I Dare

by Sharon Lee

  "I won't even try to duplicate that," she said, and her voice was high and sweet. "Let's just consider that I done what was polite."

  "Indeed," Pat Rin said, smiling. "Let us do so. Have I pleasure of addressing Ms. Audrey?"

  She nodded, unsurprised. "Expecting me, were you? Well, I guess you shoulda been, after last night. I was out on business, or I'd've tried to set things straight then. I'm hoping we can come to an accommodation today, if you got time?"

  "Mr. McFarland and I were on our way to lunch. If you would care to join us . . . ?"

  "Great minds think alike," she said, with a grin. "I was hoping you'd see your way clear to having a bite at my place. Not as public as Tobi's, and the food's better."

  Pat Rin considered her, noting a certain tension—which was certainly expectable in one come to call upon the new and unknown quantity to whom one owed allegiance—as well as a certainty of her own worth. The clever eyes met his with frankness, which was rare in this place where he found himself. She was not by any means in her first youth, and struck him as both competent and commanding.

  In fact, she was just such a one as he would need by him, if they were able to forge an alliance built on mutual profit.

  He inclined his head. "Almost, you persuade me," he murmured. "Mr. McFarland?"

  He felt, rather than heard the big man sigh. "Sounds great," he said. "Tobi's ain't the kind of place to do business, Boss."

  So, Pat Rin thought grumpily, I have cleared the matter with 'security.' Behold me, virtuous.

  "Well, now, that's—" the lady began, and cut herself off, frank gaze going over Pat Rin's shoulder.

  "Will you look at that," she breathed, reverently. "I ain't ever . . . " She brought her eyes back to Pat Rin's face with a visible effort.

  "That is one hell of a rug."

  "So it is," he agreed smoothly, slipping into his merchant's role. He moved a hand, inviting her to make a closer inspection. Nothing could have been more to her liking.

  At his direction, she sampled the nap, her fingers as reverent as her voice, and obediently inspected the underside, admiring the precious, hand-tied knots.

  "Who'd make something like this?" she asked, when he had done and stepped back to allow her to commune with the carpet.

  "Certain . . . members . . . of a particular sect," he replied, with perfect truth. "It is very rare to find such things for sale."

  She looked at him, blue eyes shrewd. "Why's that?"

  "Because, upon its world of origin, this carpet is a religious artifact, and the rules of the sect did not allow of them being sold."

  "So, how'd you get this one?"

  He smiled, liking her more and more. "Naturally, I must protect my suppliers. Let us say that it was offered for sale from a licensed dealer, who had paperwork sufficient to convince me of the carpet's authenticity."

  She sighed, stroked the carpet one last time and moved a regretful step back, her eyes still on the pattern of the joyous revelers.

  "How much does something like that put a body back?"

  "That carpet—being a uniquity, you understand—may be purchased for eight thousand cash—" He raised a hand, smoothing away the protest he saw rising to her lips. "Or, it may be leased, by the Standard month, or the Standard year."

  "Leased." She frowned, the clever eyes showing puzzlement. "What's that?"

  "Ah. It is an arrangement whereby a customer will agree to pay a set sum which is significantly lower than the cost of the carpet, plus a refundable amount of earnest money, in order to have the use of a particular carpet for a month, two months—a year." He moved his shoulders, and raised his hands, showing her empty palms. "In that case, there are papers to be executed—agreements to be made. The customer would pledge to protect the carpet from spoilage, to keep it safe from theft, and to return it, intact, upon the day specified. If the customer failed of meeting the terms, he would be seen to have purchased the carpet, and the full retail price would then be due."

  Audrey considered him with interest. "So, how much to lease it, say, for a month?"

  Pat Rin frowned slightly while he did several lightning calculations. Of all the mad starts, he scolded himself—and yet he was certain that he needed this woman's goodwill. Not that he would buy her—in fact, he doubted that he could buy her—but that he would show good faith, and a willingness to negotiate—yes, that he must do. Equal to equal. So . . .

