine advances. . . She pushed the.

switch. .

The merchant rolled through. Like most Esperancians,

Joyce was tall, but she did not come up to his neck. His

shoulders filled the doorway and his pot belly strained the

fabricord suit that had been issued him. Hung about with

survival equipment, he looked still more monstrous than

he had done when snorting his way around the dome in

snuff-stained finery of lace and rufIles. The great hooked

nose jutted from an open helmet, snuffing the air as if for

a scent of blood.

"Hah!" he bawled. Greasy black hair, carefully ring-

leted to shoulder length, swirled as he looked from side to

side; the waxed mustache and goatee threatened every

comer like horns. "What in the name of ten times ten

to the tenth damned souls on a logarithmic spiral to hell

is going on here for fumblydiddles? I thought, me, you had

anyhows the trust of those natives!"

"The others-" Joyce choked. "Come on, let's get to-

gether with them."

Van Rijn nodded curtly, so that his several chins quiv-

ered, and let her take the lead. Personal rooms in the

human section faced the same corridor, each with a door

opening onto that as well as onto its two neighbors.

Joyce's room happened to be at the end of the row, with

the machine storage section on its farther side.. Unmar-

ried and fond of privacy, she had chosen that arrangement

when she first came here. The clubroom was at the hall's

other terminus, around the curve of the dome. As she

emerged from her quarters, Joyce saw door after door

gaping open. The only ones still closed belonged to cham-

bers which nobody occupied, extras built in the antic..

ipation of outside visitors like Van Rijn's party. So

everyone else had already gotten into their suits and down

to the clubroom, the fixed emergency rendezvous. She

broke into a run. Van Rijn's ponderous jog trot made a

small earthquake behind her. Gravity on t'Kela was about

the same as on Earth or Esperance.

The only thing that's the same, Joyce thought wildly.

For an instant she was nearly blinded by the recollection

of her home on the green planet of the star called Pax

-a field billowing with grain, remote blue mountains, the

flag of the sovereign world flying red and gold against a

fleecy sky, and that brave dream which had built the Com-

monalty.

It roared at her back. The floor heaved underfoot. As

she fell, the boom car e again, and yet again. The third

explosion pierced through. A hammerblow of concussion

followed.

Striking the floor, she rolled over. Her head rattled from

side to side of her helmet. The taste of blood mixed with

smoke in her mouth. She looked back down the corridor

through ragged darknesses that came and went before

her eyes. The wall at the end, next to her own room, was

split and broken. Wild shadowy figures moved in the

gloom beyond the twisted structural members.

"They blew it open," she said stupidly.

"Close your helmet," Van Rijn barked. He had alreally

clashed his own faceplate to. The amplifier brought her his

gravelly tones, but a dullness would not let them through

to her brain.

"They blew it open," she repeated. The thing seemed

too strange to be real.

A native leaped into the breach. He could stand Terres-

trial air and temperature for a while if he held his breath.

And t'Kelan atmosphere, driven by a higher pressure, was

already streaming past him. The stocky, striped figure

poised in a tension like that of the strung bow he aim.:d.

Huge slit-pupiled eyes glared in the light from the fluoros.

An Esperancian technician came running around the

bend of the corridor. "Joyce!" he cried. "Freeman Van

Rijn! Where-" The bow twanged. A barbed arrowhead

ripped his suit. A moment afterward the air seemed full

of arrows, darts, spears, hurled from the murk. Van

Rijn threw himself across Joyce. Tbe technician spun on

his heel and fled.

Van Rijn's well-worn personal blaster jumped into his

fist. He fired from his prone position. The furry shape in

the breach tumbled backward. The shadows behind with-

drew from sight. But the yell and clatter went on out there.

A first ammoniacal whiff stung Joyce's nostrils. "Pox

and pestilence," Van Rijn growled. "You like maybe to

breathe that dragon belch?" He rose to his knees and

closed her faceplate. His little black close-set eyes regarded

her narrowly. "So, stunned, makes that the way of it? Well,

hokay, you is a pretty girl with a nice figure and stuff even

if you should not cut your hair so short. Waste not, want

not. I rescue you, ha?"

He dragged her across one shoulder, got up, and backed

wheezily along the hall, his blaster covering the direction

of the hole. "Ugh, ugh," he muttered, "this is not a job

for a poor old fat man who should be at home in his nice

office on Earth with a cigar and maybe a wee glass Genever.

The more so when those misbegotten snouthearts he must

use for help will rob him blind. la, unscrew his eyeballs

they will, so soon as he isn't looking. But all the factors at

all the trading posts are such gruntbrains that poor Nich-

olas van Rijn must come out his own selfs, a hundred

light-years in the direction of Orion's bellybutton he must

come, and look for new trading possibilities. Else the

wolves-with-rabies competition tears his Solar Spice &

Liquors Company in shreds and leaves him prostitute in

his old age. . . Ah, here we is. Downsy-daisy."

Joyce shook her head as he eased h~r to the floor. Full

awareness had come back, and her knees didn't wobble

much. The clubroom door was in front of her. She pushed

the switch. The barrier didn't move. "Locked," she said.

Van Rijn pounded till it shivered. "Open up!" he bel-

lowed. "Thunder and thighbones, what is this farce?"

A native raced around the curve of the hall. Van Rijn

turned. Joyce shoved his blaster aside. "No, that's Uulobu."

The t'Kelan must have exhausted his pistol and thrown it

away, for a tomahawk now dripped in his hand. Three

other autochthones bounded after him, swords ,and hatch-

ets aloft. Their kilts were decorated with the circle and

square insigne of the Shanga clan. "Get them!"

Van Rijn's blaster spat fire. One of the invaders flopped

over. The others whirled to escape. Uulobu yowled and

threw his tomahawk. The keen obsidian edge struck a

Shanga and knocked him down, bleeding. Uulobu yanked

the cord that ran between his weapon and wrist, retrieved

the ax, and threw it again to finish the job.

Van Rijn returned to the door. "You termite-bitten cow-

ards, let us in!" As his language got bluer, Joyce realized

what must have happened. She pounded his back with

her fists, much as he was pounding the door, until he

stopped and looked around.

"They wouldn't abandon us," Joyce said. "But they

must think we've been killed. When Carlos saw us, back

there in the hall, we were both lying on the floor, and there

were so many missiles. . . They aren't in the clubroom

any longer. They locked the door to delay the enemy while

they took a different way to the spaceships."

Ah, ja, ja, must be. But what do we do now? Blast

through the door to follow?"

Uulobu spoke in the guttural language of the Kusulongo

region. "All of us are slain or fled, sky-female. No more

battle. The noise you hear now is the Shanga plundering.

If they find us, they will fill us with arrows. Two guns can-

not stop that. But I think if we go back among the iron-

that-moves, we can slip out that way and around the

dome,"

"What's he besputtering about?" Van Rijn asked.

Joyce translated. "I think he's right," she added. "Our

best chance is to leave through the machine section. It

seems deserted for the time being. But we'd better hurry."

"So. Let this pussycat fellow go ahead, then. You stay by

me and cover my back, nie?"

They trotted back the way they had come. Hoarfrost

whitened the walls and made the floor slippery, as water'

vapor condensed in the t'Kelan cold. The breach into

the unlighted machine section gaped like a black mouth.

Remotely through walls, Joyce heard ripping, smashing

and exultant shouts, The work of years was going to

pieces around her. Why? she asked in pain, and got no

answer.

Uulobu's eyes, more adaptable to dark than any hu-

man's, probed among bulky shapes as they entered

the storage area. Vehicles were parked here: four ground-

cars and as many flitters. In addition, this long chamber

housed the specialized equipment of the studies the Esper-

ancians had made, seeking a way to save the planet. Most

lay in wreckage on the floor.

An oblong of dim light, up ahead, was the doorway to

the outside. Joyce groped forward. Her boot struck some-

thing, a fallen instrument. It clanked against something

else.

There came a yammer of challenge. The entrance filled

with a dozen shapes. They whipped through and lost

themselves among shadows and machines before Van

Rijn could fire. Uulobu hefted his tomahawk and drew his

knife. "Now we must fight for our passage," he said un-

regretfully.

"Cha-a-a-arge!" Van Rijn led the way at a run. Several

t'Kelans closed in on him. Metal and polished stone

whirled in the murk. The Earthman's blaster flared. A

native screamed, Another native got hold of the gun arm

and dragged it downward. Van Rijn tried to shake him

loose. The being hung on, though the human clubbed

him back and forth against his fellows.

Uulobu joined the ruckus, stabbing and hacking with

carnivore glee. Joyce could not do less. She had her own

pistol out, a slug-thrower. Something bumped into the

muzzle. Fangs and eyes gleamed at her in what light there

was. A short spear poised, fully able to pierce her suit.

Even so, she had never done anything harder than to

pull the trigger. The crack of the gun resounded in her

own skull.

Then for a while it was jostling, scrabbling, firing, fall-

ing, and wrestling lunacy. Now and again Joyce recog-

nized Uulobu's screech, the battle cry of his Avongo clan.

Van Rijn's voice sounded above the din like a trumpeted,

"St. Dismas help us! Down with mangy dogs!" Sud-

denly it was over. The guns had been too much. She lay on

the floor, struggling for breath, and heard the last few

Shanga run out. Somewhere a wounded warrior groaned,

until Uulobu cut his throat.

"Up with you," Van Rijn ordered between puffs. "We

got no time for making rings around the rosies,"

Uulobu helped her rise. He was too short to lean on

very well, but Van Rijn offered her an arm. They staggered.

out of the door, into the night.

There was no compound here, only the dome and

then t'Kela itself. Overhead glittered unfamiliar constel-

lations. The larger moon was aloft, nearly full, throwing

dim coppery light on the ground. West and south

stretched a rolling plain, thinly begrown with shrubs not

like Terrestrial sagebrush in appearance: low, wiry,

silvery-leaved, Due north rose the sheer black wall of

Kusulongo the Mountain, jagged against the Milky Way.

The city carved from its top could be seen only as a

glimpse of towers like teeth. Some kilometers eastward,

at its foot, ran the sacred Mangivolo River. Joyce could

see a red flash of moonlight on liquid ammonia. The trees

of that oasis where the Shanga were camped made a blot

of shadow. The hills that marched northward from Kusu-

longo gleamed with ice, an unreal sheen.

"Hurry,", Van Rijn grated. "If the other peoples think

we are dead, they will raise ship more fast than they can,"

His party rounded the dome at the reeling pace of ex-

haustion. Two tapered cylinders shimmered under the

moon, the mission's big cargo vessel and the luxury .

yacht which had brought Van Rijn and his assistants from

Earth. A couple of dead Shanga lay nearby. The night

wind rumed their fur. It had been a fight to reach safety

here. Now the ramps were retracted and the air locks

shut. As Van Rijn neared, the whine of engines shivered

forth.

"Hey!" he roared. "You clabberbrains, wait for me!"

The yacht took off first, hitting the sky like a thunder-

bolt. The backwash of air bowled Van Rijn over. Then the

Esperancian craft got under weigh. The edge of her drive

field caught Van Rijn, picked him up, and threw him sev-

eral meters. He landed with a crash and lay still.

Joyce hurried to him. "Are you all right?" she choked.

He was a detestable old oaf, but the horror of being ma-

rooned altogether alone seized upon her.

"Oo-co-oo," he groaned. "St. Dismas, I was going to put

a new stained-glass window in your chapel at home. Now

I think I will kick in the ones you have got."

Joyce glanced upward. The spaceships flashed like ris-

ing stars, and vanished. "They didn't see us," she said

numbly.

"Tell me more," Van Rijn snorted.

Uulobu joined them. "The Shanga will have heard," he

said. "They will come out here to make sure, and find us.

We must escape."

Van Rijn didn't need that translated. Shaking himself

gingerly, as if afraid semething would drop off, he crawled

to his feet and lurched back toward the dome. "We get a

llitter, nie?" he said. "

"The groundcars are stocked for a much longer pe-

riod," Joyce answered. "And we'll have to survive until

someone comes back here."

"With the pest-riddled planeteezers chasing us all the

while," Van Rijn muttered. "Joy forever, unconfined!"

"We go west, we find my people," Uulobu said. "I do not

know where the Avongo are, but other clans of the Rokul-

ela Horde must surely be out between the Narrow Land

and the Barrens."

They entered the machine section. Joyce stumbled on a

body and shuddered. Had slle killed that being herself?

