David Falkayn: Star Trader (Technic Civlization)

by Poul Anderson

  "Dear me," rumbled his mild basso profundo. "What language. I am afraid that you are further from attaining enlightenment than I had estimated."

  Chee looked up toward Adzel's countenance, and up, and up. A weight of two and a half Terran gees, the hellish white blaze of a simulated F-type sun, the loudness of every sound in this dense, parched, thunder-smelling atmosphere, struck her and quelled her. She crawled under a table for shelter. The chamber's austerity was unrelieved by a film view of illimitable windy plains on that planet which men call Woden, or by the mandala that Adzel had hung from the ceiling or the scroll of Mahayana text he had posted on a wall.

  "I trust your news is of sufficient importance to justify interrupting me at my exercises," he went on, as severely as possible for him.

  Chee paused, subdued. "I don't know," she confessed. "But it concerns us." Adzel composed himself to listen.

  She studied him for a moment, trying to anticipate his response to what she had to say. No doubt he would feel she was overreacting. And maybe that was right. But she'd be flensed and gutted if she'd admit it to him!

  He bulked above her. With the powerful tail, his centauroid body had a length of four and a half meters and mass exceeding a ton. A barndoor-broad torso, carrying a pair of arms and quadridigital hands in proportion, lifted the head more than two meters above the four cloven hoofs, at the end of a longish neck. That head was almost crocodilian, the snout bearing flared nostrils and an alarming array of teeth. The external ears were solid bony material, like the row of triangular dorsal plates which made a serration from the top of his pate to the end of his tail. Yet the skull bulged far backward to hold a considerable brain, and beneath overhanging brow ridges, his eyes were large and brown and rather wistful. Scutes armored his throat and belly, scales the rest of him. Yet they were a lovely, shimmering dark-green on top, shading to gold underneath. He was respected in his field of planetology, or had been before he quit academe to take sordid commercial employment. And in some ways, he was biologically closer to human than Chee. Besides being warm-blooded and omnivorous, he came of a species whose females give live birth and suckle their infants.

  "Dave phoned me," Chee said. Feeling a bit more her usual self, she added with a snort, "He finally dragged himself away for a few hours from that hussy he's been wasting our time on."

  "And went to Serendipity, Inc., as per plan? Excellent, excellent. I hope material of interest was revealed to him." Adzel's rubbery lips formed League Latin rather than the Anglic Chee was using, in order to stay in practice.

  "He was certainly skyhooting excited about it," the Cynthian replied. "But he wouldn't mention details."

  "I should think not, over an unsealed circuit." Adzel's tone grew disapproving. "In this town, I understand, every tenth being is somebody's spy."

  "I mean he wouldn't come here either, or have us come to his hotel, and talk," Chee said. "The computer warned him against it, without giving a reason."

  The Wodenite rubbed his jaw. "Now that is curious. Are not these quarters proof against snooping devices?"

  "They ought to be, at the rates we pay. But maybe a new kind of bug has come along, and the machine's learned about it confidentially. You know SI's policy on that, don't you? Dave wants us to radio the home office for more money and buy a 'restricted' tag for whatever he was told today. He says once we're back on Earth, he can safely chatter."

  "Why not beforehand? If he cannot leave Luna immediately, at least we could take a jaunt in our ship with him. That won't be gimmicked, not while Muddlehead is active."

  "Listen, you glorified bulligator, I can see the obvious quicker than you, including the obvious fact that of course I'd suggest the ship. But he said no, not right away, at least. You see, one of the partners in SI invited him to spend a while at that castle of theirs."

  "Strange. I had heard they never entertain guests."

  "For once you heard right. But he said this anthro wants to discuss business with him, wouldn't tell him what but hinted at large profits. The chance looked too good to miss. Only, the invitation was for immediately. He'd just time to duck back to his place for a clean shirt and a toothbrush."

  "Will Freeman van Rijn's affair wait?" Adzel asked.

  "Presumably," Chee said. "At any rate, Dave wasn't sure the socializing mood of the partners would last if he stalled them. By every account, their souls consist of printed circuits. If nothing else comes of visiting them at home, he felt this was a unique chance for an inside view of their outfit."