  "I ask two thousand cash, plus earnest money of an equal amount. But, you see, it is not efficient—for either of us—to lease for a month. I must ask a higher rate, because I must move it, twice, in a very short time. The most efficient arrangement for both is one that allows the carpet to rest in one place for a period of a few months. Should you wish to contract for three months, for instance, the monthly rate falls to one thousand cash; six months, and the rate falls again—to eight hundred cash. A year's lease may be had for a mere six hundred cash per month, plus the deposit of earnest money."

  She grinned at him. "That's quite a scheme. Let's see . . . " She was quick at her numbers. "If I lease from you for a year, you'll see a return of seventy-eight hundred cash—two-hundred cash less'n the full selling price."

  "Precisely so. However, the carpet will not be available as an item for sale during the period of its lease, and I must cover my potential loss."

  It was a laugh this time, full-bodied and attractive. "Sure you do! And you get the rug back at the end of it to sell. Or lease. Seems to me that leasing's more profitable."

  "On certain items, of course it is. I am fortunate that the carpet under discussion is durable as well as difficult to stain or to singe. However, it is a unique item and thus vulnerable to theft. And if it were stolen, I should not have it to sell ever again."

  "There's that." She looked at him thoughtfully. "OK, I came to invite you to lunch, and your 'hand there's lookin' about ready to eat one of the rugs, which can't be good for business. Let's go over to my place, and talk."

  "Certainly," he inclined his head. "After you."

  Smiling, she turned and led the way out, though she did pause for a moment on the threshold, to look back over her shoulder at the Sinner's Carpet, and sigh.

  MS. AUDREY'S HOUSE quite cast the late Boss Moran's "mansion" into the shade. Most likely, Pat Rin thought, as he followed his hostess through wide rooms and broad hallways, before embarking upon its career as a whorehouse, it had been three connected houses, and had required extensive remodeling to achieve its present state of relative sumptuousness.

  It was a well-occupied residence, to judge by the number of brightly dressed young people they passed on the way to the "private dining room." The urge to understand it as a clanhouse was very nearly overmastering—and a temptation that he must at all costs resist.

  The "private dining room," achieved at last, proved to be a cozy interior chamber. A long table at the far wall supported various tureens and platters. A smaller, round, table sat on a rag rug of a kind he was coming to know well, in the center of the room. Three places were set with what appeared to be silk napkins and silver utensils. A glass at each place was filled with a faintly amber liquid. In the middle of the table sat an artful and modest bowl of flowers.

  "Here we are," Audrey said, cheerfully. "Gotta serve ourselves, but we can talk private."

  She ushered them to the buffet, removed the lids from the tureens, and proceeded to serve herself, which was certainly her right, in her own house. Pat Rin picked up a plate, as she had, and followed her down the table, taking a mite from every unfamiliar dish. When he reached an end, he followed his hostess to the round table, situated his plate, pulled out his chair and sat.

  "Elegant little thing, ain't you?" she said wistfully.

  In the act of unfolding his napkin, Pat Rin froze. How dare—Slowly, leisurely, he turned his head, and met her eyes, frowning.

  It could not precisely be said that a frown of disapproval from Pat Rin yos'Phelium caused seasoned gamers to swoon. However, it was generally a
greed among those who had reason to know that it was no easy thing to bear, that frown, nor that it brought forcibly to mind the recollection that Lord Pat Rin shot first at Tey Dor's—and had done so for a number of years.

  Ms. Audrey laughed, quite merrily, and shook her napkin out.

  "Now, no offense meant—it's a habit of business, like you doing a quick-and-dirty assess on my poor old rag rug, first thing you walk in the room." She sighed, and looked up to bestow her pleasant smile on Cheever McFarland and his well-filled plate.

  "That's right, " she said comfortably. "Man your size has got to have his food. Enjoy yourself."

  "I intend to, ma'am, thank you," Cheever answered easily. He shook his napkin onto his knee, picked up a fork and fell to.

  Not entirely mollified, Pat Rin finished with his own napkin, extended a hand to his glass, raised it and essayed a exploratory sip.

  It was a new wine, and a sweet one, with a faint, enchanting note of something reminiscent of ginger beneath. Pat Rin had a second sip and set the glass aside.

  "The wine is pleasant," he said to his hostess. "May I know the vintage?"