The groundcars were long and square-built; the rear

four of the eight wheels ran on treads. The accumulators

were fully charged, energy reserve enough to drive several

thousand rough kilometers and maintain Earth-type con-

ditions inside for a year. There were air recyclers and suffi-

cient food to keep two humans going at least four

months. Six bunks, cooking and sanitary facilities, maps,

navigation equipment, a radio transceiver, spare parts for

survival gear--everything was there. It had to be, when you

traveled on a planet like this.

Van Rijn heaved his bulk through the door, which was

not locked, and settled himself in the driver's seat.

Joyce collapsed beside him. Uulobu entered with uneasy

eyes and quivering whiskers. Only the Ancients, among

t'Kelans, liked riding inside a vehicle. That was no prob-

lem, thou.gh, Joyce recalled dully. On field trips, once you

had established a terrestroid environment within, your

guides and guards rode on top of the car, talking with you

by intercom. Thus many kilometers had been covered,

and much had been learned, and the plans had been

drawn that would save a world. . . and now!

Van Rijn's ham hands moved deftly over the controls.

"In my company we use Landmasters," he said. "I like

not much these Globetrotters. But. sometimes our boys

have to--um-borrow one from the competition, so we

know how to . . . Ab." The engine purred to life. He

moved out through the door, riding the field drive at its

one-meter ceiling instead of using the noisier wheels.

But he could have saved his trouble. Other doors in the

dome were spewing forth Shanga. There must be a hun-

dred of them, Joyce thought. Van Rijn's lips skinned back

from his teeth. "You want to play happy fun games yet,

ha?" He switched on the headlights.

A warrior was caught in the glare, dazzled by it so that

he stood motionless, etched against blackness. Joyce's

eyes went over him, back and forth, as if something

visible could explain why he had turned on her. He was a

typical t'Kelan of this locality; races varied elsewhere, as

on most planets, but no more than among humans.

The stout form was about 150 centimeters tall, heav-

ily steatopygous to store as much liquid as the drying land

afforded. Hands and feet were nearly manlike, except for

having thick blue nails and only four digits apiece. The

fur that covered the whole body was a vivid orange,

striped with black, a triangle of white on the chest. The

head was round, with pointed ears and enormous yellow

cat-eyes, two fleshy tendrils on the forehead, a single nos-

tril crossing the 'broad nose, a lipless mouth full of sharp

white teeth framed- in restless cilia. This warrior carried

a sword-the bladeJike horn of a gondyanga plus a wooden

handle-and a circular shield painted in the colors of the

Yagola Horde to which the Shanga clan belonged.

"Beep, beep!" Van Rijn said. He gunned the car for-

ward.

The warrior sprang aside, barely in time. Others tried

to attack. Joyce glimpsed one with a bone piston whis-

tle in his mouth. The Yagola never used formal battle

cries, but advanced to music. A couple of spears clattered

against the car sides. Then Van Rijn was through, bound-

ing away at a hundred KPH with 'a comet's tail of dust

behind.

"Where we go now?" he demanded. "To yonder town

on the mountain? You said they was local big cheeses.

"The Ancients? No!" Joyce stiffened. "They must be

the ones who caused this."

"Ha? Why so?"

"I don't know, I don't know. They were so helpful be-

fore... But it has to be them. They incited. . . No

one else could have. W-we never made any enemies

among the clans. As soon as we had their biochemistry

figured out, we synthesized medicines and-and helped

them-" Joyce found suddenly that she could cry. She

leaned her helmet in her hands and let go all emotional

holds.

"There, there, everything's hunky-dunky," Van Rijn

said. He patted her shoulder. "You been a brave girl, as

well as pretty. Go on, now, relax, have fun."

T'Kela rotated once in thirty hours and some minutes,

with eight degrees of axial tilt. Considerable mght re..

mained when the car stopped, a hundred kilometers from!

Kusulongo, and the escapers made camp. Uulobu took a

sleeping bag outside while the others Earth-condition

the interior, shucked their suits, and crawled into bunks.

Not even Van Rijn's snores kept Joyce awake.

Dawn roused her. The red sun climbed from the east

with a glow like dying coals. Though its apparent diameter

was nearly half again that of Sol seen from Earth or Pax

from Esperance, the light was dull to human eyes, shad-

ows lay thick in every dip and gash, and the horizon was

lost in darkness. The sky was deep purpie, cloudless, but

filled to the south with the yellow plumes of a dust

storm. Closer by, the plain stretched bare, save for sparse

gray vegetation, strewn boulders, a coldly shimmering ice

field not far nothward. One scavenger foul wheeled over-

head on leathery-feathered wings.

Joyce sat up. Her whole body ached. Remembering what

had happened made such an emptiness within that she

hardly noticed. She wanted to roll over in the blankets,

bury her head, and sleep again. Sleep till rescue came, if it

ever did.

She made herself rise, go into the bath cubicle, wash,

and change into slacks and blouse. With refreshment

came hunger. .She returned to the main body of the car

and began work at th~ cooker.

The smell of coffee wakened Van Rijn. "Ahhh!" Whale-

like in the Long John he hadn't bothered to remove, he

wallowed from his bunk and snatched at a cup. "Good

girl." He sniffed suspiciously. "But no brandy in it? After

our troubles, we need brandy."

"No liquor here," she snapped.

"What?" For a space the merchant could only goggle

at her. His jowls turned puce. His mustaches quivered.

"Nothings to drink?" he strangled. "Why-why-why, this

is extrarageous. Who's responsible? By damn, I see to it

he's blacklisted from here to Polaris!"

"We have coffee, tea, powdered milk and fruit juices,"

Joyce said. "We get water from the ice outside. The chem-

ical unit removes ammonia and other impurities. One

does not take up storage space out in the field with liquor,

Freeman Van Rijn."

"One does if one is civilized. Let me see your food

stocks." He rummaged in the nearest locker. "Dried meat,

dried vegetables, dried-Death and-destruction!" he wailed.

"Not so much as one jar caviar? You want me to

crumble away?"

"You might give thanks you're alive."

"Not under this condition. . . . Well, I see somebody

had one brain cell still functional and laid in some ciga-

rettes." Van Rijn grabbed a handful and crumbled them

into a briar pipe he had stuffed in his bosom. He lit it.

Joyce caught a whiff, gagged, and returned to work at the

cooker, banging the utensils about with more ferocity

than was needful.

Seated at the folding table next to one of the broad win-

dows, Van Rijn crammed porridge down his gape and

peered out at the dim landscape. "Whoof, what a place.

Like hell with the furnaces on the fritz. How long you been

here, anyways?"

"Myself, about a year, as a biotechnician." She decided

it WM best to humor him. "Of course, the Esperancian

mission has been operating for several years."

"Ja, that I know. Though I am not sure just how-, I

was only here a couple of days, you remember, before the

trouble started. And any planet is so big and complicated a

thing, takes long to understand it even a little. Besides,

I had some other work along 1 must finish before investi-

gating the situation here."

"I admit being puzzled why you came. You deal in spices

and things, don't you? But there's nothing here that a

human would like. We could digest some of the proteins

and other biological compounds-they aren't all poison-

ous td us-but they lack things we need, like certain amino

acids, and they taste awful."

"My company trades with nonhumans too," Van Rijn

explained. "Not long ago, my research staff at home came

upon the original scientific reports, from the expedition

who found this planet fifteen years ago. This galaxy is so

big no one can keep track of everything while it happens.

Always we are behind. But anyhows, was mention of some

wine that the natives grow."

"Yes, kungu. Most of the clans in this hemisphere

make it. They raise the berries along with some other

plants that provide fiber. Not that they're farmers. A car-

nivorous race, nomadic except for the Ancients. But

they'll seed some ground and come back m time to har-

vest it.

"Indeed. Well, as you know, the first explorers here was

from Throra, which is a pretty similar planet to this only

not so ugh. They thought the kungu was delicious. They

even wanted to take seeds home, but found because of

ecology and stuffs, the plant will only grow on this world.

Ah-ha, thought Nicholas van Rijn, a chance maybe to

build up a very nice little trade with Throra. So because of

not having nobody worth trusting that was on Earth to be

sent here, I came in my personals to see. Oh, how bitter to

be so lonely!" Van Rijn's mouth drooped in an attempt

at pathos. One hairy hand stole across the table and closed

on Joyce's.

"Here come Uulobu," she exclaimed, pulling free and

jumping to her feet. In the very nick of time, bless both

his hearts! she thought.

The t'Kelan loped swiftly across the pIan A small ani-

mal that he had killed was slung across his shoulders. He

was clad differently from the Shanga: in the necklace of

fossil shells and the loosely woven blue kilt of his own

A vongo clan and RokuleIa Horde. A leather pouch at his

waist had been filled with liquid.

"I see he found an ammonia well," Joyce chattered,

brightly and somewhat frantically, for Van Rijn was edg-

ing around the table toward her. "That's what they have

those tendrils for,. did you know? Sensitive to any trace

of ammonia vapor. This world is so dry. Lots of frozen

water, of course You find ice everywhere you go on the

planet. Very often hundreds of square kilometers at a .

stretch. You see, the maximum temperature here is forty

below zero Celsius. But ice dosen't do the indigenous life

any good. In fact, it's one of the things that are killing

this world."

Van Rijn grumped and moved to the window. Uulobu

reached the car and said into the intercom, "Sky-female,

I have found spoor of hunters passing by, headed west

toward the Lubambaru. They can only be Rokulela. I think

we can find them without great trouble. Also I have

quenched my thirst and gotten meat for my hunger. Now

I must offer the Real Ones a share."

"Yes, do so for all of us," Joyce answered.

Uulobu began gathering sticks for a fire. "What he say?"

Van Rijn asked. Joyce translated. "So. What use to us,

making league with savages out here? We only need to

wait for rescue."

"If it comes," Joyce said. She shivered. "When they

hear about this at Esperance, they'll send an expedition

to try and learn what went wrong. But not knowing we're

alive, they may not hurry it enough."

"My people will," Van Rijn assured her. "The Poleso-

technic League looks after its own, by damn. So soon as

word gets to Earth, a warship comes to full investigation.

Inside a month."

"Oh, wonderful," Joyce breathed. She went limp and

sat down again.

Van Rijn scowled. "Natural," he ruminated, "they can-

not search a whole planet. They will know I was at that

bestinkered Kusulongo place, and land there. I suppose

those Oldsters or Seniles or whatever you call them is

sophisticated enough by now in interstellar matters to fob

the crew off with some story, if we are not nearby to make

contact. So . . . we must remain in their area, in radio

range. And radio range has to be pretty close on a red

dwarfs planet, where ionosphere characteristicals are

poor. But close to our enemies we cannot come so well, if

they are whooping after us the whole time. They can dig

traps or throw crude bombs or something. . . one way

or other, they can kill us even in this car. Ergo, we must

establish ourselves as too strong to attack, in the very

neighborhood of KusuIongo. This means we need allies.

So you have right, vie must certain go along to your

friend's peoples."

"But you can't make them fight their own race!" Joyce

protested.

Van Rijn twirled his mustache. "Can't I just?" he grin-

ned.

"I mean. . I don't know how, in any practical sense

. . . but even if you could, it would be wrong."

"Um-m-m." He regarded her for a while. "You Esper-

ancers is idealists, I hear. Your ancestors settled your

planet for a utopian community, and you is stilI doing

good for everybody even at this low date, nie? Your mis-

sion to help this planet here was for no profit, except it

makes you feel good. . ."

"And as a matter of foreign policy," Joyce admitted,

under the honesty fetish of her culture. "By assisting

other races, we gain their goodwill and persuade them, a

little, to look at things our way. If Esperance has enough

such friends, we'll be strong and influential without hav-

ing to maintain armed services."

"From what I see, I doubt very much you ever make

nice little vestrymen out of these t'Kelans."

"Well. . . true . . . they are out-and-out carnivores.

But then, man started as a carnivorous primate, didn't he?

And the t'Kelans in this area did achieve an agricultural

civilization once, thousands of years ago. That is, grain

was raised to feed meat animals. Kusulongo the City is the

last remnant. The ice age wiped it out otherwise, leaving

s-avagery-barbarism at most. But given improved condi-

tions, I'm sure the autochthones could recreate it. They'll

never have unified nations or anything, as we understand

such things. They aren't gregarious enough. But they

could develop a world order and adopt machine technol-

ogy."

"Except, from what you tell me, those snakes squatting

on top of the mountain don't want that."

Joyce paused only briefly to wonder how a snake could

squat.. before she nodded. "I guess so. Though I can't un-

derstand why. The Ancients were so helpful at first.

