"It seems somewhat awkward," said Reith.

"Exactly. Awkward and perverse. Such are affairs in Kabasas. During our stay you had best rely on my counsel. First, I nominate the Sea Dragon Inn as a base of operations."

"We'll hardly be here that long. Why not go directly to the dock and find a ship to take us across the Parapan?"

Zarfo pulled at his long black nose. "Things are never so easy! And why cheat ourselves of a sojourn at the Sea Dragon Inn? ... Perhaps a week or two."

"You naturally intend to pay for your own accommodations?"

Zarfo's white eyebrows dipped sharply. "I am as you know a poor man. My every sequin represents toil. On a joint venture of this sort openhanded generosity should certainly be the rule."

"Tonight," said Reith, "we stay at the Sea Dragon Inn. Tomorrow we leave Kabasas."

Zarfo gave a dismal grunt. "It is not my place to dispute your wishes. Hmmf. As I understand the matter, you plan to arrive at Smargash, recruit a team of technicians, then continue to Ao Hidis?"

"Correct."

"Discretion then! I suggest that we take ship to Zara across the Parapan and up the Ish River. You have not lost your money?"

"Definitely not."

"Take good care of it. The thieves of Kabasas are deft; they use thongs which reach out thirty feet." Zarfo pointed. "Observe that structure just above the beach? The Sea Dragon Inn!"

The Sea Dragon Inn was indeed a grand establishment, with wide public rooms and pleasant sleeping cubicles. The restaurant was decorated to suggest a submarine garden, even to the dark grottos where members of a local sect, who would not publicly perform the act of deglutition, were served.

Reith ordered fresh linen from the staff haberdashery and descended to the great bath on the low terrace. He scrubbed himself and was sprayed with tonic and massaged with handfuls of fragrant moss. Wrapping himself in a gown of white linen he returned to his chamber.

On the couch sat a man in a soiled dark blue suit. Reith stared. Helsse looked back at him with an unfathomable expression. He made no move and uttered no sound.

The silence was intense.

Reith slowly backed from the room, to stand uncertainly on the balcony, heart pounding as if he had seen a ghost. Zarfo appeared, swaggering back to his room with white hair billowing.

Reith signaled to him. "Come, I want to show you something." He took Zarfo to the door, thrust it ajar, half-expecting to find the room unoccupied. Helsse sat as before. Zarfo whispered: "Is he mad? He sits and stares and mocks us but does not speak."

"Helsse," said Reith. "What are you doing here? What happened to you?"

Helsse rose to his feet. Reith and Zarfo moved involuntarily back. Helsse looked at them with the faintest of smiles. He stepped out on the balcony, walked slowly to the stairs. He turned his head; Reith and Zarfo saw the pale oval of his face; then, like an apparition, he was gone.

"What is the meaning of all this?" Reith asked in a husky voice.

Zarfo shook his head, for once subdued. "The Pnume love their pranks."

"Should we have held him?"

"He could have stayed, had he wished."

"But-I doubt if he is sane."

Zarfo's only response was a hunch-shouldered shrug.

Reith went to the edge of the balcony, looked out over the town. "The Pnume know the very rooms in which we sleep!"

"A person floating down the Jinga ends up at Kabasas," said Zarfo testily. "If he is able, he patronizes the Sea Dragon Inn. This is not an intricate deduction. So much for Pnume omniscience."

On the following day Zarfo went off by himself and presently returned with a short man with skin the color of mahogany, walking with a sore-footed swagger as if his shoes were too tight. His face was seamed and crooked; small nervous eyes looked slantwise past the beak of his nose. "And here," declared Zarfo grandly,

"I give you Sealord Dobagq Hrostilfe, a person of sagacity, who will arrange everything."

Reith thought that he had never seen a more obvious rascal.

"Hrostilfe commands the Pibar," explained Zarfo. "For a most reasonable sum he will deliver us to our destination, be it the far coast of Vord."

"How much across the Parapan?" Reith asked.

"Only five thousand sequins, would you believe it?" exclaimed Zarfo.

Reith laughed scornfully. He turned to Zarfo: "I need your help no longer. You and your friend Hrostilfe can try to swindle someone else."

"What?" cried Zarfo. "After I risked my life in that infernal chute and endured all manner of hardship?"

But Reith had walked away. Zarfo came after him, somewhat crestfallen. "Adam Reith, you have made a serious mistake."

Reith nodded grimly. "Instead of an honest man I hired you."

Zarfo swelled up indignantly. "Who dares name me other than honest?"

"I do. Hrostilfe would rent his boat for a hundred sequins. He gave you a price of five hundred. You told him: 'Why should we not both profit? Adam Reith is credulous. I'll name a price and anything over a thousand sequins is mine.' So, be off with you."

Zarfo pulled ruefully at his black nose. "You do me vast wrong. I have only just come from chiding Hrostilfe, who admitted knavery. He now offers his boat at"-Zarfo cleared his throat-"twelve hundred sequins."

"Not a bice more than three hundred."

Zarfo threw his hands into the air and stalked away. Not long after Hrostilfe himself appeared with the plea that Reith inspect his ship. Reith followed him to the Pibar: a jaunty craft forty feet long, powered by electrostatic jet.

Hrostilfe kept up a halfhectoring, halfplaintive commentary. "A fast seaworthy vessel! Your price is absurd. What of my skills, my sea-lore? Do you appreciate the cost of energy? The voyage will exhaust a power cell: a hundred sequins which I cannot afford. You must pay for energy and additionally for provisions.

I am a generous man but I cannot subsidize you."

Reith agreed to pay for energy and a reasonable amount for provisions, but not the installation of new water tanks, extra foul-weather gear, good-luck fetishes for the prow; furthermore he insisted on departure the following day, at which Hrostilfe gave a sour chuckle. "There's one in the eye for the old Lokhar. He had counted on swanking it a week or more at the Sea Dragon."

"He can stay as long as he likes," said Reith, "provided that he pays."

"Small chance of that," chuckled Hrostilfe. "Well then, what about provisions?"

"Buy them. Show me an itemized tally, which I will check in detail."

"I need an advance: a hundred sequins."

"Do you take me for a fool? Remember, tomorrow noon we leave."

"The Pibar will be ready," said Hrostilfe in a sullen voice.

Returning to the Sea Dragon Inn, Reith found Anacho on the terrace. Anacho pointed to a black-haired shape leaning against the seawall. "There he stands: Helsse. I called him by name. It was as if he never heard."

Helsse turned his head; his face seemed deathly white. For a moment or two he watched them, then turned and walked slowly away.

At noon the travelers embarked on the Pibar. Hrostilfe gave his passengers a brisk welcome. Reith looked skeptically here and there, wondering in what fashion Hrostilfe thought he had won advantage for himself. "Where are the provisions?"

"In the main saloon."

Reith examined boxes and crates, checked them against Hrostilfe's tally sheet, and was forced to admit that Hrostilfe had secured good merchandise at no great price. But why, he wondered, were they not stored forward in the lazaret? He tried the door, and found it locked.

Interesting, thought Reith. He called Hrostilfe: "Best to stow the stores forward in the lazaret, before we start pitching to the waves."

"All in good time!" declared Hrostilfe. "First things first! Now it's important that we make the most of the morning current!"