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largescale, the population didn’t care about it and in any case there were none of the massive mining andmanufacturing operations which are necessary for surface transit. Barron, safely inside the Zone, hadnoticed all this and his reaction had been “So what?” He hadn’t really cared how the Darkovans lived; ithad nothing to do with him. His world was spaceport dispatch: spaceships, cargo, passenger transit— Darkover was a major pivot on long-distance hyper-travel because it was situated conveniently betweenthe High Arm and Low Arm of the Galaxy—mapping ships, and the various tractors and surfacemachinery for servicing all of those. He was not prepared for the change from spaceship to pack animals.
    The three men paused, letting go the reins of the horses, which were well-trained and stood quietly. Theforemost of the three men, a sturdy young man in his twenties, said, “You are the Terran representative Daniel Firth Barron?” He had some trouble with the name.

    “   Z’par servu .” The polite Darkovan phrase,   at your service   , brought a faint agreeable smile from the young man as he replied in some formula Barron couldn’t understand and then shifted back to Trade City language, saying, “I am Colryn. This is Lerrys, and this, Gwynn. Are you ready? Can you leave at once? Where are your baggages?”
    “I’m ready when you are.” Barron indicated the duffel bag, which held his few possessions, and the large but light case which held the equipment he must use. “The bag can be knocked around as much as you like; it’s only clothes. But be careful not to drop the crate; it’s breakable.”

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“Gwynn, you see to that,” Colryn said. “We have pack animals waiting outside the city, but for the moment we can carry them with us. It isn’t easy to manage pack animals on the streets here, as narrow as they are.”
    Barron realized that they were waiting for him to mount. He reminded himself that this assignment was allthat stood between him and ruin, but that didn’t seem very important at the moment. He wanted, for thefirst time in his adult life, to run. He set his mouth hard and said very stiffly, “I should warn you, I’ve neverbeen on a horse in my life.”
    “I am sorry,” Colryn said. His politeness was almost excessive. “There is no other way to go where we
    are going.”
    The one introduced as Lerrys swung Barron’s duffel bag up to his saddle. He said, “I’ll take this, you’llhave enough trouble with your reins, then.” His Terran was substantially better than Colryn’s, beingvirtually accentless. “You’ll soon pick up riding; I did. Colryn, why don’t you show him how to mount? And ride beside him until he gets over being nervous.”
    Nervous ! Barron felt like snarling at the youngster that he had been facing strange worlds when this boywas playing with his toys, then he relaxed.   What the hell, I am nervous, the kid would have to beblind not to see it   .

    Before he realized how it had happened, he was in the saddle, his feet slipped through the high ornatestirrups, moving slowly down the street and away from the Terran Zone. He was too confused and toobusy keeping his balance to give it a single backward look.
    He had never been at close quarters with Darkovans before. At the restaurants and shops in Trade City,they had been dark impassive faces serving him and strangers at a safe distance to be ignored. Now hewas among them for an indefinite period of time, with only the most casual of warnings, the dimmest ofpreparations.
    This never happened in the Terran Empire! Damn it, you were never supposed to be assignedwork outside your specialty; then if they actually sent you into the field on a strange planet, youwere supposed to get all sorts of briefing and training ! At the moment it was taking all theconcentration he could muster to stay on his horse.
    It was the better part of an hour before he began to relax, to feel that a fall was less