Once it was completed, however, there was no way an Acruxian could withdraw from a duel; until it was over there were a number of proscribed emergencies which would permit him to honorably quit the field.

Manning knew he had no more than about two and a half minutes in which to act—and he'd really be out of luck if his guess was wrong. Manning began a peculiar dancing motion of his own and suppressed a grin as he caught sight of the announcer's face in the emergency booth. Manning was doing a rough imitation of an ancient Terran tribal dance he had once seen on an ancestor-film. He knew that the announcer had been gaily explaining the ceremonial dance of the Acruxian, but was being completely baffled by the prancing of his fellow Terran.

He saw Dtilla glance curiously at him once, but that was all from him. Manning had gambled on the chance that the Acruxian had never before duelled a Terran and so would be willing to believe that they too had ceremonial dances.

As he danced around, drawing ever nearer to the box on the ground, Manning Draco unfastened the opening of his hand-pack and took from it the fresh-sealed flowers. He broke the seal and began to strew the flowers around. Seemingly by accident, when he'd finished, the flowers formed a circle around the box that belonged to the Acruxian.

Manning removed the second package, broke the seal and threw it on the ground near the flowers. As it struck the ground, the canister split into two sections.

At that moment, Manning motioned to those in the booth and a super-spot was thrown on the circle of flowers as one of the overhead cameras swung in for a close-up. It was just in time to catch the sight of a number of tiny objects rising swiftly from the two halves of the canister. They hovered there a moment, then spread out and approached the flowers. The microphones picked up the steady buzzing sound.

Manning Draco cast aside the hand-pack as he moved backward. Then he drew the tri-blast and waited.

Although no one in the Arena, or among the billions viewing it at home, knew what was happening, a tense hush fell over them. There was such an air of suspense that the Acruxian felt it and faltered in his dance.

So slowly that at first no one believed it was happening the top half of the big box in the center of the flowers began swinging upward. The first one who was sure of what he saw was the Acruxian.

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