ich meant four days of
fishing or hunting or just plain loafing. The Chief didn't care how a
man spent his time, so long as the work was done.

He thumbed his broad-brimmed hat back from his forehead and looked up at
the sky. There were a few thin clouds overhead, but there was no threat
of rain, which was good. In this part of Xedii, the spring rains
sometimes hit hard and washed out the transplanted seedlings before they
had a chance to take root properly. If rain would hold off for another
ten days, Anketam thought, then it could fall all it wanted. Meanwhile,
the irrigation reservoir was full to brimming, and that would supply all
the water the young shoots needed to keep them from being burnt by the
sun.

He lowered his eyes again, this time to look at the next section over
toward the south, where Jacovik and his crew were still working. He
could see their bent figures outlined against the horizon, just at the
brow of the slope, and he grinned to himself. He had beaten Jacovik out
again.

Anketam and Jacovik had had a friendly feud going for years, each trying
to do a better, faster job than the other. None of the other supervisors
on The Chief's land came even close to beating out Anketam or Jacovik,
so it was always between the two of them, which one came out on top.
Sometimes it was one, sometimes the other.

At the last harvest, Jacovik had been very pleased with himself when
the tallies showed that he'd beaten out Anketam by a hundred kilos of
cut leaves. But The Chief had taken him down a good bit when the report
came through that Anketam's leaves had made more money because they were
better quality.

He looked all around the horizon. From here, only Jacovik's section
could be seen, and only Jacovik's men could be seen moving.

When Anketam's gaze touched the northern horizon, his gray eyes narrowed
a little. There was a darkness there, a faint indication of cloud
build-up. He hoped it didn't mean rain. Getting the transplants in early
was all right, but it didn't count for anything if they were washed out.

He pushed the thought out of his mind. Rain or no rain, there was
nothing could be done about it except put up shelters over the rows of
plants. He'd just have to keep an eye on the northern horizon and hope
for the best. He didn't want to put up the shelters unless he absolutely
had to, because the seedlings were invariably bruised in the process and
that would cut the leaf yield way down. He rem