The Transit was a large building, spilling out lights, and its customers coming and going populated the street outside. Their faces were restless and excited — like Dann's now. The room they went into was very large, brightly lit, and crammed full. Here were mostly men, and Mara saw at once that she was the only woman there wearing an ordinary garment. All the rest were young, some not much more than children, and they wore flimsy, transparent skirts, with breasts just covered or not at all. Dann and she sat down and were at once brought beakers of strong-smelling drink. It was a grain drink, of the kind she had helped make in Chelops. The place was very noisy. No point in Dann's or her even trying to speak, unless they wanted to shout. Again this was a mix of peoples, some of kinds they had not seen before, and the languages they were overhearing were strange to them. This was a place, then, not for Bilma's inhabitants, but for the traders and travellers and visitors.

A tap on Mara's shoulder. "You want to change money?" she heard, and a waiter pointed across the room to a door that was shut, unlike most doors in this place. She told Dann she would not be long, and across the room she went.

It was a small room, for transactions and business, and in it was waiting for her a fat old woman who scarcely came up to her shoulder. She was very black, so she did not come from this region. She wore a handsome, scarlet, shiny dress whose skirts seemed to bounce around her as she walked back to a chair behind a plain plank table. She sat, and pointed Mara to an empty chair.

Her examination of Mara was brisk, frank and impartial: she might have been assessing a bale of new cloth. "How much do you want to change?"

Mara took out one gold coin from her pocket, where she had it ready, and then took out another. She was remembering the recurrent anxieties about changing money.

"I shall give you more than the market-place value."

Mara smiled, meaning this old woman to see that she, Mara, did not think this was saying much. And in fact this crone — she was really old, in spite of her scarlet flounces and the glitter of earrings and necklaces — was ready to smile too, sharing Mara's criticism: it was the way of the world, her smile said.

"My name is Dalide," she said. "I have been changing money for as many years as you have lived." "I am twenty-two." "You are in the best of your beauty."

Mara could have sworn that Dalide could easily have leaned forward and opened her mouth to examine her teeth, and then pinch her flesh here and there between fingers that had many times assessed the exact degree of a young woman's toothsomeness.

Mara put down the two gold coins. Dalide picked one up, while the other hand fondled the second coin. "I have never seen these," Dalide said. "Who is this person?" — pointing at the faint outline of a face, probably male, on the coin.

"I have no idea."

"Gold is gold," said Dalide. "But gold as old as this is even better." She pulled out bags of coins from a bigger bag, and began laying out in front of Mara piles of coins of differing values, meanwhile giving emphatic glances at Mara as each new pile was completed. These were not the flimsy coins she had been carrying about, making a light mass of money that you had to pay out in handfuls. Dalide was giving her coins that would be easy to handle and be changed, yet each worth a good bit. Mara counted them. She knew roughly what she should expect, and this was not far off. She swept the coins into a cloth bag she had with her, and Dalide exclaimed, "You aren't going to walk through the streets at night with that on you?"

"Do I have an alternative?"

"If you didn't have your brother I'd send my bodyguard with you." "People are very well informed about us." "You are an interesting couple."

"And why is that?"

Dalide did not answer, but said, "Would you like me to find you a good husband?"

And now Mara laughed, because of the incongruity.

Dalide did not laugh. "A good husband," she insisted.

"Well," said Mara, still laughing, "what would it cost me? Could I buy a husband with this?" And she shook her bag of coins so they clinked.

"Not quite," said Dalide, and waited for Mara to say how much money she had.

Mara said, "I do not have enough money to buy a husband." And added, laughing, "Not a good one."

Dalide nodded, allowing herself a brief smile, as a little concession to Mara. "I can change money for you — as you know. And I can find you a husband for a price."

"I'm not flattered that you think I would have to buy myself a husband.

Not so long ago I had a husband without money ever being mentioned." And she could not prevent her eyes from filling.

Dalide nodded, seeing her tears. "Hard times," she said briskly.

"Surely not in this town. If these are hard times, then I don't know what you'd say if I told you what I've seen."

"What have you seen?" asked Dalide softly.

Mara saw no reason to be secretive and said, "I've watched Ifrik drying up since I was a tiny child. I've seen things you'd not believe."

"I was a child in the River Towns. In Goidel. I was playing with my sisters when a slaver snatched me — I was for some years a slave in Kharab. I escaped. I was beautiful. I used men and became independent. Now I'm a rich woman. But there isn't much you could tell me about hardship."

Mara looked at this ugly old thing and thought that she had been beautiful. She said, "If I need you, I'll come back." She got up, and so did Dalide. As Mara went to the door, Dalide came too, and they left the business room behind. "Are you coming with me?" asked Mara, seeing how everyone in the big room turned to look at this grotesque old woman in her scarlet and her fine jewels.

"I don't work here," said Dalide. "I only came to meet you. I wanted to have a good look at you." "And you've done that." "I've done that. So, goodbye — for now."

Dalide made her way out of the crowded room and Mara looked for Dann, but he had disappeared. Then the same waiter, seeing her standing here, pointed at another door, this time an open one. She went in. And saw a smaller room full of tables where mostly men were gambling. Dann stood by one, with Bergos, and watched the fast movement of the hands throwing dice. She went to Dann, who when he saw her said, "Let's go home." He sounded irritated. If she had not come then, he would soon have been seated among the gamblers. Dann exchanged a few low words with Bergos. Mara and he went out into the street, which was not crowded now. Mara was conscious of the heavy bag of coins which she was trying to conceal, and said, "Dann, let's go quickly." And he said, "How much did you get?"

And now for the first time in her life Mara lied to him and said she had changed one gold coin and not two.

When they got safely back to the room, Mara fiddled with the coins, so that they would not seem as many as there were, sitting half turned from Dann. She gave him half of the worth of one coin, and told him that their gold coins were not known here and probably were much more valuable than they knew.

Dann lay on his bed looking up out of the window at the moon that was coming up again to the full. His face — oh, how afraid she felt, seeing it; and then he was asleep, and she could look directly at him, and wonder, Is that the new Dann, who seemed to be her enemy, or was it the real Dann, her friend? How was it possible that a person can turn into somebody not himself, just like that... But perhaps this new person, whom she disliked and feared, was the real person, not the one she thought of as real. After all, when he had been General Dann, with that boy, what was he then?

She slept with the little bag of money under her arm, and in the morning Dann was not there. The proprietor said he had gone out for a walk with Bergos. Mara paid him what was owed, and he said, "So, how did you find Mother Dalide?" Mara merely smiled at him, meaning, Mind your own business, while feeling it was probably his business too, and felt herself go quite cold when she heard him whisper, "Be careful. You must be careful." And then, as he glanced about for possible eavesdroppers, "Leave. You must leave this town."