Cherryh, CJ – Merchanters Luck

dragged it over and sat down, leaned on the desk and jabbed a finger onto it

amid the papers. “Do I figure right, you’ve got your sights on Pell? Maybe

Mallory’s playing your game out there; maybe you’re going to pull it off.”

“Mallory.”

He sat back a fraction, playing it with a scant flicker; but the hate in Edgar’s

eyes was mortal—So, he thought, having tried that perimeter. Play it without

principles. All the way. “Her cargo aboard,” he said. “She hauled me in before

undock, said she was watching. And she’s out there. Overjumped us. Just

watching. That’s what I know. I’m not particular. You want Mallory’s cargo,

welcome to it And if you want trade done somewhere across the Line, I’m

willing—but not Pell. Not and answer questions back there.”

Edger was a mass murderer. So was Mallory. But there was a febrile fixation to

Edger’s stare that tightened the hairs on his nape. No dockside justice ever

promised Edger’s kind of dealing.

“Suppose we discuss it with your man back there,” Edger said.

“Discuss what?”

“Mallory.”

“I’ll discuss Mallory. I’ve got no percentage in it”

“Where is Norway?”

“Last time I saw her she was off by James’s Point”

“Doing what?”

“Waiting for something. She’s working with Union. That’s the rumor. They’ve got

all the nullpoints sewed up and Union’s working with her. So they say.”

Edger was silent a moment. Shifted his eyes to his lieutenant and back again.

“What cargo?”

“I don’t know what cargo. I didn’t want Mallory on my neck. I didn’t break any

seals.”

“Junk, Captain Stevens. Junk. We looked. Recycling goods.” Edger’s voice rose

and fell again; and Sander’s mind went to one momentary blank.

“She set me up,” he exclaimed. “That bastard bitch set me up. She knew what was

here and sent me into it.”

No reaction from Edger: nothing. The eyes stayed fixed on him, feverish and

still, and the noise of his protest fell into that silence and died.

“Look, I don’t know anything. I swear to you, I’m a marginer with legal

troubles; and Mallory offered me hazard rate for a haul —offered me a way out,

and a profit, and she set me up. She bloody well set me up.”

“I’m touched, Stevens.”

“It’s the truth.”

“It’s a setup, Stevens, you’re right in that much.—Hagler, take a detail and

persuade Stevens he’s hired; get that ship working.”

“Hired for what?”

“Don’t press your luck, Stevens. You may survive this voyage… if you learn.”

A hand descended on his shoulder. He got up, without protest, calculating

wildly—to get back aboard again, get sealed in there with a crew and take care

of them… Allison and her cousins would be there; and there was suddenly a way

out—

Everyone was moving, the gathering adjourning elsewhere with some dispatch. They

were pulling out, he reckoned suddenly. They could not afford to sit at rest if

they suspected Mallory was on the loose. A warship out of jump, not dumping its

velocity—he did the calculations mentally, fogged in the terror of them, let

himself be taken by the arm and steered for the door, a gun prodding him in the

back. A ship like Norway could be down their throats scant minutes behind its

lightspeed bow wave of ID and interference… could blow them out of this fragile,

antique shell of a station.

There never had been a major settlement here, he surmised. It was a setup, all

of it, all the leaks of routes and trade—and he had not betrayed Mallory:

Mallory had primed him with everything she wanted spread to her enemies.

Canisters of junk for a cargo-He looked about him as they went out onto the open

dock, so chill that breath hung frosted in the air and cold lanced to the bone.

They herded him right, the jab of a rifle barrel, all of them headed out… and he

looked back, saw them taking Curran off in the other direction.

“Curran!” he yelled. “Hold it! Blast you, my crewman goes with me—”

Curran stopped, looked toward him. Sandor staggered in the sudden jerk at his

arm, the jab of a rifle barrel into his ribs—Kept turning, and hit an armored