custody. If he or his
attorney will step up here, the bail bond will be refunded." He puzzled
Little Fuzzy by hammering again with his gavel to adjourn court.

This time, instead of keeping quiet, everybody made all the noise they
could, and Uncle Gus was holding him high over his head and shouting:

"The _winnah_! By unanimous decision!"

XVII

Ruth Ortheris sipped at the tart, cold cocktail. It was good; oh, it was
good, all good! The music was soft, the lights were dim, the tables were
far apart; just she and Gerd, and nobody was paying any attention to them.
And she was clear out of the business, too. An agent who testified in
court always was expended in service like a fired round. They'd want her
back, a year from now, to testify when the board of inquiry came out from
Terra, but she wouldn't be Lieutenant j.g. Ortheris then, she'd be Mrs.
Gerd van Riebeek. She set down the glass and rubbed the sunstone on her
finger. It was a lovely sunstone, and it meant such a lovely thing.

And we're getting married with a ready-made family, too. Four Fuzzies and
a black-and-white kitten.

"You're sure you really want to go to Beta?" Gerd asked. "When Napier gets
this new government organized, it'll be taking over Science Center. We
could both get our old jobs back. Maybe something better."

"You don't want to go back?" He shook his head. "Neither do I. I want to
go to Beta and be a sunstone digger's wife."

"And a Fuzzyologist."

"And a Fuzzyologist. I couldn't drop that now. Gerd, we're only beginning
with them. We know next to nothing about their psychology."

He nodded seriously. "You know, they may turn out to be even wiser than we
are."

She laughed. "Oh, Gerd! Let's don't get too excited about them. Why,
they're like little children. All they think about is having fun."

"That's right. I said they were wiser than we are. They stick to important
things." He smoked silently for a moment. "It's not just their psychology;
we don't know anything much about their physiology, or biology either." He
picked up his glass and drank. "Here; we had eighteen of them in all.
Seventeen adults and one little one. Now what kind of ratio is that? And
the ones we saw in the woods ran about the same. In all, we sighted about
a hundred and fifty adults and only ten children."

"Maybe last year's crop have grown up," she began.

"You know any other sapient races with a one-year maturation period?" he
asked. "I'll bet