Felless cast down her eyes. In a miserable voice, she said, “It shall not be done.” She sighed. “You transgressed against the Deutsche and were ordered out of the Reich, while I transgressed against our own kind and was ordered to stay in this accursed place. Where is the justice in that?”

“Transgressed against our-?” Ttomalss began, but his confusion quickly faded. “They caught you with your tongue in the ginger jar, did they?”

“You might say so,” Felless said bitterly. “Veffani and most of a team of senior officials from Cairo mated with me when I was summoned to a meeting in the ambassador’s office just after I had tasted.”

Now there was a scandal to keep the embassy buzzing for a long time! Ttomalss had to work to keep from laughing in Felless’ face. That would be cruel-tempting, but cruel-after she’d disgraced herself. “I do not understand why you were ordered to stay there,” he said.

“As punishment,” she snapped. “I was hoping you would have a sympathetic hearing diaphragm, but I see that is too much to ask for.”

“I am lucky enough not to have acquired the ginger habit,” he said. “And it is a less urgent matter with me, since I am a male.”

“Unfair,” Felless exclaimed. “I did not ask to release pheromones after tasting. I wish I would not. I also wish I were not going to lay another clutch of eggs. But wishes are pointless, are they not?”

Ttomalss remembered the extravagant wishes he’d made while Liu Han held him in captivity. “No, not always,” he said. “They can help keep hope alive, and hope matters most when things look worst.”

“Hope?” Felless said. “My only hope is to get away from this dreadful place, and that is what I cannot do.” She paused. “No, I take that back. My other hope is to be able to get more ginger before my present supply runs out. That, at least, I expect I will be able to accomplish.” Her image disappeared from the screen.

Ttomalss stared for a little while at the soundless pictures of the two wild Big Uglies and of Kassquit. With a sigh, he ended the playback of that recording, too; he couldn’t concentrate on it. Poor Felless! For all her expertise, she hadn’t adapted well to Tosev 3. She’d expected it to be far more like Home than it really was.

If she’d stayed aboard a starship or gone to one of the new towns on the island continent or on the main continental mass, she might have done well enough. But her field of specialization involved dealing with the alien natives of Tosev 3… who had proved far more alien than the Race could possibly have imagined before setting out from Home.

Well, I know all about that, Ttomalss thought. He knew it in more intimate detail than he’d ever imagined, thanks to his captivity in China and thanks to his raising Kassquit. One way or another, everyone in the conquest fleet had learned the lessons with which the males and females of the colonization fleet were still grappling.

The colonists didn’t want to adapt. There were so many of them, they didn’t have to adapt to the same degree as had the males of the conquest fleet. They have it easy, Ttomalss thought. We did the real work, and they do not appreciate it. He wondered if the older generation of the Big Uglies ever had such thoughts about their dealings with the Race, and if the younger ones were as ungrateful as the males and females of the colonization fleet. He doubted it.

Atvar studied a map of the regions of Tosev 3 the Race ruled. Some parts of it were a tranquil yellow-green, others angry red, still others in between. He turned to Pshing, his adjutant. “Fascinating how little correlation there is between this map and the one reflecting active rebellion,” he observed.

“Truth, Exalted Fleetlord,” Pshing agreed. “The subregions of the main continental mass known as China and India accept veneration of the spirits of Emperors past almost without complaint, as do large stretches of the region known as Africa. Yet China and India still seethe with political strife, while Africa is largely tranquil. Intriguing.”

“So it is.” Atvar pointed to another section of the map. “Yet the southern part of the lesser continental mass is afire with resentment against us because of this measure, and that had also been one of the areas where our administration was least difficult and annoying. It is a puzzlement.”

“We do not yet understand everything we should about the Big Uglies,” Pshing said. “A world, I have discovered since our arrival here, is a very large place to get to know in detail.”

“That is indeed a truth.” The fleetlord’s emphatic cough told how much of a truth he thought it was. He followed the cough with a sigh. “And, of course, there is this central region of the main continental mass, where rebellion and resistance to veneration of the spirits of Emperors past skitter side by side.”

Pshing also sighed. “Such a pity, too, because this region really is among the most Homelike on the whole planet. I have actually come to enjoy Cairo’s climate. It could easily be that of a temperate region back on Home. Now if only the Tosevites were temperate.”

“Expect temperance from a Big Ugly and you are doomed to disappointment,” Atvar said. His mouth came open and he waggled his lower jaw from side to side in a wry laugh. “Expect anything from a Big Ugly and you are doomed to disappointment. What have we had on Tosev 3 but one surprise after another?”

“Nothing,” his adjutant replied. “We can only hope we have also succeeded in giving the Tosevites a few surprises.” He turned one eye turret back toward the map. “I truly do wonder what accounts for the differences in response to our edict.”

“Part of it, I suppose, springs from the differences in local superstition,” Atvar said, “but the role these differences play still baffles me. The followers of the Jewish superstition, for instance, have always been well disposed to us, but they are among those who most strongly resist venerating spirits of Emperors past. They bombard me with petitions and memorials. Even Moishe Russie does nothing but complain about it.”

“I know, Exalted Fleetlord,” Pshing said. “I have shielded you from several of his calls, too.”

“Have you? Well, I thank you,” Atvar said. “So many of the Big Uglies are so passionately convinced of their own correctness, they are willing to die, sometimes eager to die, to maintain it. This is one of the things that makes them such a delight to govern, as you must be aware.”

As if to underscore his words, the Tosevite howling that was the call to prayer of the Muslim superstition floated through the open windows of his office-except during the worst of the rioting, when he needed the armor glass as protection against assassins, he saw no point to closing those windows against the fine mild air of Cairo. Here and there, spatters of gunfire accompanied the howling. No, the locals were not reconciled to paying a tax for the privilege of keeping their foolish beliefs.

“With rational beings, lowering the tax, as we did, would also have lowered the resentment,” he grumbled. “With Big Uglies…”

Before he could go on fulminating, the telephone started making a racket. At Atvar’s gesture, Pshing answered it. No sooner had the caller’s image appeared on the screen than the adjutant assumed the posture of respect, saying, “I greet you, Exalted Fleetlord.”

“And I greet you, Pshing,” Reffet said, “but I need to speak with your principal at once-at once, do you hear me?”

“One moment, please,” Pshing replied, and muted the sound. Still down in the posture of respect, he asked Atvar, “What is your pleasure, Exalted Fleetlord?”

Speaking with his opposite number from the colonization fleet was not exactly Atvar’s pleasure, but it was sometimes necessary. Maybe this would be one of those times. He strode up to the telephone, touched the sound control, and said, “I greet you, Reffet. How now?”