"Means they need to have some sense beaten into their

skullbones. Hokay, so for the sake of t'Kela's long-range

good, we arrange to do the beating, you and I.

"Well. . . maybe. . . but still. .

Van Rijn patted her head. "You just leave the philo-

sophizings to me, little girl," he said smugly. "You only

got to cook and look beautiful."

Uulobu had lit his fire and thrown the eyeballs of his

kill onto it. His chant to his gods wailed eerily through the

car wall. Van Rijn clicked his tongue. "Not so promising

materials, that," he said. "You civilize them if you can. I

am content to get home unpunct!lred by very sharp-

looking spears, me." He rekindled his pipe and sat down

beside her. "To do this, I must understand the situation.

Suppose you explain. Some I have heard before, but no

harm to repeat." He patted her knee. "I can always ad-

mire your lips and things while you talk,"

Joyce got up for another cup of coffee and reseated her-

self at a greater distance. She forced an impersonal tone.

"Well, to begin with, this is a very unusual planet. Not

physically. I mean, there's nothing strange about a type M

dwarf star having a planet at a distance of half an A. U.,

with a mass about forty percent greater than Earth's."

"So much? Must be low density, then. Metal-poor."

"Yes. The sun is extremely old. Fewer heavy atoms

were available at the time it formed with its planets.

T'Kela's overall specific gravity is only four-point-four. It

does have some iron and copper, of course. . . As I'm sure

you know, life gets started slowly on such worlds. Their

suns emit so little ultraviolet, even in flare periods, that

the primordial organic materials aren't energized to inter-

act very fast. Nevertheless, life does start eventually, in

oceans of liquid ammonia."

Ja. And usual goes on to develop photosynthesis using

ammonia and carbon dioxide, to make carbohydrates and

the nitrogen that the animals breathe." Van Rijn tapped

his sloping forehead. "So much I have even in this dumb

old bell. But why does evolution go different now and

then, like on here and Throra?"

"Nobody knows for sure. Some catalytic agent, per- '.

haps. In any event, even at low temperatures like these, all

the water isn't solid. A certain amount is present in the

oceans, as part of the ammonium hydroxide molecule.

T'Kelan or Throran plant cells have an analogue of chlor-

ophyl, which does the same job: using gaseous carbon

dioxide and 'dissolved' water to get carbohydrates and free

oxygen. The animals reverse the process, much as they

do on Earth. But the water they release isn't exhaled. It

remains in their tissues, loosely held by a specialized mole-

cule. When an organism dies and decays, this water is

taken up by plants again. In other words, H-two-O here

acts very much like nitrogenous organic material on our

kind of planets."

"But the oxygen the plants give off, it attacks ammonia."

"Yes. The process is slow, especially since solid am-

monia is denser than the liquid phase. It sinks to the bot-

tom of lakes and oceans, which protects it from the air.

Nevertheless, there is a gradual conversion. Through a

series of steps, ammonia and oxygen yield free nitrogen

and water. The water freezes out. The seas shrink; the

air becomes poorer in oxygen; the desert areas grow."

"This I know from Throra. But there a balance was

struck. Nitrogen-fixigg bacteria evolved and the drying-out

was halted, a billion years ago. So they told me once."

"Throra was lucky. It's a somewhat bigger planet than

t'Kela, isn't it!! Denser atmosphere, therefore more heat

conservation. The greenhouse effect on such worlds de-

pends on carbon dioxide and ammonia vapor. Well, sev-

eral thousand years ago, t'Kela passed a critical point. Just

enough ammonia was lost to reduce the greenhouse effect

sharply. As the temperature fell, more and more liquid

ammonia turned solid and went to the bottom, where it's

also quite well protected against melting. This made the,

climatic change catastrophically sudden. Temperatures

dropped so low that now carbon dioxide also turns liquid,

or even solid, through part of the year. There's still some

vapor in the atmosphere, in equilibrium, but very little.

The greenhouse effect really dropped off!

"Plant life was gravely affected, as you can imagine. It

can't grow without carbon dioxide and ammonia t~ build

its tissues. Animal life died out with it. Areas the size of

a Terrestrial continent became utterly barren, almost

overnight. I told you that fue native agricultural civiliza-

tion was wiped out. Worse, though, we've learned from

geology that the nitrogen-fixing bacteria were destroyed.

Completely. They couldn't survive the winter tempera-

tures. So there's no longer any force to balance the oxida-

tion of ammonia. The deserts encroach everywhere, year

by year. . . and t'Kela's year is only six-tenths Standard.

Evolution has worked hard, adapting life to the change,

but the pace is now too rapid for it. We estimate that all

higher animals, including the natives, will be extinct

within another millennium. In ten thousand years there'll

be nothing alive here."

Though she had lived with the realization for months,

it still shook Joyce to talk about it. She clamped fingers

around her coffee cup till they hurt, stared out the win-

dow at drifting dust, and strove not to cry.

Van Rijn blew foul clouds of smoke a while in silence.

Finally he rumbled almost gently, "But you have a cure

program worked out, ja?"

"Oh . . . oh, yes. We do. The research is completed and

we were about ready to summon engineers." She found

comfort in proceeding.

"The ultimate solution, of course, is to reintroduce ni-

trogen-fixing bacteria. Our labs ha~e designed an ex-

tremely productive strain. It will need a suitable ecology,

though, to survive: which means a lot of work with soil

chemistry, a microagricultural program. We can hasten

everything-begin to show results in a decade-by less

subtle methods. In fact, we'll have to do so, or the death

process will outrun anything that bactena can accomplish.

"What we'll do is melt and electrolyze water. The oxy-

gen can be released directly into the air, 'refreshing it, But

some will go to bum local hydrocarbons. T Kela is rich in

petroleum. This burning will generate carbon dioxide, thus

strengthening the greenhouse effect. The chemIcal energy

released can also supplement the nuclear power stations

we'll install: to do the electrolysis and to energize the

combination of hydrogen from water with nitrogen from

the atmosphere, recreating ammonia."

"A big expensive job, that," Van Rijn said.

"Enormous. The biggest thing Esperance has yet under-

taken. But the plans and estimates have been drawn up.

We know we can do it."

"If the natives don't go potshotting engineers for exer-

cise after lunch."

"Yes." Joyce's blond head sank low. "That would make

it impossible. We have to have the good will of all of them,

everywhere. They'll have to cooperate, work with us and

each other, in a planet-wide effort. And Kusulongo the City

influences a quarter of the whole world! What have we

done? I thought they were our friends. . ."

"Maybe we get some warriors and throw sbarp things at

them till they appreciate us," Van Rijn suggested.

The car went swiftly, even over irregular ground. An

hour or so after it had started again, Uulobu shouted from

his seat on top. Through the overhead window the hu-

mans saw him lean across his windshield and point. Look-

ing that way, they saw a dust cloud on the northwestern

horizon, wider and lower than the one to the south. "Ani-

mals being herded," Uulobu said. "Steer thither, sky-folk."

Joyce translated and Van Rijn put the control bar over.

"I thought you said they was hunters only," he remarked.

"Herds?"

"The Horde people maintain an economy somewhere

between that of ancient Mongol cattlekeepers and Amer-

ind bison-chasers," she explained. "They don't actually

domesticate the iziru or the bambalo. They did once, be-

fore the g1acial era, but now the land couldn't support such

a concentration of grazers. The Hordes do still exercise

some control over the migrations of the herds, though,

cull them, and protect them from predators."

"Um-m-m. What are these Hordes, anyhows?"

"That's hard-to describe. No human really understands

it. Not that t'Kelan psychology is incomprehensible. But it

is nonhuman, and our mission has been so busy gathering

planetographical data that we never found time to do psy-

chological studies in depth. Words like 'pride,' 'clan,'

and 'Horde' are rough translations of native terms-not

very accurate, I'm sure--just as 't'Kela' is an arbitrary

name of ours for the whole planet. It means 'this earth'

in the Kusulongo language."

"Hokay, no need beating me over this poor old egg-

noggin with the too-obvious. I get the idea. But look you,

Freelady Davisson. . . I can call you Joyce?" Van Rijn

buttered his tones. "We is in the same boat, sink or swim

together, except for having no water to do it in, so let us

make friends, ha?" He leaned suggestively against her.

"You call me Nicky.."

She moved aside. "I cannot prevent your addressing me

as you wish, Freeman Van Rijn," she said in her frostiest

voice.

"Heigh-ho, to be young and not so globulous again! But

a lonely old man must swallow his sorrows." Van Rijn ~

sighed like a self-pitying tornado. "Apropos swallowing,

why is there not so much as one little case beer along?

Just one case; one hour or maybe two of sips, to lay the

sandstorms in this mummy gullet I got; is that so much

to ask, I ask you?"

"Well, there isn't." She pinched her mouth together.

They drove on in silence.

Presently they raised the herd: iziru, humpbacked and

spiketailed, the size of Terran cattle. Those numbered a

few thousand, Joyce estimated from previous experience.

With vegetation so sparse, they must needs spread across

many kilometers.

A couple of natives had spied the car from a distance

and came at a gallop. They rode basai, which looked not

unlike large stocky antelope with tapir faces and a single

long horn. The t'Kelans wore kilts similar to Uulobu's, but

leather medallions instead of his shell necklace. Van Rijn

stopped the car. The natives reined in. They kept weapons

ready, a strung bow and a short throwing-spear.

Uulobu jumped off the top and approached them, hands

outspread. "Luck in the kill, strength, health, and off-

spring!" he wished them in the formal order of import-

ance. "I am Tola's son Uulobu, Avongo, Rokulela, now a

follower of the sky-folk."

"So I see," the older, grizzled warrior answered coldly.

The young one grinned and put his bow away with an

elaborate flourish. Uulobu clapped hand to tomahawk.

iThe older being made a somewhat conciliatory gesture

and Uulobu relaxed a trifle.

Van Rijn had been watching intently. "Tell me what

they say," he ordered. "Everything. Tell me what this

means with their weapon foolishness."

"That was an insult the archer offered Uulobu," Joyce

explained unhappily. "Disarming before the ceremonies

of peace have been completed. It implies that Uulobu isn't

formidable enough to be worth worrying about."

"Ah, so. These is rough peoples, them. Not even inside.

their own Hordes is peace taken for granted, ha? But why

should they make nasty at Uulobu? Has he got no prestige

from serving you?

"I'm afraid not. I asked him about it once. He's the

only t'Kelan I could ask about such things."

"Ja? How come that?"

"He's the closest to a native intimate that any of us in

the mission have had. We saved him from a pretty horrible

death, you see. We'd just worked out a cure for a local

equivalent of tetanus when he caught the disease. So he

feels gratitude toward us, as well as having an economic

motive. All our regular assistants are-were impoverished,

for one reason or another. A drought had killed off too

much game in their territory, or they'd been dispossessed,

or something like that." Joyce bit her lip. "They. . . they

did swear us fealty. . . in the traditional manner. . .

and you know how bravely they fought for us. But that

was for the sake of their own honor. Uulobu is the only

t'Kelan who's shown anything like real affection for hu-

mans."

"Odd, when you come here to help them. By damn,

but you was a bunch of mackerel heads! You should have

begun with depth psychology first of all. That fool planet-

ography could wait. . . Rotten, stinking mackerel, glows

blue in the dark. . ." Van Rijn's growl trailed into a

mumble. He shook himself and demanded further trans-

lation.

"The old one is called Nyaronga, head of this pride,"

Joyce related. "The other is one of his sons, of. course.

They belong to -the Gangu clan, in the same Horde as

Uulobu's Avongo. The formalities have been concluded,

and we're invited to share their camp. These people are

hospitable enough, in their fashion. . . after bona fides

has been established."

The riders dashed off. Uulobu returned. "They must

hurry," he reported through the intercom. "The sun will

brighten today, and cover is still a goodly ways off. Best

we trail well behind so as not to stampede the animals,

sky-female." He climbed lithely to the cartop. Joyce passed

his words on as Van Rijn got the vehicle started.

"One thing at a time, like the fellow said shaking hands

with the octopus," the merchant decided. "You must tell

me much, but we begin with going back to why the natives

are not so polite to anybody who works for your mission."

"Well. . . as nearly as Uulobu could get it across to me,

those who came to us were landless. That is, they'd stopped

maintaining themselves in their ancestral hunting grounds.

This means a tremendous loss of respectability. Then, too,

he confessed-very bashfully-that our helpersP prestige

suffered because we never involved them in any fights.

The imputation grew up that they were cowards."

"A warlike culture, ha?"

