Gavving let his legs run on while he watched the elevator descend. The mindless labor let his eyes and ears and mind run free.

There were other structures around the trunk. This level was used for industry, and here were all the men. Man's work and woman's work never seemed to intersect in London Tree, at least not for copsiks.

Sometimes children swarmed through or watched them with bright, curious eyes. Today there were none.

The citizens of London Tree must have kept copsiks for generations. They were skilled at it. They had chopped Quinn Tribe apart. Even if opportunity came to run, how would he find Minya?

Gavving, pumping steadily, watched storms move sluggishly around a tight knot on the eastern arm of the Smoke Ring. Gold was nearer than he had ever seen it, save for that eerie time when he was a child, when Gold had passed so near and everything had changed.

The jungle hovered hundreds of klomters beyond the out tuft: a harmless-looking green puffball. How are you doing Clave? Did that broken leg save your freedom? MerriL were those shrunken legs finally good for something? Or have you become copsiks among the jungle people or are you dead?

Over the past eighty-five days or so, twenty sleeps, the tree had drifted to the eastern fringes of the cloud bank. He'd been told, during the trip across the sky to London Tree, that the tree could move by itself. He had seen no evidence of it. Rain swept across them from time to time . . . surely the tree had collected enough water by now .

The elevator had settled into its slot and was releasing passengers. Gavving and the others stopped pedaling. "Navy men," Horse puffed.

"Come for the women."

Gavving said, "What?"

"Citizens live in the out tuft. When you see a boxful come down and it's all men, they're come for the women."

Gavving looked away.

"Nine sleeps," said Horse. He was in his fifties, three ce'meters shorter than Gavving, with a bald, freckled head and tremendously strong legs. He had driven the bicycles for two decades. "Forty days till we meet the women. You wouldn't believe how rancy I get thinking about it." By now Gavving was strangling the handbar. Horse saw the muscles standing out along his arms and said, "Boy, I forgot. I was never married, myself. I was born here. Failed the test when I was ten."

Gavving forced himself to speak. "Born here?"

Horse nodded. "My father was a citizen, at least mother always said so. Who ever knows?"

"Seems likely. You'd be taller if-"

"Na, na, the jungle giants' kids aren't any taller than the citizens."

So: children raised in the jungle grew taller, without tide to compress

them. "What are the tests like?"

"We're na supposed to say."

"Okay."