"Green wins again!" cried out the eel-master in a voice of anguish. "Lucky lucky green! Hands behind the screen, please, until I pay the winners! I am sorely hit! Twenty sequins for this Jadarak gentleman, who risked a mere two sequins.

Ten sequins for this green-hatted lady of the Azote Coast, who chanced a sequin on the color of her hat! ... What? No more? Is this all? I have not been struck so sorely as first I feared." The operator cleared the boards of sequins laid down upon the other colors. "A new race will now occur; arrange your bets.

Sequins must be placed squarely upon the chosen color, if you please, to avoid misunderstanding. I set no limit; bet as high as you please, up to a limit of a thousand sequins, since my total wealth and reserve is only ten thousand. Five times already I have been bankrupted; always I have climbed back from poverty to serve the gambling folk of Urmank; is this not true dedication?"' As he spoke, he gathered the eels into a basket and carried them to the upper end of the chute. He hauled on a rope which, passing over a frame, lifted the lid of the reservoir. Reith edged close and peered down into the pool of water contained within. The eel-master made no objection. "Look your fill, my man; the only mysteries here are the eels themselves. If I could read their secrets I would be a rich man today!" Within the reservoir Reith saw a baffle which defined a spiral channel originating at a center well and twisting out to the chute, with a gate to the center well which the eel-master now snapped shut. In the center well he placed the eels and closed down the lid. "You have witnessed," he called out. "The eels move at random, as free as though they traveled the depths of their native streams. They whirl, they race, they seek a ray of light; when I raise the gate all will dash forth. Which will win the race to the basin? Ah, who knows? The last winner was Green; will Green win again? Place your bets, all bets down! Aha! A grandee here wagers generously upon Gray and Mauve, ten sequins on each! What's this? A purple sequin upon Purple! Behold all! A

noblewoman of the Bashai backlands wagers a hundred value on Purple! Will she win a thousand? Only the eels know."

"I know too," Cauch muttered to Reith. "She will not win. Purple eel will loiter along the way. I predict a win for White or Pale Blue."

"Why do you say that?"

"No one has bet on Pale Blue. Only three sequins are down on White."

"True, but how do the eels know?"

"Herein, as the eel-master avers, lies the mystery."

Reith asked Zap 210: "Can you understand how the operator controls the eels to his profit?"

"I don't understand anything."

"We'll have to give this matter some thought," said Reith. "Let's watch another race. In the interests of research I'll put a sequin down upon Pale Blue."

"Are all bets made?" called out the eel-master. "Please be meticulous! Sequins overlapping two colors are reckoned to fall on the losing color. No more bets?

Very well then, please keep hands behind the screen. No more bets, please! The race is about to begin!"

Stepping to the reservoir, he pulled a lever which presumably lifted the gate in front of the spiral baffle. "The race is in progress! Eels vie for light; they cavort and wheel in their joy! Down the chute they come! Which is to win?"

The gamblers craned their necks to watch; into the basin streaked the White eel.

"Ah," groaned the operator. "How can I profit with such uncooperative eels?

Twenty sequins to this already wealthy Gray; you are a mariner, sir? And ten to this noble young slave-taker from Cape Braise. I pay, I pay; where is my profit?" He came past, flipping Reith's sequin into his tray. "So then, everyone alert for the next race."

Reith turned to Cauch with a shake of his head. "Perplexing, perplexing indeed.

We had better go on."

They wandered the bazaar until Carina 4269 went down the sky. They watched a wheel of fortune; they studied a game where the participants bought a bag of irregular colored tablets and sought to fit them together into a checkerboard; a half-dozen other games, more or less ordinary. Sunset arrived; the three went to a small restaurant near the Inn of the Lucky Mariner, where they dined upon fish in red sauce, pilgrim-pod bread, a salad of sea-greens and a great black flask of wine. "In only one phase of existence," said Cauch, "can the Thang be trusted: their cuisine, to which they are loyal. The reason for this particularity escapes me."

"It goes to demonstrate," said Reith, "that you can't judge a man by the table he sets."

Cauch asked shrewdly, "How then can a man judge his fellows? For example, what is the basis of your calculation?"

"Only one thing I know for certain," said Reith. "First thoughts are always wrong."

Cauch, sitting back, inspected Reith under quizzical eyebrows. "True, quite possibly true. For instance, you probably are not the cool desperado you appear on first meeting."

"I have been judged even more harshly," said Reith. "One of my friends declares that I seem like a man from another world."

"Odd that you should say that," remarked Cauch. "A strange rumor has recently reached Zsafathra, to the effect that all men originated on a far planet, much as the Redeemers of Yao aver, and not from a union of the sacred xyxyl bird and the sea-demon Rhadamth. Furthermore, it was told that certain folk from this far planet now wander Old Tschai, performing the most remarkable deeds: defying the Dirdir, defeating the Chasch, persuading the Wankh. A new feeling is abroad across Tschai: the sense that change is on its way. What do you think of all this?"

"I suppose the rumor is not inherently absurd," said Reith.

Zap 210 said in a subdued voice: "A planet of men: it would be more strange and wild than Tschai!"

"That of course is problematical," remarked Cauch in a voice of didactic analysis, "and no doubt irrelevant to our present case. The secrets of personality are mystifying. For instance, consider the three of us. One honest Zsafathran and two brooding vagabonds driven like leaves before the winds of fate. What prompts such desperate journeys? What is to be gained? I myself in all my lifetime have not gone so far as Cape Braise; yet I feel none the worse, a trifle dull perhaps. I look at you and ponder. The girl is frightened; the man is harsh; goals beyond her understanding propel him; he takes her where she fears to go. Still, would she go back if she could?" Cauch looked into Zap 210's face; she turned away.

Reith managed a painful grin. "Without money we won't go anywhere."

"Bah," said Cauch bluffly, "if money is all you lack, I have the remedy. Once a week, each Ivensday, combat trials are arranged. In point of fact, Otwile the champion sits yonder." He nodded toward a totally bald man almost seven feet tall, massive in the shoulders and thighs, narrow at the hips. He sat alone sipping wine, staring morosely out upon the quay. "Otwile is a great fighter," said Cauch. "He once grappled a Green Chasch buck and held his own; at least he escaped with his life."

"What are the prizes?" Reith inquired.

"The man who remains five minutes within the circle wins a hundred sequins; he is paid a further twenty sequins for each broken bone. Otwile sometimes provides a hundred-worth within the minute."

"And what if the challenger throws Otwile away?"

Cauch pursed his lips. "No prize is posted; the feat is considered impossible.

Why do you ask? Do you plan to make the trial?"

"Not I," said Reith. "I need three hundred sequins. Assume that I remained five minutes in the ring to gain a hundred sequins ... I would then need ten broken bones to earn a further two hundred."

Cauch seemed disappointed. "You have an alternative scheme?"

"My mind reverts to the eel-race. How can the operator control eleven eels from a distance of ten feet while they swim down a covered chute? It seems extraordinary."