The Road of Danger-ARC (11 page)

Though the air did have an unpleasant pong; indeed, Daniel would almost call it a texture. It didn’t have anything to do with depravity, however. At a guess, the algae on the surface of the harbor included something that fixed sulfur, which became hydrogen sulfide at the touch of plasma exhaust.

The patches of virulent yellow which floated among the greens and browns were a good candidate for the culprit. Chances were it was an off-planet species which had travelled through the Matrix on a starship’s floats and now was adapting to Madison. Viewed in the right way, it was an uplifting story of triumph over adversity.

“Well, anyway it don’t half stink!” said Hogg, completing the thought which his master hadn’t spoken aloud. Daniel chuckled.

Small boats lined the seafront. The naval harbor had concrete slips, but the commercial side of Ashetown Haven used floating walkways and docks—
The House of Hrynko
was tied up to one—or, for the majority of traffic, anchorages at pilings in the open roadstead with lighters and water taxis to reach dry land.

“And here we are, I believe,” said Daniel, nodding to the building across the intersecting street—Fifth Street, according to the sign suspended on cables in the middle of the intersection. The wicker railing of the second floor balcony was woven to read MILTIADES HOTEL in brown letters against cream; above the tile roof were steps to a miniature widow’s walk.

The wall of the building’s ground floor was pale orange stucco with CALPURNIUS TRADING in florid black letters, and
Contractors and Purveyors
in smaller script beneath them. There were no windows, only a heavy door which was held open by a doorstop on the form of a bronze dog.

As Daniel started across the street, a handful of ragged boys rushed toward him, crying, “Spare change, Captain, spare change!”

“Sorry, lads, I’m on the beach my—” Daniel started to say. There was a loud
Whap!
and a cry behind him. He looked over his shoulder to see another boy staggering away, bent over and holding his left ear.

Hogg picked up the shears the boy had dropped; he had been reaching out to cut the straps of Daniel’s belt wallet. Hogg clenched and opened his other hand, working feeling back into his fingers; he’d slapped the boy instead of using his fist. From his own youthful experience, Daniel knew that such blows felt like those of a wooden bat.

Hogg twisted the shears till the steel snapped, then dropped the pieces behind him. “Cheeky little sods,” he growled. “Did they think I’m blind? Or my arm’s crippled?”

The other boys had vanished like mist as the sun rose. “Not any more, I’m sure,” Daniel said, and he stepped into the premises of Calpurnius Trading.

Three young male clerks were at desks behind the counter to the left. A capable-looking middle-aged woman sat to the right of the doorway. Her console had come from a starship, probably a passenger liner of the previous century. Even as old as that, an astrogation computer was more than sufficient for any planet-bound task. The back wall was wooden with two doors; both were closed.

“Yes, gentlemen?” the woman said. Daniel hadn’t seen her send a signal, but an interior door opened and two men came out.

“I’m Kirby Pensett, late of the RCN,” Daniel said, withdrawing an identification chip from his belt pouch. “That name doesn’t mean anything to you, but I’m here as representative of Bernhard Sattler, whom you do know. I’m to speak either to Mistress Sysco or Master Bremington.”

“Why has Bernhard sent an agent?” said the older, better dressed, of the two men. His companion looked like a stevedore. “Are you here to inspect us, is that what you mean?”

“Master Bremington?” Daniel said. “I’m here to inspect Master Sattler’s investment. Which is significant enough to justify inspection—in my opinion, but much more importantly, in his. Do you have a problem with this?”

“He’s who he says he is, Picque,” said the woman, who had inserted Daniel’s chip into her console. “Look, we’ve got nothing to hide. If Bernhard wants to look things over, I guess I don’t blame him.”

Bremington made a sour face. “Well, I suppose I can’t complain that Sattler didn’t give us warning,” he said. “And of course, we don’t have anything to hide. That is…”

He paused and gave Daniel a concerned look.

Daniel spread his hands. “I’m here on Master Sattler’s behalf,” he said. “If it may be that some port duties or the like didn’t get paid, that’s something for a government to worry about—not me. I would say that so long as the profits are being shared properly, then anything that benefits the company, benefits Master Sattler.”

