mutter impatiently. Kallee glanced around, heard those mutters, and made the only move possible, away from the Queen. He was not quite so cocky, but neither had he surrendered.
Dane caught at Tau’s sleeve and asked the question which had been burning in him since he had come upon the scene.
“What happened—about the catnip?”
There was lightening of the serious expression on Tau’s face.
“Fortunately for you that child took the leaves to the storm priest. They tested and approved it. And I can’t see that it has any ill effects. But you were just lucky, Thorson—it might have gone another way.”
Dane sighed. “I know that, sir,” he confessed. “I’m not trying to rocket out—”
Tau gave a half-smile. “We all off-fire our tubes at times,” he conceded. “Only next time—”
He did not need to complete that warning as Dane caught him up:
“There isn’t going to be a next time like this, sir—ever!”
CHAPTER IV
Gorp Hunt
But the interruption had disturbed the tenor of trading. The small chief who had so eagerly taken Paft’s place had only two Koros stones to offer and even to Dane’s inexperienced eyes they were inferior in size and color to those the other clan leader had tendered. The Terrans were aware that Koros mining was a dangerous business but they had not known that the stock of available stones was so very small. Within ten minutes the last of the serious bargaining was concluded and the clansmen were drifting away from the burned over space about the Queen’s standing fins.
Dane folded up the bargain cloth, glad for a task. He sensed that he was far from being back in Van Rycke’s good graces. The fact that his superior did not discuss any of the aspects of the deals with him was a bad sign.
Captain Jellico stretched. Although his was not, or never, what might be termed a good-humored face, he was at peace with his world. “That would seem to be all. What’s the haul, Van?”
“Ten first class stones, about fifty second grade, and twenty or so of third. The chiefs will go to the fisheries tomorrow. Then we’ll be in to see the really good stuff.”
“And how’s the herbs holding out?” That interested Dane too. Surely the few plants in the hydro and the dried leaves could not be stretched too far.
“As well as we could expect.” Van Rycke frowned. “But Craig thinks he’s on the trail of something to help—”
The storm priests had uprooted the staff marking the trading station and were wrapping the white streamer about it. Their leader had already gone and now Tau came up to the group by the ramp.
“Van says you have an idea,” the Captain hailed him.
“We haven’t tried it yet. And we can’t unless the priests give it a clear lane—”
“That goes without saying—” Jellico agreed.
The Captain had not addressed that remark to him personally, but Dane was sure it had been directed at him. Well, they needn’t worry—never again was he going to make that mistake, they could be very sure of that.
He was part of the conference which followed in the mess cabin only because he was a member of the crew. How far the reason for his disgrace had spread he had no way of telling, but he made no overtures, even to Rip.
Tau had the floor with Mura as an efficient lieutenant. He discussed the properties of catnip and gave information on the limited supply the Queen carried. Then he launched into a new suggestion.
“Felines of Terra, in fact a great many other of our native mammals, have a similar affinity for this.”
Mura produced a small flask and Tau opened it, passing it to Captain Jellico and so from hand to hand about the room. Each crewman sniffed at the strong aroma. It was a heavier scent than that given off by the crushed catnip—Dane was not sure he liked it. But a moment later Sinbad streaked in from the corridor and committed the unpardonable sin of leaping to the table top just before Mura who had taken the flask from Dane. He miaowed plaintively and clawed at the steward’s cuff. Mura stoppered the flask and put the cat down on the floor.
“What is it?” Jellico wanted to know.
“Anisette, a liquor made from the oil of anise—from seeds of the anise plant. It is a stimulant, but we use it mainly as a condiment. If it is harmless for the Salariki it ought to be a bigger bargaining point than any perfumes or spices, I-S can import. And remember, with their unlimited capital, they can flood the market with products we can’t touch, selling at a loss if need be to cut us out. Because their ship is not going to lift from Sargol just because she has no legal right here.”
“There’s this point,” Van Rycke added to the lecture. “The Eysies are trading or want to trade perfumes. But they stock only manufactured products, exotic stuff, but synthetic.” He took from his belt pouch two tiny boxes.
Before he caught the rich scent of the paste inside them Dane had already identified each as luxury items from Casper—chemical products which sold well and at high prices in the civilized ports of the Galaxy. The Cargo-master turned the boxes over, exposing the symbol on their undersides—the mark of I-S.
“These were offered to me in trade by a Salarik. I took them, just to have proof that the Eysies are operating here. But—note—they were offered to me in trade, along with two top Koros for what? One spoonful of dried catnip leaves. Does that suggest anything?”
Mura answered first. “The Salariki prefer natural products to synthetic.”
“I think so.”
“D’you suppose that was Cam’s secret?” speculated Astrogator Steen Wilcox.
“If it was,” Jellico cut in, “he certainly kept it! If we had only known this earlier—”
They were all thinking of that, of their storage space carefully packed with useless trade goods. Where, if they had known, the same space could have carried herbs with five or twenty-five times as much buying power.
“Maybe now that their sales’ resistance is broken, we can switch to some of the other stuff,” Tang Ya, torn away from his beloved communicators for the conference, said wistfully. “They like color—how about breaking out some rolls of Harlinian moth silk?”
Van Rycke sighed wearily. “Oh, we’ll try. We’ll bring out everything and anything. But we could have done so much better—” he brooded over the tricks of fate which had landed them on a planet wild for trade with no proper trade goods in either of their holds.
There was a nervous little sound of a throat being apologetically cleared. Jasper Weeks, the small wiper from the engine room detail, the third generation Venusian colonist whom the more vocal members of the Queen’s complement were apt to forget upon occasion, seeing all eyes upon him, spoke though his voice was hardly above a hoarse whisper.
“Cedar—lacquel bark—forsh weed—”
“Cinnamon,” Mura added to the list. “Imported in small quantities—”
“Naturally! Only the problem now is—how much cedar, lacquel bark, forsh weed, cinnamon do we have on board?” demanded Van Rycke.
His sarcasm did not register with Weeks for the little man pushed by Dane and left the cabin to their surprise. In the quiet which followed they could hear the clatter of his boots on ladder rungs as he descended to the quarters of the engine room staff. Tang turned to his neighbor, Johan Stotz, the Queen’s Engineer.
“What’s he going for?”
Stotz shrugged. Weeks was a self-effacing man—so much so that even in the cramped quarters of the spacer very little about him as an individual impressed his mates—a fact which was slowly dawning on them all now. Then they heard the scramble of feet hurrying