“I was hoping. I knew better, truly I did. But don’t try to tell me Bethya doesn’t stir you—”
“Don’t be vulgar, Bas.” Goonar leaned over his soup, the rising steam an excuse for the heat in his cheeks. “Besides, if she wants to talk to me, she knows where I am. Anyway, she’s an actress. Why would she be interested in a plain old ship captain?” Other than the reasons he didn’t want to hear.
“She’s ready to settle down, maybe.”
“I doubt it,” Goonar said. The soup lay heavy in his stomach, and he wished dinner over already. Basil went on spooning his in—his appetite hadn’t suffered.
His comunit buzzed. Goonar flicked it on. “Captain? This is Bethya—” His pulse raced. “We’re . . . um . . . finished here.” He could hear the careful phrasing. “We’re contacting agents to see about a booking . . . I know we need to get our equipment off your ship and into storage or something. Could I come talk to you about that and about settling up?”
“Don’t worry,” he said automatically. Then, with a feeling like plunging over a cliff, he said, “Actually—Basil and I are having dinner at the Captains’ Guild. Would you like to join us?”
“I don’t know if I . . . yes, Captain, I’d like that. Where is it?”
Goonar gave her directions and looked up to find Basil grinning like a boy who had just pulled the prize ring out of the barrel. “What!”
“It was Bethya, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it was Bethya, and yes, she’s coming over here to have dinner.” He signalled a waiter and explained that he had another guest coming.
“You’re grinning all over your face,” Basil observed. “Some of our competitors are going to think you just made a deal.”
“Let them,” Goonar said. His appetite had returned with a rush; he could have eaten an entire cattlelope.
Bethya arrived a few minutes later, and Goonar would have sworn every male in the place perked up. She knew it, too, he saw, and enjoyed it. But her smile was for him alone when he seated her.
“I didn’t want to call you until they were completely through,” she said. “And then Dougie started up—insisting that he knew just what we should do, and how, and when. I had to get them all back to the hotel, and call two agents, before he’d leave off.”
“That’s all right,” Goonar said. “What will you have?”
“That looks good,” she said, glancing at his plate. “Cattlelope?”
“Yes—soup to start, clear or cream—”
“Cream,” she said. “I need something soothing.”
Goonar ordered dinner for her and waited.
“Go on,” she said. “Don’t wait for me.”
“I’d rather,” he said. “It’s been one of those days, and I don’t need indigestion tonight.”
“I wanted to thank you again . . . both of you.” She looked at Basil, then back to Goonar. “I know it caused you trouble and worry, and perhaps your company will be angry—”
“It’s all right,” Goonar said.
“I’ve been trying to think how to make it work for you, make it pay—”
“Your presence, sera, was all we needed,” Basil said. He widened his eyes at her; she grinned at him.
“You are married, my fine young cockerel; don’t pretend to offer what you don’t have. And I’m talking business here. I thought, Goonar, you might want a share in the company.”
“In an acting company?”
“Yes. It wouldn’t amount to much, most likely, but we’ve talked it over, and we’re all willing to split off another share for you. We know what could have happened if you hadn’t taken us in. And if miracles happened and we had a long run in some major theater . . .”
Her soup arrived, saving Goonar the need to answer. Basil, who had not slowed down, pushed his plate aside. “Goonar, I’m going back to the ship; I’m just not comfortable with none of us aboard. My vote’s to take the share, if it comes to that.”
As transparent an excuse as any he’d seen, but he, too, thought having Basil aboard was a good idea. Goonar toyed with his vegetables, and watched Bethya covertly.
“Bethya . . . would you ever consider—” He cleared his throat. It was hopeless, why was he even trying? “Er . . . settling down?”
“Settling down? You mean in one place? Goonar, I’m talented, but not that talented.”
“No, I meant as—with a family. Live in a house on a planet, raise children.”
“Goonar, are you asking me to marry you?”
“I would if I thought it would do any good.”
She laughed, not unkindly. “Goonar, that has to be the most depressed proposal I ever got. But I don’t want to give up travel. Someday I’ll have to give up the stage, yes: as I said, I know the limits of my talent, and it won’t survive my forties. And though I’m a reasonably good manager, there’s been grumbling in my company that I’m too old to have the lead roles. Dougie thinks he could run the company as well, and Lisa is sure she’d be a better village belle.”
“She’s wrong,” Goonar said. “She looks like a village idiot and sounds like a goose with a bone in its throat.”
Bethya laughed again. “Not quite that bad, but I’ll agree she’s not as good as she thinks. Anyway, I’d like to have children. But stay in one place? No.” She gave him another of those looks that had raised his hopes. “I confess I’ve been selfish, Goonar . . . traveling on the Fortune was such fun, and I thought maybe trader captains took their wives along. I like you—we can laugh together, that’s important, and you’re honest and kind. But not even for you will I go sit in a house on a rotating mudball.”
“Some captains take their wives along,” Goonar said. “I mean, it’s not against the rules.”
“Many are fooled by glamour,” Bethya said. “But wives and husbands see behind the stage makeup.”
“I’m not in love with your stage makeup,” Goonar said. “I’m not some callow boy.”
“Then who are you in love with?” Bethya asked.
“The woman who took in a fugitive when she didn’t have a clue how she was going to get him out. The woman who sang and danced and stole my heart, while she was scheming to evade the Benignity. The woman who could act two parts and never scramble them, and who in all those weeks, doubled up in bunk space, never said a cross word. Was kind to Esmay Suiza—”
“All right, all right.” She had gone red, and as the blush faded he saw that her eyes were bright with unshed tears. “I . . . this is utterly crazy. I have had suitors—”
“I’m sure you have,” said Goonar. His heart pounded until he was sure it would fly out of his chest. Would she?
“I’m—I can’t just—” But the look on her face said she could, and suddenly she opened to him like a rose in midsummer. “All right—yes—I’ve been taken with you since I saw you sitting there beside Basil, sad and worried and tired. I told myself it was just a performer’s pride, to make you laugh, make you smile, make you . . . think . . . you wanted me. But . . . it’s ridiculous, you and me, we aren’t the lad and lass in the story.”
“That’s true,” Goonar said, pulling her to him gently and inexorably. “We’re not that lad and lass . . . but we are this man and this woman.” He buried his face in her hair. “You are so beautiful.”
Harlis arrived at the Allsystems dock area thirty minutes late.
“What happened?” asked Taylor.
“A slight inconvenience,” Harlis said, breathing hard. “Let’s go aboard and get out of here.”
“Our departure slot isn’t for another hour.”
Harlis went aboard, to find that the owner’s suite was full of duffel and four men were asleep there.
“What’s this?” he asked Taylor.
“You’re down here,” Taylor said, showing him to the smallest cabin—meant, Harlis could see, for a cook or valet or something like that. “My people need to be together.”
“But—”