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wrong?"
     
                  "You could have got lodging for three ounces a night, or at most four, if you'd bargained sharply."
     
                  "Why the boar-begotten thief! Am I a dog? HI knock his teeth—"
     
                  "My lord! It wouldn't become your dignity, not to mention that the magistrates would take a poor view of the act, this being not your own demesne. Next time let me haggle, for my dignity doesn't matter."
     
                  "Very well; with your background I can see you'd make a perfect merchant."
     
                  Vakar handed over the washing-facilities. By the time the last of the party had washed, the water and towel were foul indeed. They ate from wooden bowls with the dispatch and silence of tired and hungry men, washing down great masses of roast pork and barley-bread with gulps of the green wine of Zhysk and paying no heed to a noisy party of merchants clustered at the other end of the long table.
     
                  When they turned in, however, Vakar found that the chatter of the merchants kept him awake. They seemed to be making an all-night party of it, with a flute-girl and all the trimmings. When the flute-girl was not tweetling the men were engaged in some game of chance with loud boasts, threats, and accusations.
     
                  Vakar stood it for a couple of hours until his slow temper reached a boil. Then he climbed out of bed and knocked aside the curtain separating the dormitory from the front chamber of the inn.
     
                  "Stop that racket!" he roared, " before I beat your heads in!"
     
                  The noise stopped as four pairs of eyes turned upon him. The stoutest merchant said:
     
                  "And who are you, my good man?"
     
                  "I'm Prince Vakar of Lorsk, and when I say shut up—"
     
                  "And I'm the Queen of Ogugia. If you foreigners don't like it here, go back—"
     
                  "Swine!" yelled Vakar, looking for something to throw, but Nyeron, cudgel in hand, intervened :
     
                  "No fighting here! If you must brawl, go outside."
     
                  "Gladly," said Vakar. "Wait wh il e I fetch my sword—"
     
                  "Oh, it's to be swords?" said the stout merchant. "Then you must wait while I send home for mine. As it's drunk the blood of several Gorgonian pirates it shouldn't find a Lorskan popinjay—"
     
                  "What's that?" said Vakar. "Who are you, really?" His initial burst of rage had subsided enough for his ever-lively curiosity to come into play, and he realized that he was making himself look foolish.
     
                  "I'm Mateng of Po, owner of three ships, as you'd know if you weren't an ignorant—"
     
                  "Wait," said Vakar. "Are any of your ships leaving shortly for the mainland?"
     
                  "Yes. The Dyra sails for Gadaira tomorrow if the wind holds."
     
                  "Isn't Gadaira the nearest mainland port to Torrutseish? "
     
                  " It is."
     
                  "How much—" Vakar started to say, then checked himself. He stuck his head back into the dormitory and called: "Fual! Wake up; come out and haggle for me!"
     
    -
     
                  Next morning Vakar was collecting his crew to ride to the docks when he found that Sret was missing. Back in the inn he found the interpreter chatting with Nyeron.
     
                  "Come along!" said Vakar.
     
                  "Yes sir," said Sret, and as he started out called back over his shoulder in Hesperian: "Farewell; I shall see you again sooner than you think!"
     
                  Then he came. They rattled down to the harbor where Vakar stopped at the