“Chee!” said Murgatroyd.

The heavy voice boomed.  “You there!  This is a human-occupied world!  If you come in peace, cut your drive and let our guard ship approach!”

Murgatroyd replied in an interested but doubtful tone.  The booming voice bellowed.  Another voice of higher authority took over.  Murgatroyd was entranced that so many people wanted to talk to him.  He made what for him was practically an oration.  The last voice spoke persuasively and suavely.

“Chee-chee-chee-chee,” said Murgatroyd.

One of the grain ships flickered and ceased to be.  It had gone into overdrive.  Another.  And another.  Suddenly they began to flick out of sight by twos and threes.

“Chee,” said Murgatroyd with a note of finality.

The last grain ship vanished.

“Calling guard ship,” said Calhoun dryly.  “This is Med Ship Aesclipus Twenty.  I called here a couple of weeks ago.  You’ve been talking to my tormal, Murgatroyd.”

A pause.  A blank pause.  Then profanity of deep and savage intemperance.

“I’ve been on Dara,” said Calhoun.

Dead silence fell.

“There’s a famine there,” said Calhoun deliberately.  “So the grain ships you’ve had in orbit have been taken away by men from Dara—­blueskins if you like—­to feed themselves and their families.  They’ve been dying of hunger and they don’t like it.”

There was a single burst of the unprintable.  Then the formerly suave voice said waspishly, “Well?  The Med Service will hear of your interference!”

“Yes,” said Calhoun.  “I’ll report it myself.  I have a message for you.  Dara is ready to pay for every ounce of grain and for the ships it was stored in.  They’ll pay in heavy metals—­irridium, uranium, that sort of thing.”

The suave voice fairly curdled.

“As if we’d allow anything that was ever on Dara to touch ground here!”

“Ah!  But there can be sterilization.  To begin with metals, uranium melts at 1150 deg. centigrade, and tungsten at 3370 deg. and irridium at 2350 deg..  You could load such things and melt them down in space and then tow them home.  And you can actually sterilize a lot of other useful materials!”

The suave voice was infuriated:  “I’ll report this!  You’ll suffer for this!”

Calhoun said pleasantly, “I’m sure that what I say is being recorded, so that I’ll add that it’s perfectly practical for Wealdians to land on Dara, take whatever property they think wise—­to pay for damage done by blueskins, of course—­and get back to Wealdian ships with absolutely no danger of carrying contagion.  If you’ll make sure the recording’s clear....”

He described, clearly and specifically, exactly how a man could be outfitted to walk into any area of any conceivable contagion, do whatever seemed necessary in the way of looting—­but Calhoun did not use the word—­and then return to his fellows with no risk whatever of bringing back infection.  He gave exact details.