the body to the ground. He looked up coldly at
the ring of faces and said, "One of the Hirlaji did that with his hands.
That's all--just his hands."

For a moment everyone was still ... and then one of the men broke from
the crowd, snarling, with a heavy knife in his hand. He stopped just
outside the white circle of the handlight, the knife extended before
him. Rynason raised the disintegrator and trained it on him, his face
frozen into a cold mask.

The man stood in indecision.

And from the crowd behind him another figure stepped forward. It was
Malhomme, and his lips were drawn back in disgust. He struck with an
open hand, the side of his palm catching the man's neck beneath his ear.
The man fell sprawling to the ground, and lay still.

Malhomme looked at him for a moment, then he turned to the men behind
him. "That's enough!" he shouted. "_Enough!_" Angrily, he looked down at
the crumpled form of Manning's body. "Bury him!" he said.

There was still no movement from the men; Malhomme grabbed two of them
roughly and shoved them out of the crowd. They hesitated, looking
quickly from Malhomme to the disintegrator in Rynason's hand, then bent
to pick up the body.

"It's a measure of man's eternal mercy," said Malhomme acidly, "that at
least we bury each other." He stared at the men in the mob, and the fury
in his eyes broke them at last. Muttering, shrugging, shaking their
heads, they dispersed, going off in two and threes to take cover from
the wind-driven sand.

Malhomme turned to Rynason and Mara, his face relaxing at last. The hard
lines around his mouth softened into a rueful smile as he put his arm
around Rynason's shoulder. "We can all take shelter in the buildings
here for the night. You could use some rest, Lee Rynason--you look like
hell. And maybe I can put a temporary splint on your arm, woman."

They found a nearby building where the roof had long ago fallen in, but
the walls were still standing. While Malhomme ministered to Mara he did
not stop talking for a moment; Rynason couldn't tell whether he was
trying to keep the girl's mind off the pain or whether he was simply
unwinding his emotions.

"You know, I've preached at these men for so many years I've got
callouses in my throat. And one of these days maybe they'll know what
I'm talking about, so that I won't have to shout." He shrugged. "Well,
it would be a dull world, where I didn't have a good excuse to shout.
Sometimes you might ask your a