The Venom Trees of Sunga

IX – The Crater Shikawa

Salazar threw away his tattered robe. Jogging on up the slope, he stumbled and fell again, tearing a hole in one trouser knee. His fingers felt a sticky wetness where the rock had gashed his skin. On he plunged.

He climbed and climbed. Now and then the slope became steep enough to require the use of hands. His heart raced and his breath came in gasps, so that betimes he had to stop for his laboring body to catch up. Served him right, he thought, for studying so much as not to leave time for more exercise than he had been taking!

Each time he stopped, he looked back for Mahasingh. But the starlight was too dim to make out a human form among the tumbled rocks and scanty shrubs of the slope behind him.

On he plodded, wondering what to do at the top. If Mahasingh still pursued him, should he skirt the crater and go down the other side, hoping to lose his foe in the nanshin forest? Perhaps he would have been wiser to step aside when he had entered the venom trees at first and quietly wait for Mahasingh to blunder past him.

Perhaps Mahasingh had been fatally stricken by the venom and had never emerged from the nanshins. That was probably too much to hope for, but at least he could take his hike a little more easily.

Then a deep roar killed this hope. Mahasingh shouted from below: "I see you, Salazar! You cannot escape. I shall do you as you deserve for making me fail in my duty!"

Salazar strained his eyes through the darkness. At last he thought he detected movement. A paler patch in the darkness bobbed among the darker shapes of rock and bush. He resumed his climb, berating himself for letting his pursuer catch him against the night sky.

On and on he climbed. The next time he turned to look, Mahasingh was closer. There was something odd about his appearance, but the starlight was not bright enough for Salazar to tell what it was.

Salazar wondered why Mahasingh had not shot at him again. He was sure that with his longer legs, the giant would catch up with him, barring a broken leg or heart failure. The sheath knife at Salazar's belt had a twenty-centimeter blade, useless against Mahasingh's machete save in a clinch. He ought to have cut himself a club from a branch, but it was too late for that now.

On he went despite racing heart and laboring lungs. He remembered the fable of the rabbit who outran the fox; the fox ran for his dinner, while the rabbit ran for his life. If people had unkindly compared Salazar to a rabbit, he would follow the advice of Arjuna in the Hindu epic and be the best rabbit he could.

As they climbed, the air grew colder and mistier. Salazar scrambled over ridges of glassy black obsidian. He stumbled and fell to his knees again, gouging a cut on his palm from the glassy fractures of the lava.

The slope rounded off to a level. A glance back showed that Mahasingh was still coming. The pursuer shouted:

"I have you now, Salazar!"

The man waved his machete; the mist was too thick to make out details except at close range.

Then a puff of breeze slightly cleared the intervening air. In the starlight Salazar saw that Mahasingh was twelve or fifteen meters behind and a smaller distance below him. He also saw what was different about the man: he was stripped to loincloth, shoes, and the scarf around his head.

Evidently Mahasingh had gotten his clothes full of nanshin venom in the forest and had shed them when he emerged. If Salazar had a chance to plunge into the nanshins again, Mahasingh would follow him thither at his peril.

Salazar ran again, heading for the dim red glow in the mist ahead. Soon he neared the crater, whence came the eternal swish-swish of the fountains of lava. If he could lose Mahasingh in this dim, rubescent light ...

In the pit of Shikawa, the silver-gray scum of cooling lava looked black beneath the night sky, while the zigzag cracks and the ever-rising and falling fountains shone a brilliant orange. Salazar turned to the right and jogged along the circumference, jumping obstacles dimly seen in the lava light and lifting his feet lest he trip. Behind came Mahasingh's labored breathing.

The sound receded; Salazar glanced back. Mahasingh had halted on the edge of the crater, gasping; Salazar did likewise. The biologist remembered his father's joke about the time he had dug on an archaeological site in Durango, on Terra. It got so hot there, said Keith Salazar, that when you saw a coyote chasing a jackrabbit, both were walking.

As if at a signal, both men resumed running. Again they halted and again recommenced. Salazar thought he was nearing the end of his endurance, but he suspected the same of Mahasingh. If the foreman had longer legs, those legs had to carry a lot more weight.

Something about the terrain seemed familiar; then Salazar recognized the embayment in the wall that Alexis had shown him. Of the two points of land embracing the circular void, he had previously stepped out on the farther one.

