of
signal when a ship goes into overdrive. Usually it doesn't mean a
thing. Nobody pays any attention. But if somebody comes out here...."

"What?"

"It'll be regrettable," said Calhoun. He was suddenly very tired.
"It'll spoil any chance of our coming back and stealing some more
food, like interstellar mice. If they find out what we've done they'll
expect us to try it again. They might get set to fight. Or they might
simply land the rest of these ships."

"If I'd realized what you were about," said Maril, "I'd have joined in
the lessons. I could have piloted a ship."

"You wouldn't have wanted to," said Calhoun. He yawned. "You wouldn't
want to be a heroine. No normal girl does."

"Why?"

"Korvan," said Calhoun. He yawned again. "I've asked about him. He's
been trying very desperately to deserve well of his fellow blueskins.
All he's accomplished is develop a way to starve painlessly. He
wouldn't feel comfortable with a girl who'd helped make starving
unnecessary. He'd admire you politely, but he'd never marry you. And
you know it."

She shook her head, but it was not easy to tell whether she denied the
reaction of Korvan, whom Calhoun had never met, or denied that he was
more important to her than anything else. The last was what Calhoun
plainly implied.

"You don't seem to be trying to be a hero!" she protested.

"I'd enjoy it," admitted Calhoun, "but I have a job to do. It's got to
be done. It's more important than being admired."

"You could take another ship back," she told him. "It would be worth
more to Dara than the Med Ship is! And then everybody would realize
that you'd planned everything."

"Ah," said Calhoun, "but you've no idea how much this ship matters to
Dara!"

He seated himself at the controls. He slipped headphones over his
ears. He listened. Very, very carefully, he monitored all the wave
lengths and wave forms he could discover in use on Weald. There was no
mention of the oddity of behavior of shiploads of surplus grain aloft.
There was no mention of the ships at all. There was plenty of mention
of Dara, and blueskins, and of the vicious political fight now going
on to see which political party could promise the most complete
protection against blueskins.

After a full hour of it, Calhoun flipped off his receptor and swung
the Med Ship to an exact, painstakingly precise aim at the sun around
which Dara rolled. He said, "Overdrive coming, Murgatroyd!"

Murgatroyd grabbed. The st