"The . . . silver was only for one who was worthy. One day the old dwarf died while he was using it. Three dwarves wrestled for it-"

"That sounds like too many dwarves. Rather."

It did. "I saw two myself, and I never got inside the jungle. I guess Seekers get more dwarves."

". . .Goon."

"The winner put the suit on and died. The one who lost to him put it on and died. The last one was a woman. She started to get into it, but while the-" Rather patted his skull "-this part was still open she said she heard the voice of Kendy the Checker. Nobody else could hear it. They got scared and dumped it and moved to another part of the sky."

"Sounds like the air feed went bad. What then?"

"That's when they found the Admiralty. They say one of your ships tried to rob them-"

"Nonsense."

"We say treefodder. They say you did." It might have happened in the past: Navy robbing savages-

Wayne Mickl was looking disgusted. He said, "It's possible. A ship low on provisions . . . this isn't helping.''

"Wait. You three who trade your suit off. Are you always on duty at Headquarters?"

"No, of course not. Why?"

Rather took a deep breath. "Your fourth point: of course we'll bring the suit back. Not all of us will go. You'll keep friends of mine to answer for it if the suit doesn't come back.

"Your third point: maybe it's mutiny if you lose your chance at a pressure suit that can fly without wings, especially if it belongs to the Admiralty, which was my first point, and especially if you could get three\ So let's work on your second point. Can you get the Admiralty's permission?"

"Admiral Robar Henling would rather give up his seeds. At his age it wouldn't- No. Just no."

He was getting somewhere. He had Mickl's attention. Think! "Will your, uh, triad try to track down that flying pressure suit?"

"We will. We are!"

"You can go anywhere if you think it's the right direction, stet? You're Guardians. One of you is an officer. Nobody'11 ask. Am I completely off the track?"

". . . Not yet."

"So off you go, tracking rumors of a fourth pressure suit. Maybe you find it. You close in. But there's a dwarf in it, and he sees you coming and flies away laughing. What he doesn't know is that your triad was working without a pressure suit for a while. Then it came back. Now off goes the bandit dwarf, but he's doomed, because your suit flies too and he doesn't know it!"

Mickl's grin was not quite a pleasant sight. "Were you a Teller, where you came from?"

Rather knew exactly what he meant. "Our Teller was Merril till she died. These days everyone does some telling. Captain-Guardian, I'm trying to help. I'll bring the suit back whether it works or not."