Calum had spent the entire first few hours whistling happily or chortling at having escaped so deviously. It eased Acorna’s nagging conscience that he evidently suffered from no guilt about their precipitous departure. She herself still felt pangs of grief and guilt about sneaking away without a proper farewell to Gill and Pal and Mr. Li-not to mention Rafik, who had been away, as usual, on business for his uncle Hafiz. But she could not have said good-bye without warning them … and it had seemed essential to take advantage of Judit’s offer to keep all three men busy and out of communication until the AcaPecki was well clear of Maganos.
“Are you sure even Rafik won’t be able to deduce our course, Calum?” Acorna had asked when they were outside the heliopause of the Kezdetian primary.
“Not even Rafik, Acorna. He may be subtle in dealing with people, but I’m the engineer and navigator,” Calum said proudly.
“But they all know our destination: the Coma Berenices quadrant.”
“Ah,”-Calum s smile was devious as he held up one finger-“there are nine and sixty ways of getting there, and we’re taking almost, but not quite, the most illogical. I don’t trust Rafik not to think of the most illogical, so I plotted in the course he is least likely to suspect. Therefore, there is no logical or illogical way for him to figure out what way we did go. See-here’s the space we’re navigating in.” He put his hands in a position to encircle a globe, then drew out the left side.
“Milky Way,” he explained, “then we are going down …” He let his right hand describe a direct downward line. “That is NOT the shortest distance to where we want to be.” And his right hand made his planned deviation. “Except that, actually and spatially, it will be. But I don’t have to make a course cor