He glanced back at Mahasingh, coming on fast and raising the machete. The lava light gleamed redly on the steel.

Salazar measured the distance between the points of rock, noting irregularities. Then he ran out on the nearer point and leapt across the gap. He came down on the farther point, teetered for a desperate second, and recovered his balance. He ran on a few steps and stopped to watch Mahasingh.

Without pause, Mahasingh launched himself on a leap like Salazar's, but he came down just short of the easterly point. His feet skidded off the edge, and with a hoarse cry he slid down the rock face. At the last instant he grabbed the surface of the point. His scarf-wound head remained above the rocky edge, while his arms scrabbled for handholds. Salazar heard the machete clink as it bounced off the rocks below.

Mahasingh grunted as he tried in vain to swing a leg up to get a foothold. Salazar felt around in the lava rock at his feet. He walked toward Mahasingh holding a lump of perhaps two kilos.

"Salazar!" said Mahasingh.

"Well?"

"If you are going to kill me, I beg a favor."

"What?"

"I pray that you crush my skull with that rock in your hand. I have a horror of falling alive into the lava, and I had rather be unconscious when I go on to my next life."

Salazar tossed the rock from hand to hand. "I don't really want to kill anybody. I'm a scientist, not a soldier or a gangster. I did scrag a couple of those lumberjacks you sent to ambush the train—"

"I did not send them! It was all Cantemir's idea. He insisted, against my advice."

"He tells a different story, but I won't try to sort it out now. In fact, I would even help you up if I didn't think you would then do me in."

"I swear by the holy Trimurti to do nothing of the sort!"

"Easy to say, but how do I know?"

"Listen, Salazar. I am through with my job for the Adriana Company. Half my lumberjacks have signed up with Abdallah as members of that new cult you started. The others have begun to drift away. Some, including Shapir, whom I made subforeman in Abdallah's place, have gone to Miss Ritter's village; others have gone back to Sungecho. With the crew I have left, it would take years to harvest the trees.

"I have tried to follow Arjuna's advice and be a good lumber-camp foreman, but I never knew the job would involve me in so many immoral, unethical actions. It has smudged my karma almost beyond repair. If you get me out of here, I shall return to the mainland, leaving Adriana's contract with High Chief Yaamo void. Cantemir never signed it; first, because Yaamo insisted on a delay because of the zuta watchers' objections. Now George is out of the picture, so Dumfries would have to sign it. Even if the company sent another gang, it could never meet the deadlines."

Salazar tossed up and caught the rock while thinking of a reply. Besides the rock, he still had his sheath knife, while Mahasingh had lost his machete, so Salazar could probably hold his own with the man. At last he said:

"All right, I'll try to get you out. But you see this?" He held up the two-kilo lump. "If you make a false move, I'll nail you with this. I was on my college baseball team, so I can kill or cripple you with this at any time."

This was a lie. Salazar had been a failure at sports, but Mahasingh need not know that. Salazar was thankful not to have betraying cervical spines.

"Baseball?" said Mahasingh. "That is the game that Terrans of American or Japanese descent play instead of cricket, is it not? I have seen them make jolly good throws and catches."

"Yes. But before I do anything more, I want some answers. First, why did you stop shooting?"

"Ran out of rounds, and in my haste I forgot to bring an extra clip. Stupid of me."

"Next, how did you get through the nanshins?"

"I was wearing a stout coat, and I drew the hood tightly and used the saddle pad from your juten as a shield. Even so, I got a few drops on my skin. When I came out of the woods, I took off the affected clothes before the venom ate through them."

"Speaking of my juten, who's going to pay the stable in Amoen for the animal?"

Mahasingh thought. "The ethical thing is for me to give you my mount. You will find it squatting where I left it, below the nanshin belt."

"How can I tell it from any other juten if it wanders off?"

"The claw on the third finger of its right hand is miss-mg.

"Lastly, how did you survive such a long, hard climb? You must be quite an athlete."

"I practice harkat-yoga, which keeps me fit. Had I not been winded from the climb, I could easily have made that jump. I say, Mr. Salazar, if you do not do something soon, I shall fall into the lava, anyway. My arms are giving out."

"Hm. But if I give you a hand, you're likely to pull me down with you. Let's see. If I can have that thing around your head, I may be able to brace myself while holding one end, and you hold the other."

