The ships’ lawyers were getting together, frightening thought, mixing throughout the bar and restaurant.
Oser-Hayes figured in a number of conversations. So did the infamous lawsuit, as ship captains from both sides of the War wanted to know the progress of the action against Mazian, and as war stories and reminiscences were the bulk of the conversation.
Those, and the information someone had now let slip, that Pell and Mariner had come to terms with Union and that the old Hinder Star routes might see another rebirth via Esperance, which the local stationmaster was resisting.
The party now, with several new arrivals, outgrew the banquet room and the bar, and the talk now regarded profits that could be made on a new Earth route using Esperance as well as Mariner-Pell—except for the resistance of the Esperance administration, which was doing everything it could to hang on to a failing status quo.
The entire list of ships docked at Esperance, except Champlain , was represented in the restaurant and bar, and JR circulated along with the rest, called on to give the straight story about the lawsuit until he’d lost track of the times he’d told it, asked about the captaincy on Finity’s End and the Old Man’s health until he’d lost track of that subject, too. There was genuine concern about Captain James Robert, genuine interest in a young captain who carried the name.
“ Finity ’s best kept secret,” a woman said, shaking his hand. “Pleased to meet you.” And proceeded to introduce him to half Celestial ’s senior crew. They were no longer just the captains present. In the way of spacer gatherings, it had spread to include several ranks down.
He edged around a group of senior officers and found Wayne, who’d just gotten back from dockside. Wayne gave him a slip of paper, said it was a security matter, and that required a trip over to one of the few lights in the room to read the note.
It was from Lyra.
The item we were searching the skin for has turned up in a shop in Blue. Instructions?
Damn, he thought. He couldn’t detach Bucklin. They had a security need here as great as there was possible to have in this end of space.
But he signaled Wayne and took Wayne and the note out to the area where Bucklin and far more senior officers were standing watch.
He showed it to Bucklin, but he went on to show it to Tom R., who was in charge of security. “The hisa artifact that went missing at Mariner,” he said quietly. “We’ve found it here. Champlain crew is the juniors’ bet. No one’s taken any action. I just got this.”
“Madelaine should see this. So should the Old Man.”
It seemed a good idea. Security rated the matter as above their heads, and he tended to agree. He dismissed Wayne back to Lyra to say they were working on the problem, and wove his way back through the dimly lit room toward Madelaine.
“The artifact,” he said, “here, in a shop. Champlain , most likely.”
“Oh, that’s interesting,” Madelaine said in a predatory way. “Absolute identification?”
“I don’t know,” he had to say. “But nothing hisa belongs in any shop here.”
“Where’s Fletcher?” Madelaine asked.
“I don’t know that, either.” All of a sudden he very much wanted to know that answer, wished he’d sent Wayne after that information, and it was almost worth chasing Wayne down to make sure. But Wayne had left, almost certainly, the room was crowded, and his mission was to the Old Man himself.
“Sir.” He came up at the Old Man’s shoulder. “A word. A brief word.”
“Back in a moment.” The Old Man rose carefully, left the table and the conversation with several old acquaintances, and moved into a dark corner where, by the nature of the party, there was privacy.
“What’s the problem?” the Old Man asked
“The juniors have found the hisa artifact in a shop in Blue. I don’t know who found it, I don’t know how we know that’s the one, but that’s the initial information.”
“That’s very interesting,” the Old Man said, exactly as Madelaine had said.
“I thought you’d want to know. That’s all.”
“Keep it quiet for now. We’ll talk. Tell them on no account talk to the police.”
“Yessir,” he said “I’ll send a courier back.” One of the seniors in security, was his intention as he let the Old Man get back to his table and his conversation, but he made it no farther than the next table when Madison snagged him to know what that had been.
He shouldn’t have sent Wayne back. He should have held him to serve as a messenger… mistake he’d not have made if he’d used his head.
He went to Bucklin, who had a pocket-com. “Call Lyra. Tell her no action. None.”
“Yessir,” Bucklin said, and made the call on the instant, noise and all.
That was handled, and wouldn’t blow up. He went to Tom, the senior security chief present, and ordered a courier back to the Xanadu.
“I want to keep an eye on things,” he said. “If somehow someone saw someone and got nervous, I don’t want junior-juniors on the docks. It’s already a bad idea, just with the meeting here.”
“Yessir,” Tom said.
He shouldn’t have interfered in Bucklin’s domain without asking Bucklin what he’d done. It was a kneejerk reaction, to have given that last order, involving junior crew. He wasn’t pleased he’d done it; orders from too many levels were a guaranteed way to foul a situation up; and he went back to Bucklin and pulled him into a corner.
“I just ordered juniormost crew off the docks,” he said. “Shouldn’t have. Sorry.”
“Beat you to it an hour ago,” Bucklin said with the ghost of a smile. “Captain, sir.”
They’d watched vid, waiting for a phone call. They’d played cards, waiting for a phone call.
“They’ve got to do something,” Jeremy said. “I bet Lyra didn’t even find anybody.”
“She’ll tell them when she can get hold of them,” Fletcher said, on the last of a bad hand. “They’re talking war and peace, here. It’s not like they can break off and go chasing after an illegal art dealer.”
“Maybe we ought to put in a call to Legal,” Vince said. “Madelaine could get a warrant and get that place locked down until they search it.”
Vince had a touching faith in the law. Fletcher didn’t. But it was late to argue the point. Linda had made two stupid plays, sheer exhaustion, and was still trying. He himself was done for, with the hand he was holding.
Vince calmly did for all of them.
“ That’s where all the cards were hiding,” Linda said in disgust.
“Got you,” Vince said. “Want to play again?”
They were playing at the table in the main room of the suite. Fletcher gathered up cards. “I think it’s time to turn in. We don’t know what we’ll be into, tomorrow. We’d better get some sleep.”
There were grumbles, the evening ritual, but only halfhearted ones. Jeremy was glum, and hindmost in quitting the table.
“Jeremy,” Fletcher said, “it’s not the stick that matters. We know. We found it. If something happens, that’s bad, but it’s not the end of everything. You hear what I’m saying? Cheer up. We’ll do what we can tomorrow, and if we get it back we’ll celebrate and go to the Lagoon for supper. There’s two weeks of liberty. We’ve got time.”
“Yessir,” Jeremy said faintly, and went off to bed with Vince. Exhausted. They all were. They’d stayed up far later than usual, after a day in which they’d ricocheted all over Blue Sector, to every amusement the rules allowed, and now they were faced with repeats of the notable things to do, leaving him nothing with which to bribe the juniors into good behavior.
It was possible the rules might ease a little and let them spill over into Green, particularly if Champlain pulled out—he thought that if he were the captain of Champlain , he’d want to pull out very early, before, say, Finity’s End and Boreale finished their business; and that if he were in that unenviable position, he’d want to take a route that didn’t lay along Finity ’s route. Champlain wasn’t a big ship, by what he understood, and what it could do was probably limited.