"Do you think I care about danger? Or are you afraid I'll turn--foolhardy?" "Not exactly. It's not a physical danger, Jason. It's an emotional--or rather an intellectual danger." "Hell, don't you know any language but that psycho double-talk?" "Let me finish, Jason. Jay Allison may have been repressed, overcontrolled, but you are seriously impulsive. You lack a balance-wheel, if I could put it that way. And if you run too many risks, your buried alter-ego may come to the surface and take over in sheer self-preservation." "In other words," I said, laughing loudly, "if I scare that Allison stuffed-shirt he may start stirring in his grave?" Forth coughed and smothered a laugh and said that was one way of putting it. I clapped him reassuringly on the shoulder and said, "Forget it, sir. I promise to be godly, sober and industrious--but is there any law against enjoying what I'm doing?" Somebody burst out of the warehouse-palace place, and shouted at me. "Jason? The guide is here," and I stood up, giving Forth a final grin. "Don't you worry. Jay Allison's good riddance," I said, and went back to meet the other guide they had chosen. And I almost backed out when I saw the guide. For the guide was a woman. She was small for a Darkovan girl, and narrowly built, the sort of body that could have been called boyish or coltish but certainly not, at first glance, feminine. Close-cut curls, blue-black and wispy, cast the faintest of shadows over a squarish sunburnt face, and her eyes were so thickly rimmed with heavy dark lashes that I could not guess their color. Her nose was snubbed and might have looked whimsical and was instead oddly arrogant. Her mouth was wide, and her chin round, and altogether I dismissed her as not at all a pretty woman. She held up her palm and said rather sullenly, "Kyla-Raineach, free Amazon, licensed guide." I acknowledged the gesture with a nod, scowling. The guild of free Amazons entered virtually every masculine field, but that of mountain guide seemed somewhat bizarre even for an Amazon. She seemed wiry and agile enough, her body, under the heavy blanket-like clothing, almost as lean of hip and flat of breast as my own; only the slender long legs were unequivocally feminine. The other men were checking and loading supplies; I noted from the corner of my eye that Regis Hastur was taking his turn heaving bundles with the rest. I sat down on some still-undisturbed sacks, and motioned her to sit. "You've had trail experience? We're going into the Hellers through Dammerung, and that's rough going even for professionals." * * * * * She said in a flat expressionless voice, "I was with the Terran Mapping expedition to the South Polar ridge last year." "Ever been in the Hellers? If anything happened to me, could you lead the expedition safely back to Carthon?" She looked down at her stubby fingers. "I'm sure I could," she said finally, and started to rise. "Is that all?"