both old and good for
nothing any more."

"This world may be old, Keeper," Dranigo said, "but it is the
Mother-World, Terra, the world that sent Man to the Stars. And
you--when you lost the Crown, you recovered it again."

"The next time, I won't be able to. Too many people will know that the
Crown is worth stealing, and the next time, they'll kill me first."

"Well, we said we'd give you twenty thousand trade-tokens for it,"
Salvadro said. "We'll have them for you as soon as we can draw them
from the Government bank, here. Or give you a check and let you draw
them as you want them." Raud didn't understand that, and Salvadro
didn't try to explain. "And then we'll fly you home."

He shook his head. "No, I have no home. The place where you saw me is
Keeper's House, and I am not the Keeper any more. I will stay here and
find a place to live, and pay somebody to take care of me...."

With twenty thousand trade-tokens, he could do that. It would buy a
house in which he could live, and he could find some woman who had
lost her man, who would do his work for him. But he must be careful of
the money. Dig a crypt in the corner of his house for it. He wondered
if he could find a pair of good dogs and train them to guard it for
him....

* * * * *

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