He read it with his cheeks whitening:

Bring ten thousand League credits in unmarked bills tomorrow night at 0100 hours to that island in the Mortha River lying one hundred and three kilometers due south-southwest of your country house. Do not tell police or make any attempt to use tracer beams or otherwise trail us, or you will not see your child again.

The Zordoch of the Branna Kai was dead, and over the whole planet Cromman and such other planets of the system as had been colonized, there was mourning; for the hereditary chief of the most powerful of the clans had been well loved.

Duwan stood at the window and looked out over the great estate of his fathers. Torches bobbed through the dusk, a long ceremonial procession approached the castle with the slowness of ancient ritual. The weird skirl of pipes and the rolling thunder of drums rose in the evening, breaking in a surf of sound against the high stone walls, surf that sent its broken spindrift up to the ears of Duiwan. He savored the sound, hungrily.

The Zordoch of the Branna Kai was dead; and the chiefs of the clans were coming with their immemorial ceremonies to give the crown to his eldest son.

A slave entered, genuflecting before the tall arrogant figure, purple-robed and turbaned, that stood before the window. “Your pardon, lord,” he said fearfully, “but a stranger desires admittance.”

“Eh?” Duwan scowled. The castle was closed to all but the slowly approaching chiefs. The old rituals were not to be disturbed nor did Duwan wish distraction in his greatest of hours. He snarled his gathering anger: “I’ll have the warders’ heads for this.”

“Sire,” mumbled the slave “he did not come in by the gates. He landed on the roof in an airship. He is not of Cromman, but from some strange world—”

“Hm-m-m?” Duwan pricked up his ears, and an ominous tingle ran along his spine. He could not imagine a Galactic having much interest in as newly discovered and backward a system as this. Later, of course, after a progressive had held the Zordochy for a few years—but now—“Send him in.”

The stranger came so quickly that Duwan suspected he had been on the way while the slave went ahead to get permission. The Crommanite recognized him as terrestrial, though he did not have the look of a Solarian—probably some colonist. What was more to the point, he wore the blue uniform of the League Patrol.

The human bowed formally. “Your pardon,” he said, “but I am on an urgent mission.” He glanced out the window at the approaching torches. “In fact, I am almost too late.”

“That is true,” replied Duwan coldly. “I must ask you to leave before the chiefs reach the castle’s gates.”

“My business can be accomplished in less time. I am, as you see, a representative of the Patrol—here are my credentials, if you wish to see them.”

Duwan barely glanced at the papers. “I am familiar with the like,” he said. “After all, Cromman has been in the League for almost a century now, though we have had little outside contact.” He felt, somehow, irritated at the compulsion, that he must explain the fact: “When we were introduced to spaceships and the like, we naturally wished to develop our own planet and its sisters first before venturing into other worlds. Also, most of the Zordochs were conservatives. But a newer generation of leaders is arising—I myself, as you see, am about to become head of the most influential clan—and we will see some changes now.”