Bremington gave Daniel a slight smile, the first break in hostility since he entered the lobby. “Come on back to my office,” he said, “and after we’ve talked for a moment, I’ll set you up with a console and full access codes.”

He cleared his throat and added, “We’d have gone bust seven years ago if Bernhard hadn’t raised our capitalization. I’d cheat my mother before I’d cheat him.”

“Thank you, Master Bremington,” Daniel said with a half-bow. With a deeper bow to the woman, he added, “And thank
you
, mistress.”

“I’ll just wander around, if that’s all right with you, sir,” said Hogg. The words were more respectful than the tone in which he spoke them.

Daniel followed Bremington down a short hallway. Before the door behind him closed, he heard Hogg said, “I wonder, mistress, if there’s a place nearby that a poor man might find a drink and a game of poker?”

***

The pale russet robe Adele wore in her guise as Principal Hrynko felt unfamiliar but not uncomfortable. She wore khaki utilities beneath it, and the rigger who had run it up for her had placed long vertical slits along the sides as directed. Through them she could reach her pistol or her data unit as easily as she could have normally.

“
Hallelujah, I’m a bum!
” her escort chorused. She wasn’t sure how the Alliance staff would to react to the details of her escort, but she suspected no one on Madison except her had more than a passing acquaintance with Kostroman nobility. “
Hallelujah, bum again!
”

Techs had built Adele’s litter from high pressure tubing and bats of insulation. Covered with ribbons and bunting from the ship’s stores, it was flashy enough to appeal to any real Kostroman. Spacers felt that the more decoration, the better; a taste shared by most cultures once you got past the sophisticates of Xenos and Pleasaunce City.

Adele’s data unit was already operating in passive mode, gathering inputs according to the instructions Adele had programmed before she left the ship. She didn’t suppose she’d need the pistol at Forty Stars Sector Headquarters, but there had been unpleasant surprises in the past. They had been
less
unpleasant because she had been able to shoot her way out of trouble.

They’d reached the plaza in front of the Alliance Building. Adele said, “Set me down here.”

Tovera was ahead of the litter, walking with Woetjans at the side of the ragged column. She took the command through her earbud and spoke crisply though inaudibly to the bosun.

“
Hallelujah, give us a handout
—”

“Halt!” Woetjans shouted. Some of the locals—loungers in the portico as well as those entering or leaving the entrance on business—leaped to the side in surprise; spacers laughed at them.

Three of the four riggers carrying the litter started to put it down. The last was a moment behind the others, with the result that Adele would have pitched out onto the flagstones if she hadn’t grabbed the stringers with both hands.

Riding with Hogg has sharpened my instincts
, she thought.
Perhaps if I live another fifty years, I’ll rise to the level of Landsman in the opinion of my shipmates
.

Woetjans had suggested that riggers carry the litter because their job required them to be agile. They weren’t used to working as this sort of team, however, and marching in step wasn’t part of
any
spacer’s training. The twenty Sissies accompanying Adele each wore a russet sash over the right shoulder to indicate that they were Hrynko retainers, but beyond that they were as disparate a group as you could find.

They didn’t carry real weapons, but they had clubs of various sorts. That was normal practice on Kostroma, and it wouldn’t have raised eyebrows for a member of the nobility in Xenos. Nobody expected a Senator’s daughter to be jostled in the street by laborers. The Alliance authorities here might object, but they wouldn’t be surprised to see it.

Adele stepped out of the litter, feeling thankful. She had—reasonably—felt on the verge of disaster all during the procession from the Harborfront. It might very well have been that a member of the escort would have caught her if the litter-bearers had flung her out, since they’d learned to be alert on the
Princess Cecile
lest Mistress Mundy fall or drift into serious trouble. Nonetheless, it had been an uncomfortable sensation.

The whole escort moved toward the double doors of the entrance, several of them sliding pipes or batons from under their belts. A pair of slender, forties-ish women in blue uniforms were leaving the building. They saw the oncoming gang and turned back inside with startled chirps.

Adele opened her mouth to object, but Woetjans was already bellowing, “Dasi, Barnes, and Creighton
only
, you wankers, just like I said! Any of you who can’t obey orders can spend their liberty polishing thruster nozzles! Yes, I mean you, Hatchett.”