"Here you are!" With one hand, Mahasingh snatched off the scarf and tossed it.

Salazar studied the contorted surface. He picked a spot where he could brace both feet against ridges of lava rock while his free hand grasped another projection. He tossed one end of the scarf to Mahasingh and, holding the other end looped around his wrist, lowered himself into a well-braced supine position.

"Okay," he grunted.

Then began a long, sweat-beading struggle. Salazar hoped the scarf was strong enough. It would be heartbreaking to have the fabric tear and drop Mahasingh into the inferno anyway.

Little by little Mahasingh inched his way up over the apex of the point. At last he could, with an additional pull on the scarf, wriggle one foot up the wall of Shikawa until he could get the toe of his shoe atop the edge. Then, with further grunting and heaving, he worked his way up and over. For an instant he remained on hands and knees, gasping.

Salazar stepped back, away from the edge, holding his rock at the ready. When Mahasingh finally rose to his feet, he made no move toward Salazar. His naked brown chest was scored and bleeding from the lava he had hugged.

"Mr. Salazar," said Mahasingh, "please believe me when I say that I have tried throughout to do the right thing. I admit I let that crass materialist Cantemir lure me into actions that will probably get me incarnated as a worm or a spider. Good night and good-bye, sir!"

Mahasingh walked off into the misty dark. Salazar thought, I could almost like that fellow if he weren't so self-righteous. Then he saw that the other had left his scarf on the rocks. He started to call out but choked off the call. The article might come in handy, so Salazar pocketed it.

For some minutes Salazar remained where he was, breathing hard and thinking. He preferred to see no more of Dhan Gopal Mahasingh. If he went back down the mountain with the man, he would have to keep his rock ready in case Mahasingh should change his mind and try to kill him after all, an act for which he would doubtless have worked out a lofty-sounding self-justification.

True, Mahasingh managed to sound like a high-minded, naively idealistic man trapped by circumstances in the role of villain. But as his father was wont to say, one could never be sure. The sensible thing would be for Salazar to keep his distance.

A quarter hour later Salazar stood on the base of the point from which he had rescued Mahasingh, taking a last look at Shikawa. The fountains sounded their steady swish-swish, swish-swish. Salazar had heard that at intervals the molten lava either rose and spilled out over the top of the mountain or sank down out of sight. In the latter case, pieces of the wall cracked off and went thundering down to the depths.

"Kirk!" barked the commanding voice of Alexis Ritter. "Are you alive? Silly question. Where's Mahasingh? Fall into the crater?"

"No, he's alive and well. At least, he was a few minutes ago, when he started back down the mountain. What are you doing here?"

"Somebody saw Mahasingh chasing Sri Sen, both mounted. I sent my Kooks to investigate, and they found one juten dead of gunshot and another squatting quietly without its rider. A long false beard lay on the ground between them." She looked hard at Salazar. "I thought there was something familiar about that phony prophet. He must have been you in a beard.

"There were also signs that someone had gone through the nanshins, hacking away the branches. So I collected Hatsa and Hagii and came up to see what happened." A wave indicated her rifle-bearing bodyguards, barely visible through the mist. "Your Choku said he would come, too, as soon as he secured your camp. I haven't seen him since. Did you say Mahasingh did not fall into Shikawa? And that you didn't push him in?"

"Absolutely not! The last I saw of him, he was headed down slope, scratched and battered but otherwise functional."

"You look a bit scratched and battered, too. But Shiiko shall have her due, never fear!"

Alexis drew her bowie knife and rushed upon Salazar, holding the weapon out in an upward-stabbing position. The action was so unexpected that Salazar was almost caught unaware and stabbed. At the last instant he threw his rock, but between his haste and his lack of skill the missile went wild.

When the relentless woman was almost upon him, he turned, ran three steps to the apex of the point, and leapt.

He came down on the solid ground of the opposite point. Alexis pulled up with a scream of rage.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Salazar shouted.

"Fulfilling my contract with Yaamo!" she shouted back; then in Sungao: "Hatsa! Hagii! Seize that man and throw him into the crater!"

As Salazar braced himself to flee, one of the bodyguards said: "We cannot, mistress."

"What mean you, you cannot? I command!"

