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appears."
    "Solitary prospectors who go off into the blue are usually looking for gold. They show up only at long intervals to cash in their accumulation, and if they've been lucky, they may buy supplies that will last for years."
    "If he shows up at all, the warrant will see that he is detained for galactic police authorities."
    "Have you considered the possibility that he might live the rest of his life out without being seen again?" Pummery asked. "He might be able to cash in his gold without being seen if he has a confederate. Are you still intent on changing the status of this world to 'Nullified?' "
    "I am."
    "We'll contest the petition, of course. And we'll win."
    "How can you possibly win? There is no doubt at all that organizations on Llayless harbored a murderer. Not only did they fail to punish him, but they helped him avoid punishment."
    Pummery smiled. "I told you when you arrived—an Unnullified world, a world without government, can be far more law-abiding than your so-called normal worlds. According to the results of your own investigation, Lefory is one of the most severely punished men in galactic history."
    "How do you figure that? No one punished him at all."
    "Study your notes again. At the Last Hope mine, he was shouldered. At the Laughingstock, he was much more emphatically shouldered. Once he was almost killed. At Smelter No. 2, more of the same thing. The danger to his life was increasing. Finally, at the Shangri-la, he was escaping death by narrower and narrower margins.
    "It isn't necessary for management to take a hand in the punishment of a murderer, you see. Every person on Llayless knows that if a Roger Lefory can murder in a fit of temper and escape the consequences, no person is safe. So the people of Llayless set about making an example of him. They put him through living hell, one place after another. And when he finally announced to a fellow worker that he was leaving Llayless, they gave his punishment the final twist."
    "And what was that?" Dantler demanded.
    "You've already answered your question: He disappeared. His fellow workers so frightened him that he gave up his plan to return to Pummery and leave the planet. He was afraid he wouldn't live long enough to get there. Instead, he went to hide out beyond the mountains, thus condemning himself to perpetual hell. Don't you believe for a moment that he is gleefully basking in the wilderness and chuckling about how he got away with murder. He is eating plants that make him sick and half starving because he hasn't the knack for catching birds or animals. He simply isn't the type for solitary prospecting. He wouldn't recognize paydirt if he fell in it. He desperately needs fellow workers he can shift his own share of work onto. Running back to Pummery and using the return ticket he has on file to get off the world is his kind of gambit, but he was too terrified to try it.
    "The sanctity of life is a basic law among humans everywhere. An Unnullified world doesn't need the apparatus of government and courts to punish murderers. Word of a murder circulates among workers almost instantly. The murderer's deed dogs his tracks forever after. It followed Lefory everywhere, and his fellow workers reacted accordingly. If he shows up again, Llayless's community of workers will resume where it left off. His punishment is already a legend that will deter people from murder far into the future. Do you know how many murders there have been on Llayless in its history?"
    Dantler shook his head.
    "Two," Pummery said. "One happened twenty-eight years ago. That murderer's punishment is still remembered and still a deterrent—as Lefory's punishment will be for decades to come. How many murderers do you know of on normal worlds who have been released through lack of evidence or through legal manipulations? So many you couldn't answer, I'm sure. On an Unnullified world, where the people are the law, punishment is certain—and it is perpetual. It will dog Lefory