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closed and locked, and I waited for the outer gate, that of iron-sheathed wood, to be opened.
    I glanced back again and I saw the slave, Linda, naked, on a leash, being led to her master. She saw me, and looked down, shyly.
    I exited then through the second gate of the house of Samos.
    I had heard that she did the tile dance exquisitely. I almost envied Samos. I decided I would have the dance taught to my own slaves. I would be curious to learn which of them could perform it well, and which brilliantly.
    “Greetings, Captain,” said Thurnock, from the boat.
    “Greetings, Thurnock,” I said. I stepped down into the boat and took the tiller. The boat was thrust off into the dark water, and, in moments, we were rowing quietly toward my house.

I Attend The Market Of Vart
     
     
    The girl screamed, fighting the sales collar and the position chain.
    She tried to pull it from her throat.
    The two male slaves, to the right, turned the crank of the windlass and she was drawn, in her turn, struggling, before the men.
    The men in the crowd regarded her, curiously. Had she never been sold before?
    She tried to turn away, and cover herself, her feet in the damp sawdust. The inside of her left thigh was stained yellow, as she had lost water in her terror.
    The auctioneer did not strike her with his whip. He merely took her arms and lifted them, so that the position chain, attached to each side of the sales collar, lay across her upper arms. Then he had her clasp her hands behind the back of her neck, so that the chain, on each side of the collar, was in the crook of her arms, and she was exposed in such a way that she could be properly exhibited.
    In a higher class market girls are usually fed a cathartic a few hours before the sale, and forced to relieve themselves shortly before their sale, a kettle passed down the line. In the current market such niceties, especially in large sales, were seldom observed.
    By the hair the auctioneer pulled her head up and back so that her features might be observed by the men.
    “Another loot girl taken by our noble Captain, Bejar, in his brilliant capture of the Blossoms of Telnus,” called the auctioneer. He was also the slaver, Vart, once Publius Quintus of Ar, banished from that city, and nearly impaled, for falsifying slave data. He had advertised a girl as a trained pleasure slave who, as it turned out, did not even know the eleven kisses. The Vart is a small, sharp-toothed winged mammal, carnivorous, which commonly flies in flocks.
    “A blond-haired, blue-eyed barbarian,” called the auctioneer, “who speaks little or no Gorean, untrained, formerly free, a purse not yet rent, a thigh not yet kissed by the iron. What am I offered?”
    “A copper tarsk,” called a man from the floor, a fellow who rented chains of work girls.
    “I hear one tarsk,” called the auctioneer. “Do I hear more?”
    “Let us have the next girl!” called a man. The slaves at the windlass tensed, but the auctioneer did not tell them to move the chain, removing the blond girl and bringing forth the next item on the chain.
    “Surely I hear more?” called the auctioneer. “Do I hear two tarsks?” I suppose he may have paid two or three tarsks for her himself, to Bejar.
    The girl was beautiful, but not as beautiful, it was true, as most Gorean slave girls. I did not think she would bring a high price. Unfortunately, then, almost anyone might buy her. I looked about. It seemed a common, motley crowd for the house of Vart, where men came generally to buy cheap girls, sometimes in lots, at bargain prices. His establishment was located in a warehouse near the docks. I conjectured there were some two hundred buyers and onlookers present. I wore the tunic, and leather apron and cap, of the metal worker.
    “Look at her,” said the man beside me. “How ugly she is, what a she-tarsk.”
    “A true she-tarsk,” agreed another.
    They had seen, I gathered, few Earth girls. They did not understand the effects of years