"We dare not slay Mr. Salazar, because he is also Sri Khushvant Sen, the holy man, who has influence with the planetary spirit Metasu. Besides, it is illegal to attack Terrans save to prevent a crime. He threatens us not at the moment."

"So I was right about your being two-faced!" said Alexis. "It was you, then, who lured a score of my Kashanites away for your silly conservationist cult! Hatsa! Hagii! He is no holy man but a Terran scientist who donned that costume and manner to thwart the Adriana Company's program. He has also disrupted my community and if not stopped will destroy it. Then I shall not be able to continue you in my service. Would not depriving you of your livelihood be a crime which you are entitled to forestall?"

"Now that you put it that way, mistress ..." said Hagii, scratching his scaly skull.

"Then seize Salazar!"

Hatsa said: "Mistress, you have raised a deep moral problem for us. We must go a little away to reason it out before we can decide whether to obey you."

Both Kooks turned their backs and faded into the mist. Alexis screamed and stamped her foot.

Salazar had a flash of superstitious fancy. What if at that instant some genius loci caused the point of rock to collapse beneath Alexis, dropping her into the lava? There would be a brief flare as her clothing flamed and then, no more Alexis. It would make a fine, dramatic end to her career.

Nothing of the sort happened. Alexis looked around and called: "Hagii! Hatsa! Come back! You can hold him whilst I slay him!" She screamed the bodyguards' names again, without response.

"I'll get you yet!" she shouted at Salazar. She started to run around the embayment, holding her knife at the ready. Salazar ran along the circumference of Shikawa, keeping a comfortable lead on Alexis, who was too plump to be a good runner.

She tripped and fell so that the knife skittered over the rock. At her yell of pain and dismay, Salazar turned back. With three long bounds he reached the knife.

Alexis sat up, nursing a bleeding knee. Tears streamed down her soot-smeared face. "What are you going to do, Kirk? Kill me? Rape me?"

Salazar allowed himself a grin as he picked up the knife. "Neither, my dear. But I'll keep this; you're not to be trusted with weapons."

"Oh, fuck you!" she spat, climbing painfully to her feet. "I'll get even with you yet. Hey, here come my Kooks back." She dropped into Sungao. "What have you twain decided?"

"Mistress," said one, "Hagii and I have concluded that your arguments are sound enough to overbear those against them. So command us and we shall obey."

"Then grab that man!"

Salazar wondered for a flash if he could outrun the Kooks over the tumbled lava in the dark, trusting to their poor night vision to give them as many falls as he would probably incur. He was still limping from the bash he had given his knee.

But the two bodyguards were already upon him with clawed hands outspread. Salazar gripped Alexis's knife and aimed an underhand thrust at the nearer Kook, a long, upward-sweeping lunge that would have disemboweled a Terran opponent. But Kooks' reflexes were faster than men's. Before Salazar's thrust sank home, a scaly hand gripped his wrist and stopped his attack. The other Kook seized his other arm, while the first assailant twisted the knife out of Salazar's grip. The two then dragged him toward the edge of the crater. Alexis cried:

"Good-bye, Kirk! No hard feelings!"

Stupid, stupid, he thought, for not starting to run as soon as he had picked up the knife! He had had a perfectly good chance to escape and had muffed it. Why? Because of curiosity to see how the Kooks would decide, because of his intellectual's weakness for reasoning everything out instead of acting instantly by reflex, and because of masculine resentment at being chivied about the country. He hoped that death in the lava would be quick.

Two strides more brought Salazar and his captors to the rim. Instead of throwing him over the edge forthwith, the Kooks halted. One asked:

"Mistress, which is the correct way to perform this act? With the victim facing the crater or away from it?"

"It matters not," she said. "Go ahead, throw him!"

"Hold!" said another Kookish voice. "Put the honorable Sarasara back on his feet forthwith and release him or you will be shot!"

Choku was standing over the Kooks' two rifles, which they had laid down to seize Salazar. He cradled Salazar's rifle and aimed at Hagii and Hatsa, swinging his muzzle toward Alexis to include her in the threat. In his free hand he held a lantern.

"What's all this?" said a deep, powerful voice in English. "Whatever it is, stop it at once!"

The heads of Salazar, Alexis, and the three Kooks swung to peer into the firelit murk. Out of the mist came a litter made of lengths of bamboolike cane, like that wherein Alexis's Kooks had carried Salazar from Amoen to Kashania thirty-odd days before. Two Kooks bore this litter, one fore and one aft. They halted and put down the carrying chair. Out climbed die bloated body of the Reverend Valentine Dumfries, holding a lantern.

