Part 9 (1/2)

”Why have we stopped?” I demanded.

Her eyebrows lifted a bit higher. ”We've got another hull ridge,” she said calmly. ”Chort's getting ready to go out and fix it.”

I scowled past her at the displays. Sure enough, the new camera I'd had Ixil and Shawn install in the wraparound showed two s.p.a.ce-suited figures just sealing the pressure door behind them. One was obviously Chort; the other was just as obviously Ixil. ”You should have called me,” I growled.

”Why?” she countered. ”There's nothing to this operation that the pilot needs to have a hand in. Besides, you're off-duty, remember? Go back to bed.”

The radio speaker clicked. ”We're ready, Tera,” Ixil's voice said. ”You can shut down the grav generator.”

”Acknowledged,” Tera said, flipping back the safety cover and turning the switch ninety degrees. ”Shutting off gravity generator now.”

She pushed the switch, and I went through the usual momentary disorientation before my stomach settled down. ”Go back to bed,” Tera repeated, her eyes on the monitors. ”I'll call you if there's a problem.”

”I'm sure you would,” I said shortly. Once again, it seemed, I had managed to embarra.s.s myself in front of this woman. This was getting to be a very bad habit. ”I'll stay a bit.”

”I don't need you,” she said flatly, flicking a single glowering glance at me and then turning her attention back to the monitors. ”More to the point, I don't want you. Go away.”

”Do we know where the ridge is?” I asked, ignoring the order.

”Big sphere; starboard side,” she said. ”Chort thinks it's a small one.”

”Let's hope he's right.”

She didn't answer. For a few minutes we watched the monitors together in silence, anxious silence on my part, frosty silence on hers. I presumed that Ixil had made it his business to make sure the grav generator couldn't impulsively go on-line again; but I didn't know for sure, and I didn't want to ask him about it on an open radio channel. I tried to figure out how I wouldlock down the generator if it was up to me, but I didn't know enough about the intricacies of the system.

”You two been flying together long?” Tera broke into my thoughts.

I blinked at her in mild surprise. Casual conversation from Tera was something new in my admittedly brief acquaintance with her. ”Six years,” I told her. ”I took him on about a year after I bought the Stormy Banks. I figured having a partner would help me run cargoes faster and more efficiently and bring in more money.”

”I take it it didn't work?”

”What makes you say that?” I countered, long experience with that question putting automatic defensiveness into my voice.

”You're here, aren't you?” she said. ”Sorry-I didn't mean that the way it sounded. With the Patth handling almost everything worth s.h.i.+pping these days, it's a wonder everyone else hasn't been driven out of business.”

”Give them a few more years,” I said sourly. ”The way they're going, it won't be long before they have it all.”

”At least everything legitimate,” she said, giving me a sideways look. ”You do run legitimate cargoes, don't you, McKell?”

”Every single chance I get,” I said, trying to put a touch of levity into my tone as I gazed at her profile, wis.h.i.+ng I could read what was going on behind those hazel eyes of hers. Had she talked to someone while we were on Xathru?

Heard something, perhaps, about my forced affiliation with Brother John and the Antoniewicz organization? ”What about you?” I asked, hoping to change the subject. ”How long have you been flying?”

”Not long,” she said. ”What do you do when you can't get legitimate work?”

So much for changing the subject. ”Sometimes we're able to pick up intrasystem cargoes,” I told her. ”Occasionally we have to find temp jobs in whatever port we're stuck in until something comes along. Mostly, we eat real light.”

”You're not a big fan of the Patth, then, I take it?”

”No one who hauls cargo for a living is a fan of the Patth,” I said darkly, my conversation with Nicabar flas.h.i.+ng to mind. ”Is this your subtle way of suggesting we might be carrying a Patth cargo?”

There were a lot of things, I knew, that a competent actress could do with her body, voice, and expression. But the last time I checked, the red flush that rose to briefly color Tera's cheeks wasn't one of them. ”We'd better not be,”

she said, the studied casualness in her voice a sharp contrast to the emotion implicit in that reddened skin. ”Though I doubt we'll find out for sure anywhere this side of Earth.”

”If even then,” I pointed out. ”Whoever Borodin's got working that end isn't under any obligation to let us watch while he cuts the cargo bay open.”

”No, of course not,” she murmured, almost as if talking to herself. ”I wonder why he lied to us about coming along.”

”Who, Borodin? What makes you think he did lie?”

She shrugged. ”You saw that note he left. He had to have written it before the Ihmisits closed the port down for the night.”

I thought about Director Aymi-Mastr of the Meima Port Authority and that murder charge she'd talked about. ”Unless he just had it here as a precaution,” I suggested. ”Maybe he fully intended to join us, but circ.u.mstances prevented him.”

She snorted. ”Right. A full bottle, or a warm bed. Circ.u.mstances.”

”Or a small matter of murder,” I said.

She looked at me, her eyes narrowing. ”Murder?””That's right,” I said. ”I was told there was a warrant out for his arrest on a possible murder charge.”

She shook her head. ”Hard to believe,” she said. ”He seemed like such a normal, upstanding man.”

”That's exactly what I said when they asked me about it,” I said approvingly.

”Nice to know there's at least one thing we agree on.”

”Well, now, wait a minute,” she warned cautiously. ”I never said I thought he didn't do it, I just said it was hard to believe. I don't know anything about the man.”

”Sure, I understand,” I a.s.sured her. In fact, I understood far more than she probably realized. Just as her involuntary blush when talking about the Patth had given me a glimpse into her emotional state, so, too, had the complete lack of any such coloring when I told her about Cameron's murder charge. And that despite her alleged total surprise at hearing such shocking news.

Maybe she'd already used up all of her emotional reactions for one day. Or maybe she hadn't been surprised by the murder charge for the simple reason that she'd already known all about it.

”Computer Specialist Tera?” Chort's whistly voice came over the speaker. ”I believe I'm finished here. Shall I check the rest of the hull?”

I was still watching Tera closely, which was why I caught the slight but unmistakable tightening of her facial muscles. Perhaps she was thinking along the same line that had suddenly occurred to me: that it had been just as Chort had set off on a similar check of the cargo and engine hulls his last time out that the accident with the grav generator had occurred.

If it was, in fact, an accident. Perhaps someone aboard didn't want anyone taking a close look at the outside of the cargo sphere.

For a moment I was tempted to tell him to go ahead, just to see if our theoretical spoilsport still had his same access to switches or junction boxes or whatever. But only for a moment. Ixil was sharing the hot spot with Chort, and the spoilsport might decide he didn't like Ixil any more than he'd liked Jones. I had no interest in risking Ixil's life or health, at least not then.

Certainly not over a theory that hadn't even occurred to me until five seconds ago.

”This is McKell,” I said toward the speaker before Tera could answer. ”Don't bother, Chort-we don't have time for it. You and Ixil just get back in and b.u.t.ton up.”

”Acknowledged,” he whistled.