said to be having an audience with King Firkked."

"No mystery to that," von Schlichten said. "He travels on our ships,
in disguise, coolie-class, on the geek-deck."

"Be a good idea if he could be caught at it, some time," Blount said,
making another move. "One of the lower-deck loading ports could be
left unlocked, by carelessness, and he could blunder overboard at
about five thousand feet." He watched Harrington make a deceptively
pointless-looking move. "Sid, this damn dog business worries me."

"Worries me, too. I'm fond of that mutt, and God only knows what sort
of stuff he's been getting to eat. And I hate to think of why those
geeks stole him, too."

"Well, at risk of seeming heartless, I'm not so much worried for
Stalin as I am about why Keeluk was hiding him, and why he was willing
to murder the only two Terrans in Konkrook who trust him, to prevent
our finding out that he had him."

"A Mr. Keeluk, a clergyman," von Schlichten quoted. He chain-lit
another cigarette and stubbed out the old one. "Maybe the Rev. Keeluk
wanted Stalin for sacramental purposes."

Blount looked up sharply. "Ritual killing?" he asked. "Or sympathetic
magic?"

Von Schlichten shrugged. "Take your choice. Maybe Rakkeed wanted the
dog, to kill before a congregation of his followers, killing us by
proxy, or in effigy. Or maybe they think we worship Stalin, and
getting control of him would give them power over us. I wish we knew a
little more about Ulleran psychology."

That wasn't the first time he'd made that wish. Even if sex weren't
the paramount psychological factor the ancient Freudians believed, it
was an extremely important one, and on Uller most of the fundamental
terms of Terran psychology were meaningless. At the same time, the
average Ulleran probably had complexes and neuroses that would have
had Freud talking to himself, and they certainly indulged in practices
that would have even stood Krafft-Ebing's hair on end.

"One thing," Blount said. "It doesn't take any Ulleran psychologist to
know that about eighty percent of them hate us poisonously."

"Oh, rubbish!" Harrington blew the exclamation out around his
pipe-stem with a gush of smoke. "A few fanatics hate us, and a few
merchants who lost money when we replaced this primitive barter
economy of theirs, but nine-tenths of them have benefited enormously
from us, and continue to benefit...."

"And hate us more deeply with each new benefit," Blount added. "They
re