Part 19 (1/2)

”Look closely, right here,” he said, pointing at a spot about midway along the rectangular cross-sectioned handle. ”See the black streak?”

I leaned forward. It was there, all right: a faint black vertical mark, with a wider and fainter echo beside it as if a charcoal line had been smeared. ”Let me guess,” I said, leaning back again. ”A mark from the rubber edge of your cabin door?”

”Very good,” he said, lifting the wrench up by the cloth for a closer look of his own. ”Those doors. .h.i.t pretty hard when the buffer doesn't engage. My a.s.sumption is he hit the release pad, then shoved this into the gap when it opened.”

And it was still moving as the door hit it; hence, the smeared streak. ”That would have left enough of an opening for the bottles, but not enough to get hisarm through,” I pointed out. ”Probably why they weren't farther from the door.

Unless he was hoping someone would kick them on the way in or out.”

”That wouldn't have done him any good,” Ixil reminded me. ”You have to ignite the mixture, remember?”

”None of this does him any good,” I growled, mentally giving the whole thing up as hopeless. There was some vital information we didn't yet have-I was sure of it. And until we found out what it was all we were going to accomplish by chasing our meager data around was to make ourselves dizzy.

Apparently, Ixil had figured that out, too. ”As you suggested in an earlier conversation, it all makes perfect sense,” he said, starting to wrap up the wrench again. ”We just don't yet know what that sense is.”

I nodded to the wrench. ”You planning to check it for fingerprints?”

”I was thinking of it,” he agreed. ”Knowing the Icarus, though, I suspect we'll need to use it before we ever get within hailing distance of a proper fingerprinting expert.”

”Knowing the Icarus, I'd say you were right,” I agreed. ”So what now?”

”I thought I'd see about fixing my door,” he said, tucking the wrench under

one.

arm and snapping his fingers as he reached for the remains of his sandwich.

The two ferrets came at his call, scampering up his body to his shoulders. ”Your door, rather, since your outer pad's on my cabin now. I can take the pad off the empty Number Two cabin on the top deck and replace the whole thing.”

”What if we want to get in there?” I asked.

”What for?” he asked reasonably. ”Anyway, we can always move a pad from one of the other cabins temporarily if we need to.”

”Point,” I conceded. ”Okay, go ahead.”

”Right. I'll see you later.” Stuffing another large corner of his sandwich into his mouth, he headed out.

For a couple of minutes, ignoring my own resolve not to waste time and effort doing so, I chased our meager data around in a couple more circles. It didn't get me anywhere.

And then, behind me out in the corridor, I heard the steady tread of approaching footsteps. Two pairs, from the sound of it, neither of them Ixil's.

It was probably something totally innocent, of course. But I'd had enough unpleasant surprises for one day, and I wasn't interested in having any more of them. Folding my arms across my chest, I slid my right hand out of sight beneath my jacket and got a grip on my plasmic, then swiveled my seat around to face the open doorway.

The first in line was Tera, stalking onto the bridge like she owned it.

”McKell,” she said in terse greeting. There was nothing the slightest bit friendly about her expression. ”We need to talk to you.”

Before I could reply, the other half of the ”we” stepped into sight behind her: Nicabar, looking even less friendly than she did. Not a good sign. ”Come in,”

I.

said mildly, ignoring the fact that they were already in. ”Revs, aren't you supposed to be on duty in the engine room?”

”Yes,” he said, his eyes flicking once to my folded arms. If he suspected Iwas holding my gun, he didn't comment on it. ”I asked Chort to watch things for a few minutes.”

Strictly speaking, that was a violation of the Mercantile Code, me being the captain and not being informed and all. But so far this trip I'd been fairly casual about the duty roster, and there didn't seem much point in complaining about it now. ”Fine. What can I do for you?”

Tera glanced at Nicabar, who glanced in turn out into the corridor and then unlocked the release, letting the door slide shut beside him. ”You can start with some honesty,” Tera said as they both looked back at me. ”This Mr.

Antoniewicz whose name scares off customs inspectors. Who exactly is he?”

It was a trap, of course. And with someone else, it might have worked. But Tera didn't have the facial control or sheer chutzpah to pull it off. ”You already know the answer,” I said. I s.h.i.+fted my gaze to Nicabar. ”Or rather, you know it.

I see you've already given Tera your version; how about doing the same for me?”

”He's a dealer in death and misery,” Nicabar said, his voice as dark as his expression. ”He buys and sells drugs, guns, customs officials, governments, and people's lives.”

His eyes bored into mine. ”And we want to know what exactly your relations.h.i.+p is to his organization.”

”Nice speech,” I complimented him, stalling for time. I'd known from the start that the relative ease with which I'd obtained Shawn's borandis would inevitably generate speculation among the others as to how I'd pulled it off. But I hadn't expected that speculation to turn into full-blown suspicion so quickly or so bluntly. This could be very awkward indeed. ”Did you work it up specially for this occasion? Or is it left over from the last s.h.i.+p you worked that had ties to Antoniewicz? Or the one before that, or the one before that?”

”What exactly are you implying?” Nicabar asked, his tone the unpleasant stillness of the air when there's a thunderstorm brewing in the distance.

”I'm saying that you and everyone else aboard the Icarus has worked for Antoniewicz at one time or another,” I told him. ”You had no choice.

Antoniewicz's fingers stretch into so many nooks and crannies across the Spiral it's practically impossible to engage in any business that doesn't touch something he's involved with.”

”That's not the same,” Tera protested.

”What, if you don't know what you're doing it doesn't count?” I scoffed.

”There's a very slippery slope beneath that kind of moral position.”

”Speaking of slippery, you still haven't answered our question,” Nicabar put in.

”I'm getting to it,” I said. ”I just wanted to make sure the answer was in the proper context. One of the ways Antoniewicz got a slice of so many pies was by buying up legitimate businesses, especially those in serious financial trouble.

I was a legitimate business. Thanks to the Patth s.h.i.+pping monopoly, I got into serious financial trouble. Antoniewicz bought me up. End of story.”

”Not end of story,” Nicabar said. ”He didn't just buy your business. He bought you.”

”Of course he did,” I said, putting an edge of bitterness into my tone. ”Ixiland I are the business.”

”So you sold your soul,” Nicabar said contemptuously. ”For money.”

”I prefer to think of it as having traded my pride for a little bottom-line integrity,” I shot back. ”Or do you think it would have been more honorable to have declared bankruptcy and left my creditors holding an empty bag. Well?”