Tau had the floor with Mura as an efficient lieutenant.  He discussed the properties of catnip and gave information on the limited supply the Queen carried.  Then he launched into a new suggestion.

“Felines of Terra, in fact a great many other of our native mammals, have a similar affinity for this.”

Mura produced a small flask and Tau opened it, passing it to Captain Jellico and so from hand to hand about the room.  Each crewman sniffed at the strong aroma.  It was a heavier scent than that given off by the crushed catnip—­Dane was not sure he liked it.  But a moment later Sinbad streaked in from the corridor and committed the unpardonable sin of leaping to the table top just before Mura who had taken the flask from Dane.  He miaowed plaintively and clawed at the steward’s cuff.  Mura stoppered the flask and put the cat down on the floor.

“What is it?” Jellico wanted to know.

“Anisette, a liquor made from the oil of anise—­from seeds of the anise plant.  It is a stimulant, but we use it mainly as a condiment.  If it is harmless for the Salariki it ought to be a bigger bargaining point than any perfumes or spices, I-S can import.  And remember, with their unlimited capital, they can flood the market with products we can’t touch, selling at a loss if need be to cut us out.  Because their ship is not going to lift from Sargol just because she has no legal right here.”

“There’s this point,” Van Rycke added to the lecture.  “The Eysies are trading or want to trade perfumes.  But they stock only manufactured products, exotic stuff, but synthetic.”  He took from his belt pouch two tiny boxes.

Before he caught the rich scent of the paste inside them Dane had already identified each as luxury items from Casper—­chemical products which sold well and at high prices in the civilized ports of the Galaxy.  The Cargo-master turned the boxes over, exposing the symbol on their undersides—­the mark of I-S.

“These were offered to me in trade by a Salarik.  I took them, just to have proof that the Eysies are operating here.  But—­note—­they were offered to me in trade, along with two top Koros for what?  One spoonful of dried catnip leaves.  Does that suggest anything?”

Mura answered first.  “The Salariki prefer natural products to synthetic.”

“I think so.”

“D’you suppose that was Cam’s secret?” speculated Astrogator Steen Wilcox.

“If it was,” Jellico cut in, “he certainly kept it!  If we had only known this earlier—­”

They were all thinking of that, of their storage space carefully packed with useless trade goods.  Where, if they had known, the same space could have carried herbs with five or twenty-five times as much buying power.

“Maybe now that their sales’ resistance is broken, we can switch to some of the other stuff,” Tang Ya, torn away from his beloved communicators for the conference, said wistfully.  “They like color—­how about breaking out some rolls of Harlinian moth silk?”