Choku spoke in Sungao: "Sir, this Terran woman and her helpers—"

Dumfries waved a hand. "I don't understand a word. Can you speak English or at least some Terran tongue?"

"A ritter," said Choku. "Zis woman and her Kooks were about to srow Sarasara in crater. He is my boss, so I muss protec' him."

"Is this true, Mr. Salazar?" said Dumfries. He rolled ponderously toward the other group, helping himself along with his crutch-headed walking stick.

"You bet it's true, Reverend." Walking toward Choku, Salazar picked up the two rifles laid down by Alexis's Kooks. He exchanged one with Choku for his own firearm, since each weapon had a stock adapted to its owner's species.

"What about this other?" asked Choku.

"Best gotten rid of," said Salazar. Staying well clear of Alexis and her Kooks, he walked back to the brink and tossed the extra rifle over the edge. There was a brief, sharp crackle as the cartridges in the magazine exploded.

"Ha!" cried one of Alexis's Kooks. "That was my gun! You must pay me for it!"

"So sue me!" said Salazar. "After you tried to give me a bath in lava, I do not think your magistrates will pay you much heed."

"But what on Earth," asked Dumfries, "or on Kukulcan, for that matter, possessed Miss Ritter to attempt so foul a deed?"

"Don't believe a word he says!" cried Alexis. "He was trying to push me into Shikawa, and my Kooks saved me."

"Well, Mr. Salazar?" asked Dumfries.

"She's got it backward, Reverend. She has a deal with Chief Yaamo to sacrifice one human being a year by tossing him into Shikawa to propitiate the volcano spirit. If you don't believe me, ask Choku here."

"My honoraber emproyer tess ze truce," said Choku. "Awr us human beings know about zis."

"Don't believe that Kook, either!" cried Alexis. "He would of course stand up for his employer!"

"Then," said Salazar, "ask Miss Ritter's Kooks. If you don't know, Kooks are the cosmos's worst liars; they hardly know how."

"Well, you two?" said Dumfries.

Hagii and Hatsa put their heads together; then Hagii spoke: "Prease, we wir not answer, because it would be disroyar to our emproyer."

"There you are," said Salazar.

"Anyway," Alexis burst out, approaching Dumfries, "neither Kook nor Terran law touches what we do in the outback. And where's that money Cantemir promised for keeping my people from interfering with the lumbering?"

"What did George promise?" asked Dumfries.

"Twenty thousand in gold. When I took it up with Mahasingh, he refused to honor the promise and referred me to the higher officers of the company. Well, since you're board chairman, I couldn't go any higher."

"Is that promise in writing?"

"No; I trusted Cantemir's word."

"It seems to me that by setting your people on the lumbermen to disrupt their schedule, you haven't done anything to be paid for."

"When Mahasingh welshed on Cantemir's promise, I had to show I wasn't to be trifled with. But if you'll make an agreement now, I'll tell my people to lay off."

"No!" said Dumfries. "We do not pay people for letting us do what we have a perfect right to do. George was foolish to make the promise in the first place, assuming of course that you are telling the truth about it."

"I'll settle for half."

"No again. Anyone who pays an extortionist is merely asking for more of the same."

"I can throw in a night of pleasure if you wouldn't mind being on the bottom."

"Great Demiurge, what an idea! Look, young woman. Get it through your pretty red head that I am not interested in fornication, and that I would never pay a penny to anyone who would make a deal with a slimy reptile-sacrificing a human being to the mythical spooks of a race of vile, slithering beasts. You are a traitor to your species!"

During this talk Alexis had quietly moved past her two Kooks and towards Dumfries, who stood near the rim with his back to the crater. Now she gave a scream of:

"Then go to Shiiko yourself, you fat monster!"

She threw herself upon Dumfries, giving a fierce push to his bulbous belly. The push sent him back a step, but when he put his foot down, it was upon the thin air inside the crater.

The sect leader gave a roar for help, and for an eye-wink his arms windmilled. Then down he went. Salazar was not close enough to see Dumfries strike the lava below, but he heard the piercing scream and the smack of the body hitting the scum.

