He caught her to him and held her there a minute. “Forgive me,” he said thereafter, shakenly. “I didn’t mean to react like that to a little teasing.
But-”
“But?” she urged, seconds later.
“I think what did it was your kidding me that I might’ve left home today instead of yesterday. Suddenly I remembered that I did leave home, and why.”
“And you stepped back into jealousy because the real thought pained you too much. my beloved.” She knelt before him, stroked his face, regarded him Side 23
Anderson, Poul – Avatar, The
through tears.
“Could be,” he said. “I’m not in any habit of probing my psyche.” He pulled his lips upward. “As long as the damn thing runs, not rattling a lot, I’ll simply give it an occasional change of oil. Okay, let’s drop this subject with a dull, sickening thud.”
She remained grave. “No, Dan. You are in danger, and everything you care about is, Lis and the children foremost. How could I deserve being your mistress if you must shelter me from your griefs? Tell me.”
“I did while we drove here.”
“You laid out a skeleton for me. Breathe on it now, that it may rise alive.”
“I, uh, I don’t know what to say Pegeen.” That was a name for her which they had private between them.
“Let me lead you, then.” She settled beside him afresh; they touched, arm to arm and flank to flank, while they gazed outward at torchflies, trees, and fugitive stars. Save for the springwater, the night was growing still as it grew old. “Why are you in rebellion?” she asked. “Sure, and I hunger to explore yonder suns myself. But you have Chinook, that you got remodeled and crewed for the same purpose.”
“Yeah, after the alien ship passed through the Phoebean gate. Have you forgotten, though? Only a watchship was around, to see what precise guidepath she followed-which, actually, only a couple of specialist officers did. Damn them, they didn’t release the information except to their high command, and the Union government promptly declared it super top secret. Don Pedro himself- the Señor, the head of the Rueda clan and combine-he’s never managed to pry the data loose. If the rest of the crew hadn’t babbled, maybe you and I would still not know that an outworld vessel ever did come by.
“Oh, yes,” Brodersen went on, out of the acridness in his gullet, “I could see the reasoning. Why, I could agree, sort of, would you believe? We’d no idea what kind of beings were at the far end of that gate. We couldn’t let any random team charge through, to raise any possible kind of havoc. That had to include me and my company. When I commissioned Chinook, I did it on sheer hope, that the official expedition would come back bearing good news, so the government could freely let responsible private parties go. Or else, if the expedition did not come back, the Union Council would some year let me make a second attempt. At that, I kept her fully stocked, so I could take off too fast for a politician or bureaucrat to get my clearance cancelled.
“And God damn it, Emissary did return! And they’re suppressing the fact!
They want to kill our chance for going, ever-”
He slumped. “Hell and damnation,” he said, “you’ve heard me drone on, over and over, about what’s common knowledge. Last time we met, you heard me talk about my earliest suspicions. Today you heard me rant about what’s happened since. Why do you put up with my repeating like this?”
She laid her head against his shoulder. “Because you have the need, my dear, my dear,” she answered. After a moment: “But tell me next, what was the need in you to charge forward like O’Shaughnessy’s bull? You steer yourself well. Why could you not be patient and cunning, till at last you held the truth gathered between your fingers for a noose to do hangman’s justice?”
More than the words, her tone calmed him. “Well,” he said, “I’d already compromised myself to a degree. Then I trusted Amelia Hancock too much, and look what happened.”