Eye for an eye

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Walter Dudley and his wife paused at the top of the ramp for their first glimpse of the independent world of Maylor. The bleak landscape stretched unbroken to the taut line of the horizon.

"It doesn't look very interesting," Dudley observed.

Eleanor Dudley was more emphatic. "It stinks."

"Maybe it'll be better in town," Dudley said, though he knew it wouldn't. One could not expect to find much of the tinsel of civilization on a world that was, admittedly, the last refuge of the failure.

A noisy, vilely malodorous groundcar arrived in a choking swirl of dust and fumes, and they climbed aboard with their hand luggage. Minutes later, bounced and jolted to the verge of nausea, they were deposited at the diminutive passenger terminal.

Hamal Bakr, the Galactic Insurance Company's temporary resident manager, was waiting for them. Dudley disliked him at sight. Not only was he tall and handsome, but his casual afternoon robe displayed his trim figure with the effectiveness of a military uniform. Dudley had met his type before - met it frequently, and always to his profound regret. Bakr would be the darling of his sector manager, and even his infrequent failures would count more than other men's successes.

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