hagiologists who know all that stuff; we'll have a couple of them
interrogate those slaves. I don't know how much they can get out of
them--lot of peasants, won't be up on the theological niceties--but a
synthesis of what we get from the lot of them--"

"That's an idea," Vall agreed. "About the first idea we've had,
here--Oh, how about politics, too? Check on who's the king, what the
stories about the royal family are, that sort of thing."

Ranthar Jard looked at the map on the wall. "The Croutha have only
gotten halfway to Nharkan, here. Say we transpose detectives in at
night on some of these time lines we think are promising, and check
up at the tax-collection offices on a big landowner north of Jhirda
named Ghromdour? That might get us something."

"Well, I don't want you to think we're trying to get out of work,
Chief's Assistant," one of the deputies said, "but is there any real
necessity for our trying to locate the Wizard Trader time lines? If
you can get them from the Esaron Sector, it'll be the same, won't it?"

"Marv, in this business you never depend on just one lead," Ranthar
Jard told him. "And beside, when Skordran Kirv's gang hits the base of
operations in North America, there's no guarantee that they may not
have time to send off a radio warning to the crowd at the base here in
India. We have to hit both places at once."

"Well, that, too," Vall said. "But the main thing is to get these
Wizard Trader camps on the Kholghoor Sector cleaned out. How are you
fixed for men and equipment, for a big raid, Jard?"