On Dara, while Calhoun journeyed placidly back to it, grain was distributed lavishly, and everybody on the planet had their cereal ration almost doubled.  It was still not a comfortable ration, but the relief was great.  There was considerable gratitude felt for Calhoun, which as usual included a lively anticipation of further favors to come.  Maril was interviewed repeatedly, as the person best able to discuss him, and she did his reputation no harm.  That was all that happened on Dara....

No.  There was something else.  A very curious thing, too.  There was a spread of mild symptoms which nobody could exactly call a disease.  They lasted only a few hours.  A person felt slightly feverish, and ran a temperature which peaked at 30.9 deg. centigrade, and drank more water than usual.  Then his temperature went back to normal and he forgot all about it.  There have always been such trivial epidemics.  They are rarely recorded, because few people think to go to a doctor.  That was the case here.

Calhoun looked ahead a little, too.  Presently the fleet of grain ships would arrive and unload and lift again for Orede, and this time they would make an infinity of slaughter among wild cattle herds, and bring back incredible quantities of fresh-slaughtered frozen beef.  Almost everybody would get to taste meat again, which would be most gratifying.

Then, the industries of Dara would labor at government-required tasks.  An astonishing amount of fissionable material would be fashioned into bombs—­a concession by Calhoun—­and plastic factories would make an astonishing number of plastic sag-suits.  And large shipments of heavy metals in ingots would be made to the planet’s capital city and there would be some guns and minor items.

Perhaps somebody could have predicted any of these items in advance, but it was unlikely that anyone did.  Nobody but Calhoun, however, would ever have put them together and hoped very urgently that things would work out.  He could see a promising total result.  In fact, in the Med Ship hurtling through space, on the fourth day of his journey, he thought of an improvement that could be made in the sum of all those happenings when they got mixed together.

He got back to Dara.  Maril came to the Med Ship.  Murgatroyd greeted her with enthusiasm.

“Something strange has happened,” said Maril, very much subdued.  “I told you that sometimes blueskin markings fade out on children, and then neither they nor their children ever have markings again.”

“Yes,” said Calhoun.  “I remember that you told me.”

“And you were reminded of a group of viruses on Tralee.  You said they only took hold of people in terribly bad physical condition, but then they could be passed on from mother to child, until sometimes they died out.”

Calhoun blinked.

“Yes?”

“Korvan,” said Maril very carefully.  “Has worked out an idea that that’s what happens to the blueskin markings on Darians.  He thinks that people almost dead of the plague could get the virus, and if they recovered from the plague pass the virus on and be blueskins.”