His escort looked at him, opened his mouth, and showed Grant he was tongueless. He positioned Grant on the square and a moment later Grant was back on the sidewalk. Discouragement was on him like a great weight. It deadened him. It smothered him. He paced the streets and eventually found himself before a restaurant. He remembered then that he had not eaten for a long time. He went in and ordered oysters. That was about the only meat you could buy in The Pass and be sure of not eating some sentient being. Then, waiting, he sat in a booth with his head between his hands. It was apparent they didn't want him to have any part of his stones--the stones he had spent six months and risked his life for--the stones that meant so much to him and to Beth. They wanted all of his stones. The dirty Shylocks. They weren't willing to take half, or two-thirds, or three-fourths. They wanted all. They weren't willing for him to have any part of them. He would have settled for ten per cent, which would have been over fifty thousand dollars, but they didn't offer him ten per cent. They offered nothing. They wanted all. Netse must have been contacted by Relegar and told to keep hands off. That was why Grant had wanted to see Netse first. But he had not dreamed that Netse would refuse him entirely. He had thought it would be merely a matter of the price. Now what could he do? He didn't dare let the constrictor have more than three day's head-start, for the saurian would finish digesting the fish in about five days. That meant Grant would have to start back to the swamp tomorrow. But Relegar's spies would report every move. The minute he set out, Relegar would be notified. And Relegar would come after him. Grant shuddered. Where his hands touched his face his finger tips were cold. Relegar would find him. The spider had a locator sense that was infallible. He could set out days later and find Grant unerringly. And how could one fight the Uranian when they met? Relegar's nervous system was so constructed that he was practically impossible to kill. You could boil him or freeze him without injuring him. Uranians had been boiled alive in prussic acid for forty hours without ill effects. You could cut off legs and even sever the head and they would still live. So what could a man do? There was only one thing Grant knew. That was to go after the stones. They were his and he would never give them up. They might take the stones away from him, but he would never give them up. So the next morning he overhauled his suit and patched it. He got fresh oxygen and bought a meager supply of food. He had one more good meal and started out south again with the single stone in his watch-pocket.