"Why, no. Father."

"Your Grandmother thinks that you have begun to notice girls seriously."

"Well, sir. Grandmother is never wrong... but I hadn't been aware of it."

"A man isn't complete without a wife. But I don't think you're old enough. Laugh with all the girls and cry with none -- and remember our customs." Krausa was thinking that he was bound by Baslim's injunction to seek aid of the Hegemony in finding where the lad had come from. It would be awkward if Thorby married before the opportunity arose. Yet the boy had grown taller in the months he had been in Sisu. Adding to Krausa's fret was an uneasy feeling that his half-conceived notion of finding (or faking) an ancestry for Thorby conflicted with his unbreakable obligations to Baslim.

Then he had a cheerful idea. "Tell you what. Son! It's possible that the girl for you isn't aboard. After all, there are only a few in port side purdah -- and picking a wife is a serious matter. She can gain you status or ruin you. So why not take it easy? At the Great Gathering you will meet hundreds of eligible girls. If you find one you like and who likes you, I'll discuss it with your Grandmother and if she approves, well dicker for her exchange. We won't be stingy either. How does that sound?"

It put the problem comfortably in the distance. "It sounds fine. Father!"

"I have said enough." Krausa thought happily that he would check the files while Thorby was meeting those "hundreds of girls" -- and he need not review his obligation to Baslim until he had done so. The lad might be a born member of the People -- in fact his obvious merits made fraki ancestry almost unthinkable. If so, Baslim's wishes would be carried out in the spirit more than if followed to the letter. In the meantime -- forget it!

They completed the mile to the edge of the Losian community. Thorby stared at sleek Losian ships and thought uneasily that he had tried to burn one of those pretty things out of space. Then he reminded himself that Father had said it was not a firecontrolman's business to worry about what target was handed him.

When they got into city traffic he had no time to worry. Losians do not use passenger cars, nor do they favor anything as stately as a sedan chair. On foot, they scurry twice as fast as a man can run; in a hurry, they put on a vehicle which makes one think of jet propulsion. Four and sometimes six limbs are encased in sleeves which end in something like skates. A framework fits the body and carries a bulge for the power plant (what sort Thorby could not imagine). Encased in this mechanical clown suit, each becomes a guided missile, accelerating with careless abandon, showering sparks, filling the air with earsplitting noises, cornering in defiance of friction, inertia, and gravity, cutting in and out, never braking until the last minute.

Pedestrians and powered speed maniacs mix democratically, with no perceptible rules. There seems to be no age limit for driver's licenses and the smallest Losians are simply more reckless editions of their elders.

Thorby wondered if he would ever get out into space alive.

A Losian would come zipping toward Thorby on the wrong side of the street (there was no right side), squeal to a stop almost on Thorby's toes, zig aside while snatching breath off his face and heart out of his mouth -- and never touch him. Thorby would jump. After a dozen escapes he tried to pattern himself after his foster father. Captain Krausa plowed stolidly ahead, apparently sure that the wild drivers would treat him as a stationary object Thorby found it hard to live by that faith, but it seemed to work.

Thorby could not make out how the city was organized. Powered traffic and pedestrians poured through any opening and the convention of private land and public street did not seem to hold. At first they proceeded along an area which Thorby classified as a plaza, then they went up a ramp, through a building which had no clear limits -- no vertical walls, no defined roof -- out again and down, through an arch which skirted a hole. Thorby was lost.

Once he thought they must be going through a private home -- they pushed through what must have been a dinner party. But the guests merely pulled in their feet.

Krausa stopped. "We're almost there. Son, we're visiting the fraki who bought our load. This meeting heals the trouble between us caused by buying and selling. He has offended me by offering payment; now we have to become friends again."

"We don't get paid?"

"What would your Grandmother say? We've already been paid -- but now I'll give it to him free and hell give me the thorium just because he likes my pretty blue eyes. Their customs don't allow anything as crass as selling."

"They don't trade with each other?"

"Of course they do. But the theory is that one fraki gives another anything he needs. It's sheer accident that the other happens to have money that he is anxious to press on the other as a gift -- and that the two gifts balance. They are shrewd merchants, Son; we never pick up an extra credit here."

"Then why this nonsense?"

"Son, if you worry about why fraki do what they do, you'll drive yourself crazy. When you're on their planet, do it their way... it's good business. Now listen. We'll have a meal of friendship... only they can't, or they'll lose face. So there will be a screen between us. You have to be present, because the Losian's son will be there -- only it's a daughter. And the fraki I'm going to see is the mother, not the father. Their males live in purdah... I think. But notice that when I speak through the interpreter, I'll use masculine gender."

"Why?"

"Because they know enough about our customs to know that masculine gender means the head of the house. It's logical if you look at it correctly."

Thorby wondered. Who was head of the Family? Father? Or Grandmother? Of course, when the Chief Officer issued an order, she signed it "By Order of the Captain," but that was just because... no. Well, anyhow --

Thorby suddenly suspected that the customs of the Family might be illogical in spots. But the Captain was speaking. "We don't actually eat with them; that's another fiction. You'll be served a green, slimy liquid. Just raise it to your lips; it would burn out your gullet. Otherwise --" Captain Krausa paused while a Losian scorcher avoided the end of his nose. "Otherwise listen so that you will know how to behave next time. Oh yes! -- after I ask how old my host's son is, you'll be asked how old you are. You answer 'forty.' "

"Why?"

"Because that is a respectable age, in their years, for a son who is assisting his father."

They arrived and seemed still to be in public. But they squatted down opposite two Losians while a third crouched nearby. The screen between them was the size of a kerchief; Thorby could see over it. Thorby tried to look, listen, and learn, but the traffic never let up. It shot around and cut between them, with happy, shrill racket.

Their host started by accusing Captain Krausa of having lured him into a misdeed. The interpreter was almost impossible to understand, but he showed surprising command of scurrilous Interlingua. Thorby could not believe his ears and expected that Father would either walk out, or start trouble.

But Captain Krausa listened quietly, then answered with real poetry -- he accused the Losian of every crime from barratry to mopery and dopery in the spaceways.

This put the meeting on a friendly footing. The Losian made them a present of the thorium he had already paid, then offered to throw in his sons and everything he possessed.

Captain Krausa accepted and gave away Sisu, with all contents.

Both parties generously gave back the gifts. They ended at status quo, each to retain as a symbol of friendship what each now had: the Losian many hundredweight of verga leaf, the Trader slugs of thorium. Both agreed that the gifts were worthless but valuable for reasons of sentiment. In a burst of emotion the Losian gave away his son and Krausa made him (her) a present of Thorby. Inquiries followed and it was discovered that each was too young to leave the nest.