Yon lay back again, a smile beneath his beard. "Good. Take the boat, then."
Hale strode out. Caryl held the door open for him. She kept her head bowed and didn't look at him, but there was the faintest trace of a smile on her lips. Hale ignored her.
The trip across the channel, even with a good breeze, took nearly half a day because of the adverse currents. Hale spent the time thinking.
The IHC ship evidently still had plenty of power, even after twelve years, if they could blow a fishing smack out of the water. It took power to use a space gun in an atmosphere.
But why did they want to keep the people of Cardigan's Green away? Surely they weren't afraid of a raid—or were they? There must be some way to contact them, or Yon the Fisher could not have made the offer that Hale had so cavalierly accepted.
Two of the crew developed the sniffles on the trip, and Hale, with great magnanimity, dosed them for free.
At last, the Island loomed out of the sea. It was a continuation of the mainland mountains, and looked it.
The Peniyan Range, half a million or so years ago, was a solid chain, connecting the offshore island with the mainland. Indeed, what is now the Island was once merely the tip of the old Peniyan Peninsula. But, between earthquake and sea action, a lower section vanished beneath the sea, leaving the jagged cliffs of the Island.
There is only one decent landing place, a beach near the flat plateau of the Island's top. All the rest of the perimeter is composed of sheer cliffs that drop straight into the surf. The lower cliffs at the southern end of the Island have since been blasted away to make a harbor, but at that time only the small beach afforded an approach.