by Hal Clement
“It would certainly seem so. We’ll have a lot to take home — and some, I guess, we’d better not be too hasty in spreading about.” He gestured at what he meant, and the mate agreed soberly. “Nothing to keep us from playing with it now, though.” The captain went his way, and Dondragmer looked after him with a mixture of seriousness and amusement. He rather wished that Reejaaren were around; he had never liked ‘the islander, and perhaps now he would be a little less convinced that the Bree’s crew was composed exclusively of liars.
That sort of reflection was a waste of time, however. He had work to do. Pulling plates off the metal monster was less fun than being told how to do experiments, but his half of the bargain had to be fulfilled. He started up the mound, calling his watch after him.
Barlennan went on to the Bree. She was already prepared for the trip, two sailors aboard and her fire hot. The great expanse of shimmering, nearly transparent fabric amused him; like the mate, he was thinking of Reejaaren, though in this case it was of what the interpreter’s reaction would be if he saw the use to which his material was being put. Not possible to trust sewn seams, indeed! Barlennan’s own people knew a thing or two, even without friendly Flyers to tell them. He had patched sails with the stuff before they were ten thousand miles from the island where it had been obtained, and his seams had held even in front of the valley of wind.
He slipped through the opening in the rail, made sure it was secured behind him, and glanced into the fire pit, which was lined with metal foil from a condenser the Flyers had donated. All the cordage seemed sound and taut; he nodded to the crewmen. One heaped another few sticks on the glowing, flameless fire in the pit; the other released the moorings.
Gently, her forty-foot sphere of fabric bulging with hot air, the new Bree lifted from the plateau and drifted river-ward on the light breeze.
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