"N-no. That's the paradox. They don't have wars, or

even vendettas, in our sense. Fights are very small-scale

affairs, though they happen constantly. I suppose that

arises from the political organization. Or does it? We've

noticed the same thing in remote parts of t'Kela, among

altogether different societies from the Horde culture."

"Explain that, if you will be so kind as to make me a

little four-decker sandwich while you talk."

Joyce bit back her annoyance and went to the cooker

table. "As I said, we never did carry out intensive xenolog-

ical research, even locally," she told him. "But we do know

that the basic social unit is the same everywhere on this

world, what we call the pride. It springs from the fact

that the sex ratio is about three females to one male. Liv-

ing together you have the oldest male, his wives, their

offspring of subadult age. All males, and females unen-

cumbered with infants, share in hunting, though only

males fight other t'Kelans. The small-um--children help

out in the work around camp. So do any widows of the

leader's father that he's taken in. The size of such a

pride ranges up to twenty or so. That's as many as can

make a living in an area small enough to cover afoot, on

this desert planet."

"I see. The t'Kelan pride answers to the human family.

It is just as universal, too, right? I suppose larger units get

organized in different ways, depending on the culture."

"Yes. The most backward savages have no organization

larger than the pride. But ~he Kusulongo society, as we

call it-the Horde people-the biggest and most advanced

culture, spread over half the northern hemisphere -it has

a more elaborate superstructure. Ten or twenty prides form

what we call a.clan, a cooperative group claiming descent

from a common male ancestor, controlling a large terri-

tory thr_ough which they follow the wild herds. The clan

in turn are loosely federated into Hordes, each of which

holds an annual get-together in some traditional oasis.

That's when they trade, socialize, arrange marriages-newly

adult males get wives and start new prides-yes, and they

Iadjudicate quarrels, by arbitration or combat; at such

times. There's a lot of squabbling among clans, you see,

over points of honor or practical matters like ammonia

wells. One nearly always marries within one's own Horde;

it has its own dress, customs, gods, and so forth.

"No wars between Hordes?" Van Rijn asked.

"No, unless you want to call the terrible things that hap-

pen during a Volkerwanderung a war. Normally, although

individual units from different Hordes may clash, there

isn't any organized .campaigning. I suppose they simply

haven't the economic surplus to maintaIn armies in the

field."

"Um-m-m. I suspect, me, the reason goes deeper than

that. When humans want to have wars, by damn, they

don't let any little questions of if they can afford it stop

them. I doubt t'Kelans would be any different. Um-m-m."

Van Rijn's free hand'tugged his goatee. "Maybe here is a

key that goes tick-a-lock and solves our problem, if we

know how to stick it in.

"Well," Joyce said, ,"the Ancients are also a war preven-

tive. They settle most inter-Horde disputes, among other

things.

"Ah, yes, those fellows on the mountain. Tell me at5out

them."

Joyce finished making the sandwich and gave it to Van

Rijn. He wolfed it noisily. She sat down and stared out at

the scene: brush and boulders and swirling dust under

the surly red light, the dark mass of the herd drifting

along, a rider who galloped back to head off some strag-

glers. Far ahead now could be seen the Lubambaru, a

range of ice, sharp peaks that shimmered against the.

crepuscular sky. Faintly to her, above the murmur of the

engine, came yelps and the lowing of the animals. The car

rocked and bumped; she felt the terrain in her bones.

"The Ancients are survivors of the lost civilization," she

said. "They hung on in their city, and kept the arts that

were otherwise forgotten. That kind of life doesn't come

natural to most t'Kelans. I gather that in the course of

thousands of years, those,who didn't like it there wandered

down to join the nomads, while occasional nomads who

thought the city would be congenial went up and were

adopted into the group. That would make for some genetic

selection. The Ancients are a distinct psychological type.

Much more reserved and. . . intellectual, I guess you'd

call it . . . than anyone else."

"How they make their living?" Van Rijn asked around a

mouthful. .

"They provide services and goods for which they are

paid in kind. They are scribes, who keep records;

physicians; skilled metallurgists; weavers of fine textiles;

makers of gunpowder, though they only sell firEworks and

keep a few cannon for themselves. They're credited with

magical powers, of course, especially because-they can pre-

dict solar flares."

"And they was friendly until yesterday?"

"In their own aloof, secretive fashion. They must

have been plotting the attack on us for some time, though,

egging on the Shanga and furnishing the powder to blow

open our dome. I still can't imagine why. I'm certain they

believed us when we explained how we'd come to save

their race from extinction."

"Ja, no doubt. Only maybe at first they did not see all

the implications." Van Rijn finished eating, belched,

picked his teeth with a fingernail, and relapsed into brood-

ing silence. Joyce tried not to be too desperately homesick.

After a long time, Van Rijn smote the Control board so

that it rang. "By damn!" he bellowed. "It fits together!"

"What?" Joyce sat straight.

"But I still can't see how to use it," he said.

"What do you mean?"

"Shut up, Freelady." He returned to his thoughts. The

slow hours passed.

Late in the afternoon, a forest hove into sight. It cov-

ered the foothills of the Lubambaru, where an ammonia

river coursed thinly and seepage moistened the soil a little.

The trees were low and gnarled, with thorny blue trunks

and a dense foliage of small greenish-gray leaves. Tall

shrubs sprouted in thickets between them. The riders urged

their iziru into the wood, posted a few pickets to keep

watch, and started northward in a compact group, fifteen

altogether, plus pack animals and a couple of fuzzy in-

fants in arms. The females were stockier than the males

and had snouted faces. Though hairy and homeother-

mic, the t'Kelans were not mammals; mothers regurgi-

tated food for children who had not yet cut their fangs.

Old Nyaronga led the band, sword rattling at his side,

spear in hand and shield on arm, great yellow eyes flicker-

ing about the landscape. His half-grown sons flanked the

party, arrows nocked to bows. Van Rijn trundled the car

in their wake. "They expect trouble?" he asked.

Joyce started from her glum thoughts. "They always ex-

pect trouble," she said. "I told you, didn't I, what a quar-

relsome race this is-no wars, but so many bloody set-tos.

However, their caution is just routine today. Obviously

they're going to pitch camp with the other prides of their

clan. A herd this size would require all the Gangu to con-

trol it."

"You said they was hunters, not herders."

"They are, most of the time. But I you see, iziru and

bambalo stampede when the sun flares, and many are so

badly sunburned that they die. That must be because they

haven't developed protection against ultraviolet since the

atmosphere began to change. Big animals with long gen-'

erations evolve more slowly than small ones, as a rule.

The clans can't afford such losses. In a flare season liKe

this, they keep close watch on the herds and force them

into areas where there is some shade anq where the under-

growth hinders panicky running."

Van Rijn's thumb jerked a scornful gesture at the lower-

ing red disc. "You mean that ember ever puts out enough

radiation to hurt a sick butterfly?"

"Not if the butterfly came from Earth. But you know

what type M dwarfs are like. T1:tey flare, and when they

do, it can increase their luminosity several hundred percent.

These days on t'Kela, the oxygen content of the air has

been lowered to a point where the ozone layer doesn't

block out as much ultraviolet as it should. Then, too, a

planet like this, with a metal-poor core, has a weak mag-

netic field. Some of the charged particles from the sun

get through also-,adding to an aIre~dy high cosmic-ray

background. It wouldn't bother you or me, but mankind

evolved to withstand considerably more radiation than is

the norm here."

"Ja, I see. Maybe also there not being much radioactive

minerals locally has been a factor. On Throra, the flares

don't bother them. They make festival then. But like you

say, t'Kela is a harder luck world than Throra."

Joyce shivered. "This is a cruel cosmos. That's what

we believe in on Esperance-fighting back against the uni-

verse, all beings together."

"Is a very nice philosophy, except that all beings is not

built for it. You is a very sweet child, anyone ever tell you

that?" Van Rijn laid an arm lightly across her shoulder.

She found that she didn't mind greatly, with the gloom

and the brewing star-storm outside.

In another hour they reached the camp site. Hump-

backed leather tents had been erected around. a flat field

where there was an ammonia spring. Fires burned before

the entrances, tended by the young. Females crouched over

cooking pots, males swaggered abqut with hands on wea-

pon hilts. The arrival of the car brought everyone to

watch, not running, but strolling up with an elaborate pre-

tense of indifference.

Or is it a pretense? Joyce wondered. She looked out at

the crowd, a couple of hundred unhuman faces, eyes aglow,

spearheads a-gleam, fur rumpled by the whimpering wind,

but scarcely a sound from anyone. They've acted the

same way, she thought, every clan and Horde, everywhere

we encountered them: wild fascination at first, with our

looks and our machines; then a lapse into this cool formal

courtesy, as if we didn't make any real difference for

good or ill. They've thanked us, not very wam1ly, for

what favors we could do, and often insisted on making

payment, but they've never invited us to their merrymak-

ings or their rites, and sometimes the children throw

rocks at us.

Nyaronga barked a command. His pride began pitching

their own camp. Gradually the others drifted away.

Van Rijn glanced at the sun. "They sure it flares tOday?"

he asked.

"Oh, yes. If the Ancients have said so, then it will,"

Joyce assured him. "It isn't hard to predict, if you have

smoked glass and a primitive telescope to watch the star

surface. The light is so dim that the spots and flare

phenomena can easily be observed-unlike a type-G star-

and the patterns are very characteristic. Any jackleg as-

tronomer can predict a flare on an M class dwarf, days in

advance. Heliograph signals carry the word from Kusu-

longo to the Hordes."

"I suppose the Old Fogies got inherited empirical knowl-

edge from early times, like the Babylonians knew about

planetary movements, ja . . . Whoops, speak of the devil,

here we go!"

The sun was now not far above the western ridges,

which stood black under its swollen disc. A thin curl of

clearer red puffed slowly out of it on one side. The basai

reared and screamed. A roar went through the clansfolk.

Males grabbed the animals' bridles and dragged them to a

standstill. Females snatched their pots and their young

into the tents.

The flame expanded and brightened. Light crept along

the shadowy hills and the plains beyond. The sky began to

pale. The wind strengthened and threshed in the woods on

the edge of camp.

The t'Kelans manhandled their terrified beasts into a

long shelter of hides stretched over poles. One bolted. A

warrior twirled his lariat, tossed, and brought the creature

crashing to earth. Two others helped drag it under cover.

Still the flame from the solar disc waxed and gathered

luminosity, minute by minute. It was not yet too brilliant

for human eyes to watch unprotected. Joyce saw how a

spider web of forces formed and crawled there, drawn in

fiery loops. A gout of radiance spurted, died, and was

reborn. Though she had seen the spectacle before, she

found herself clutching Van Rijn's arm. The merchant

stuffed his pipe and blew stolid fumes.

Uulobu got down off the car. Joyce heard him ask Nya-

ronga, "May I help you face the angry Real One?"

"No," said the patriarch. "Get in a tent with the fe-

males."

Uulobu's teeth gleamed. The fur rose along his back.

He unhooked the tomahawk at his waist.

"Don't!" Joyce cried through the intercom. "We are

guests!"

For an instant the two t'Kelans glared at each other.

Nyaronga's spear was aimed at Uulobu's throat. Then the

Avongo sagged a little. "We are guests," he said in a

choked voice. "Another time, Nyaronga, I shall talk about

this with you."

"You-landless?" The leader checked himself. "Wen,

peace has been said between us, and there is no time now

to unsay it. But we Gangu will defend our own herds and

pastures. No help is needed."

Stiff-legged, Uulobu went into the nearest tent. Presently

the last basai were gotten inside the shelter. Its flap was

laced shut, to leave them in soothing darkness.

The flare swelled. It became a ragged sheet of fire next

the sun disc, almost as big, pouring out as much light,

but of an orange hue. Still it continued to grow, to brighten

and yellow. The wind increased.

The heads of prides walked slowly to the center of camp.

They formed a ring; the unwed youths made a larger

circle around them. Nyaronga himself took forth a brass

horn and winded it. Spears were raised aloft, swords and

tomahawks shaken. The t'Kelans began to dance, faster

and faster as the radiance heightened. Suddenly Nyaronga

blew his horn again. A cloud of arrows whistled toward

the sun.

"What they doing?" Van Rijn asked. "Exorcising the

demon?"

"No," said Joyce. "They don't believe that's possible.

They're defying him. They always challenge him to come

down and'fight.' And he's not a devil, by the way, but a

god."

Van Rijn nodded. "It fits the pattern," he said, half to

himself. "When a god steps out of his rightful job, you

don't try to bribe him back, you threaten him. la, it fits."

