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Ida Mary and I still hesitated about going far from the shack. The prairie about us was so unsettled, so lacking in trees that there were practically no landmarks for the unaccustomed eye to follow. We became confused as to direction and distance. "Three miles from the buffalo waller," our locator had said. "No trouble to locate your claim."
Joe Kivelson got the square box he had brought down from the ship along with the log, fussed a little with it, and then launched it out the disposal port. It was a radio locator. Sometimes a lucky ship will get more wax than the holds' capacity; they pack it in skins and anchor it on the bottom, and drop one of those gadgets with it.
Within the locator plate the green pinpoint of light reappeared, red-ringed and suspended now against the three-dimensional immensities of the Milky Way. It stayed still a moment, began a smooth drift towards Galactic East. Gefty let his breath out carefully. He sensed Kerim's eyes on him but kept his gaze fixed on the locator plate. The green dot slowed, came to a stop.
Twenty n'liu from the clanhome, slightly over fifty kilometers, Hovan set the null-grav car down in a clearing, reached into a storage compartment in the control panel, and handed Steve the locator beacon. Tarlac clipped it to the waistband of his shorts. "Twenty days, right?" he said as he climbed out of the car. "Five or ten," Hovan said with a smile. "May Lord Sepol guard and guide you, ruhar."
This has nothing on it that isn't in my quarters and locator files." "There's billing information on the back, sir," Kirk, pointed out. "And current charge slips are kept in the envelope. We use these to prepare the subscriber bills, as well as to maintain the directory service. It's a convenience file, to speed up our work." Morely turned the envelope over in his hands. "Oh, yes."
He glanced around him with some importance, but only a laugh followed his speech. "Come, Frenchy," said an old locator, "you only say that because your little brother wanted to play with Jack like a grown man, and when Jack ordered him off the board and he became sassy, Jack scooted him outer the saloon."
Now the star map began to glide through the locator plate, carrying the fixed green dot with it. It brought the dot up to dead center point in the locator plate and stopped. Gefty slumped a little. He rubbed his hands slowly down his face and muttered a few words. Then he shook his head. "Gefty," Kerim whispered, "what is it? Where are we?" Gefty looked at her.
About noon we stopped at a deserted ranch house, surrounded by corrals a camp, our driver explained, where some stockman held his cattle overnight in driving them to market. Here we ate a lunch and the locator fed and watered the team, refilling the jars from an old well with its long wooden water troughs. There the trail ended.
But the Oklahoma Run, for all its drama and its violence, dwindled in importance beside these Drawings with their fabulous areas and their armies of people. Across the prairie came the sound of horses' hoofs and the heavy rumbling of a wagon. A locator with a hayrack full of seekers was coming at a reckless pace, not stopping for the trails.
"I've had opportunities for learning something, as prospector, locator of alluvial claims and holder of an interest in one or two comparatively prosperous companies." He leaned forward and touched Crestwick's shoulder. "Come along, Jim, and I'll give you one or two particulars that should decide you." Somewhat to his astonishment, the lad rose and rather sheepishly followed him.
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