"Well, you won't get him," Garth growled, pillowing his head on his arms. "This joint smells already, but you make it worse. Beat it."
He did not see Captain Brown slip Tolomo a folded credit-current. The trader deftly pocketed the money, nodded, and gripped Garth by the hair, lifting his head. The bluish, inhuman face was thrust into the Earthman's.
"Listen to me, Garth," Tolomo said, fairly spitting the words. "I let you come in here and get drunk all the time on the cuff. You pay me a little, not much, whenever you gather enough alka-roots to sell. But you owe plenty. People ask me why I let a bum like you come to my Moonflower-Ritz Bar—"
"That's a laugh," Garth mouthed. "A ramshackle plastic flophouse full of cockroaches and bad liquor. Moonflower-Ritz, hogwash!"
"Shut up," Tolomo snapped. "I let you run up a bill here when nobody else would. Now you take this job and pay me or I have the marshal put you in jail. At hard labor, in the swamps."
Garth called Tolomo something unprintable. "Okay," he groaned. "You win, louse. You know damn well no Earthman can stand swampwork, even with bog-shoes. Now let go of my hair before I smash your teeth in."
"You do it? You guide these people?"
"I said I would, didn't I?" Garth reached fumblingly for the bottle before him. Someone thrust a filled glass into his hand. He gulped the fiery purplish liquor, shuddered, and blew out his breath.
"Okay," he said. "Welcome to Ganymede, the pleasure spot of the System. The worst climate outside Hell, the only world almost completely unexplored, and the nicest place for going to the dogs I've ever seen. The Chamber of Commerce greets you. Here's the representative." He pointed to a six-legged lizard with the face of a gargoyle that scuttled over the table and leaped into the shadows where the light of the radio-lamp did not reach.
Captain Brown said, "I can offer you fifty dollars to guide us to the ruined city—Chahnn. And, maybe, I can offer you ten thousand bucks to do another little job for us."