"Anyhow," continued Voorhis, "I set down here where we saw the open spot, an' then of course we were stuck with nothin' to lift off with. It looked all right. We'd unload our goods, an' if the local crowd couldn't use them all, why they'd pass the rest on at a profit to themselves. So we come out to palaver, an' then they won't let us go back in the ship. We were just lucky my com man had sent out a landing report when it looked like we piled up, or the Space Force patrol never woulda heard of us."
"Was there any trouble?" asked Mayne. "Any unnecessary hostility?"
Voorhis considered, rubbing the back of his head thoughtfully.
"Well ... I suppose, lookin' at it their way, they coulda been a lot rougher. A couple of punches got thrown, an' one of my boys got a spear busted over his head, but mostly they acted ... well ... maybe more like cops than cannibals."
"Just enforcing the native laws, eh?"
Voorhis did not swallow that quite so graciously. He did not know or care what the local laws might be, but he thought it suspicious in the extreme that he should have plopped down exactly upon the spot chosen by the natives for a temple.
"So do they have to use my ship to hang it on?" he finished plaintively.
"The company is in agreement with you there, captain," Melin put in. "You see, Judge, our point is that nothing is really lost or seriously damaged, neither ship nor cargo. They are merely being withheld from their rightful owner, and we believe that puts the responsibility for recovery upon the Terran government. Captain Voorhis has our entire sympathy—"
"Yeah!" said Voorhis. "An' if I get my head sliced off tryin' to get at that undamaged cargo, you'll come to my funeral! I say it's a loss!"