Citizen of the Galaxy by Robert A. Heinlein

She shook her head. “I don’t believe it.”

“You mean you don’t want to!”

“I don’t believe it. He’s People. You can tell it in his walk, his manner, his good mind, everything about him. Hmm . . . I’ll look at the files myself.”

“Go ahead. Since you don’t believe me.”

“Now, Fjalar, I didn’t say –”

“Oh, yes, you did. If I told you it was raining dirtside, and you didn’t want rain, you –”

“Please, dear! You know it never rains this time of year on Hekate. I was just –”

“Sky around us!”

“There’s no need to lose your temper. It doesn’t become a captain.”

“It doesn’t become a captain to have his word doubted in his own ship, either!”

“I’m sorry, Fjalar.” She went on quietly, “It won’t hurt to look. If I widened the search, or looked through unfiled material — you know how clerks are with deadfile data. Mmm . . . it would help if I knew who Thorby’s parents were — before election. While I shan’t permit him to marry before then, I might line up important support if it was assumed that immediately after, a wedding could be expec –”

“Rhoda.”

“What, dear? The entire Vega group could be swayed, if a presumption could be established about Thorby’s birth . . . if an eligible daughter of theirs –”

“Rhoda!”

“I was talking, dear.”

“For a moment, I’ll talk. The Captain. Wife, he’s fraki blood. Furthermore, Baslim knew it . . . and laid a strict injunction on me to help him find his family. I had hoped — yes, and believed — that the files would show that Baslim was mistaken.” He frowned and chewed his lip. “A Hegemonic cruiser is due here in two weeks. That ought to give you time to assure yourself that I can search files as well as any clerk.”

“What do you mean?”

“Is there doubt? Debts are always paid . . . and there is one more payment due.”

She stared. “Husband, are you out of your mind?”

“I don’t like it any better than you do. He’s not only a fine boy; he’s the most brilliant tracker we’ve ever had.”

“Trackers!” she said bitterly. “Who cares about that? Fjalar, if you think that I will permit one of my sons to be turned over to fraki –” She choked up.

“He is fraki.”

“He is not. He is Sisu, just as I am. I was adopted, so was he. We are both Sisu, we will always be.”

“Have it your way. I hope he will always be Sisu in his heart. But the last payment must be made.”

“That debt was paid in full, long ago!”

“The ledger doesn’t show it.”

“Nonsense! Baslim wanted the boy returned to his family. Some fraki family — if fraki have families. So we gave him a family — our own, clan and sept. Is that not better payment than some flea-bitten fraki litter? Or do you think so little of Sisu?”

She glared up at him, and the Krausa thought bitterly that there must be something to the belief that the pure blood of the People produced better brains. In dickering with fraki he never lost his temper. But Mother — and now Rhoda — could always put him in the wrong.

At least Mother, hard as she had been, had never asked the impossible. But Rhoda . . . well, Wife was new to the job. He said tensely, “Chief Officer, this injunction was laid on me personally, not on Sisu. I have no choice.”

“So? Very well, Captain — well speak of it later. And now, with all respect to you, sir, I have work to do.”

Thorby had a wonderful time at the Gathering but not as much fun as he expected; repeatedly Mother required him to help entertain chief officers of other ships. Often a visitor brought a daughter or granddaughter along and Thorby had to keep the girl busy while the elders talked. He did his best and even acquired facility in the half-insulting small talk of his age group. He learned something that he called dancing which would have done credit to any man with two left feet and knees that bent backwards. He could now put his arm around a girl when music called for it without chills and fever.