The males ended their dance and walked with haughty

slowness to their tents. The doorflaps were drawn. The

camp lay deserted under the sun.

"Ha!" Van Rijn surged to his feet. "My gear"

"What?" Joyce stared at him. She had grown so used to

wan red light on this day's travel that the hue now pouring

in the windows seemed ghastly on his cheeks.

"I want to go outside," Van Rijn told her. "Don't just

stand there with tongue unreeled. Get me my suit!"

Joyce found herself obeying him. By the time his gross

form was bedecked, the sun was atop the hills and had

tripled its radiance. The flare was like a second star, not

round but flame-shaped, .and nearly white. Long shadows

wavered across the world, which had taken on an unnat-

ural brazen tinge. The wind blew dust and dead leaves over

the ground, flattened the fires, and shivered the tents till

they thundered.

"Now," Van Rijn said, "when I wave, you fix your inter-

com to full power so they can hear you. Then tell those so-

called males to peek out at me if they have the guts." He

glared at her. "And be unpolite about it, you understand

me?"

Before she could reply he was in the air lock. A minute

afterward he had cycled through and was stumping over

the field until he stood in the middle of the encampment.

Curtly, he signaled.

Joyce wet her lips what did that idiot think he was

doing? He'd never heard of this planet a month ago. He

hadn't been on it a week. Practically all his Information

about it he had from her, during the past ten or fifteen

hours. And he thought he knew how to conduct himself?

Why, if he didn't get his fat belly full of whetted iron, it

would only be because there was no justice in the universe.

Did he think she'd let herself be dragged down with him?

Etched huge and black against the burning sky, Van

Rijn jerked his arm again.

Joyce turned the intercom high and said in the vernacu-

lar, "Watch, all Gangu who are brave enough! Look upon

the male from far places, who stands alone beneath the

angered sun!"

Her tones boomed hollowly across the wind. Van Rijn

might have nodded. She must squint now to see what he

did. That was due to the contrast, not to the illumination

per se. It was still only a few percent of what Earth gets.

But the flare, with an effective temperature of a million

degrees or better, was emitting in frequencies to which her

eyes were sensitive. Ultraviolet also, she thought in a cor-

ner of her mind: too little to turn a human baby pink,

but enough to bring pain or death to these poor dwellers in

Hades.

Van Rijn drew his blaster. With great deliberation, he

fired several bolts at the star. Their flash and noise seemed

puny agaimt the rage up there. Now what-?

"No!" Joyce screamed.

Van Rijn opened )lis faceplate. He made a show of it,

sticking his countenance out of the helmet, into the full

light. He danced grotesquely about and thumbed his

craggy nose at heaven.

But...

The merchant finished with an unrepeatable gesture,

closed his helmet again, fired off two more bolts, and"stood

with folded arms as the sun went under the horizon.

The flare lingered in view for a while, a sheet of

ghostly radiance above the trees. Van Rijn walked back

to the car through twilight. Joyce let him in. He opened his

helmet, wheezing, weeping, and blaspheming in a dozen

languages. Frost began to form on his suit.

"Hoo-ee!" he moaned. "And not even a little hundred

cc. of whiskey to console my poor old mucky membranes"

"You could have died," Joyce whispered.

"Oh, no. No. Not that '#ay does Nicholas van Rijn die.

At the age of a hundred and fifty, I plan to be shot by an

outraged husband. The cold was not too bad, for the

short few minutes I could hold my breath. But letting in

that ammonia-Terror and taxes!" He waddled to the bath

cubicle and splashed his face with loud snortings. -

The last flare-light sank. The sky remained hazy with au-

rora, so that only the brightest stars showed. The most

penetrating charged particles from the flare would not

arrive for hours; it was safe outside. One by one the

t'Kelans emerged. Fires were poked up, sputtering and

glaring in the dark.

Van Rijn came back. "Hokay, I'm set," he said. "Now

put on your own suit and come out with me. We got to talk

at them."

As she walked into the circle around which stood the

swart outlines of the tents, Joyce must push her way

through females and young. Their ring closed behind her,

and she saw fireglow reflected from their eyes and knew she

was hemmed in. It was comforting to have Van Rijn's

buk so near and Uulobu's pad-pad at her back.

Thin comfort, though, when she looked at the males

who waited by the ammonia spring. They had gathered as

soon as they saw the humans coming. To her vision they

were one shadow, like the night behind them. The fires on

either side, that made it almost like day for a t'Kelan,

hardly lit the front rank for her. Now and then a flame

jumped high in the wind, or sparks went showering, or the,

dull glow on the smoke was thrown toward the group.

Then she saw a barbed obsidian spearhead, a horn sword,

an ax or an iron dagger, drawn. The forest soughed beyond,

the camp and she heard the frightened bawling of iziru as

they blundered around in the dark. Her mouth went dry.

The fathers of the prides stood in the forefront. Most

were fairly young; old age was not common in the desert.

Nyaronga seemed to have primacy on that account. He

stood, spear in hand, fangs showing L'1 the half-open jaws,

tendrils astir. His kilt fluttered in the unrestful air.

Van Rijn came to a halt before him. Joyce made herself

stand close and meet Nyaronga's gaze. Uulobu crouched at

her feet. A murmur like the sigh before a storm went

through the warriors.

But the Earthman waited imperturbable, until at last

Nyaronga must break the silence. "Why did you challenge

the sun? No sky-one has ever done so before."

Joyce translated, a hurried mumble. Van Rijn puffed

himself up visibly, even in his suit. "Tell him," he said, "I

came just a short time ago. Tell him the rest of you did

not think it was worth your whiles to make defiance, but

I did."

"What do you intend to do?" she begged. "A misstep

could get us killed."

"True. But if we don't make any steps, we get killed for

sure, or starve to death because we don't dare come in

radio range of where the rescue ship will be. Not so?" He

patted her hand. "Damn these gloves! This WQuld be

more fun without. But in all kinds of cases, you trust

me, Joyce. Nicholas Van Rijn has not got old and fat on a

hundred rough planets, if he was not smart enough to

outlive everybody else. Right? Exact. So tell whatever I

say to them, and use a sharp tone. Not unforgivable insults,

but be snotty, hokay?"

She gulped. "Yes. I don't know why, b-but I will let you

take the lead. If-" She suppressed fear and turned to the

waitmg t'Kelans. "This sky-male with me is not one of

my own party," she told them. "He is of my race, but from

a more powerful people among them than my people. He

wishes me to tell you that though we sky-folk have hitherto

not deigned to challenge the sun, he has not thought it

was beneath him to do so."

"You never deigned?" rapped someone. "What do you

mean by that?" .

Joyce improvised. "The brightening of the sun is no

menace to our people. We have often said as much. Were

none of you here ever among those who asked us?"

Stillness fell again for a moment, until a scarred one-

eyed patriarch said grudgingly, "Thus 1 heard last year,

when you-or one like you-were in my pride's country

healing sick cubs."

"Well, now you have seen it is true," Joyce replied.

Van Rijn tugged her sleeve. "Hoy, what goes on? Let me

talk or else our last chance gets stupided away."

She dared not let herself be angered, but recounted the

exchange. He astonished her by answering, "I am sorry,

little girl. You was doing just wonderful. Now, though, I

have a speech to make. You translate as I finish ~very

sentence, ha?"

He leaned forward and stabbed his index finger just be-

neath Nyaronga's nose, again and again, as he said harshly,

"You ask why I went out under the brightening sun? It

was to show you I am not afraid of the fire it makes. I spit

on your sun and it sizzles. Maybe it goes out. My sun could

eat yours for breakfast and want an encore, by damn!

Your little clot hardly gives enough light to see by, not

enough to make bogeyman for a baby in my people."

The t'Kelans snarled and edged closer, hefting their

weapons. Nyaronga retorted indignantly, "Yes, we have

often observed that you sky-folk are nearly blind."

"You ever stood in the light from our cars? You go

blind then, nie? You could not stand Earth, you. Pop and

sputter you'd go, up in a little greasy cloud of smoke."

They were taken aback at that. Nyaronga spat and said,

"You must even bundle yourselves against the air."

"You saw me stick my head out in the open. You care

to try a whiff of my air for a change? I dare you."

A rumble went through the warriors, half wrath and

half unease. Van Rijn chopped contemptuously with one

hand. "See? You is more weakling than us."

A big young chieftain stepped forward. His whiskers

bristled. "f dare."

"Hokay, I give you a smell." Van Rijn turned to Joyce.

"Help me with this bebloodied air unit. I don't want no

more of that beetle venom they call air in my helmet."

"But-but-" Helplessly, she obeyed, unscrewing the

flush valve on the recycler unit between his shoulders.

"Blow it in his face," Van Rijn commanded.

The warrior stood bowstring taut. Joyce thought of the

pain he must endure. She couldn't aim the hose at him.

"Move!" Van Rijn barked. She did. Terrestrial atmosphere

gushed forth.

The warrior yowled and stumbled back. He rubbed his

nose and streaming eyes. For a minute he wobbled around,

before he collapsed into the arms of a follower. Joyce re-

fitted the valve as Van Rijn chortled, "I knew it. Too hot,

too much oxygen, and especial the water vapor. It makes

Throrans sick, so I thought sure it would do the same for

these chaps. Tell them he will get well in a little while."

Joyce gave the reassurance. Nyaronga shook himself

and said, "I have heard tales about this. Why must you

show that poor fool what was known, that you breathe poi-

son?"

"To prove we is just as tough as you, only more so, in a

different way," Van Rijn answered through Joyce. "We

can whip you to your kennels like small dogs if we

choose."

That remark brought a yell. "Sharpened stone flashed

aloft. Nyaronga raised his arms for silence. It came, in a

mutter and a grumble and a deep sigh out of the females

watching from darkness. The old chief said with bleak

pride, "We know you command weapons we do not. This

means you have arts we lack, which has never been denied.

It does not mean you are stronger. A t'Kelan is not

stronger than a bambalo simply because he has a bow

to kill it from afar. We are a hunter folk, and you are not,

whatever your weapons."

"Tell him," Van Rijn said, "that I will fight their most

powerful man barehanded. Since I must wear this suit

that protects from his bite, he can use armaments. They

will go through fabricord, so it is fair, me?"

"He'll kill you," Joyce protested.

Van Rijn leered. "If so, I die for the most beautifullest

lady On this planet." His voice dropped. "Maybe then you

is sorry you was not more kind to a nice old man when

you could be."

"I won't!"

"You will, by damn!" He seized her wrist so strong1y

that she winced. "I know what I am making, you got me?"

Numbly, she conveyed the challenge. Van Rijn drew his

blaster and threw it at- Nyaronga's feet. "If I lose, the win-

ner can keep this," he said.

That fetched them. A dozen wild young males leaped

forth, shouting, into the firelight. Nyaronga roared and

cuffed them into order. He glared from one to another

and jerked his spear at an individual. "This is my own

son Kusalu. Let him defend the honor of pride and clatL"

The t'Kelan was overtopped by Van Rijn, but was al-

most as broad. Muscles moved snakishly under his fur. His

fangs glistened as he slid forward, tomahawk in right

hand, iron dagger in left. The other males fanned out,

making a wide circle of eyes and poised weapons. Uulobu

drew Joyce aside. His grasp trembled on her arm. "Could

I but fight him myself," he whispered.

While Kusalu glided about Van Rijn turned, ponderous

as a planet. His arms hung apelike from hunched shoul-

ders. The fires tinged his crude features where they jutted

within the helmet. "Nya-a-ah," he said.

Kusalu cursed and threw the tomahawk with splin-

tering force. Van Rijn's left hand moved at an impossible

speed. He caught the weapon in mid air and threw himself

backward. The thong tautened. Kusalu went forward on

his face. Van Rijn plunged to the attack.

Kusalu rolled over and bounced to his feet in time. His

blade flashed. Van Rijn blocked it with his right wrist. The

Earthman's left hand took a hitch in the thong and

yanked again. Kusalu went to one knee. Van Rijn twisted'

that arm around behind his back. Every t'Kelan screamed.

Kusalu slashed the thong across. Spitting, he leaped

erect again and pounced. Van Rijn gave him an expert

kick in the belly, withdrawing the foot before it could be

seized. Kusalu lurched. Van Rijn closed in with a karate

chop to the side of the neck.

Kusalu staggered but remained up. Van Rijn barely

ducked the rip of the knife. He retreated. Kusalu stood a -

moment regaining his wind. Then he moved in one

blur.

Things happened. Kusalu was grabbed as he charged

and sent flailing over Van Rijn's shoulder. He hit ground

with a thump. Van Rijn waited. Kusalu still had the dag-

ger. He rose and stalked near. Blood ran from his nostril.

