The Sunstones of Terra

Victor Grego rubbed the sunstone on his left finger with the heel of his right palm, and watched it brighten. He noticed a boastful ring to his voice, not the suave, unepathetic tone considered proper on a message day. If anybody wondered why, when they played that tape off six months from now in Johannesburg on Terra, they could look in the cargo holds of the ship that had brought it across 500 light years of space. Everything gets of gold and platinum and gadolinium, furs and biochemicals and brandy, perfumes that defied synthetic limitation,. hardwoods no plastic could copy, spices, and the steel copper full of sunstones