The Quillian Sector

"You'd think they'd snap up anything connected with light and beauty," she admitted. "I made that mistake five years ago-a recording of the ice waterfalls of Brell. The sun hits them at just the right angle twice a year, and if conditions are right, the result is fantastic. All the colors ever imagined mixed in the wildest profusion. It took me two years to get it just right, and when I did, I headed straight for Phenge. They weren't interested. They liked their mist and shadows and darkness and didn't want brightness and color. I doubt if I sold more than a score of recordings. Well, a girl learns."

"We all learn." Bochner glanced at the sky. "But some of us tend to forget. You've been out here since long before dawn and it's time you had something to eat. I've ordered a meal for the two of us and it's waiting for you to enjoy it. Ready?"

She hesitated, searching the sky, then rose from her chair and shrugged.

"You're right, Leo. I'll get nothing more until sunset. No!"

She moved to prevent him lifting her equipment. "I'll manage."

A proud woman, he thought, as he followed her to the hotel. And a strong one. She carried the heavy apparatus with apparent ease. As he would carry his own if he was on a hunt, the pack on his back and the rifle at the ready, magazine loaded, sights adjusted, safety catch released-the mechanism an extension of himself as the missile it could hurl was an extension of his arm, his will.

To kill. To wait and savor the moment. To feel the godlike power cradled in his arms. To watch the target-the woman, for example. If he were about to shoot her, where would he aim? A few inches above the upper curve of her buttocks, he decided. The bullet sent to drive into the slight concavity at the base of her spine. To smash, to break, to shock, to kill. She would fall instantly, her head unmarked and suitable for mounting as a trophy.

He could visualize it set against its background of polished wood.

A small, round head, wreathed in a soft cloud of rich, brown hair. The eyes would stare from beneath slanting eyebrows, brown and sharply appraising, touched by a master hand to give them the semblance of life. The mouth would be slightly open to reveal the inner gleam of neat, white teeth, the lips themselves full and intriguing in their implied sensuality. The jut of the chin, with its shallow cleft. The slender column of the neck. The ears. The high forehead. The…

"Leo!" He blinked, instantly alert, as she called to him. "Daydreaming?"

"Thinking. Wondering how much longer we shall have to wait."

"It can't be long now." She set down her equipment and stretched as if unconscious of the way the gesture enhanced the firm thrust of her breasts. "Today, tomorrow, what does it matter?"

"It doesn't, if you're working." Bochner led the way to where a table stood beside a window, its surface loaded with glass and cutlery, china and covered dishes. As they sat, a waiter hurried forward to pour them both cups of fragrant tisane. "But what is there for me to do on Kumetat? If any game exists in the wilderness, it is small and relatively harmless. Suitable only for the training of beginners in the art of assessing the environment and location of the lair."

"And the stalk?"

He glanced at her and smiled. "The stalk! What can be better? The art of pitting your mind and strength, your skill and cunning, against another. A beast which would kill you if given the chance. A creature armed and armored by nature against which you are weak and defenseless aside from your own intelligence, the power of your mind."

"And, naturally, of your gun," she said dryly. "We must never forget the gun, must we?"

"You don't approve?"

"Of killing animals? No."

"Of hunting?"

"Of a stalk where, as you say, it is mind pitted against mind and cunning against cunning, yes. My father used to hunt when I was young and he took me with him when I was old enough to keep up. But he never carried a gun. He used a camera. It was enough to get up close and record the event. The fun, he used to say, was in the chase. The stalk. Any fool can kill."

He said blandly, "Of course. Now, may a fool offer you some refreshment? Slices of meat, cooked in a piquant sauce, and highly recommended by the chef? This compote of fruits, honey and nuts? A slice of bread coated with spiced seeds? An egg-they are worth trying. Or-" He broke off, looking at the hand she had placed on his own.

"Leo, I'm sorry."

"For calling me a fool?"

"You're not that, and we both know it. It's just that, well, a man with a gun never seems to give an animal a sporting chance. He stands back and fires and that's it, if he's any shot at all. Where's the danger?"

"For a man facing a beast which can't reach or hurt him-none," he admitted. "Such work is butchery. But to hunt a beast you must hit in exactly the right place with the single shot which is all time will allow, and first to track it to a point where it is at home and you are not-that isn't work for fools."

"Or for men?"