Vall shook his head. "That's over my echelon," he said. "Have to be
decided by the Paratime Commission. I doubt if your company'll suffer.
You bought them innocently, in conformity with local custom. Ever buy
slaves from this Coru-hin-Irigod before?"

"I'm new, here. The man I'm replacing broke his neck when his horse
put a foot in a gopher hole about two ten-days ago."

Beside him, Vall could see Dalla nod as though making a mental note.
When she got back to Home Time Line, she'd put a crew of mediums to
work trying to contact the discarnate former plantation manager; at
Rhogom Institute, she had been working on the problem of return of a
discarnate personality from outtime.

"A few times," Skordran Kirv said. "Nothing suspicious; all local
stuff. We questioned Coru-hin-Irigod pretty closely on that point, and
he says that this is the first time he ever brought a batch of
Nebu-hin-Abenoz's outlanders this far west."

* * * * *

The interrogations were being conducted inside the plantation house,
in the secret central rooms where the paratimers lived. Skordran Kirv
used a door-activator to slide open a hidden door.

"I suppose I don't have to warn either of you that any positive
statement made in the hearing of a narco-hypnotized subject--" he
began.