  Audrey smiled. "We just call it Autumn Wine. It comes in from the country in lots of six, and I generally buy a couple dozen, if that many pass through. Some of our clients are partial, and some of the staff. We've got a few left from last season's buy; I'll be pleased to give you a bottle."

  A gift of wine. Pat Rin felt absurdly pleased as he inclined his head. "Thank you, I would like that."

  She nodded, and had an appreciative sip from her own glass. "That's good," she murmured, and shook her head. "Understand, this wine'll turn, if you keep it too long into spring, and what you'll have then is some nice smellin' paint remover."

  "Ah, then I will remember to enjoy it soon, with warm memories of your hospitality."

  For a heartbeat, she stared at him, her mouth half-smiling, then she shook her head and returned to her meal.

  At long last did Pat Rin address his own plate, and found the unfamiliar viands good—even very good. Nor did he wonder when Cheever McFarland rose from his place to refill his own plate.

  "I wonder," Pat Rin said softly, "if you know who makes the rag rugs. I have several in . . . my . . . house, and would be pleased to have more—or even to purchase some for trade."

  "Well, for that, Ajay Naylor makes 'em—has for years. But buying 'em for trade—there's no profit there, Boss. The rugs is how she pays. Strictly barter, is Ajay."

  "Is she? But the trade I had meant was not necessarily local."

  "Gonna sell 'em at the port?" Audrey frowned at her plate consideringly. "Might do, I guess."

  "Do no ships come through the port?" Pat Rin murmured.

  "Oh, well, ships. Sure they do. Once in a summer snowstorm. The trouble with trying to sell things to the ships is you gotta deliver the full order on time. Which means you need a safe road from here to there. Which you ain't got."

  "And yet there is the Port Road, which runs through this territory and straight to the port," Pat Rin pointed out.

  "That's right. And there's six different territories between here and there. That's a lot of toll—and assuming there ain't a turf war goin' on in one—or more!—when you gotta pass—not the way to bet, not with that bunch. Also assuming that somebody up an' comin' don't decided to knock you over and make your profit his."

  "I see." Pat Rin sipped his wine. "Then we will need to work to secure the Port Road, so that all may have equal access to trade."

  Audrey blinked at him. "Sure we will," she said politely, and Cheever McFarland laughed.

  "Don't egg him on, ma'am," he said, pushing his plate aside and reaching for his glass. "He'll do it just to prove you wrong."

  "Thank you, Mr. McFarland," Pat Rin said coolly, and turned back to his hostess.

  "You will understand that I have not had much time to go over such records as I have . . . inherited . . . from the late Mr. Moran, so I wonder if you might tell me if there is a bank within my territory?"

  Her eyebrows pulled together in a puzzled frown. "Bank?"

  It was seldom that Pat Rin had cause to question his abilities in Terran, but she was so plainly at a loss, and that over an inquiry after an institution that must surely be well known to so astute a businessperson . . . Hurriedly, he sifted his vocabulary for the correct word to convey his meaning—and the word was "bank".

  "Bank," he said again, softly, certainly—but her puzzlement did not abate. "Forgive me. An . . . institution . . . which keeps large sums of cash in trust for customers, which makes capital loans, receives collateral, pays out interest—"

  "Oh!" Understanding dawned. "Gotcha. Pawn shops. Sure, you got two established and one making a start." She frowned, briefly. "Pays out interest, now—that's opposite the way it's been done. The shop charges you interest, see, to keep your item instead of selling it. No percentage in them paying out interest, when they gotta store the stuff, too."

  Beside him, Cheever McFarland shifted, but when Pat Rin looked, the pilot was found to be gazing raptly at the artful arrangement of flowers.

  "A pawn shop is a different enterprise entirely," Pat Rin said carefully. "The institution that I envision holds cash in trust for members, and loans cash to other members, to whom it charges interest. The institution then pays interest to its depositor-members, in payment for its use of their funds." He was about to go on to elucidate the more arcane functions of banks, but he saw from her face that he had said quite enough. Audrey obviously thought he was raving.

  She had recourse to her glass, and sat holding it in her hand, looking at him out of considering blue eyes.

