sergeant

the flesh and seek the spirit—and you may have no religious beliefs. But if we have been chosen to work out some purpose here, it is up to us to prove worthy of being so selected!”
“I agree,” Kartr returned shortly but he knew that the other recognized his sincerity.
The Zacathan nodded. “Fine, fine. I am going to ­enjoy my declining years. And to think I have been given this just when I thought that life was totally devoid of excite­ment. My dear”—he raised his voice to address Zacita—“the aroma of that stew is delightful. My hunger increases with every step I draw nearer to the fire!”
But Kartr spooned up the soup mechanically. It was very well for Zicti to paint the future in such bold strokes. A hist-techneer by his training was always taught to look at the whole situation, not to study details. Now ranger instruction worked in just the opposite fashion, it was the small details which mattered most, the careful study of a new planet, the long hours of patient spying upon strange peoples or animals, the rebuilding by speculation from a few bricks of a whole vanished civilization. And here and now they were faced with a detail which he and he alone must handle.
He must render Cummi harmless!
That was the thought which had held over from sleep that morning, had been part of his dreams, and was now crystallized into a driving urge. Living or dead—he must and would find the Ageratan. If Joyd Cummi were still alive he was a menace to all of them.
Odd—Kartr shook his head as if to clear it—he was so haunted by that thought. Cummi was a danger, and Cummi was his business. Luckily the Ageratan was no trained explorer-woodsman, he must leave a trail so plain it would be child’s play for a ranger to follow. They had been together when they left the city. Somewhere that night they had parted company. Had Cummi pushed him off the sled in the dark, intending the fall to kill him? If that were so it would be a much more difficult task to locate the Ageratan—he would leave no footprints on clouds. The thing for Kartr to do was to return to that ledge where he had first gained consciousness.
“That’s ten—maybe fifteen miles north—”
The sergeant started to hear the words come from Zinga’s thin lips—picked out of his own thoughts.
“And—Kartr—you do not go alone, not on that trail!”
He stiffened. But Zinga must know his protest without his putting it into words.
“That job is mine,” the sergeant returned, his teeth set hard.
“Granted. But still I say you