Bridget ban greeted this announcement with astonished silence. She could not imagine this…elf containing a single manly impulse. One surge of testosterone and the vessel would shatter. For that matter, anything genuinely feminine would whistle through her as through an empty reed. Those who try to do two things at once, she decided, would seldom do either very well.
Foreganger or Jehovah? She could simply guess, but Jehovah was ten days’ journey and Foreganger closer to twenty. Better an extra day on Peacock to make certain, even if that meant snuggling with Pulawayo. Yet, what guarantee did she have that, even after the bribe, Pulawayo would cooperate? She could imagine an entire series of such delays—always immanently cooperative, never overtly a refusal—until finally a well-doctored set of records would be handed over with great fanfare, cooperative exclamations, and calculated deception.
She wondered if they thought they could doctor the records well enough to deceive a Hound. There were rumors that captains carrying illicit cargoes could “launder” their transits through Peacock Junction, and could drop off radar screens when the need arose. A Hound’s matter, if true, though not to her present purpose; but Peacock might well fear otherwise.
And so the Hound found herself at liberty until evening. The day was one of brilliant clarity. Polychromopolis, the planetary capital, lay in the monsoon belt and the dry season had just begun. The temperature was hot—at or above body temperature, and fans and parasols were common along the streets. Above, in a cloudless sky, a few high white streamers marked the tracks of jetliners and ballistic leapers headed for the antipodes. Below, the recently ended rains had painted the landscape in moist pastels. Flowers of brilliant yellow and orange and red lined the pedestrian walkways beneath the shade of broad, leafy trees. Some of the blossoms would have been known on Old Earth—assuming the origin myths were really true—but others were artifacts unknown to nature: exotic races of palm and orchid and rose and deodar, bearing those ancient names only through courtesy and the contribution of a few ancestral genes.
Passing her on the Embarcadero—the slidewalk from the Port into the main shopping district—were folk from all over the Spiral Arm. She saw pale, squat Jugurthans with their startlingly wide and out-turned noses; Chettinads in tartan kilts and turbans. There were sour-faced, girdled Jehovans muttering over their prayer beads; and gaudy trade-captains from the Greater Hanse whose jewels and rings and robes glittered in the late-morning sunlight. She heard the hooting accents of Alabaster, the flat twang of Megranome, and the nearly incomprehensible jibber-jabber of Terran pack peddlers. Peacock wasn’t a great interchange like Jehovah, but many travelers stopped here for pleasure and relaxation. It was the preferred vacation spot for this region of the Arm.
She noticed how heads turned and eyes flickered in her direction. A Hound? Here? Why? It was the uniform, of course. The concept of a uniform was alien to ’Cockers, perhaps a little perverted. Pulawayo had asked her to wear the uniform tonight.
She stepped onto the Esplanade, a lateral slidewalk traversing the main Portside shopping district known as Rodyadarava. She had no eye for the clothing stores—the Rift would fill with stars before she would prance about in the topless srong that the elves of Peacock favored; and judging by a pair of Jugurthan women passing by, a few sagging tourists might have profited by adopting the same attitude. But a tea shop at the corner of Kairthnashrad caught her eye, and she entered on a whim to seek refuge from the heat.
Inside, she encountered a medley of odors: a hint of vanilla, a suggestion of roses, the unmistakable aroma of Abyalonic holdenblum. On the far wall of the shop, a rack of bins was filled with teas of various colors: blacks and duns and ochres, but also more exotic shades that nature had never intended.
What, she thought in a mood approaching panic, if I only want a cup of tea?
Small round tables had been set up around the shop and on the little plaza outside. Some were at sitting level; others were tall and people stood at them, drinking and chatting. At this time of day, about half the tables were occupied by a mix of sixty-forty, locals to tourists. Two Chettinad traders, in matching kilts and turbans, pondered over a game board. They whispered to each other as Bridget ban passed by.
“Ah, Cu,” said the teakeeper behind the counter. “You have come for a cup of Pleasurepot? Our most famous blend.”
Bridget ban studied the rows of teas. “I’m…not sure.”
The teakeeper laughed. “A more meditative blend, then. I have Gray Thoughts, a private blend the Consortium makes for a colleague of yours; but I’m sure he’d not grudge you a taste of it.”
The Hound had been curious where the teakeeper had learned the form of address the Kennel used among themselves. She could also guess the name of the colleague: Greystroke would have found the name of the blend both amusing and irresistible.
The teakeeper went belowstairs and climbed back with a canister of plain metallic gray. Turning it, he showed her the embossing on the bottom: Greystroke’s personal logo. At her approval, the teakeeper took a carefully measured scoop of the leaves; filled a small, perforated ball; and prepared an infusion—discussing all the while the physics and chemistry involved. Bridget ban only wanted a drink, but the teakeeper would not hand the cup over until a mandatory amount of “steeping” had elapsed. “It’s different for each blend, you see.”
She didn’t see, and did her best to forget after she took the steaming cup away.
The Chettinads were playing shaHmat, and were in the mid-game. Some versions of the game were played in three dimensions. Some used computers and hundreds of pieces with fluctuating fighting qualities. Still others—called “chutes and ladders”—mimicked the superluminal creases of Electric Avenue and allowed game pieces to slipstream rapidly between designated squares. But the Chettinads were playing the true game, unadorned, handling finely carved wooden pieces across a nine-by-nine board of squares.
Red, whose turban was an intricate plaid of green, yellow, and red checks and lines, was engaged in Remour’s Offer. His emperor stood unmoved on the center square of his home row while his minions had pushed forward in a complex arrangement of mutual support. The flanking councilors and leaping hounds were in play on the princess side, although the fortresses still anchored the two ends of his line. The princess was in midfield with a good chance to marry the opposing prince. If White allowed that, his prince would become powerless in any attack on Red. Hence, he was playing McDevitt’s Refusal.
An unstable arrangement, she thought. Complexity upon complexity, and the least wrong move would send it all crashing into chaos from which only the most nimble thinker could pluck victory. White’s prince was castled, refusing to meet the opposing princess.
After a time in which nothing seemed to happen, White picked up his teacup and sipped. He put it down again. Nothing happened some more.
Then, with a shrug, he sent a White hound leaping out.
A mistake! Bridget ban took a swallow of Gray Thoughts, and leaned forward a little to see how Red would respond.
Red barely noticed. He moved his prince forward one square. “These are bad times,” he commented after a sip from his cup.
White’s turban—richly green, shot through with ochre threads and golden bands—bobbed side to side in agreement. “The ICC grows bold and arrogant. They strut.”
It was the custom of the Chettinad traders when in public to speak in allusions. “Three ships of Sèan Company passed through the Junction yesterday,” said Red. “They paid no duties as poor Chettinads must pay. This was said by a customs officer far gone in her cups.”