want to know what's in it for them, sir."

Grayder said, "Ask them what they expect."

He did so, returned and informed, "They want to know what you've got to offer."

Overhearing this, Shelton exclaimed, "The nerve of them! How about us telling

them we'll sink their darned boat unless they come ashore at the double?" "Given the free choice of all the loot on this ship," ventured the Ambassador, "it's a good bet that they'd ask for guns-assuming that they still know about Terran weapons. We cant let them have guns. This planet is listed as a penal world despite the centuries that have passed. It will remain such until the Terran authorities see fit to unlist it."

"Small arms are my department anyway," reminded Shelton. "I wouldn't donate a defective stun-gun even if they went down on their knees and begged for it."

"Nobody is thinking of giving them guns," said Grayder. He gazed thoughtfully through the port toward where the boat was lying, had a closer look through his field-glasses. The passengers, he noticed, looked even scruffier than the Tungs. "Denims wouldn't do them any harm. They seem to have no idea of how to make decent clothes."

"Come to that, they seem to have no idea of anything that involves hard work," commented the Ambassador. "Do we have any spare denims?"

"Plenty. We're always loaded in excess of requirements." Phoning to stores, Grayder ordered a sample to be taken to the trooper. Then he switched to the airlock. "Cassidy is bringing denims to you. Take them out and show them to those mendicants. Three suits for the man who comes aboard and talks."

"Right, sir."

Watching from the control-cabin they saw the trooper march down to the beach and exhibit the bribe. Some four-sided conversation followed. Then he came back. The phone rang.

"They say they'll take the denims, sir, plus three pairs of boots like mine. They also want my trumpet."

"Holy smoke!" said Shelton, outraged. "We're dickering with the frowsy descendants of thugs like Arabs haggling over a carpet. Who do they think we are?"

"Tell them," ordered Grayder, "three suits of denims and nothing else. That's the bargain, take it or leave it."

Back traipsed the trooper. The ultimatum caused a good deal of discussion in the boat. Finally the oars dipped, the boat came to shore, one man stepped out. As the trooper led him toward the ship the other two put out their oars, retreated to what they considered a safe distance and waited.

Presently the newcomer arrived in the cabin. He had a skinny frame, the sharp, darting eyes of a wary monkey and looked rather like a racing tipster dead out of luck.

Chapter 3.

Crayder began the inquisition mostly because the others were content to let him.

"Sit down. What's your name?"

"Tor Hamarverd."

"What's that place on the island?"

"The Hamarverd keep."

"Keep? Don't you call it a stronghold?"

"That's a foreign word."

"Is it really? Whom do you call foreigners? Where do they live?"

"Far away over there," answered Tor Hamarverd, pointing eastward.

"Have you ever been there?"

"Not likely! One can find trouble enough without going looking for it."

"Then," said Grayder, seeking a clue to even the most rudimentary form of

planetary communication, "how do you know that they use this different word?"

"We got a few foreign women by trade. They often use that word."

"Did these women permit themselves to be traded to you of their own free will?"

Hamarverd obviously viewed this question as ridiculous. "What else do you expect them to do if they don't like any man in their own keep? Don't your women pick and choose?"

The Ambassador interjected, "Let it pass, Captain. We've already gone over that subject. It's the same here as elsewhere and that's enough for us."

Changing the subject, Grayder eyed the other's crude attire, asked, "What do you think of the clothing we're giving you?"

Topnotch. We could do with lots more. And some boots. He gazed hopefully at the audience. "You been sent here to fix us up with supplies?"

"No, we haven't," informed Grayder. "After all this time its been taken for granted that you'd have got yourselves pretty well fixed up on your own account. There's been nothing to stop you that we can see. All that is needed is organization and work."

"Nobody's going to organize us," declared Hamarverd positively. "Nobody's going to make us work either. We wouldn't stand for it. To hell with them!"

The listeners exchanged glances before Grayder went on, "Seriously, have you never heard it suggested that there is virtue in work?"

"Sure have." Hamarverd let go a reminiscent chuckle. Samel the Good he called himself. Samel the Goof was his proper name. Always prating about honesty, truthfulness and suchlike slobby stuff. Practiced what he preached, too. Worked like a slave while half the keep rode on his back. His brains were addled from birth."

