ng, can't you?" Anketam asked.

"Oh, I wouldn't want to put you to all that trouble. I have to be up to
your Chief's house before sunrise."

"We get up before sunrise," Anketam said flatly. "You can stay for
breakfast."

II

The spring planting did well. The rains didn't come until after the
seedlings had taken root and anchored themselves well into the soil, and
the rows showed no signs of heavy bruising. Anketam had been watching
one section in particular, where young Basom had planted. Basom had a
tendency to do a sloppy job, and if it had showed up as bruised or
poorly planted seedlings, Anketam would have seen to it that Basom got
what was coming to him.

But the section looked as good as anyone else's, so Anketam said nothing
to Basom.

Russat had come back after twenty days and reported that there was an
awful lot of fuss in Chromdin, but nothing was really developing. Then
he had gone on back home.

As spring became summer, Anketam pushed the war out of his mind.
Evidently, there wasn't going to be any real shooting. Except that two
of The Chief's sons had gone off to join the Army, things remained the
same as always. Life went on as it had.

The summer was hot and almost windless. Work became all but impossible,
except during the early morning and late afternoon. Fortunately, there
wasn't much that had to be done. At this stage of their growth, the
plants pretty much took care of themselves.

Anketam spent most of his time fishing. He and Jacovik and some of the
others would go down to the river and sit under the shade trees, out of
the sun, and dangle their lines in the water. It really didn't matter if
they caught much or not; the purpose of fishing was to loaf and get away
from the heat, not to catch fish. Even so, they always managed to bring
home enough for a good meal at the end of the day.

The day that the war intruded on Anketam's consciousness again had
started off just like any other day. Anketam got his fishing gear
together, including a lunch that Memi had packed for him, and gone over
to pick up Blejjo.

Blejjo was the oldest man in the village. Some said he was over a
hundred, but Blejjo himself only admitted to eighty. He'd been retired a
long time back, and his only duties now were little odd jobs that were
easy enough, even for an old man. Not that there was anything feeble
about old Blejjo; he still looked and acted spry enough.

He was sitting on his front porch, talking to