surrender any knowledge treasure which may be found? Why do you, and these with you, willingly go into the Dead Land if you gain no benefit from your labors?'
'I will make with this,' again the Zacathan indicated the scanner, 'a record, one which you will be free to see. It is my wish to prove that I can set aside the mists of the past. With such proof I can visit other worlds and on each I can add to the store of ancient knowledge. To my people, Axe, such is the primary work of our lives. We find in any discoveries value, whether it is something which can be seen and handled, or whether it abides only in the minds thereafter.'
'There must be a considering of this,' the Axe replied. 'You will be told what the answer will be.' So abruptly he turned and waddled away.
'He has a reason,' Jofre ventured. The issha might not be able to read minds but they were aware when alerted to certain emanations of emotion. He was certain that the Axe was indeed taking time out to think and that, behind his assent, if assent it would be, there would also be a scheme set in motion.
'There is one on guard,' Taynad said in a low tone from the door to which they had followed, more slowly, their late visitor.
'We could not expect less,' Zurzal asserted. 'But I think we need fear no more attention until our friend is ready to move.'
IT WAS ONLY PARTLY IMPATIENCE WHICH RODE JOFRE. He held Zurzal's knowledge to be far above even that of the Shagga priests—and put to better use. However, he also knew that the Zacathan was so fiercely determined to prove the efficiency of the scanner that he might be led to overlook any hidden threats. Its use on Tssek had confirmed for Zurzal that he could do this, but to be able to deliver a find from Lochan would reestablish his credit among his own peers. And that was a situation which Jofre could understand very well, even though he himself could have no hope of a triumphant return to Asborgan and an addition of issha status made by the Shagga.
The sheer mechanics of a crossing of the long tundralike plain to the northern country was always to the fore of his mind. That they could tramp it carrying all their supplies was out of the question. From the scanty tape information they had studied so carefully they knew that the Shattered Land would be a far greater obstacle even than the insect-infested tundra.
'We can make no deal with Gosal?' he asked, though he was sure of the answer. 'Even if he would give us use of the one gravity sled—'
'Those carriers,' Taynad added as if she had been following some line of reasoning of her own, 'are they natives or beasts, servants, slaves—? The Jat has tried to reach them by mind touch—there is nothing there.'
'They serve both the maned people and those they call Deves,' Jofre commented. 'But even with such aid could we reach our goal while our supplies still hold out?'
Zurzal's toothed jaws showed in a grin. 'We shall have another visitor,' he stated. 'One who will come by dark.'
And Jofre, who had quickly retaken his place as sentry, was startled as there was a warning from the other end of the warehouse, that where there seemed to be only solid wall. He saw movement and knew that Taynad was on alert, slipping from their cubicle to the door of the next, the Jat close beside her.
'It is all right,' Zurzal said, his hissing voice carrying easily. 'Bright evening to you, Commander!'
That port official who had been so obstructive at their landing passed close enough to one of the moss torches to show his face, pausing in the light a second or two as if to make sure they recognized him, before he slipped into their quarters and settled himself cross-legged facing the Zacathan.
'You are a fool, Learned One,' his voice had the rasp of exasperation in it. 'There is no way under the Heavens of Lochan that you can succeed in this.' .
'Men have succeeded on thinner chances than the one I have been offered, Wok Bi. And you have your orders.'
'Orders!' The man flung up his hands in a gesture which suggested that this was indeed folly. 'You head willfully into country where one expedition came to a very bloody end. There are what—four of you—one a woman —another a Jat—you would need a squad of Patrol to even venture over the border there. It is madness and you are forcing me to be a part of it.'
'Your orders are plain,' Zurzal returned placidly. 'Yes, we are a small party, but that means we have less to transport. It is the transport that we must now consider.'
'No Pungal owner will lease out to you and I cannot make them.' There was a small note of satisfaction in that. 'And on your own feet there is no possible way to reach your goal before Change-season.'
'There are the Gar,' Zurzal said.
'Gar!' The way Wok Bi said that name made it sound as if the Zacathan had hissed it.
Gar—Jofre remembered. There had been a brief note concerning them on one of the tapes. They were the nomads of the inner lands and the off-worlders would have to transverse those in order to reach their own goal.
'Yes. Captain Gosal has a mixed cargo. There were Gar dealers to meet us at set down. And those have caravan trails inland. With fresh goods some one of them will be moving out.'
'The priests will not hear of it!' Wok Bi fell back on a second objection.
'I think that there will be a change of thought there, too. Now—the Gar caravans must have been transport other than these Punga—'
Wok Bi shook his head. 'No, not this side of the Var, but they do have carriers which are steady movers. It is said that sometimes they keep the trail for a full day and a night at a time since their drivers have learned to sleep a-swing. On the other side of the Var—there you would have to take your chance with what the Wild Ones use— they have mounts of a sort—I have seen a couple of specimens of them—running four-legged, with a sweep of horn—and nasty tempered I am told. Also that you might be able to make any deals for a guide or beasts of burden beyond the Var—that is very problematical.'
