"It's a double joy to behold the face of my friend and to hear his
voice," I replied in the same language. Then I switched to Confed for
the business I had in mind. Their polite forms are far too clumsy and
uncomfortable for business use; it takes half a day to get an idea
across. "It seems as though I'm always coming to you with trouble," I
began.

"What now?" Kron asked. "Every time I see you, I hope that we can relax
and enjoy our friendship, but every time you are burdened. Are you
Earthmen forever filled with troubles or does my world provoke them?" He
smiled at me.

"A little of both, I suppose," I said.

Kron hummed--the Niobian equivalent of laughter. "I've been observing
you Earthmen for the past twenty years, and I have yet to see one of you
completely relaxed. You take yourselves much too seriously. After all,
my friend, life is short at best. We should enjoy some of it. Now tell
me your troubles, and perhaps there is no cause to worry."

"You're wrong, Kron. There is plenty of cause to worry. This can affect
the well-being of everything on this world."

Kron's face sharpened into lines of interest. "Continue, friend
Lanceford."

"It's those oysters the BIT sent you a few years ago. They're getting
out of hand."

Kron hummed. "I was afraid that it--"

"--was something serious!" I finished. "That's what I told Heinz
Bergdorf when he came to me with this story. Now sober down and listen!
This _is_ serious!"

* * * * *

"It sounds pretty grim," Kron said after I had finished. "But how is it
that your people didn't foresee the danger? Something as viciously
reproductive as the oyster should be common knowledge."

"Not on our world. You see, the study of sea life is a specialized
science on Earth. It is one of the faults of our technological
civilization that almost everyone must specialize from the time he
enters secondary school. Unless one specializes in marine biology, one
generally knows little or nothing about it."

"Odd. Very odd. But then, you Earthmen always were a peculiar race. Now,
if I heard you right, I believe that you said there is an animal on your
world which preys upon these oysters. A starfish?"

"Yes."

"Won't this animal be as destructive as the oyster?"

"Bergdorf doesn't think so, and I trust his judgment."

"Won't this animal also kill our Komal? They are like these oysters of
yours in a way."

"But they burrow, and the starfish doesn't