  "OK," she said at last. "Just who would be running this joint—this bank?"

  Pat Rin raised an eyebrow. "A board of trustees."

  "Uh-huh. And the reason they don't take all the free money and leg it for Deacon's turf would be?"

  Ah. You have forgotten where you are, he told himself, and sighed ruefully.

  "Ordinarily," he answered Audrey, "I would say, because of the contracts and laws binding upon them. I quite see that such contracts and laws would be unenforceable under . . . present circumstances."

  "It'd be tough," she allowed. "We don't have much to do with contracts and laws—not here, an' not on any other turf I ever heard of." She frowned and had a bit more of her wine.

  "I like the idea," she said slowly. "I can see how it could work. But these trustees of yours—they'd have to be people who weren't tempted by big stacks of cash, and that ain't anybody I ever met."

  "Many people are tempted by large sums of money." Pat Rin frowned. Surely, he thought, there was something, some mechanism, aside from law and honor, which would insure the safety of the investors, and the honesty of the trustees?

  "How if," he murmured, his eyes now on the flower arrangement as well, but seeing something rather different—Mr. dea'Gauss seated in his office, holding forth on the structure of a particular fund that Pat Rin had wished to invest in, outlining the various failsafes and protocols . . .

  "How if the procedures required the keys of at least three trustees in order to access the money itself? If the trustees are all businesspeople of consequence . . . "

  "And, better yet, if they all hate each other," Audrey said, suddenly smiling. "This could work. It could work. It'll take some planning and some finagling, but it might be possible." Her smile widened into a grin. "Just moved from the Impossible pile to the Maybe pile. You'll be a trustee, yourself?"

  "Indeed I will not. The bank—best call it a—a mercantile association—it should have nothing to do with the boss or the boss' office. Ideally, it should be a separate entity, protected by those laws and contracts we have both agreed are unenforceable at the moment."

  She stared, then laughed, and looked aside to Cheever McFarland. "He like this all the time?"

  "No, ma'am," Cheever said seriously. "Some days he's downright ornery. He sleeps, occasional. And, from time to time, he likes a game."

&nbs
p; "Does he?" She looked back to Pat Rin with interest. "Cards?" she asked, then corrected herself, "No, you're a boxman, ain't you? Dice."

  Pat Rin sighed, and spared a glare for Cheever McFarland, who was once again studying the flowers. To Audrey, he inclined his head, slightly.

  "I am . . . familiar . . . with most types of gaming and gambling practiced in the galaxy."

  "Well." She finished her wine and put the glass down. "What're you doing here?"

  He raised an eyebrow. "Rusticating."

  She didn't smile. "Plan on sticking around?"

  "Surely that's my business."

  "Was," she said, her voice almost stern. "But then you set yourself up as boss. That changes the rule of play." She raised a hand, as if she'd felt his outrage.

  "Hear me out, just hear me out. Nort Moran was a stupid, selfish animal, and the whole territory's best off without him. Vindal—that was the boss before—she was smart, but she wasn't tough. Word was she didn't even try to pull when Moran walked in on her. You—you're smart and you're tough—and we need you. You're gonna be good for business—this bank idea of yours, for one; and putting the gab-rag back on the street. That's for day one. Who knows what you'll come up with by the time you're on the street a week?"

  "Who, indeed," Pat Rin said politely, sternly suppressing the shiver. For the second time in his life, he was being offered a Ring. Gods. At least, this offer was made with honor—or so he thought—perhaps leavened with a healthy dose of fear.

  Audrey nodded. "Right. Right. You're the boss. An' I'm outta line." She sighed, and pushed back from the table. "Just—think about it, OK?"

  Apparently, their luncheon business was concluded. Pat Rin inclined his head and rose. "I will think about it. My thanks for a most delicious and convivial meal."

  "You're welcome," Audrey said, matching his formality. "I hope it'll be the first of many." She glanced up to Cheever McFarland. "Mr. McFarland, my pleasure."

  "No, ma'am. My pleasure," the pilot assured her, gallantly, which won him an easy laugh before she led them back through the hallways and spacious rooms to the main entranceway.