oss the hall.

She was a pretty girl, but Hoddan hardly noticed the fact. With so many
other things on his mind, he had no time for girls.

Thal, behind him, said in a quivering voice:

"My Lady Fani, I beg you to plead with your father for his most faithful
retainer!"

The girl looked surprisedly at him. Her eyes fell on Hoddan. She looked
interested. Hoddan, at that moment, was very nearly as disgusted and as
indignant as a man could be. He did not look romantically at her--which
to the Lady Fani, daughter of that Don Loris who was prince of this and
baron of that and so on, was news. He did not look at her at all. He
ground his teeth.

"Don't try to wheedle me, Fani!" snapped Don Loris. "I am a reasonable
man, but I indulge you too much--even to allowing you to refuse that
young imbecile Ghek, with no end of inconvenience as a result. But I
will not have you question my decision about Thal and this Hoddan
person!"

The girl said pleasantly:

"Of course not, Father. But what have they done?"

"The two of them," snapped Don Loris again, "fought twenty men today and
defeated all of them! Thal plundered them. Then thirty other men,
mounted, tried to avenge the first and they defeated them also! Thal
plundered eighteen. And all this was permissible, if unlikely. But they
did it with stun-pistols! Everybody within news range will talk of it!
They'll know that this Hoddan came to Darth to see me! They'll suspect
that I imported new weapons for political purposes! They'll guess at the
prettiest scheme I've had these twenty years!"

The girl stood still. A spearman leaned his weapon against the wall,
raced across the hall, shifted a chair to a convenient position for the
Lady Fani to sit on it, and raced back to his fellows. She sat down.

"But did they really defeat so many?" she asked, marveling. "That's
wonderful! And Thal was undoubtedly fighting in defense of someone you'd
told him to protect, as a loyal retainer should do. Wasn't he?"

"I wish," fumed her father, "that you would not throw in irrelevances! I
sent him to bring this Hoddan here this afternoon, not to massacre my
neighbors' retainers--or rather, not to not massacre them. A little
blood-letting would have done no harm, but stun-pistols--"

"He was protecting somebody he was told to protect," said Fani. "And
this other man, this--"

"Hoddan. Bron Hoddan," said her father irritably. "Yes. He was
protecting himself! Doubtless he thought he did m