Stetson flicked on the switch of a recorder beside him. “O.K. You can go ahead any time.”
“Where do you want me to start?”
“First, how’d you spot right away where they’d hidden the Delphinus?”
“Easy. Tanub’s word for his people was Grazzi. Most races call themselves something meaning The People. But in his tongue that’s Ocheero. Grazzi wasn’t on the translated list. I started working on it. The most likely answer was that it had been adopted from another language, and meant enemy.”
“And that told you where the Delphinus was?”
“No. But it fitted my hunch about these Gienahns. I’d kind of felt from the first minute of meeting them that they had a culture like the Indians of ancient Terra.”
“Why?”
“They came in like a primitive raiding party. The leader dropped right onto the hood of my sled. An act of bravery, no less. Counting coup, you see?”
“I guess so.”
“Then he said he was High Path Chief. That wasn’t on the language list, either. But it was easy: Raider Chief. There’s a word in almost every language in history that means raider and derives from a word for road, path or highway.”