"Not that," Stephen said. "We were about to dump the main oxygen supply, but I didn't. I-we, I didn't know which pipe was which. We cut off reaction mass to the thrusters instead. Because I decided I didn't want to kill a thousand people."
His voice was trembling. Sal tried to hug herself against his chest, but Stephen held her apart and tilted her face so that she met his eyes.
"Another thousand people," he said. Only then did he draw her close.
The expression Sal hadn't been able to recognize was hope.
"Stephen," she said. "Let me stay with you. All night."
"No," he murmured gently. "That-"
"Please, Stephen, for God's sake!" she said.
"Sal, it's not you, it's me," he said with his lips to her ear. "On the ground, I don't sleep well. I don't really sleep. I appreciate what you're trying to do, but I don't want anybody around me when. . Not even servants. Especially not somebody I care about."
Sal drew away and looked into his eyes again. "You don't understand, Stephen. If it's not you, it'll be the man I killed on Arles. The liquor helped for a while, but I can't drink enough anymore. If you won't hold me, I. ."
She flung her head forward and blotted her tears on Stephen's worn brown doublet. "I don't know what I'll do. I don't know what I'll do."
He stroked her back with fingers that could bend steel of their own thickness. "You need me, Sal?" he said. "You need me?"
"On my life I do, Stephen," she said. She choked; she didn't know if he could hear her words or not. "On my very life."
"Christ's blood, what a pair of cripples we are!" he said.
Stephen lifted Sal into the air so that her short blond hair brushed the ceiling plates. "But you ought to see the other guy," he added with a wry smile. "And after all, I didn't kill you, did I?"
Stephen swung her in a circle around him as though she were a child rather than a solidly built adult. Piet Ricimer looked up from the crowd pressing him. Sal caught a glimpse of a beaming smile replacing the amazement that had flashed across Piet's face.
"I warn you," Stephen said, suddenly serious as he put her down. "I've got two rooms with nothing but a bed, a wardrobe, and a lot of slash bottles. There won't be anything else available with this crowd in town."
"We'll manage," Sal said. She hugged him close again. "We've managed everything so far."
BETAPORT, VENUS
March 15, Year 28
1455 hours, Venus time
"I am pleased to see you again, Colonel," Guillermo said as he bowed Stephen into Piet's private office.
The Molt was the only one authorized to open the door nowadays. The door keeper, on the other hand, was Dole or another trusted sailor who'd been with Captain Ricimer too long to care who a would-be intruder might be. If somebody tried to push into the captain's office, he got knocked down-and lucky if he didn't get a boot in the ribs besides.
Of course, Mister Gregg wanting to see the captain-that was something else again. There weren't appointments between old shipmates.
Piet was hunched over a desk covered with shiny glassine printouts, trying to find a datum as he talked on the phone. He raised three fingers when he heard the door open, but he didn't look up from his search. Stephen moved a stack of flimsies and a sample case-microchips, of recent European manufacture from the look of them-off the chair and sat down.
Piet caught the motion from the corner of his eye. He glanced at Stephen, grinned with enthusiasm, and said, "I'm very sorry, Factor, but something's come up. I'll get back to you."
He hung up the phone and switched it mute. "Stephen!" he said, rising from his chair. "My goodness, I'm afraid I've been as busy as I hear you are yourself!"
"I came by with a business proposition, Piet," Stephen said as they shook hands above the cluttered desk. Piet looked like he'd gained five kilos in the months since the Wrath came home, but the fire of his countenance burned just as bright as it ever had.
"I've got something I'd like you to look at too, Stephen," Piet said as they both sat down. "But you first, please. After all, you came to me when I haven't managed to get out to see anybody in far too long."
"Blythe Spirits Limited has six ships, now, Piet," Stephen said, leaning back deliberately in the chair. He'd learned that by feigning ease he could sometimes induce the actual feeling. "They're all of them ships taken in the sweep of Fed shipping we made after the Grand Fleet of Retribution came apart."
He made a face at Pleyal's grandiose title. "They can be had for a song, though the navigational upgrades are a significant factor."
Piet chuckled, then sobered. "Metal hulls aren't as strong as good ceramic, Stephen," he said. "Not that I'm trying to tell you or Captain Blythe your business, but. ."
Stephen nodded. "Right, but metal degrades instead of failing abruptly the way overstressed ceramic's been known to do."
He smiled grimly. They'd seen it happen to a consort of their own vesseclass="underline" what had been a ship after one transit disintegrated to a sleet of gravel during the next. There'd been no survivors, and no chance of survivors.
"At the point Sal no longer thinks the hulls are safe," Stephen continued, "we'll strip the electronics and scrap the rest. They're very cheap, Piet."
"I wouldn't venture to make business decisions for you, Stephen," Piet said with a reminiscent smile. They'd seen a lot of things together, Piet and he.
Outside the door a cultured, angry voice said, "I have an appointment with the factor, my good man, an appointment!"
Lightbody was on duty with Guillermo. Stephen heard the sailor's reply only as a truculent rumble, but he was willing to bet Lightbody slapped his truncheon of high-pressure tubing into his palm as he spoke.
"Cargoes are going begging," Stephen explained. "The Fed colonies don't make any complaint about trading with us no matter what Pleyal says back in Montreal. For a lot of them it's us or starve, and they know it. And I'm not talking short-term profits, either. The shippers who make contacts now will have a foundation to build on as the colonies grow."
He leaned forward and stretched his hand across the desk. "Piet," he said, "you and I started out to be traders. Pleyal's beaten. Come on into Blythe Spirits with us."
Piet laughed brightly. Only someone who knew him very well would have heard the slight tension in the note. "All right," he said. He placed his hand over his friend's. "How much would you like from me?"
"Not your money, Piet," Stephen said. "I want you, doing the same thing Sal's doing in Ishtar City. Picking captains who'll get so rich on quarter shares that they'll buy their own ships and make everybody-themselves and Venus and the colonies they serve-that much the richer. Equal partners, Piet. The three of us."
Piet tilted back in his chair and laced his fingers behind his head. "Fernando Comaguena, the Hidalgo of the Southern Cross-the pretender, Pleyal would say-is in Ishtar City now. There's some suggestion the governor might permit him to recruit help on Venus to regain his rightful position in Buenos Aires."
He raised an eyebrow.
Stephen got up and stretched. "Not for me, thank you, Piet," he said. He smiled, wondering if the expression looked as sad as he felt. Though it wasn't a surprise. . "The Federation's been beaten. Pleyal and his successors can never be a threat to Venus again. They'll never be able to dictate who goes to the stars."
Piet lowered his hands slowly to the desk and stared at them. "It's a little hard to be sure where to draw the line, Stephen," he said.
"Then draw it here!" Stephen said with a passion that surprised them both. "Piet, there'll never be perfect peace while there are men. But there can be peace for some men."