Tolmasov sighed. “Fralk, I told you before that there are other humans on the Omalo side of the canyon. If you used a rifle to fight the Omalo, you might also hurt or kill one of these other humans. That could bring their domain and ours to war, and in our homelands we have weapons much, much worse than rifles.” We’ve used some of them on each other, too, he thought, and as much by luck as anything else, not the worst ones.

“What if other humans give Omalo rifles, fill us full of holes?” the Minervan asked. “You leave us so we not fight back?”

The pilot frowned. “I will find out,” he promised. Fralk had asked before whether the Americans would give firearms to the Minervans east of Jotun Canyon. That had been before he knew what bullets could do, though. Now he was really worried. Tolmasov still could not imagine Emmett Bragg being so stupid as to arm the natives with weapons dangerous to humans, but he could not overlook the possibility, either. Helping the Skarmer would not look good back on Earth, but neither would standing idly by while they got slaughtered.

Tolmasov felt the wish that came over every commander now and then, the wish to be safely back in the ranks again, with nothing to worry about and nothing to do but what somebody else told him to do. As every commander must, he strangled that wish in its cradle.

He would have had scant time to indulge it in any case, for Fralk was going on in a mixture of Russian and the Skarmer tongue. “We will give you whatever you want if you give us one of these rifles to take across the gorge and use against the Omalo. Anything! No price could be too great!” The Minervan abruptly stopped, realizing no sensible merchant said things like that.

“Fralk, if I gave a rifle to your people, I would not only have to worry about your hurting the humans east of the canyon; I would also fear for the safety of my own crew here.” Tolmasov spoke first in Russian, then as best he could in Fralk’s language he needed the Minervan to understand.

“Nyet, Sergei Konstantinovich, nyet,” Fralk said urgently. “Never hurt you-you our friends. Give you-“ He used a Skarmer word the pilot could not follow; Tolmasov raised a hand to show that. “Males you keep so you hurt them if we do any bad thing to you,” Fralk explained.

“Ah. Hostages.” Tolmasov gave him the Russian word.

“Hostages,” Fralk repeated. “Thank you. Yes, I am sure Hogram would agree to give you hostages”-he politely dropped the human term into a sentence in his own tongue-“so you could trust us with one of your rifles.”

Tolmasov knew he ought to say no and walk away. What the Minervans did to each other was their business. If humans meddled in it, only trouble would result. But he didn’t know what the Americans had done on their side of Jotun Canyon, and Fralk was so eager. He would have been, too, in the Minervan’s place.

The pilot decided to temporize. “I talk with my domain masters,” he said. “If they say yes, then we trade rifle. If no, we cannot.” He was confident even the blockheads back in Moscow had better sense than to authorize letting the natives get their three-fingered hands on an AKT4.

From the way Fralk’s appendages were quivering, he was confident Tolmasov had in effect just said yes. “Thank you, Sergei Konstantinovich! We would have beaten the Omalo anyhow. Now we will surely smash them-they will widen themselves before us forevermore.”

“Hmm,” was all Tolmasov said. Fralk made a more enthusiastic would-be conqueror than he quite liked. Maybe changing the subject would calm the Minervan down. Tolmasov pointed at the krong’s carcass. “We leave this here?”

“Yes, I suppose so-the meat is vile,” Fralk answered. “Long ago there was a bounty on their claws, but since none has been seen this near town in a good many years, I suppose that offer has melted.” He did not want to talk about the krong. He wanted to talk about Tolmasov’s rifle. “From how far away can it kill?”

“Farther than you can throw a stone,” the pilot answered. He did not want to tell Fralk the Kalashnikov was accurate out to three or four hundred meters and could kill from a kilometer away if a round happened to hit.

What he did say was plenty. “Wonderful!” Fralk exclaimed. “Wonderful!” Tolmasov had never heard a Minervan burbling before. “Hogram will be as excited as I am at the prospect of doing away with the wretched Omalo while at the same time keeping our males safe.”

“Remember what I say,” Tolmasov warned him. ‘.’My domain masters may not let us sell you rifle. They say no, we not sell.” He started walking away from the dead krong, back toward Hogram’s town. Maybe if Fralk could not see the beast anymore, he would stop being so heated not really the right word to apply to a Minervan, the pilot thought-about what the Kalashnikov could do.

No such luck. The Minervan went right on babbling until Tolmasov rudely left him outside the humans’ tent and went in alone. Oleg Lopatin looked up from the radio handset he was checking. “I’ve seen you looking happier, Sergei Konstantinovich,” he said.

Tolmasov was so frazzled, he did not even mind unburdening himself to the KGB man. “I almost wish I’d let the miserable creature eat us,” he finished. “That might have ended up doing the mission less harm than letting the locals find out about firearms.”

“Possibly not, Comrade Colonel,” Lopatin said. Tolmasov grew alert; Lopatin only used formal address when he had something on his mind. “Would it not accord well with Marxist-Leninist principles to render fraternal assistance to this advanced society in its struggle against the oppressive feudal aristocrats on the eastern side of Jotun Canyon? The dialectic of history supports the Skarmer; how can we not do the same?”

“Two good reasons: This is Minerva, not Earth; and there are people on the other side of the canyon. I have more loyalty to my own kind than I do to dialectical materialism.” The moment the words were out of his mouth, Tolmasov knew he had said too much. And words were never unsayable, not to a chekist.

But Lopatin’s response was mild. “Marxist-Leninist principles hold universally, Sergei Konstantinovich. You know that as well as I. Tell me, what had you planned to do about Fralk’s request?”

“Nothing,” Tolmasov answered honestly. “Or rather, say I had consulted with Moscow and they told me he could not have his rifle. A little discreet checking with Bragg will let me make sure he isn’t giving the Omalo firearms.”

“Yes, by all means check with Bragg,” Lopatin said. “But perhaps you also really should ask Moscow about this question. Then there can be no room for misunderstanding. This is only a suggestion, of course.”

But it wasn’t only a suggestion, as Tolmasov knew. That was what he got for leaving himself open to the KGB man. “Let me talk with Bragg first,” the pilot said, dickering now. “If I have his clear assurance that he is not giving guns to the locals, a decision from Moscow is unnecessary. Otherwise-”

“Good enough,” Lopatin said, to Tolmasov’s surprise and relief. “Call now, why don’t you? Even I will admit, Sergei Konstantinovich, that our colleagues back on Earth are not always as timely as they might be. The longer the opportunity we give them, the better.”

He said that with the air of a man making a great concession, perhaps so he could act as if he were repaying Tolmasov for his slip of a few minutes before. But the pilot, like most men on the frontier, already had a low opinion of the alleged experts back home. Not only were they slow in making up their minds, they were sadly disconnected from the reality he was living. That scheme for peace talks between Hogram and the eastern chieftain, for instance… Tolmasov could have told them-did tell them-it was a waste of time. They had forced him to go ahead with it anyway and proven him right.

So who knew what Moscow would instruct now? They might well order him to let the Minervans have an AKT4. That would leave the whole expedition vulnerable in a way it had not been before. As a soldier, he hated the idea of making himself more vulnerable.