Booce sighed. "I was guessing. I don't really know when the in branch will fall off. Jeffer, there's likely to be a shock when the branch tears loose. Stay aboard the CARM. Stay strapped in when you sleep. Leave the motor off."

"Stet. Will the rest of you be okay on the trunk?"

"As long as we keep our wings handy. Always have your wings in reach . . . always. But you should be in the CARM in case we need rescue."

The steam rocket still required attention. Booce and Carlot festooned the water tank with lines and wove a braid of lines around the bow end. "We'll moor the cabins here. Other than that ... I still don't know what we're going to use for sikenwire. There has to be some way to hold the coals in place."

Clave had a suggestion. "We could arrive crippled. Get a push from the CARM to drift the log into range, then signal for help somehow. Tell the Navy we lost our sikenwire, got home by luck."

"Mmm . . . maybe. I'd look like a fool, but maybe. I just don't want to be in too much of a hurry." He stopped abruptly. Then he said, "Ryllin and the girls, they-we were in a hurry to get back to the Admiralty. We started the rocket running before the tuft dropped off."

"What's-?"

"Did I tell you you're rich?"

"I don't know what it means," Clave said.

"That wart on the trunk is thousands of kilos of metal. With metal you can buy anything that's for sale in the Market. It also makes us a target. Someone might try to steal it."

"Good news and bad news."

"Right. We'll set up shop to sell the wood, and take our time selling the metal. No hurry."

Food had grown short again. Debby and Clave flew in along the trunk until they found a covey of flashers. With the trunk as a backstop they fired their full complement of arrows and shot half a dozen of the small birds. It took them six days.

They built a fire on the trunk to cook the birds. Logbearer's crew was ready for a feast.

Booce was the exception. He ate little. He was uncharacteristically silent, his eyes on the fire, until Carlot said, "Dad? Twenty, twenty-five days?"

"About that," Booce said. Then: "I guessed last time. I should be in the tuft watching the bugs."

"Dad, you couldn't warn us from down there anyway."

"I could start climbing ten or fifteen days early ..."

"Dad-"

"I'm glad we don't have the rocket running. We were running the rocket when it happened."

The silence stretched. Debby asked, "What happened?"

Booce told it.

Booce was fast asleep when the cabin's yielding wooden wall slammed into his face and chest. His grunt of surprise was lost among feminine shrieks. He was reaching for his wings before his eyes were fully open.