The ambassador was an olive-skinned man with receding hair and a hooked nose. He wore a brown mantle with the old trim that indicated his relationship to the Borunes. He lounged rather indolently in a large cushioned chair near the window of the sunny room where he and Queen Layla were to meet. He rose as she entered and bowed with exquisite grace. "Your Highness," he murmured politely.

"My dear Count Brador," Queen Layla gushed at him, putting on her most helpless and scatterbrained expression, "please do sit down. I'm sure we know each other well enough by now to skip all these tedious formalities." She sank into a chair, fanning herself with one hand. "It's turned warm, hasn't it?"

"Summers are lovely here in Sendaria, your Highness," the count replied, settling back in his chair. "I wonder - have you had the chance to think over the proposals I gave you at our last meeting?"

Queen Layla stared at him blankly. "Which proposals were those, Count Brador?" She gave a helpless little giggle. "Please forgive me, but my mind seems to be absolutely gone these days. There are so many details. I wonder how my husband keeps them all straight."

"We were discussing the administration of the port at Camaar, your Highness," the count reminded her gently.

"We were?" The queen gave him a blank look of total incomprehension, secretly delighted at the flicker of annoyance that crossed his face. It was her best ploy. By pretending to have forgotten all previous conversations, she forced him to begin at the beginning every time they met. The count's strategy, she knew, depended upon a gradual build-up to his final proposal, and her pretended forgetfulness neatly defeated that. "Whatever led us into such a tedious subject as that?" she added.

"Surely your Highness recalls," the count protested with just the slightest hint of annoyance. "The Tolnedran merchant vessel, Star of Tol Horb, was kept standing at anchor for a week and a half in the harbor before moorage could be found for her. Every day's delay in unloading her was costing a fortune."

"Things are so hectic these days," the queen of Sendaria sighed. "It's the manpower shortage, you understand. Everybody who hasn't gone off to war is busy freighting supplies to the army. I'll send a very stern note to the port authorities about it, though. Was there anything else, Count Brador?"

Brador coughed uncomfortably. "Uh - your Highness has already forwarded just such a note," he reminded her.