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address Wass had
given him. Not much later he walked Vye into a small lobby with a
discreet list of names posted in its rack. No occupations attached to
those colored streamers Hume noted. This meant either that their
owners represented luxury trades, where a name signified the
profession or service, or that they were covers—perhaps both. Wass'
world fringed many different circles, intermingled with some quite
surprising professions dedicated to the comfort, pleasure or health of
the idle rich, off-world nobility, and the criminal elite.
    Hume fingered the right call button, knowing that the thumb pattern
he had left on Wass' conference table would have already been relayed
as his symbol of admission here. A flicker of light winked below the
name, the wall to the right shimmered, and produced a doorway.
Steering Vye to it, Hume nodded to the man waiting there. He was a
flat-faced Eucorian of the servant caste, and now he reached out to
draw Lansor over the threshold.
    "I have him, gentlehomo." His voice was as expressionless as his face.
There was another shimmer and the door disappeared.
    Hume brushed his hand down the outer side of his thigh, wiping flesh
against the coarse stuff of the crew uniform. He left the lobby
frowning at his own thoughts.
    Stupid! A swamper from one of the worst rat holes in the port. Like as
not that youngster would have had his brains kicked out in a brawl, or
been fried to a crisp when some drunk got wild with a blaster, before
the year was out. He'd done him a real kindness, given him a chance at
a future less than one man in a billion ever had the power to even
dream about. Why, if Vye Lansor had known what was going to happen to
him, he would have been so willing to volunteer, that he would have
dragged Hume here. There was no reason to have any regrets over the
boy, he had never had it so good—never! There was only one small
period of risk for Vye to face. Those days he would have to spend
alone on Jumala between the time Wass' organization would plant him
there and the coming of Hume's party to "discover" him. Hume himself
would tape every possible aid to cover that period. All the knowledge
of a Guild Out-Hunter, added to the information gathered by the
survey, would be used to provide Rynch Brodie with the training
necessary for wilderness survival. Hume was already listing the items
to be included as he strode down the street, his tread once more
assured.

3
*
    His head ached dully, of that he was conscious first. As he turned,
without opening his eyes, he felt the brush of softness against his
cheek, and a pungent odor fill his nostrils.
    He opened his eyes, stared up past a rim of broken rock toward the
cloudless, blue-green sky. A relay clicked into proper place deep in
his mind.
    Of course! He had been trying to lure a strong-jaws out of its
traphole with hooked bait, then his foot had slipped. Rynch Brodie sat
up, flexed his bare thin arms, and moved his long legs experimentally.
No broken bones, anyway. But still he frowned. Odd—that dream which
jarred with the here and now.
    Crawling to the side of the creek, he dipped head and shoulders into
the water, letting the chill of the stream flush away some of his
waking bewilderment. He shook himself, making the drops fly from his
uncovered torso and arms, and then discovered his hunting tackle.
    He stood for a moment fingering each piece of his scanty clothing,
recalling every piece of labor or battle which had added pouch, belt,
strip of fabric to his equipment. Yet—there was still that odd sense
of strangeness, as if none of this was really his.
    Rynch shook his head, wiped his wet face with his arm. It was all his,
that was sure, every bit of it. He'd been lucky, the survival manual
on the L-B had furnished him with general directions and this was a
world which was not unfriendly—not if one was prepared for trouble.
    He climbed up and loosened the net, coiling its folds into one hand,
taking the good spear in his other. A