A bright yellow flare from below lit up the rosy, misty murk, then swiftly subsided as the combustible parts of Dumfries and his garments were consumed. Salazar would have liked, as a scientist, to watch this instant cremation, but that would have meant leaning over the edge, and with so many unfriendly presences around, he did not care to risk following Dumfries into Shikawa.

"Oh!" said Alexis, as if talking to herself. "I didn't really mean ..."

One of Dumfries's litter bearers cried: "This Terran has slain our livelihood! We can sue her for loss of income! Seize her to hale before a magistrate!"

The speaker started toward Alexis, whose two Kooks stepped forward as if to protect her.

"Enough!" shouted Salazar in Sungao, covering the Kooks with his rifle. "That will do! All of you, return whence you came, forthwith!"

"You are being as foolish as a Terran, in any case," added Choku, also covering the group with his rifle. "It is a well-established law that a human being who works for a Terran does so at his own risk!"

The four other Kooks put their reptilian heads together, argued briefly with much flicking of forked tongues, then turned away from the crater. Their backs faded into the ruby mist. The two who had borne Dumfries carried the litter; the lantern had gone into Shikawa with Dumfries.

"Kirk," said Alexis, "since you've won, how about calling off the war? Come back to Kashania with me and I'll give you another night to remember!"

Salazar grinned. "No thanks! Do you offer free cunt to everybody you have an argument with? Anyway, I've had enough to remember all my life already.

"And by the way, doesn't your cult believe in reincarnation?"

"Yes, but what of that?"

"I know what you must have been in your last life. There's a voracious Terran freshwater fish called a piranha, which—"

"Oh, go to hell!" she snarled, and stamped off into the darkness after her Kooks.

"Let us go, Choku," said Salazar, stooping to pick up Alexis's bowie knife.

"Are you all right, sir? I see that you limp."

"Not entirely. I have been run almost to death and put through enough—how would you say, 'melodrama'?—put through enough crises to last three lifetimes."

Choku slung the Kookish rifle over one shoulder by its sling. "You have been physically harmed as well, sir. You bleed. Do you wish to return to the camp?"

"Certainly! How got you up here without my neutralizing whistle?"

"Through a gap in the forest, sir."

"Show me the way, please."

Salazar started limping around the rim of the crater, in which the fountains continued their play. He declined an offer by Choku to carry him, fearing that with a Kook's poor night vision, his carrier might stumble into Shikawa. Choku asked:

"What befell your beard, sir?"

"Mahasingh seized it to try to cut off my head. When it came off, he was too surprised to strike again before I got away."

"You aliens!" muttered Choku. Salazar could imagine the Kook's neck bristles fluttering in wonder and disdain. "This evening, sir, after you left in disguise for the meeting, a human being came asking for you. He said he was a scientist who wished to learn of your investigations, but I knew better. He bore upper-caste professional symbols, but under those I could faintly see an earlier set identifying him as a member of the high chief's police."

"Hm. Perhaps I had better get back into my Sri Sen outfit and clear out. Does the Unriu Express run tomorrow or the day after?"

"The day after, I believe. Tomorrow is already today."

"I lost my robe and turban on the flight up the mountain."

"Perhaps we can improvise substitutes, sir. Not wearing those coverings, we human beings are easily deceived by those alien disguises."

Emerging from the nanshins, Salazar said: "If my reckoning be right, we should be near the place where my juten was slain."

Choku flicked out his tongue. "I am sure you are right, sir. I detect the odor of juten."

As they neared the place where Salazar had begun his flight afoot, Salazar heard animal sounds. He said:

"Choku, pray hand me the lantern."

Limping, Salazar led the Kook towards the source of the sounds. When they came within range of the spotlight, Salazar saw a pair of poöshos tearing at the carcass of his juten. There was no sign of the other riding animal, which must have fled when the nocturnal predators had approached.

Salazar raised his rifle, sighted as best he could in the dark, and fired. At the bang, the poöshos fled with ghostly wails. One snatched up something from the ground and vanished into the darkness.

"Damn it, it's got my beard!" cried Salazar. "I can't chase it with my bum knee."

"Get on my back, sir," said Choku.

Mounted piggyback, Salazar endured the Kook's jouncing run. The poöshos fled along the open strip below the nanshin belt. As Choku began to overhaul them, Salazar said:

"Stop an instant, Choku!"