"La ci darem La mano," sang Van Rijn. As Kusalu pre-

pared to smite, the Earthman got a grip on his right arm,

whirled him around, and pinned him.

Kusalu squalled. Van Rijn ground a knee in his bact

"You say, 'Uncle?'" he panted.

"He'll die first," Joyce wailed.

"Hokay, we do it hard fashion." Van Rijn forced the

knife loose and kicked it aside. He let Kusalu go. But the

t'Kelan had scarcely raised himself when a gauntleted

fist smashed into his stomach. He reeled. Van Rijn pushed

in relentlessly, blow after blow, until the warrior sank.

The merchant stood aside. Joyce stared at him with

horror. "Is all in order," he calmed her. "I did not damage

him Permanent.

Nyaronga helped his son climb back up. Two others led

Kusalu away. A low keening went among the massed .

t'Kelans. It was like nothing Joyce had ever heard before.

Van Rijn and Nyaronga confronted each other. The

native said very slowly, "You have proven yourself, Sky-

male. For a landless one, you fight well, and it was good of

you not to slay him.

Joyce translated between sobs. Van Rijn answered, "Say

I did not kill that young buck because there is no need.

Then say I have plenty territory of my own." He pointed

upward, where stars glistened in the windy, hazy sky. "Ten

him there is my hunting grounds. by damn. "

When he had digested this, Nyaronga asked almost plain-

tively, "But what does he wish in our land? What is his

gain?"

"We came to help-" Joyce stopped herself and put the

question to Van Rijn.

"Ha!" the Earthman gloated. "Now we talk about tur-

keys." He squatted near a fire. The pride fathers joined

him; their sons pressed close to clisten. Uulobu breathed

happily, "Weare taken as friends."

"I do not come to rob your land or game," Van Rijn

said in an oleaginous tone. "No, only to make deals, with

good profit on both sides. Surely these folks trade with

each other. They could not have so much stuffs as they do

otherwise."

"Oh, yes, of course." Joyce settled weakly beside him.

"And their relationship to the city is essentiaIly quid pro

quo, as I told you before."

"Then they will understand bargains being strna. So ten

them those Gaffers on the mountain has got jealous of us.

Tell them they sicced the Shanga onto our camp. The

whole truths, not varnished more than needfol "

"What? But I thought-I mean. didn't you want to give

them the impression that we're actually poweriul? Should

we admit we're refugees?"

"Well, say we has had to make a . . . what do the miIi-

tary communiques say when you has ot your pants beaten

off? . . . an orderly rearward advance for strategic reasons,

to previously prepared positions."

Joyce did. Tendrils r~ on the native heam. pupils

narrowed, and hands raised weapons anew. Nyaronga

asked dubiously. "Do you wish shelter among us?"

"No," said Van Rijn. "Ten him we is come to warn

them, because if they get wiped out we can make no nice

deals with profit. Tell them the Sh~ga now has your guns

from the dome, and will move with their fellow clans into

Rokulela territory."

Joyce wondered if she had heard aright. "But we don't

. . . we didn't. . . we brought no weapons except a few

personal sidearms. And everybody must have taken his

own away with him in the retreat."

"Do they know that, these peoples?"

"Why . . . well. . . would they believe you?"

"My good prettY blonde with curves in all the right

places, I give you Nicholas van Rijn's promise they would

not believe anything else."

Haltingly, she spoke the lie. The reaction was homble.

They boiled throughout the camp, leaped about, brand-

ished their spears, and ululated like wolves. Nyaronga

alone sat still, but his fur stood on end.

"Is this indeed so?" he demanded. It came as a whisper

through the noise.

"Why else would the Shanga attack us, with help from

the Ancients?" Van Rijn countered.

"You know very well why," Joyce said. "The Ancients

bribed them, played on their superstitions, and probably of-

fered them our metal to make knives from."

"Ja, no doubt, but you give this old devil here my rhe..

torical just the way I said it. Ask him does it not make

sense, that the Shanga would act for the sake of blasters

and slugthrowers, once the Geezers put them up to it and

supplied gunpowder? Then tell him this means the Gray-

beards must be on the side of the Shanga's own Horde. . .

what's they called, now?"

"The Yagola."

"So. Tell him that things you overheard give you good

reason to believe the Shanga clan will put themselves at

the head of the Yagola to move west and push the Roku-

lela out of this fine country."

Nyaronga and the others, who fell into an ominous quiet

as Joyce spoke, had no trouble grasping the concept. As

she had told Van Rijn, war was not a t'Kelan institution.

But she was not conveying the idea of a full-dress war-

rather, a Volkerwanderung into new bunting grounds.

And such things were frequent enough on this dying

planet. When a region turned utterly barren its inhabi-

tants must displace someone else, or die in the attempt.

The difference now was that the Yagola were not starved

out of their homes. They were alleged to be anticipating

that eventuality, plotting to grab off more land with their

stolen firearms to give them absolute superiority.

"I had not thought them such monsters," Nyaronga

said.

"They aren't," Joyce protested in Angiic to Van Rijn.

"You're maligning them so horribly that-that-"

"Well, well, all's fair in love and propaganda. .. he said.

"Propose to Nyaronga that we all return to Kusulonga,

collecting reinforcements as we go, to see for ounelves

if this business really is true .and use numerical advan-

tage while we have still got it."

"You are going to set them at each other's throats! I

won't be party to any such thing. I'D die first. ..

"Look, sweet potato, nobody has got killed yet. Maybe

nobody has to be. 1 can explain later. But for now, we have

got to strike while the fat is in the fire. They is wonder-

ful excited. Don't give them a chance to 0001 off till they

has positive decided to march." The man laid a hand on

his heart. "You think old, short of breath, comfort-loving,

cowardly Nicholas van Rijn wants to fight a war? You

think again. A formfitting chair, a tall cool drink, a Venus-

ian cigar, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik on the taper, aboard

his ketch while he sails with a bunch of dancing girls

down Sunda Straits, that is only which he wants. Is that

much to ask? Be like your own kind,. gentle setfs and help

me stir them up to fight. "

Trapped in her own bewildemtent, she followed his lead.

That same night, riders went out bearing messages to such

other Rokulela clans as were known to be within reach.

The first progress eastward was in darkness, to avoid the

still flaring sun. Almost every male, grown or half-grown,

rode along, leaving females and young behind in camp.

They wore flowing robes and burnooses, their basai were

blanketed, against the fierce itch that attacked exposed

t'Kelan skin during such periods. Most of the charged par-

ticles from the star struck the planet's day side, but there

was enough magnetic field to bring some around to the

opposite hemisphere. Even so, the party made surprisingly

good speed. Peering from the car windows, Joyce glimpsed

them under the two moons, shadowy shapeless forms that

slipped over the harsh terrain, an occasional flash of spear-

heads. Through the engine's low voice she heard them

calling to each other, and the deep earth-mutter of unshod

hoofs.

"You see," Van Rijn lectured, "I am not on this world

long, but I been on a lot of others, and read reports about

many more. In my line of business this is needful. They

always make parallels. I got enough clues about these

t'Kelans to guess the basic pattern of their minds, from

analogizings. You Esperancers, on this other hand, has

not had so much experience. Like most colonies, you is

too isolated from the galactic mainstream to keep au

courant with things, like for instance the modem explorer

techniques. That was obvious from the fact you did not

make depth psychology studies the very first thing, but

instead took what you found at face valuation. Never do

that, Joyce. Always bite the coin that feeds you, for this is

a hard and wicked universe."

"You seem to know what you're about, Nick," she ad-

mitted. He beamed and raised her hand to his lips. She

made some confused noise about heating coffee and re-

treated. She didn't want to hurt his feelings; he really was

an old dear, under that crust of his.

When she came back to the front seat, placing herself

out of his reach, she said, "Well, tell me, what pattern did

you deduce? How do their minds work?"

"You assumed they was like warlike human primitives,

in early days on Earth," he said. "On the topside, that

worked hokay. They is intelligent, with language; they can

reason and talk with you; this made them seem easy

understood. What you forgot, I think, me, was conscious

Iintelligence is only a small part of the whole selfness. All

it does is help us get what we want. But the wanting itself

-food, shelter, sex, everything-our motives-they come

from deeper down. There is no logical reason even to

stay alive. But instinct says to, so we want to. And instinct

comes from very old evolution. We was animals long be-

fore we became thinkers and, uh-" Van Rijn's beady

eyes rolled piously ceilingward-" and was given souls.

You got to think how a race evolved before you can take

them. . . I mean understand them.

"Now humans, the experts tell me, got started way back

when, as ground apes that turned carnivore when the for-

ests shrank up in Africa for lots of megayears. This is

when they started to walking erect the whole time, and

grew hands fully developed to make weapons because

they had not claws and teeth like lions. Hokay, so we

is a mean lot, we Homo Sapienses, with killer instincts.

But not exclusive. We is still omnivores who can even sur-

vive on Brussels sprouts if we got to. Pfui! But we can.

Our ancestors been peaceful nutpluckers and living off

each other's fleas a long, longer time than they was hunt-

ers. It shows.

"The t'Kelans, on the other side, has been carnivores

since they was still four-footers. Not very good carnivores.

Unspecialized, with no claws and pretty weak biting ap-

paratus even if it is stronger than humans'. That is why

they also developed hands and made tools, which led to

them getting big brains. Nevertheleast, they have no vege-

tarian whatsolutely in their ancestors, as we do. And

they have much powerfuller killing instincts than us. And

is not so gregarious. Carnivores can't be. You get a big'

concentration of hunters in one spot, and by damn, the

game goes away. Is that coffee ready?"

"I think so." Joyce fetched it. Van Rijn slurped it down,

disregarding a temperature that would have taken the

skirt off her palate, steering with one bare splay foot as he

drank.

"I begin to see," she said with growing excitement.

"That's why they never developed true nations or fought

real wars. Big organizations are completely artificial things

to them, commanding no loyalty. You don't fight or die

for a Horde, any more than a human would fight for. . .

for his bridge club."

"Um-m-m, I have known some mighty bloodshot looks

across bridge tables. But ja, you get the idea. The pride is

a natural thing here, like the human family. The clan,

with blood ties, is only one step removed. It can excite

t'Kelans as much, maybe, as his country can excite a man.

But Hordes? Nie. An arrangement of convenience only.

"Not that pride and clan is .loving-kindness and sugar

candy. Humans make family squabbles and civil wars.

T'Kelans have still stronger fighting instincts than us.

Lots of arguments and bloodshed. But only on a small

scale, and not taken too serious. You said to me, is no

vendettas here. That means somebody killing somebody

else is not thought to have done anything bad. In fact,

wnoever does not fight-male, anyhow-strikes them as

unnatural, like less than normal."

"Is. . . that why they never warmed up to us? To the

Esperancian mission, I mean?"

"Partly. Not that you was expected to fight at any speci-

fical time. Nobody went out to pick a quarrel when you

gave no offense and was even useful. But your behavior

taken in one lump added up to a thing they couldn't un-

derstand. They figured there was something wrong with

you, and felt a goodly natured contempt. I had to prove I

was tough as they or tougher. That satisfied their instincts,

which then went to sleep and let them listen to me

with respects."

Van Rijn put down his empty cup and took out his pipe.

"Another thing you lacked was territory," he said. "Ani-

mals on Earth, too, has an instinct to stake out and de-

fend a piece of ground for themselves. Humans do. But

for carnivores this instinct has got to be very, very, very

powerful, because if they get driven away from where the

game is, they can't survive on roots and berries. They

die.

"You saw yourselfs how those natives what could not

maintain a place in their ancestral hunting grounds but

went to you instead was looked downwards on. You Esper-

ancers only had a dome on some worthless nibble of land.

Then you went around preaching how you had no designs

on anybody's country. Ha! They had to believe you was

either lying-maybe that is one reason the Shanga at-

tacked you-or else was abnormal weaklings."

"But couldn't they understand?" Joyce asked. "Did they

expect us, who didn't even look like them, to think the

same way as they do?"

"Sophisticated, civilized t'Kelans could have caught the.

idea," Van Rijn said. "However, you was dealing with

naive barbarians." . .

"Except the Ancients. I'm sure they realize-"

"Maybe so. Quite possible. But you made a deadly threat

to them. Could you not see? They has been the scribes,

doctors, high-grade artisans, sun experts, for ages and

ages. You come in and start doing the same as them, only

much better. What you expect them to do? Kiss your

foots? Kiss any part of your anatomy? Not them! They is

carnivores, too. They fight back.

