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"Land like you wouldn't believe," Eddie was enthusing. "Grazing fit for the Gods." He looked at Spring Indigo. "Like your people's country, oath-sister; tall grass to the horizon, but without the cold winters."
"My people are here," Indigo said, laying her head on Giernas’s shoulder. "But it will be good to have broad plains about me."
"And to live by the sea," Jaditwara said. "And see the stars of the southlands-something to teach my daughters."
"Next-door ranches," Sue said. "And we can afford to develop 'em in style-no living in sod huts for twenty years while we slave to pay off loans."
"Good grazing and good hunting," Eddie went on. "I can see it now, my hall-oh, all right, Jaddi, our hall-broad fields golden for the harvest, pastures, the colts kicking their heels in the morning mist."
"A base," Giernas nodded. "Home, somewhere to rest in-between times."
The snowpeaks of the Andes floated before his mind's eye, and Iguassu falls, and the Amazon, and condors wheeling over the step-pyramids of Cerro Sechin. He raised his mug.
"Drink to it-to new begi
Oh, Tom will to his parents
Jack will to his dear
Jane to loves and children-
Bob to steaks and beer!
Vicki to the dancing room
To hear the fiddles play;
'Round the world-and home again
That's the Island way.
Oh, that's the Island way.
Everywhere-and home again That's our Island way!