ty? What use would sea-creatures have for
buildings?"

"None," Gibson said. "I think the city must have been built ages ago--by
men or by a manlike race, judging from the architecture--and was
submerged later by a sinking of land masses that killed off the original
builders and left Arz nothing but an oversized archipelago. The squids
took over then, and from all appearances they've developed a culture of
their own."

"I don't see it," Stryker complained, shaking his head. "The pink
fishers--"

"Are cattle, or less," Gibson finished. "The octopods are the dominant
race, and they're so far above Fifth Order that we're completely out of
bounds here. Under Terran Regulations we can't colonize Arz. It would be
armed invasion."

"Invasion of a squid world?" Farrell protested, baffled. "Why should
surface colonization conflict with an undersea culture, Gib? Why
couldn't we share the planet?"

"Because the octopods own the islands too, and keep them policed,"
Gibson said patiently. "They even own the pink fishers. It was one of
the squid-people, making a dry-land canvass of his preserve here to pick
a couple of victims for this morning's show, that carried you off last
night."

"Behold a familiar pattern shaping up," Stryker said. He laughed
suddenly, a great irrepressible bellow of sound. "Arz is a squid's
world, Arthur, don't you see? And like most civilized peoples, they're
sportsmen. The flying-lizards are the game they hunt, and they raise the
pink fishers for--"

Farrell swore in astonishment. "Then those poor devils are put out there
deliberately, like worms on a hook--angling in reverse! No wonder I
couldn't spot their motivation!"

Gibson got up and sealed the port, shutting out the soft morning breeze.
"Colonization being out of the question, we may as well move on before
the octopods get curious enough about us to make trouble. Do you feel up
to the acceleration, Arthur?"

Farrell and Stryker looked at each other, grinning. Farrell said: "You
don't think I want to stick here and be used for bait again, do you?"

He and Stryker were still grinning over it when Gibson, unamused,
blasted the _Marco Four_ free of Arz.

End of Project Gutenberg's The Anglers of Arz, by Roger Phillips Dee

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ANGLERS OF ARZ ***

***** This file should be named 32665.txt or 32665.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www