"But we never meant to displace them!

"Remember," Van Rijn &aid, wagging his pipe stem at

her, "reason is just the lackey for instinct. The Gaffers is

more subtle than anybody elses. They can sit still in one

place, between walls. They do not hunt. They do not

claim thousands of square kilometers for themselves. But

does this mean they have no instinct of territoriality? Ha!

Not bloody likely! They has only sublimed it. Their work,

that is their territory-and you moved in on it.

Joyce sat numbly, staring out into night. Time passed.

before she could protest. "But we explained to them-I'm

sure they understood-we explained this planet will die

without our help."

"Ja,ja. But a naturally born fighter has less fear of

death than other kinds animals. Besides, the death was

scheduled for a thousand years from now, did you not

say? That is too long a time to feel with emotions. Your

own threat to them was real, here and now."

Van Rijn lit his pipe. "Also," he continued around the

mouthpiece, "your gabbing about planet-wide cooperation

md not sit so well. I doubt they could really comprehend

it. Carnivores don't make cooperations except on the most

teensy scale. It isn't practical for them. They haven't got

such instincts. The Hordes-which, remember, is not na-

tions in any sense-they could never get what you was

talking about, I bet. Altruism is outside their mental hori-

zontals. It only made them suspicious of you. The An-

cients maybe had some vague notion of your motives, but

didn't share them in the littlest. You can't organize these

peoples. Sooner will you build a carousel on Saturn's rings.

It does not let itself be done."

"You've organized them to fight!" she exclaimed in her

anguish.

"No. Only given them a common purpose for this time

being. They believed what I said about weapons left in the

dome. With minds like that, they find it much the easiest

thing to believe. Of course you had an arsenal--everybody

does. Of course you would have used it if you got the

chance--anybody would. Ergo, you never got the chance;

the Shanga captured it too fast. The rest of the story, the

Yagola plot against the Rokulela, is at least logical enough

to their minds that they had better investigate it good."

"But what are you going to make them do?" She couldn't

hold back the tears any longer. "Storm the mountain?

They can't get along without the Ancients."

"Sure, they can, if humans substitute."

"B-b-but-but-no, we can't, we mustn't-"

"Maybe we don't have to," Van Rijn said. "I got to play

by my ear of tinned 'cauliflower when we arrive. We will

see." He laid his pipe aside. "There, there, now, don't be

so sad. But go ahead and cry if you want. Papa Nicky will

dry your eyes and blow your nose." He offered her the

curve of his arm. She crept into it, buried her face against

his side, and wept herself to sleep.

Kusulongo the Mountain rose monstrous from the plain,

cliff upon gloomy cliff, with talus slopes and glaciers be-

tween, until the spires carved from its top stood ragged

across the sun-disc. Joyce had seldom felt the cold and

murk of this world as she did now, riding up the path to

the city on a homed animal that must be blanketed against

the human warmth of her suit. The wind went shriek-

ing through the empty dark sky, around the crags, to buffet

her like fists and snap the banner which Uulobu carried on

a lance as he rode ahead. Glancing back, down a dizzying

sweep of stone, she saw Nyaronga and the half-dozen

other chiefs who had been allowed to come with the party.

Their cloaks streamed about them; spears rose and fell

with the gait of their mounts; the color of their fur was

lost in this dreary light, but she thought she made out

the grimness on their faces. Immensely far below, at the

mountain's foot, lay their followers, five hundred armed

and angry Rokulela. But they were hidden by dusk, and if

she died on the heights they could give her no more than a

vengeance she didn't want.

She shuddered and edged her basai close to the one

which puffed and groaned beneath Van Rijn's weight.

Their knees touched. "At least we have some company,"

she said, knowing the remark was moronic but driven to

say anything that might drown out the wind. "Thank God

the flare died away so fast."

"Ja, we made good time," the merchant said. "Only

three days from the Lubambaru to here, that's quicker

than I forewaited. And lots of allies picked up."

She harked back wistfully to the trek. Van Rijn had spent

the time being amusing, and had succeeded better than

she would have expected. But then they arrived, and the

Shanga scrambled up the mountain one jump ahead of

the Rokulela charge; the attackers withdrew, unwilling

to face cannon if there was a chance of avoiding it; a par-

ley was agreed on; and she couldn't imagine how it might

end other than in blood. The Ancients might let her

group go down again unhurt, as they'd promised-or might

not-but, however that went, before sundown many war-

riors would lie broken for the carrion fowl. Oh, yes, she

admitted to herself, I'm also afraid of what will happen

to me, if I should get back alive to Esperance. Instigating

combat! Ten years', corrective detention if I'm lucky. . .

unless I run away with Nick and never see home again,

never, never-But to make those glad young hunters die!

She jerked her reins, half minded to flee down the trail

and into the desert. The beast skittered under her. Van

Rijn caught her by the shoulder, "Calm, there, if you

please," he growled. "We has got to outbluff them upstairs.

They will be a Satan's lot harder to diddle than the bar-

barians was."

"Can we?" she pleaded. "They can defend every ap-

proach. They're stocked for a long siege, I'm certain, longer

than. . . than we could maintain."

"If we bottle them for a month, is enough. For then

comes the League ship."

"But they can send for help, too. Use the heliographs."

She pointed to one of the skeletal towers above. Its mirror

shimmered dully in the red luminance. Only a t'Kelan

could see the others, spaced out in several directions across

the plains and hills. "Or messengers can slip between our

lines-we'd be spread so terribly thin-they could raise the

whole Yagola Horde against us."

"Maybe so, maybe not. We see. Now peep down and let

me think."

They jogged on in silence, except for the wind. After

an hour they came to a wall built across the trail. Impass-

able slopes of detritus stretched on either side. The arch.,

way held two primitive cannon. Four members of the city

garrison poised there, torches flickering near the fuses.

Guards in leather helmets and corselets, armed with bows

and pikes, stood atop the wall. The iron gleamed through

the shadows.

Uulobu rode forth, cocky in the respect he had newly

won from the clans. "Let pass the mighty sky-folk who

have condescended to speak with your patriarchs," he de-

manded.

"Hmpf!" snorted the captain of the post. "When

have the sky-folk ever had the spirit of a gutted yangulu?"

"They have always had the spirit of a makovolo in a

rage," Uulobu said. He ran a thumb along the edge of his

dagger. "If you wish proof, consider who dared cage the

Ancients on their own mountain."

The warrior mane a flustered noise, collected himself,

and stated loudly, "You may pass then, and be safe as

long as the peace between us is not unsaid."

"No more fiddlydoodles there," Van Rijn rapped. "We

want by, or we take your popguns and stuff them in a place

they do not usually go." Joyce forebore to interpret. Nick

had so many good qualities; if only he could overcome

that vulgarity! But he had had a hard life, poor thing. No

one had ever really taken him in hand. . . . Van Rijn

rode straight between the cannon and on up the path.

It debouched on a broad terrace before the city wall.

Other guns frowned from the approaches. Two score war-

riors paced their rounds with more discipline than was

known in the Hordes. Joyce's eyes went to the three shapes

in the portal. They wore plain white robes, and fur was

grizzled with age. But their gaze was arrogant on the new-

comers.

She hesitated. "I . . . this is the chief scribe-" she be-

gan.

"No introduction to secretaries and office boys," Van

Rijn said. "We go straight to the boss."

Joyce moistened her lips and told them: "The head

of the sky-folk demands immediate parley."

"So be it," said one Ancient without tone. "But you must

leave your arms here."

Nyaronga bared his teeth. "There is no help for it,"

Joyce reminded him. "You know as well as I, by the law

of the fathers, none but Ancients and warriors born in the

city may go through this gate With weapons." Her own

holster and Van Rijn's were already empty.

She could almost see the heart sink in the Rokulela, and

remembered what the Earthman had said about instinct.

Disarming a t'Kelan was a symbolic emasculation. They

put a bold face on it, clattering their implements down and

dismounting to stride With stiff backs at Van Rijn's

heels. But she noticed how their eyes flickered about, like

those of trapped animals, when they passed the gateway.

Kusulongo the City rose in square tiers, black and mas-

sive under the watchtowers. The streets were narrow guts

twisting between, full of wind and the noise of hammering

from the metalsmiths' quarters. Dwellers by birthright

stood aside as the barbarians passed, drawing their robes

about' them as if to avoid contact. The three councillors

said no word; stillness fell everywhere as they walked

deeper into the citadel, until Joyce wanted to scream.

At the middle of the city stood a block full twenty me-

ters high, Windowless, only the door and the ventholes

opening to air. Guards hoisted their swords and hissed in

salute as the hierarchs went through the entrance. Joyce

heard a small groan at her back. The Rokulela followed

the humans inside, down a winding hall, but she didn't

think they would be of much use. The torchlit cave at the

end was cleverly designed to sap a hunter's nerve.

Six white-robed oldsters were seated on a semicircular

dais. The wall behind them carried a mosaic, vivid even

in this fluttering dimness, of the sun as it flared. Nyaron-

ga's breath sucked between his teeth. He had just been re-

minded of the Ancients' power. True, Joyce told herself,

he knew the humans could take over the same functions.

But immemorial habit is not easily broken.

Their guides sat down too. The newcomers remained

standing. Silence thickened. Joyce swallowed several times

and said, "I speak for Nicholas van Rijn, patriarch of the

sky-folk, who has leagued himself with the Rokulela clans.

We come to demand justice."

"Here there is justice," th~ gaunt male at the center of

the dais replied. "I, Oluba's son Akulo, Ancient-born, chief

in council, speak for Kusulongo the City. Why have you

borne a spear against us?"

"Ha!" snorted Van Rijn when it had been conveyed to

him. "Ask that old hippopotamus why he started these

troubles in the first place." .

"You mean hypocrite," Joyce said automatically.

"I mean what I mean. Come on, now. I know very well

why he has, but let us hear what ways he covers up."

Joyce put the question. Akulo curled his tendrils, a ges-

ture of skepticism, and murmured, "This is strange. Never

have the Ancients taken part in quarrels below the moun-

tains. When you attacked the Shanga, we gave them ref-

uge, but such is old custom. We will gladly hear your

dispute with them and arrange a fair settlement, but this is

no fight of ours."

Joyce anticipated Van Rijn by snapping in an upsurge of

indignation. "They blew down our walls. Who could have

supplied them the means but yourselves?"

"Ah, yes." Akulo stroked his whiskers. "I understand

your thinking, sky-female. It is very natural. Well, as this

council intended to explain should other carriers of your

people arrive here alld accuse us, we do sell fireworks for

magic and celebration. The Shanga bought a large quantity

from us. We did not ask why. No rule controls how much

may be bought at a time. They must have emptied the pow-

der out themselves, to use against you."

"What's he say?" Van Rijn demanded. .

Joyce explained. Nyaronga muttered-it took courage

with the Ancients listening-"No doubt the Shanga pride-

fathers will support that tale. An untruth is a low price for

weapons like yours."

"What weapons speak you of?" a councillor interrupted.

"The arsenal the sky-folk had, which the Shanga cap-

tured for use against my own Horde," Nyaronga spat. His

mouth curled upward. "So much for the disinterested-

ness of the Ancients."

"But-No!" Akulo leaned forward, his voice not quite as

smooth as before. "It is true that Kusulongo the City did

nothing to discourage an assault on the sky-ones' camp.

They are weak and bloodless-legitimate prey. More, they

were causing unrest among the clans, unQermining the

ways of the fathers-"

"Ways off which Kusulongo the City grew fat," Joyce

put in.

Akulo scowled at her but continued addressing Nya-

ronga. "By their attack, the Shanga did win a rich plunder of

metal. They will have many good knives. But that is not

enough addition to their power that they could ever invade

new lands when desperation does not lash them. We

thought of that too, here on the mountain, and did not

wish tQ see it happen. The concern of the Ancients was

ever to preserve a fitting balance of things. If the sky-folk

went away, that balance would actually be restored which

they endangered. A little extra metal in Yagola hands

would not upset it anew. The sky-folk were never seen to

carry any but a few hand-weapons. Those they took with

them when they fle.d. There never was an armory in the

dome for the Shanga to seize. Your fear was for nothing,

you Rokulela."

Joyce had been translating for Van Rijn sotto voce. He

nodded. "Hokay. Now tell them what I said you should."

I've gone too far to retreat, she realized desolately. "But

we did have weapons in reserve!" she blurted. "Many of

them, hundreds, whole boxes full, that we did not get a

chance to use before the attack drove us outside."