Adele stared coldly at the confusion, her natural expression under the circumstances. Spacers slunk away from the door and gathered around the litter, tucking away cudgels or in the case of one technician, a knife that he shouldn’t have been carrying.

Tovera nodded. The spacers pushed open the doors and marched into the atrium. Adele followed them, and Tovera brought up the rear with her attaché case held waist high in her left hand. Though the building didn’t have a military detachment, the pair of security guards inside were fingering their shock rods as they scowled at Woetjans and her spacers.

Adele felt the humor of the situation, though she didn’t let it reach her lips. With Tovera in the room, nobody else could be considered really dangerous. The mental smile hardened: except perhaps for Tovera’s mistress.

The double-height atrium was semicircular, with doors opening off the curve. There were dozen people watching Adele’s arrival at ground level, and a similar number peered down over the mezzanine rail.

“I am the Principal Hrynko!” Adele said, her words filling the big room. She had grown up in a family of politicians; even her little sister Agatha had known how to project her voice. “I am here to meet your Admiral Jeletsky, as one leader to another!”

The male receptionist at the central island was in urgent communication with someone over the intercom, but he kept his eyes on Adele and her entourage. Nobody actually responded to Adele.

She pointed to a man in lace-trimmed trousers and jacket who stood at the open door to his office. The style had been briefly popular on Pleasance about five years earlier, marking the fellow as a local who was trying to pass as a citizen of an Alliance core world. He was probably a mid-level functionary and therefore as frightened of overstepping his authority as he was of doing the wrong thing.

“You!” Adele said, pointing with her right arm. “Take me to the Squadron Commander!”

“Mistress?” said the receptionist in a desperate voice. “Your Ladyship? Please, someone is coming. He’ll be here very shortly, so if you—there he is! Deputy Quinley, the, ah, Principal Hrynko is here to see you.”

Quinley was short, tubby, and at the moment red-faced. Over an ordinary business suit with puffed sleeves he wore a blue sash; the pretty blond aide trotting with him through an interior doorway was trying to tug wrinkles out of its glossy fabric.

He stopped and straightened when he saw Adele. Bowing, he said with unexpected dignity, “Your Ladyship, I am Deputy Controller Quinley. How may the Alliance serve you here on Madison?”

“I am here to see Admiral Jeletsky,” Adele said. “I am a leader, and I will meet with your leader.”

What Adele was
really
here to do was to cause a stir that would cause all departments in the building to check on what was happening—and by so doing, to open their systems to her personal data unit. She wasn’t looking for information at the moment; that would require her input, choosing the pathways and circumventing security. All she expected to get from this were the internal addresses.

“Your Ladyship,” Quinley said quietly but firmly, “Admiral Jeletsky is a Fleet official. Unless you’re here to declare war, your business is with the Sector’s civil government. I am the highest Alliance representative available. If you’ll come back to my office, we will deal with your concerns as expeditiously as possible.”

He looked at Woetjans and added, “My office isn’t overly large, Your Ladyship. It would be better if you left your companions here to amuse themselves. And better still if they were to wait outside.”

Adele looked stern in a calculated fashion for a moment. Then she said, “My secretary will accompany me.”

To the bosun she added, “Woetjans, you may wait at the litter while I deal with this bureaucrat.”

If Quinley was offended by the description, he avoided letting the fact show. “Follow me, please,” he said and walked back the way he had come. Adele, Tovera, and finally the aide followed.

A security guard opened the door into a hallway. He and Quinley exchanged glances; then the guard faced front and stood with no more expression than the wall behind him while “the Kostromans” passed.

Quinley’s office was on the ground floor, but the back wall was glass with a door into the small garden beyond. The deputy controller touched a belt fob as he entered, and the sidewalls became a creamy blank. Everything in the office was virtual except for the chairs and desk of a synthetic with the sheen of black onyx.

“If you’ll give me a moment, please,” Quinley said, sliding behind the desk and bringing up a display on which he concentrated.

Adele had to restrain her reflex to take out her data unit. As a loud semi-barbarian, she was a harmless joke. If she showed herself to be technologically capable, she would become more interesting—especially since Quinley was showing himself to be a good deal more than a pompous nonentity also.