  "Indeed." Adzel nodded. "Indeed. David acted quite correctly, when the opportunity concerns an organization so powerful and enigmatic. I do not see what makes you feel any urgency. We two shall simply have to spend a few more days here."

  Chee bristled. "I don't have your stone-brained calm. The computer put Dave onto something big. I mean astronomical—money by the planetful. I could tell that by his manner. Suppose his hosts aim to do him in, for the sake of getting at that thing themselves?"

  "Now, now, my little friend," Adzel chided. "Serendipity, Inc., does not meddle in the business of its clients. It does not reveal their secrets. As a rule, the partners do not even know what those secrets are. They have no ties to other organizations. Not only repeated private investigations, but the experience of years has confirmed this. If ever they had violated their own announced ethic, ever shown special favor or prejudice, the repercussions would soon have laid the deed bare. No other member of the Polesotechnic League—no group throughout the whole of known space—has proven itself more trustworthy."

  "Always a first time, sonny."

  "Well, but think. If the strain is not excessive," Adzel said with rare tartness. "For the sake of argument, let us make the ridiculous assumption that Serendipity did in fact eavesdrop on David's conference with the computer, and has in fact decided to break its word never to seize private advantage.

  "It remains bound by the covenant of the League, a covenant which was established and is enforced for good pragmatic reasons. Imprisonment, murder, torture, drugs, brainscrub, every kind of direct attack upon the psychobiological integrity of the individual, is banned. The consequences of transgression are atavistically severe. As the saying goes on Earth, the game is not worth the lantern. Hence the resources of espionage, temptation, and coercion are limited. David is immune to bribery and blackmail. He will reveal nothing to hypothetical surveillance, nor will he fall into conversational traps. If female bait is dangled before him, he will delightedly accept it without touching the fishhook. Has he not already—" At that point, in a coincidence too outrageous for anything other than real life, the phone buzzed. Adzel pressed the Accept button. The image of Falkayn's latest girlfriend appeared. His partners recognized her; they had both met her, briefly, and were too experienced to believe the old cliche that all humans look alike.

  "Good evenwatch, Freelady," Adzel said. "May I be of assistance?" Her expression was unhappy, her tone unsteady. "I apologize for disturbing you," she said. "But I'm trying to get hold of Da—Captain Falkayn. He's not come back. Do you know—?"

  "He isn't here either, I am sorry to say."

  "He promised he'd meet me . . . before now . . . and he hasn't, and—" Veronica swallowed. "I'm worried."

  "A rather urgent matter arose. He lacked time in which to contact you," Adzel lied gallantly. "I was asked to convey his sincere regrets."

  Her smile was forlorn. "Was the urgent matter blond or brunette?"

  "Neither, Freelady. I assure you it involves his profession. He may be gone for a few standard days. Shall I remind him to phone you upon his return?"

  "I'd be so grateful if you would, sir." She twisted her fingers together. "Th-thank you." Adzel blanked the screen. "I am reluctant to state this of a friend," he murmured, "but occasionally David impresses me as being rather heartless in certain respects."

  "Huh!" Chee said. "That creature's only afraid he'll get away without spilling information to her."

  "I doubt it. Oh, I gran
t you such a motive has been present, and probably continues in some degree. But her distress looks genuine, insofar as I can read human behavior. She appears to have conceived a personal affection for him." Adzel made a commiserating noise. "How much more conducive to serenity is a fixed rutting season like mine."

  Chee had been calmed by the interruption. Also, her wish to get out of this lead-weighting bake oven that Adzel called home grew stronger each minute. "That is a good-looking specimen, by Dave's standards," she said. "No wonder he delayed getting down to work. And I don't suppose he'll be overly slow about returning to her, until he's ready to haul gravs off Luna altogether. Maybe we needn't really fret on his account."

  "I trust not," Adzel said.