While Choku directed the spotlight at the fleeing animals, Salazar fired over Choku's head. The shot seemed to have missed, but the poösho bearing Salazar's beard abandoned it. Back on the ground, Salazar collected it.

The sky was paling when Choku and Salazar returned to their camp. Salazar caught a few hours of sleep and made last-minute observations of the nearby kusis. As the sun went down in a glory of crimson, gold, and azure, he said:

"I think the time has come to return to Henderson. Additional observations would add but little to my the-sis.

"And your cult, sir?"

"Abdallah is in charge; and Mahasingh says he, too, is leaving. The Adriana lumbering appears to be collapsing, at least for now."

"But sir, suppose the lumber company recruits another crew to complete the job?"

Salazar shrugged. "If I come back, it will be as Doctor Sarasara, with more authority than I now have. I cannot stay on forever as unpaid guardian of the nanshin forest. So let us pack."

They toiled through half the night. Salazar, after putting his notes in the best order he could, stuffed them and his recorder reels and rolls of film into his large, waterproof plastic case with a lock.

"This," he told Choku, "is more important than all the rest of my gear together. If it be a choice betwixt saving the case and all the other baggage, save the case. I could get a new tent, rifle, cameras, and so forth, but I could not replace these records until I get home and duplicate them."

The sky was still a star-spangled black when Choku roused Salazar, who set to work, yawning, to transform himself into Sri Khushvant Sen. The beard was a little the worse for wear but could still be combed out and affixed.

Making Mahasingh's scarf into a turban proved more obdurate. After two unsuccessful attempts by Salazar, Choku said:

"I can help, sir."

Salazar sat while Choku expertly wound the scarf into an authentic turban and tucked the free end in. This time Salazar found he could move and even shake his head without the headgear's coming apart. "How did you ever learn that, Choku? I never heard of a Kukulcanian's wearing a turban."

"I worked for Mr. Kashani, sir, before Miss Ritter came. He taught me the trick, since he wore it in leading his cult. He said very few Terrans on his home world wore them nowadays, save cult leaders."

"Why are you not still working for the Kashanites?"

"Miss Ritter dismissed me, I suppose because of my reluctance to comply with some of her more extreme commands."

For the discarded robe, Salazar's yellow slicker was pressed into service. The color was not quite right, but there was no time to correct it.

Around midday Salazar set out for Amoen. Choku toted the baggage, in which Cantemir's big-game rifle was packed. Salazar wore his pistol and carried the case with his notes and records beneath his arm.

Arriving before sunset, they sought Amoen's nearest thing to an inn. This was a small house, a blocky concrete affair like most Kook houses, with a couple of extra rooms equipped as bedrooms. The owner, Geshukya, let out the extra rooms to Terrans.

Other Kooks never stopped there. Having a remarkable indifference to comfort and bound by complex rules of kin and caste, Kooks had no native equivalent of "hotel" or "inn." When nightfall caught one away from home with no kith or kin, he simply sat on the ground with his back against something and went to sleep.

On the way to Geshukya's, Salazar clapped a hand to his forehead. "Oh, my God!"

Choku turned. "Sir, I believe that English expression denotes agitation. What, pray, is amiss?"

"We shall have to walk past Takao's juten stable to get to Geshukya's unless we make a wide detour through the woods. At this time of day, that strikes me as unwise."

"Well, then, sir?"

"If Takao sees me, he will ask after the juten I rented from him, which Mahasingh shot. If I tell the truth, there will be an inquiry and we shall be stuck here for sixtnights."

"Well, then, sir? Do you wish to remove your disguise? "

"But if I show my bare face, one of Yaamo's constables is looking for me. In a one-street town like this he would probably find me. So either way I am likely to be intercepted."

"If, sir, you could assume a third personality ..."

"Exactly! We will go behind that barn and cut off most of this beard. Then get my regular sun hat out of the bag."

When they emerged on the town's main street again, Salazar was still brown of skin but wore a short, close-cut black beard. On his head was a Terran sun helmet. His father had imported several of them from a Terran land called India, claiming they were the most practical headgear for persons of north European ancestry forced to work under tropical suns.

They passed Takao's stable. In front, a trio of Kooks surrounded a juten, arguing. Takao called out:

"O Terran! Pray pause. May your health be good!"

"And may your health be likewise good," replied Salazar automatically.

