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."
They arrived and seemed still to be in public. But they squatted down opposite two Losians while a third crouched nearby. The screen between them was the size of a kerchief; Thorby could see over it. Thorby tried to look, listen, and learn, but the traffic never let up. It shot around and cut between them, with happy, shrill racket.
Their host started by accusing Captain Krausa of having lured him into a misdeed. The interpreter was almost impossible to understand, but he showed surprising command of scurrilous Interlingua. Thorby could not believe his ears and expected that Father would either walk out, or start trouble.
But Captain Krausa listened quietly, then answered with real poetry -- he accused the Losian of every crime from barratry to mopery and dopery in the spaceways.
This put the meeting on a friendly footing. The Losian made them a present of the thorium he had already paid, then offered to throw in his sons and everything he possessed.
Captain Krausa accepted and gave away Sisu, with all contents.
Both parties generously gave back the gifts. They ended at status quo, each to retain as a symbol of friendship what each now had: the Losian many hundredweight of verga leaf, the Trader slugs of thorium. Both agreed that the gifts were worthless but valuable for reasons of sentiment. In a burst of emotion the Losian gave away his son and Krausa made him (her) a present of Thorby
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