  V

  By flitter, the castle in the Alps was not many minutes from Lunograd. But those were terrible kilometers that lay between; mountaineering parties never ventured so far. And a wide reach of land and sky around the site was forbidden—patrolled by armed men, guarded by robot gun emplacements—with that baronial absoluteness the great may claim in a civilization which exalts the rights of privacy and property. A nonhuman labor force had built it, imported for the purpose from a dozen remote planets and afterward returned, totally dispersed. For a while, local resentment combined with curiosity to yield fantastic rumors. Telescopic pictures were taken from orbit, and published, until half the Commonwealth knew about gaunt black towers, sheer walls, comings and goings of ships at a special spaceport, in the Lunar mountains.

  But gossip faded with interest. Large estates were common enough among the lords of the Polesotechnic League—most of whom carried on in a far more colorful fashion than these recluses. Furtiveness and concealment were a frequent part of normal business practice. For years, now, Serendipity, Inc., had been taken for granted.

  To be sure, Falkayn thought, if the society news learns I've been chauffeured out here, actually gotten inside— A sour grin tugged at his mouth. Wouldn't it be cruel to tell the poor dears the truth?

  The scenery was spectacular, from this upper-level room where he stood. A wide viewport showed the downward sweep of rock, crags, cliffs, talus slopes, to a gash of blackness. Opposite that valley, and on either side of the castle plateau, peaks lifted raw into the constellations. Earth hung low in the south, nearly full, nearly blinding in its brilliance; interminable shadows surrounded the bluish spotlight that it cast. But you could watch the same, or better, from a number of lodges: where there would be merriment, music, decoration, decent food and decent talk. The meal he had just finished, shortly after his arrival, had been as grimly functional as what he saw of the many big chambers. Conversation, with the four partners who were present, had consisted of banalities punctuated by silences. He excused himself as soon as he could. That was obviously sooner than they wished, but he knew the glib phrases and they didn't.

  Only in the office had he been offered a cigar. He decided that was because the gesture was programmed into the kind of lounger they had bought. He reached inside his tunic for pipe and tobacco. Kim Yoon-Kun, a small neat expressionless man in a pajama suit that managed to resemble a uniform, had followed him. "We don't mind if you smoke at the table, Captain Falkayn," he said, "though none of us practice the . . . amusement."

  "Ah, but I mind," Falkayn answered. "I was strictly raised to believe that pipes are not allowed in dining areas. At the same time, I crave a puff. Please bear with me."

  "Of course," said the accented voice. "You are our guest. Our sole regret is that Freeman Latimer and Freelady Beldaniel cannot be present."

  Odd, Falkayn thought, not for the first time. Hugh Latimer leaves his wife here, and goes off with Thea's sister. Mentally, he shrugged. Their pairing arrangements were their own affair. If they had any. By every account, Latimer was as dry a stick as Kim, despite being an accomplished space pilot. The wife, like Anastasia Herrera and no doubt the sister of Thea, succeeded in being more old-maidish than the latter. Their attempt to make small talk with the visitor would have been pathetic had it been less dogged.

  What matters, Falkayn thought, is getting out of here, back to town and some honest fun. E.g., with Veronica.

  "This is not an ideal room for you, though," Kim said with a starched smile. "You observe how sparsely furnished it is. We are six people and a few nonhuman servants. We built this place large with a view to eventual expansion, bringing in more associates, perhaps spouses and children in time, if that proves feasible. But as yet we, ah, rattle around. I believe you and we should converse in a more amenable place. The others are already going there. We can serve coffee and brandy if you wish. May I conduct you?"

  "Thanks," Falkayn said. The doubtless rehearsed speech did not quench his hope of soon being able to leave what had proven to be a citadel of boredom. "We can start talking business?"

  "Why—" Startled, Kim searched for words. "It was not planned for this evenwatch. Is not the custom that social activity precede . . . that one get acquainted? We assume you will stay with us for several days, at least. Some interesting local excursions are possible from here, for example. And we will enjoy hearing you relate your adventures in distant parts of space."

  "You're very kind," Falkayn said, "but I'm afraid I haven't time."

  "Did you not tell the younger Freelady Beldaniel—"

  "I was mistaken. I checked with my partners, and they told me my boss has started to sweat rivets. Why don't you sketch out your proposition right away, to help me decide how long he might let me stay in connection with it?"

