 Why do the Altairians let Zeckler go?
He drew his carefully tailored Terran-styled jacket closer about his shoulders, shivering as his eyes avoided the black, yawning cell-holes they were passing. There was a startled gasp from within, and a skinny, gnarled little man suddenly appeared in the guard's light, like a grotesque, twisted ghost out of the blackness. Interplanetary ruling. Zeckler's face was dark with a week's beard, and his bloodshot eyes belied the cocky grin on his lips. I sent an appeal to the Terran Consulate the first day I was arrested. I mean, all they had to do was get a man over here, get the extradition papers signed, and provide transportation off the planet for me. I've got three million credits sitting in the Terran Consulate on Altair V, just waiting for me to walk in and pick them up. The Altairians are sore about it. And the Terran Consulate isn't willing to sell all the trading possibilities here down the river just to get you out of a mess. Zeckler stood up shakily. "You've committed the most heinous crime these creatures can imagine, and they're going to get you for it if it's the last thing they do. Zeckler fished in the other man's pocket, extracted a cigarette, and lighted it with trembling fingers. I'm here to keep you from botching things up still worse for the Trading Commission, that's all. They spread out from Terra with the first wave of exploration—the slick, fast-talking con-men who could work new territories unfettered by the legal restrictions that soon closed down the more established planets. The first men in were the richest out, and through some curious quirk of the Terrestrial mind, they knew they could count on Terran protection, however crooked and underhand their methods. Altair I had been recognized at once by the Trading Commission as a commercial prize of tremendous value, but early reports had warned of the danger of wildcat trading on the little, musty, jungle-like planet with its shaggy, three-eyed inhabitants—warned specifically against the confidence tactics so frequently used—but there was always somebody, Meyerhoff reflected sourly, who just didn't get the word. "If you hadn't been so greedy, you'd have found out what a chunk of land was to these natives before you started peddling it. You'd have found out that they're marsupials, and that two out of five of them get thrown out of their mother's pouch before they're old enough to survive.
 They let Zeckler go because he is the best liar.
 They let Zeckler go because he did not murder any Altairians.  They let Zeckler go because he is the best liar.  They let Zeckler go because Altairian law doesn't apply to Earthmen.  They let Zeckler go because he converted to the religion of the Altairian Goddess.