"What happened to him?"

"Died of exhaustion, still yapping his stuff. He'd have lived a lot longer and easier if he hadn't been crazy."

"Nobody listened to him?"

"Only for a laugh."

"Everybody works on Terra," Grayder said. "I can imagine."

"Don't you believe me?""Does he work?" demanded Hamarverd, pointing at the Ambassador's large paunch.

"I certainly do," assured the Ambassador. "You look it," said Hamarverd.

"My work is extremely important, in case you don't know.

"You don't fool me, Fatski."

Grayder chipped in hurriedly. "If you doubt whether we work how d'you think we

made the superior clothes we're wearing, the ship we're using?"

"You've got slaves, millions of them. And we're here because our forefathers refused to be your slaves. They chose freedom, see?"

"That is news to me," observed the Ambassador with some sarcasm. "What is?"

"That they had any choice about coming here. To the best of my knowledge and

belief they were shipped by compulsion.""If that's the best of your knowledge, Fatski, your worst must be terrible.""Stop calling me Fatski," insisted the Ambassador. "I call you what I like,"

Hamarverd retorted. "You're not on Terra now."

"Neither are you, thank heavens," said the Ambassador. Now Shelton put on his toughest expression and threatened, "If you don't see fit to be polite we won't see fit to give the promised reward."

"Don't get hard with me, you bleary-eyed ponk," said Hamarverd. "I took it for granted that the promise might not be worth the breath you'd wasted on it."

Again Grayder broke in to keep the peace. "If you doubted that you'd get the clothes why did you consent to come aboard?"

"Because we wanted to know why you'd suddenly decided to look us up after all these years."

"There are reasons of high policy."

"That's just a lot of double-talk," scoffed Tor Hamarverd. "Want me to tell you something?"

"Go ahead."

"If Terra thinks the time has come to start trading, that's all right. There are a lot of things we could do with. Right now we'll swap ten tons of fresh lizard meat for a few stutter-guns, spares and ammunition, for instance. You interested?"

"No."

"But if Terra's idea is to start some funny business you can all go and stuff yourselves. You're not going to transfer us to yet another planet. Neither are you going to walk in and confiscate this one. We're here and we're staying here, just as we are, and we're taking no lip from Terrans. You couldn't make a million of our ancestors lift a finger for you and you won't make a far larger number of us do so today."

"And who authorized you to speak for the entire world?" asked the Ambassador. "I'm speaking for the Hamarverd keep. The other keeps can do their own talking. But it's a sure bet what they'll say." He made a gesture of contempt. "The Mullers and the Yant-offs are mentally retarded but even they aren't dopey enough to start doing chores for Terrans." "Has it ever occurred to you," asked Grayder, "that someday you might be taken over by people who aren't remotely like Terrans?"

"Such as who?"

"Some alien lifeform with territorial ambitions."

"Such as who?" Hamarverd repeated.

"It remains to be seen," Grayder evaded.

"We'll believe it when we see it," said Hamarverd.

"By then it may be too late."

"That's our worry, not yours."

Once more Shelton interrupted. "Do you think that Terrans will sit idly by while

weak, under-populated planets occupied by their blood relations are conquered one by one?"

"Who'll be doing the conquering?"

"Another lifeform, as the Captain told you."

"He told me nothing worth hearing," retorted Hamarverd. "He said that the bogey- men will get us if we don't watch out. We know who the bogey-men are!"

"Meaning Terrans, I suppose?" inquired the Ambassador.

"That's right, Fatski."

To the others the Ambassador said heavily, "This fellow's notions may or may not be representative of general opinion on this world. We haven't got the time to find out by making contact with twenty thousand or fifty thousand individual strongholds. It would take many years to do it."

"I'm afraid that that is the position, Your Excellency," agreed Grayder. "It's obvious that here we have to cope with what amounts to an enormous number of tiny, independent, self-sufficient nations each a few hundreds strong. There is no real unity among them, no central authority. Each is a law unto itself."

"We like it that way," contributed Hamarverd. "We don't like it any other way. Least of all do we like it the Terran way."

"You know little or nothing about Terra," the Ambassador pointed out. "You've been out of touch for four hundred years. Things have changed in that time."