  "Proper discussion requires material we do not keep in our dwelling." Impatience, a touch of outright nervousness, cracked slightly the mask that was Kim Yoon-Kun. "But come, we can lay your suggestion before the others."

  The knowledge hit Falkayn: He's almighty anxious to get me out of this particular room, isn't he?

  "Do you mean we'll discuss the commencement of discussions?" he hedged. "That's a funny one. I didn't ask for documentation. Can't you simply explain in a general way what you're after?"

  "Follow me." Kim's tone jittered. "We have problems of security, the preservation of confidences, that must be dealt with in advance."

  Falkayn began enjoying himself. He was ordinarily a genial, obliging young man; but those who push a merchant adventurer, son of a military aristocrat, must expect to be pushed back, hard. He donned hauteur. "If you do not trust me, sir, your invitation was a mistake," he said. "I don't wish to squander your valuable time with negotiations foredoomed to fruitlessness."

  "Nothing of the sort." Kim took Falkayn's arm. "Come along, if you please, and all shall be made clear." Falkayn stayed put. He was stronger and heavier; and the gravity field was set at about Earth standard, the usual practice in residences on dwarf worlds where muscles would otherwise atrophy. His resistance to the tug did not show through his tunic. "In a while, Freeman," he said. "Not at once, I beg of your indulgence. I came here to meditate."

  Kim let go and stepped back. The black eyes grew still narrower. "Your dossier does not indicate any religious affiliation," he said slowly.

  "Dossier?" Falkayn raised his brows with ostentation.

  "The integrated file of material our computer has about you—nothing except what is on public record," Kim said in haste. "Only in order that our company may serve you better."

  "I see. Well, you're right, except that one of my shipmates is a Buddhist—converted years ago, while studying on Earth—and he's gotten me interested. Besides," Falkayn said, warming up, "it's quite a semantic quibble whether the purer sects of Buddhism are religions, in the ordinary sense. Certainly they are agnostic with respect to gods or other hypothetical animistic elements in the reality-complex; their doctrine of karma does not require reincarnation as that term is generally used; and in fact, nirvana is not annihilation, but rather is a state that may be achieved in this life and consists of—" And then it was too late for Kim.

  The spaceship slanted across the view, a lean cylinder that glowed under Earthlight and shimmered w
ithin the driving grav-fields. She swung into vertical ascent and dwindled from sight until lost in the cold of the Milky Way.

  "Well," Falkayn murmured. "Well, well."

  He glanced at Kim. "I suppose Latimer and Beldaniel are crewing her?" he said.

  "A routine trip," Kim answered, fists knotted at sides.

  "Frankly, sir, I doubt that." Falkayn remembered the pipe he held and began to stuff it. "I know hyperdrive craft when I see them. They are not used for interplanetary shuttling; why tie up that much capital when a cheaper vessel will do? For the same reason, common carriers are employed interstellar wherever practical. And full partners in a big company don't make long voyages as a matter of routine. Clear to see, this job is on the urgent side."

  And you didn't want me to know, he added unspoken. His muscles grew taut. Why not?

  Wrath glittered at him. He measured out a chuckle. "You needn't have worried about me, if you did," he said. "I wouldn't pry into your secrets."

  Kim eased a trifle. "Their mission is important, but irrelevant to our business with you," he said. Is it? Falkayn thought. Why didn't you tell me at the beginning, then, instead of letting me grow suspicious?—I believe I know why. You're so isolated from the human mainstream, so untrained in the nuances of how people think and act, that you doubted your own ability to convince me this takeoff is harmless as far as I'm concerned . . . when it probably isn't!

  Again Kim attempted a smile. "But pardon me, Captain Falkayn. We have no desire to intrude upon your religious practices. Please remain, undisturbed, as long as you wish. When you desire company, you may employ the intercom yonder, and one of us will come to guide you to the other room." He bowed.

  "May you have a pleasant spiritual experience."

  Touché! Falkayn thought, staring after the man's back. Since the damage has been done, he turns my yarn right around on me—his aim being to keep me here for some time, and my navel-watching act presenting him with an extra hour—but what's the purpose of it all?