'About the pilgrims…

'Nothing doing. First you talk of Gutshot, then I'll talk of gnomes and popes and pilgrims.

'It's simply told, said Tennyson. 'Gutshot, as you may know, is a feudal planet. A lot of nasty little fiefs headed by crews of dirty people — some of them human, but a lot of them not. I was court physician to the margrave of Daventry. Human, as you may have guessed. A human doctor trained in human medicine would be of little use to aliens. It was not the job I would have picked, but at the time I considered myself lucky to get it. A young physician fresh out of medical school ordinarily finds it hard to get started in his profession unless he has some money. I had no money, of course, and there didn't seem to be too many clinics that were looking around for fresh new talent; besides, it costs a fortune to set up a practice of your own, after which you'd sit around for several years, slowly starving, until people began coming to you. Once the initial shock of Gutshot wore off, I became somewhat accustomed to it. Like you can grow accustomed, after a time, to an aching tooth. So I stayed on. The fees were good. In fact, to me, they seemed princely. The margrave was not a bad guy. Not good, but not bad either. We got along together. Then the bastard up and died on me. Nothing wrong with him. Just tipped over. Heart attack, I'd guess, although there hadn't been any indication he was heading for one. I didn't really have a chance to determine cause of death and-

'But no one could blame you. It was not your —

'What you can't comprehend, he said, 'is the kind of politics there are in any feudal setup. A pack of wolves held in restraint by one man. Loose the leash and they're at one another's throats. I'd not consciously been involved in any politics, but I had sort of been the margrave's lieutenant and advisor, unofficially of course, so considerable resentment was aimed at me.