Dane sat down.  “Could be something he ate—­”

Rip shook his head.  “He wasn’t at the feast—­remember?  And he didn’t eat anything from outside, he swore that to Tau.  In fact he didn’t go dirt much while we were down—­”

That was only too true as Dane could now recall.  And the fact that the steward had not been at the feast, had not sampled native food products, wiped out the simplest and most comforting reasons for his present collapse.

“What’s this about Frank?” Ali stood in the doorway.  “He said yesterday that he had a headache.  But now Tau has him shut off—­”

“But he wasn’t at that feast.”  Ali stopped short as the implications of that struck him.  “How’s Tang feeling?”

“Fine—­why?” The Com-tech had come up behind Kamil and was answering for himself.  “Why this interest in the state of my health?”

“Frank’s down with something—­in isolation,” Rip replied bluntly.  “Did he do anything out of the ordinary when we were off ship?”

For a long moment the other stared at Shannon and then he shook his head.  “No.  And he wasn’t dirt-side to any extent either.  So Tau’s running tests—­” He lapsed into silence.  None of them wished to put their thoughts into words.

Dane picked up the microtape he had brought with him and went on down the corridor to return it.  The panel of the cargo office was ajar and to his relief he found Van Rycke out.  He shoved the tape back in its case and pulled out the next one.  Sinbad was there, not in his own private hammock, but sprawled out on the Cargo-master’s bunk.  He watched Dane lazily, mouthing a silent mew of welcome.  For some reason since they had blasted from Sargol the cat had been lazy—­as if his adventures afield there had sapped much of his vitality.

“Why aren’t you out working?” Dane asked as he leaned over to scratch under a furry chin raised for the benefit of such a caress.  “You inspect the hold lately, boy?”

Sinbad merely blinked and after the manner of his species looked infinitely bored.  As Dane turned to go the Cargo-master came in.  He showed no surprise at Dane’s presence.  Instead he reached out and fingered the label of the tape Dane had just chosen.  After a glance at the identifying symbol he took it out of his assistant’s hand, plopped it back in its case, and stood for a moment eyeing the selection of past voyage records.  With a tongue-click of satisfaction he pulled out another and tossed it across the desk to Dane.

“See what you can make out of this tangle,” he ordered.  But Dane’s shoulders went back as if some weight had been lifted from them.  The old easiness was still lacking, but he was no longer exiled to the outer darkness of Van Rycke’s displeasure.

Holding the microtape as if it were a first grade Koros stone Dane went back to his own cabin, snapped the tape into his reader, adjusted the ear buttons and lay back on his bunk to listen.