Blake nodded. "And you?"
She laughed. "I am here because I live here," she said.
He tried to assimilate the information, but could not. Perceiving his difficulty, the girl went on, "My parents indentured themselves to the Great Starway Cartel and were assigned to the rubber plantations of Dubhe 4. They died of yellow-water dysentery before their indenture ran out, and in accordance with Interstellar Law I was auctioned off along with the rest of their possessions. Eldoria bought me."
Five years as a roving psycheye had hardened Blake to commercial colonization practices; nevertheless, he found the present example of man's inhumanity to man sickening.
"How old are you?" Blake asked.
"Fourteen."
"And what are you going to be when you grow up?"
"Probably I shall be a psychiatrist. Eldoria is sending me to the mission school now, and afterward she is going to put me through an institute of higher learning. And when I come of age, she is going to give me my freedom."
"I see," Blake said. He indicated the book on her lap. "Homework?"
She shook her head. "In addition to my courses at the mission school, I am studying the humanities."