He lurched to his feet and searched the crowd for Spotwood. The crowd seemed intensely quiet during Chemin's performance. Each man had his eyes riveted to the flying hands and undulating body of the girl in the center. Koven inched his way free of the crowd, still keeping watch on the dance. He just broke from the edges as Chemin disappeared into the darkness from which she had come, and pairs of males and females, with sharp, biting cries, began again the ritual. With a throbbing in his nerves that always came when he was very close to something he worked for, Koven cut around a series of huts in time to see the girl Chemin disappear into one of them. Looking left and right, seeing no one except the crowd at the rear of the hut forming this edge of the ring, he eased out the pistol and stepped through the hangings. Chemin sat with her head resting wearily on her arms, as if the dancing had drained her last reserve of energy. The light scuff of Koven's shoes on dirt caused her to whip her head up, and he realized again how attractive she was, in spite of the perspiration filming her body and the tired haggardness of her features. "Don't make a single sound," he warned. "I'll fire." Gradually the spasmodic quivering in her throat subsided. "You are the new man here with Spotwood," she said, frightened. Koven nodded. "I came to find out how Bruschloss organized the attacks on South, through your ruler." The Hog's name washed the light of truth for a moment into her eyes, and Koven pressed on, sure. "We didn't know how the plans for attack were circulated on this continent. But you've been giving the plans, out there in the ring. That solo dance had a meaning." "Fertility ..." she began. "Oh, no. Before and after it, yes. But the women paid no attention to your solo dance. The men did. They were attentive. They were waiting for and receiving orders, weren't they? Orders your ruler had to give through a dance, because Spotwood was here, and you couldn't dare give them in a way he might understand." "You are wrong." Koven stepped forward and pressed the pistol against Chemin's breast. In the badly-lit tent he could still see the flesh of that breast harden. "Am I wrong?" A tiny tongue caressed her lips in anxiety. "What are you going to do with me?" "Do you have more to tell them?" "No, I...." "Tell the truth." The pistol muzzle ground an ugly white pit in her flesh. "Yes, I have more." "When you dance, tell the people to kill Bruschloss and his two men, immediately. Orders from your ruler. Bruschloss is a traitor, tell them." Aghast: "I could not...." "Would you rather die?" "The ruler will know...."