"May your ancestral spirits guide you to success!"

"And may your ancestral spirits save you from errors and perils!"

"May you overcome all obstacles."

Salazar finally said: "Very well, my friends, what is it?"

Takao said: "You see here the juten hired two sixtnights ago by a Terran named Maasinga or something like that, saying he worked for the Adriana Lumber Company. Earlier today this same beast wandered back to our stable without its rider. Know you Mr. Maasinga? He has facial bristles like unto yours, but longer."

"I have met him," said Salazar cautiously. "I hear he means to return to Sungecho."

"We have heard of disturbances up this mountain, with riots and other Terranisms. Know you aught of this?"

Salazar studied the juten. Sure enough, the third right foreclaw was missing. Mahasingh had sounded noble in giving Salazar his mount in trade for the slain one, as if it were his to give. In fact, this looked like the start of convoluted litigation. Mahasingh could claim he owed Takao nothing because Takao had his hackney back. Salazar could claim he did not owe Takao for the dead juten because Mahasingh had killed the beast, not he. He answered:

"True, there was a disturbance. I went thither—"

"Excuse me, sir, but who are you?"

"Hasan Misri," said Salazar, giving the first name that popped into his head. "I went up the mountain to see if there was a place to set up a trading post to sell sundries to Terrans. Finding conditions unfavorable, at least for now, I shall return to Sungecho."

"Another thing, sir," said Takao. "Another Terran, giving the name of Sen, also rented a juten. He had somewhat of your appearance and seemed to be the leader of some Terran religious cult. We have heard naught of him since."

"I have met Mr. Sen," said Salazar gravely. "He said he wished to consult the hermit Seisen; that is all I know. May all paths lie smooth before you!"

"And may all your paths run straight and level."

Salazar emerged from Geshukya's house next dawn in his Arab businessman getup, with his pistol holster beneath the slicker. He had touched up his makeup; the real beard, sprouting beneath the false one, itched. Choku, who had slept with his back against Geshukya's house, joined Salazar, taking over the duffel bag, while Salazar carried the record case.

As they neared the station, Salazar touched Choku to detain him, saying: "Is that not Mahasingh?"

"Indeed it is, sir."

Mahasingh was handing his ticket to Conductor Zuiha. Salazar muttered: "That will not do. He knows who I am. Wait a moment, please!"

Salazar hastened back to the juten stable, where a Kook stable boy was feeding the animals. Salazar sent him in to rouse the owner. Takao appeared with his neck spines rippling displeasure.

"What would you, alien, at this hour?" he snapped.

"You wished to speak to the Terran Mahasingh, did you not?"

"Aye."

"I just now saw him boarding the express at the terminal. If you hurry, you can catch him."

"Oh, that is different! Thank you, sir!"

Takao departed at the Kooks' jouncing run. A few minutes later Salazar, strolling toward the station, saw three figures approaching: Takao, Mahasingh, and a Kook whom Salazar took to be the constable.

Salazar found a recessed doorway to a shop and stepped into the niche, studying the merchandise through the windows. It was junky stuff made for Terran tourists, but Salazar focused his attention on it until, reflected in the glass, he saw the two Kooks and the tall Terran pass by. The constable's scaly, clawed hands firmly gripped Mahasingh's arm. The latter volubly protested:

"But why should you detain me if the honorable Takao has his animal back? I shall miss my train. I will in due course pay the excess over the deposit!"

Salazar waited until they were past and then hurried back to Choku. Together they marched to the station, where Choku piled Salazar's bag on the baggage flatcar. Salazar bought soft-fare tickets for both.

"Honorable boss," said Choku, "that is unnecessary extravagance. I am perfectly comfortable on the open car, though I understand that it is different for you delicate aliens."

"It is not your comfort but my own skin whereof I think," said Salazar. "I need you as a bodyguard."

"You aliens!" said Choku. "Ever quarreling and feuding like .infants! How you ever cooperated long enough to organize voyages between the stars I shall never understand. "

They entered the soft-fare car. Salazar pulled out his copy of Yorimoto's Pithecoidea of Kukulcan. Now and then he glanced nervously toward the end of the car, watching for Mahasingh in case the ex-foreman talked his way out of his predicament. Sounds implied another arrival. Salazar, bracing for another confrontation, choked back an exclamation. The person entering was Alexis Ritter.