cation?"

Horng's head tilted to one side in a peculiarly strained fashion;
Rynason could see a muscle jumping where the alien's neck blended with
his torso. THE MEMORIES ARE BURIED SO DEEPLY. I CANNOT REACH THEM.

Rynason gazed pensively at the interpreter as these words were recorded.
What could have happened during that conversation that would have caused
its memory to be so deeply buried?

"Can you find among any of the rest of Tebron's memories any thoughts
about Kor?"

YES. TEBRON HAD MEMORIES THAT HE HAD COMMUNICATED WITH KOR, BUT THESE
ARE FLEETING. THERE IS NOTHING CLEAR.

The Hirlaji was shaking, his entire body trembling with some sort of
tension which even communicated itself through the interpreter, causing
the stylus to quaver and jump forward, dragging a jagged line across the
paper. Rynason stared up at the alien, feeling a chill down his back
which seemed to penetrate through to his chest and lungs. This massive
creature was shaking like the rumbling warnings of an earthquake, his
eyes cast downward from the deep shadows of their sockets; Rynason could
almost feel the weight of their gaze like a heavy, dark blanket. He
lifted the interpreter's mike slowly.

"Your race does not forget," he said softly. "Why can't you remember
this conversation?"

Horng's four-digited hands clasped tightly and the powerful tendons
stood out starkly on the heavy wrists as Horng drew in long breaths of
air, the sound of his breathing loud in the great space under the dome.

THERE IS NOTHING CLEAR. THERE IS NOTHING CLEAR.

TWO

The Earthman called the town Hirlaj too, because the spaceport was
there. It was a new town, only a few months old, but the gleaming alloys
of the buildings were already coated with dirt and pitted by the
frequent dust storms that swept through. Garbage littered the alleys;
its odor was strange but still foul in the alien atmosphere. The small,
darting creatures were here too, foraging in the alleys and the
outskirts of the town, where the streets ended in garbage heaps and new
cemeteries or faded into the trackless flat where the spacers touched
down.

The Earthmen filled the streets ... drinking, fighting, laughing and
cursing, arguing over money or power or, sometimes, women. The women
here were hard and self-sufficient, following the path of Terran
expansion in the stars and taking what they felt was due them as women
or what they could get as men. Supply houses did a thrivin