lynching. It would be a civil war."

"Well, that's swell!" Dad said. "The Federation Government has never
paid us any attention; the Federation planets are scattered over too
many million cubic light-years of space for the Government to run
around to all of them wiping everybody's noses. As long as things are
quiet here, they'll continue to do nothing for us. But let a story hit
the big papers on Terra, _Revolution Breaks Out on Fenris_--and
that'll be the story I'll send to Interworld News--and watch what
happens."

"I will tell you what will happen," Bish Ware said. "A lot of people
will get killed. That isn't important, in itself. People are getting
killed all the time, in a lot worse causes. But these people will all
have friends and relatives who will take it up for them. Start killing
people here in a faction fight, and somebody will be shooting somebody
in the back out of a dark passage a hundred years from now over it.
You want this planet poisoned with blood feuds for the next century?"

Dad and I looked at one another. That was something that hadn't
occurred to either of us, and it should have. There were feuds, even
now. Half the little settlements on the other islands and on the
mainland had started when some group or family moved out of Port
Sandor because of the enmity of some larger and more powerful group or
family, and half our shootings and knife fights grew out of old
grudges between families or hunting crews.

"We don't want it poisoned for the next century with the sort of thing
Mort Hallstock and Steve Ravick started here, either," Dad said.

"Granted." Bish nodded. "If a civil war's the only possible way to get
rid of them, that's what you'll have to have, I suppose. Only make
sure you don't leave a single one of them alive when it's over. But if
you can get the Federation Government in here to clean the mess up,
that would be better. Nobody starts a vendetta with the Terran
Federation."

"But how?" Dad asked. "I've sent story after story off about crime and
corruption on Fenris. They all get the file-and-forget treatment."

Mrs. Laden had taken away the soup plates and brought us our main
course. Bish sat toying with his fork for a moment.

"I don't know what you can do," he said slowly. "If you can stall off
the blowup till the _Cape Canaveral_ gets in, and you can send
somebody to Terra...."

All of a sudden, it hit me. Here was something that would give Bish a
purpose; something to