The mounts of the Nitra had been prevented from bolting by Surra’s presence down canyon. Now, sweating and rolling their eyes fearfully, they were caught and fastened to the horses of Hosteen’s pack train. And the party was well on its way across country, leaving its late opponents slumbering by the ruins of the djimbut burrow, before the night had completely closed in.
In the false dawn they came upon Widders’ dump, where a section of the far tip of Finger Canyon widened out. The Norbies whistled in surprise, for they fronted a bubble tent of plastaglau, its blue-gray surface opaque and heat-resistant. From a rock beyond, Baku took off to fly to Hosteen. There was no other sign of life there.
Logan glowered at the off-world mushroom squatting arrogantly on Arzoran earth.
“So—what does this civ think we are? Pampered pets from the inner worlds?”
The Terran shrugged. “What he thinks does not matter—it may be that he considers this to be necessary shelter. What he brings is more important—we need those supplies.”
But he, too, was startled by that tent, unwanted and unreal in its present setting. It gave the appearance of more than just a dump, though their plans had not called for any base here.
“You say we ride for water—this is an off-world live place!” Kavok’s protest came on snapping fingers. Hosteen disliked the hostility in that outburst. Widders had made just the stupid mistake that settlers on Arzor tried to avoid. Some off-world equipment and weapons the Norbies accepted as a matter of course. But a strange dwelling set down in the heart of their own territory without any agreement beforehand—that was an aggravation that, in the present precariously balanced state of affairs, might well send them all packing out of the Peaks—at the very best. Why Kelson had allowed Widders to commit this might-be-fatal mistake Hosteen could not understand.
He came up to the plasta-glau hemisphere and smacked his hand with more than necessary force against the close lock, taking out some of his irritation in that blow. There was a shimmer of fading forcefield, and he could see the small cubby of the heat lock open before him.
This thing imported from off-world must have cost a small fortune. To set up camp here did not make sense, and things that did not make sense were suspicious. Hosteen’s foot pressure on the bal-floor of the lock activated the forcefield, sealing him in before a second barrier went down, making him free of the interior.
Perhaps this was only a utility bubble, intended for what an inner-planet man would consider the most rustic living, Hosteen thought, for there was only one big room. The supplies he sought were piled in boxes and containers in its center. But around the slope-walled perimeter he saw fold beds—four of them!—a cook unit, a drink unit, and even a portable refresher! No, this could not have been intended as a one-day camp!
He persuaded the Norbies to enter, brought in the horses, and set up a line of supply boxes to mark off a temporary stable, since that was one need the designer of the bubble had apparently not foreseen. The quarters for settlers and natives were correspondingly cramped, but Hosteen knew they could weather the day now with more comfort than they had known even in the depths of the burrow.
Gorgol and Kavok examined their new housing with suspicion, gradually overcome by interest. They were already familiar with the conveniences of cook and drink units, and having seen Hosteen and Logan make use of the refresher, they tried it in turn.
“This is a fine thing,” Kavok signed. “Why not for Norbie, too?” He looked inquiringly at the settlers, and Hosteen guessed the young native was trying to reckon in his mind the amount of trade goods it might take to purchase such a wonder for the clan.
“This be a fine thing—but see—” Hosteen opened the control box of the cook unit, displaying an intricate pattern of wiring. “Do this break, one man maybe in Galwadi, he could fix—maybe he could not. Some pieces might have to come from beyond the stars. Then what good is this?”
Kavok digested that and agreed. “No good. Many yoris skins, many frawn skins to be paid for this?”
“That is so. Quade, our blood-father” he made the sign for clan chief—“he is a man of many horses, many fine things from beyond the stars. That is so?”
“That is so,” the Shosonna agreed.
“Yet, Quade, our blood-father, he could drive all his horses and half his frawn herd in the Peaks to the Port, and there he would have to give them all up for a place such as this, a place that, when it broke, no man could have mended without giving many more horses, many frawn hides—”
“Then this is not a good thing!” Kavok’s reaction was quick and emphatic. “Why is this here now?”
“The off-world one who seeks his son, he is not used to the Big Dry, and he thinks that one cannot live—as perhaps he could not—without such a thing.”
“He is truly an off-world child of little knowledge,” was Kavok’s comment.
Baku sidled along the edge of a box she had selected for a perch. Now she mantled, her wings a quarter spread, and gave a throaty call. Surra was already at the door.
“Company.” Hosteen drew his stunner. But somehow he did not believe they were about to face another native raiding party. Baku’s warning was of an air approach, and he expected a ’copter.
What he did not foresee as he strode out to the patch of ground already bearing the marks of several landings and take-offs, was the size of the flyer making an elevator descent there. The ’copters, used sparingly by the settlers because of the prohibitive cost of replacement parts and repairs, were able, at best, to hold three or four men crowded together, with a limited space for emergency supplies or very valuable cargo. The machine now agleam in the early-morning light was a sleek, expensive type such as Hosteen had never seen on any frontier world. And his estimation of Widders’ wealth and influence went up again. To transport such a craft to Arzor must have cost a small fortune. No wonder that with such a carrier the civ had been able to send in a bubble tent and all the other trappings of a real safari.
Nor was the Terran too amazed to see Widders himself descend the folding ladder from the flyer’s cockpit. He had at least changed his off-world clothing for more durable coveralls such as a pilot wore. And he had belted about his slight paunch an armory of gadgets such as Hosteen had not seen since he mustered out of the Service.
“So you finally got here!” Widders greeted him sourly. Glancing around, he added in a petulant spurt of words, “Where’re all those horses you were sure we needed so badly?”
“In there.” Hosteen nodded toward the tent and was amazed at the answering flood of dusky color on the other’s craggy face.
“You—put—animals—in—my—tent!”
“I don’t lose horses, not when our lives depend on them,” the Terran retorted. “Nor would I sentence any living thing to a day in the sun during the Big Dry! Your pilot had better taxi over under that overhang if he wants to save this ’copter. At this hour you can not hope to get back to the nearest plains shelter—”
“I have no intention of returning to the plains region,” Widders replied, and he meant that. Short of picking him up bodily, Hosteen realized, and putting him forcibly into the ’copter, there was no way of shipping him out—for now.
However, one day in the crowded and now rather stale-smelling interior of the tent might well induce the civ to reconsider his decision. There was no use wasting energy fighting a wordy battle now when time and nature might convince him. Hosteen relayed his warning to the pilot and left the civ to enter the tent by himself.
When he came in with the pilot, an ex-Survey man who held tightly to a position of neutrality, Hosteen walked into tension, though there were as yet no outwardly hostile gestures or words. Widders swung around to face the Terran, the dusky hue of his face changed to a livid fury.