Silence. cracked down. The councillors stared at her

in horror. Torch flames jumped and shadows chased each

other across the walls. The Rokulela chiefs watched with

a stem satisfaction that put some self-confidence back

into them.

Finally Akulo stuttered, "B-b-but you said-I asked you

once myself, and you denied having-having more than a

few. . ."

"Naturally," Joyce said, "we kept our main strength in

reserve, unrevealed."

"The Shanga reported nothing of this sort."

"Would you expect them to?" Joyce let that sink in be-

fore she went on. "Nor will you find the cache if you search

the oasis. They did not resist our assault with fire, so the

guns cannot have been in this neighborhood. Most likely

someone took them away at once into the Yagola lands,

to be distributed later."

"We shall see about this." Another Ancient clipped off

the words. "Guard!" A sentry came in through the door-

way to the entry tunnel. "Fetch the spokesman of our clan

guests."

Joyce brought Van Rijn up to date while they waited.

"Goes well so far," the merchant said. "But next comes the

ticklish part, not so much fun as tickling you."

"Really!" She drew herself up, hot in the face. "You're

impossible."

"No, just improbable. . . Ah, here we go already."

A lean t'Kelan in Shanga garb trod into the room. He

folded his arms and glowered at the Rokulela. "This is

Batuzi's son Masotu," Akulo introduced. He leaned for-

ward, tense as his colleagues. "The sky-folk have said you

took many terrible weapons from their camp. Is that

truth?"

Masotu started. "Certainly not! There was nothing but

that one emptied handgun I showed you when you came

down at dawn."

"So the Ancients were indeed in league with the

Shanga," rasped a t'Kelan in Van Rijn's party.

Briefly disconcerted, Akulo collected himself and said in

a steel tone, "Very well. Why should we deny it, after all?

Kusulongo the City seeks the good of the whole world,

whIch IS Its own good; and these sly strangers were bring-

ing new ways that rotted old usage. Were they not soft-

ening you for the invasion of their own people? What

other reason had they to travel about in your lands? What

other reason could they have? Yes, this council urged

the Shanga to wipe them out as they deserve."

Though her heartbeat nearly drowned her words, Joyce

managed to interpret for Van Rijn. The merchant's lips

thinned. "Now they confess it to our facing," he said.

"Yet they have got to have some story ready to fob off

Earthships and make humans never want to come here

again. They do not intend to let us go down this hill alive,

I see, and talk contradictions afterwards." But he gave her

no word for the natives.

Akulo pointed at Masotu. "Do you tell us, then, that the

sky-folk have lied and you fbund no arsenal?"

"Yes." The Shanga traded stares with Nyaronga. "Ah,

your folk fretted lest we use that power to overrun your

grasslands," he deduced shrewdly. "There was no need to

fear. Go back in peace and let us finish dealing with the

aliens."

"We never feared," Nyaronga corrected. Nonetheless his

glance toward the humans was doubtful.

An Ancient stirred impatiently on the dais. "Enough of

this," he said. "Now we have all seen still another case

of the sky-fold brewing trouble. Call in the guards to

slay them. Let peace be said between Shanga and all Ro-

kulela. Send everyone home and have done."

Joyce finished her running translation as Akulo opened

his mouth. "Botulism and bureaucrats!" Van Rijn ex-

ploded. "Not this fast, little chum." He reached under the

recycler tank on his back and pulled out his blaster.

"Please to keep still."

No t'Kelan stirred, though a hiss went among them.

Van Rijn backed toward the wall so he could cover the

doorway as well. "Now we talk more friendly," he smiled.

"The law has been broken," Akulo sputtered.

"Likewise the truce which you said between us," Joyce

answered, though no culture on this planet regarded oath-

breaking as anything but a peccadillo. She felt near

fainting with relief. Not that the blaster solved many

problems. It wouldn't get them out of a city aswarm with

archers and spear-casters. But-

"Quiet!" boomed Van Rijn. Echoes rang from wall to

stony wall. A couple of sentries darted in. They pulled up

short when they saw the gun.

"Come on, join the party," the Earthman invited. "Lots

of room and energy charges for everybodies."

To Joyce he said, "Hokay, now is where we find out

whether we have brains enough to get out of being heroes.

Tell them that Nicholas Van Rijn has a speech to make,

then talk for me as I go along."

Weakly, she relayed the message. The least relaxation

showed on the tigery bodies before her. Akulo, Nyaronga,

and Masotu nodded together. "Let him be heard," the An-

cient said. "There is always time to fight afterward."

"Good." Van Rijn's giant form took a step forward. He

swept the blaster muzzle around in an oratorical gesture.

"First, you should know I caused all this hullaballoo

mainly so we could talk. If I come back here alone, you

would have clobbered me with pointy little rocks, and that

would not be so good for any of us. Ergo, I had to come in

company. Let Nyaronga tell you I can fight like a hungry

creditor if needful. But maybe there is no need this time

ha?"

Joyce passed on his words, sentence by sentence, and

waited while the Gangu pride-father conflrn1ed that hu-

mans were tough customers. Van Rijn took advantage of

the general surprise to launch a quick verbal offensive.

"We have got this situation. Suppose the Shanga are ly-

ing and have really coppered a modem arsenal. Then

they can gain such power that even this city becomes a

client of theirs instead of being primus inter pares like be-

fore. Nie? To prevent this, a common cause is needful be-

tween Ancients, Rokulela, and us humans who can get

bigger weapons to stop the Yagola when our rescue ship

comes in."

"But we have no such booty," Masotu insisted. i

"So you say," Joyce replied. She was beginning to get:

Van Rijn's general idea. .. Ancients and Rokulela, dare you

take his word on so weighty a matter?"

As indecision waxed on the dais, Van Rijn continued.

"Now let us on the other hands suppose I am the liar and

there never was any loose zappers in the dome. Then

Shanga and Ancients must keep on working together. For

my people's ship that will come from our own territory,

which is the whole skyfril of stars, they must be told some

yarn about why their dome was destroyed. Everybody but

me and this cute doll here got safe away, so it will be

known the Shanga did the job. Our folks will be angry

at losing such a good chance for profit they have been work-

ing on for a long time. They will blame the Ancients as

using Shanga for pussyfoots, and maybe blow this whole

mountain to smitherlets, unless a good story that Shanga

corroborate in every way has been cooked beforehand to

clear the Ancients. Right? Ja. Well, then, for years to

come, the Shanga-through them, all Yagola-must be in

close touch with Kusulongo town. And they will not take

the blame for no payment at all, will they"? So hokay, you

Rokulela, how impartial you think the Ancients will be

to you? How impartial can the Ancients be, when the

Shanga can blackmail them? You need humans here

to make a balance."

Uulobu clashed his teeth together and cried, "This is

true!" But Joyce watched Nyaronga. The chief pondered

a long while, trading looks with his colleagues, before he

said, "Yes, this may well be. At least, one does not wish

to risk being cheated, when disputes come here for judg-

ment. Also, the bad years may come to Yagolaland next,

when they must move elsewhere. . . and a single failure

to predict a flare for us could weaken our whole country .

for invasion."

Stillness stretched. Joyce's phone pickup sent her only

the sputter of torches and the boom of wind beyond the

doorway. Akulo stared down Van Rijn's gun muzzle, with-

out a move. At last he said, "You sow discord with great

skill, stranger. Do you think we can let so dangerous a one,

or these pride-fathers whom you have now made into

firm allies, leave here alive?"

"Ja," answered Van Rijn complacently through Joyce.

"Because I did not really stir up trouble, only prove to

your own big benefits that you can't trust each other and

need human peoples to keep order. For see you, with hu-

mans and their weapons around, who have an interest in

peace between clans and Hordes, some Yagola with a few

guns can't accomplish anything. Or if they truly don't

have guns, there is still no reason for the city to work

foot in shoe with them if humans return peacefully and

do not want revenge for their dome. So either way, the

right balance is restored between herders and town. Q.E.D."

"But why should the sky-folk wish to establish them~

selves here?" Akulo argued. "Is your aim to take over the

rightful functions of Kusulongo the City? No, first you

must slay each one of us on the mountain!"

"Not needful," Van Rijn said. "We make our profit

other ways. I have asked out the lady here about the

facts while we was en route, and she dovetails very pretty,

let me tell you. Vb . . . Joyce. . . you take over now. I

am not sure how to best get the notion across when they

haven't much chemical theory."

Her mouth fell open. "Do you mean-Nick, do you have

an answer?"

"Ja, ja, ja." He rubbed his hands and beamed. "I worked

that out fine. Like follows: My own company takes over

operations on t'Kela. You Esperancers help us get started,

natural, but after that you can go spend your money on

some other planet gone to seed. . . while Nicholas van

Rijn takes money out of this one."

"What, what are you thinking?"

"Look, I want kungu wine, and a fur trade on the side

might also be nice to have. The clans everywhere will

bring me this stuff. I sell them ammonia and nitrates

from the nitrogen-fixing plants we build, in exchange. They

will need this to enrich their soils-also they will need to:

cultivate nitrogen-fixing bacteira the way you show them

-to increase crop yields so they can buy still more am-

monia and nitrates. Of course, what they will really do

this for is to get surplus credit for buying modem gad-

gets.. Guns, especial. Nobody with hunter instincts can re-

sist buying guns; he will even become a part-time farmer

to do it. But also my factors will sell them tools and ma-

chines and stuff, what makes them slowly more civilized

the way you want them to be. On all these deals, Solar

Spice & Liquors turns a pretty good profit."

"But we didn't come to exploit them!"

Van Rijn chuckled. He reached up to twirl his mustache,

clanked a hand against his helmet, made a face, and

said, "Maybe you Esperancers didn't, but I sure did. And

don't you see, this they can understand, the clans. Charity

is outside their instincts, but profit is not, and they will feel

good at how they swindle us on the price of wine. No more

standoffishness and suspicion about humans-not when hu-

mans is plainly come here on a money hunt. You see?"

She nodded, half dazed. They weren't going to like this

on Esperance; the Commonalty looked down from a

lofty moral position on the Polesotechnic League; but they

weren't fanatical about it, and if this was the only way the job

could be one-Wait "The Ancients," she objected. "How

will you conciliate them? Introducing so many new ele-

ments is bound to destroy the basis of their whole economy."

"Oh, I already got that in mind. We will want plenty of

native agents and clerks, smart fellows who keep records

and expand our market territory and cetera. ,That takes

care of many young Ancients. . . silly name. . . . As for

the rest, though, maintaining the power and prestiges

of the city as a unit, that we can also do. Remember,

there are oil wells to develop and electrolysis plants to

build. The electrolyzer plants will sell hydrogen to the

ammonia plants, and the oil-burning operation can sell

electricity. Hokay, so I build these oil and electrolyzer

plants, turn them over to the Ancients to run, and let the

Ancients buy them from me on a long-,term mortgage. So

profitable and key facilities should'suit them very well,

nie?" He stared thoughtfully into a dark comer. "Um-m-m

. . . do you think I can get twenty percent interest, com-

pounded annual, or must I have to settle for fifteen?"

Joyce gasped a while before she could start searching

for Kusulongo phrases.

They went down the mountain toward sunset, with

cheers at their back and canlpfires twinkling below to wel-

come them. Somehow the view seemed brighter to Joyce

than ever erenow. And there was beauty in that illimitable

westward plain, where a free folk wandered through their

own lives. The next few weeks, waiting for the ship, won't

be bad at all, she thought. In fact, they should be fun.

"Another advantage," V an Rijn told her smugly, "is

that making a commercial operation with profit for every-

body out of thIs is a much better guarantee the job will be

continued for long enough to save the planet. You tho!1ght

your government could do it. Bah! Governments is day-

flies. Any change of ideology, of mood, even, and poof

goes YOJlf project. But private action, where everybody con-

cerned is needful to everybody else's income, that's stable.

Politics, they come and go, but greed goes on forever."

"Oh, no, that can't be," she denied.

"Well, we got time in the car to argue about it, and

about much else." Van Rijn said. "I think I can rig a little

still to get the alcohol out of kungu. Then we put it in

fruit juice and have a sort of wine with our meals like

human beings, by damn!"

"I . . . I shouldn't, Nicky. . . that is, well, us two

alone--"

"You is only young once. You mean a poor old man

like me has got to show you how to be young?" Van Rijn

barely suppressed a leer. "Hokay, fine by me."

Joyce looked away, flushing. She'd have to maintain a

strict watch on him till the ship arrived, she thought. And

on herself, for that matter.

Of course, if she did happen to relax just the littlest bit

. . . after all, he really was a very interesting person.