Gordon Dickson - The Right to Arm Bears

“Your cousin …? I see,” said Mal. There was a long, long pause. “Very interesting.”

“Funny. That’s how Little Bite put it, when I told him,” answered the Bluffer, cat-footing confidently along the very edge of a precipice. “You Shorties sure have a habit of talking alike and saying the same things all the time. Comes of having such little heads with not much space inside for words, I suppose.”

The Magnificent Wilf

Mindspan

Hoka! Hoka! Hoka! (with Poul Anderson)

Hokas Pokas! (with Poul Anderson)

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

Spacial Delivery copyright (c) 1961 by Ace Books, Inc., Spacepaw copyright (c) 1969 by Gordon Dickson, “The Law-Twister Shorty” copyright (c) 1971 by Ben Bova. First unitary edition.

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

A Baen Book

Baen Publishing Enterprises

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Riverdale, NY 10471

www.baen.com

ISBN: 0-671-31959-0

Cover art by Richard Martin

First Baen printing, December 2000

Distributed by Simon & Schuster

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Production by Windhaven Press, Auburn, NH

Printed in the United States of America