THE COSMIC COMPUTER

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"Sure. They offered a big reward for the pirates, dead or alive. And
there hasn't been a single case of piracy inside the city limits of
Storisende," he added solemnly.

The Calder Range had grown to a sharp blue line on the horizon ahead,
and he could see the late afternoon sun on granite peaks. Below, the
fields were bare and brown, and the woods were autumn-tinted. They had
been green with new foliage when he had last seen them, and the
wine-melon fields had been in pink blossom. Must have gotten the crop in
early, on this side of the mountains. Maybe they were still harvesting,
over in the Gordon Valley. Or maybe this gang below was going to the
wine-pressing. Now that he thought of it, he'd seen a lot of cask staves
going aboard at Storisende.

Yet there seemed to be less land under cultivation now than six years
ago. He could see squares of bracken and low brush that had been melon
fields recently, among the new forests that had grown up in the past