Her eyes suddenly locked with Kamil’s, then moved to fix each of her shipmates sitting or standing opposite her.
“That fact neither softened the horror of those ten months nor clouded the memory of it, no more than any onworlder living through that time is likely to forget it. The dying and the sickness itself were only part of it. The misery and want were everywhere, the fear, the ever-growing, crushing despair, and with all that, too much, far too much human-nastiness. I was young and a stranger, but even I was aware of rampant filth and evil.
“Never, ever, can a similar scourge be permitted to strike any planet, not while the power or the possibility of preventing it exists. That need holds true and must hold despite the danger of occasionally serving individuals or starships with the gravest injustice.”
“I don’t think any of us will argue that. Doctor,” Miceal Jellico said quietly after several seconds of grim silence. “If our lads had believed us to be plague-stricken in fact, the Solar Queen would’ve met her end in a star’s heart. Spirit of Space! Had I imagined them capable of any other course, that’s where I would’ve sent the Queen myself before I passed out.”
Rael smiled. “I know. If I’d doubted that, I’d never have come on board at all.”
Jellico shook his head as he watched the woman leave the cabin several minutes later. She would have been young, he thought, probably not much more than eleven, when she had gone through that plague. It would have been a hard experience at any age and explained both her basic gravity and her fascination with mass illness and other disaster situations.
That was no condemnation of her. Every human being reaching adulthood had his defenses and his own way of viewing the universe around him. Those who experienced massive trauma, physical or mental, and who were not shattered by it had made some pretty powerful adaptations to accommodate it, especially when it had been suffered in their vulnerable formative years. The awesome slaughter of the Crater War had shredded Ali’s childhood. Somehow, he had lived through that carnage, but it had left him one of life’s observers. He would allow nothing to penetrate the armor he had carefully constructed around himself. Rael Cofort had been somewhat older and the deadly situation in which she found herself had been of considerably shorter duration, but even so, she, too, had her facade and, her scars …
He saw the Cargo-Master start to push out into the corridor. “Van, hold up.”
The other waited for him and fell into step beside him.
“Quite a story,” he remarked.
“Aye.”
“You believe it?” Van Rycke asked. “She never mentioned a ship’s name or a planet’s.”
“That can all be checked. The timing’d be right. Cofort appeared as a force on the scene suddenly and very young out of a spacer clan who should never under normal circumstances have been able to finance the setup he created for himself.” The rest of his history, of course, was the result of a lot of luck and even more hard work and shrewd dealing, but that early start had often been a source of speculation among the ranks of the Free Traders.
Jellico shrugged, dismissing the question for the time being. “It’s Rael herself who interests me at the moment. You and Thorson’ll be checking out the market soon. Take her with you and give her as free a hand as seems prudent. I want to see what she can do.”
“Her brother never or only rarely used her in that capacity,” Van Rycke reminded him doubtfully. “From what I saw, she’d choose the goods, but Cofort would trade for them.”
“Put it to the test anyway.”
Van gave him a curious look. “Why bother?”
He shrugged. “A xenobiologist looking for more data, maybe. Cofort’s a puzzle however you try to look at her.”
His eyes narrowed. “You and I’re both old foxes, but given all the information she had, would you have reached the same conclusion or come to it as quickly as she did?”
“Not in a star’s life span,” he admitted.
“That kind of deductive power might prove very handy to a Free Trader—if she can use it for more mundane purposes than uncovering bizarre murder plots.”
“It wouldn’t do to make a career of that,” his companion agreed dryly.
“Not unless one was straight Whisperer bait or planning to ally himself permanently with the Patrol, which would amount to the same thing.”
“You don’t believe Rael Cofort’s thinking along those lines?” the Cargo-Master asked.
“Who knows what that woman’s thinking?” he responded wearily.
Van Rycke eyed him closely. “Craig mentioned that you had some serious reservations about her.”
Jellico smiled. “I still do, but at least I think I know now why Cofort dumped her.”
Jan’s pale brows rose. “That’s more than I can claim.”
“Some perfectly capable people draw trouble. I believe Doctor Cofort is a prime example.”
“A jinx?”
Miceal gave a short laugh. “Does the Cofort operation show much sign of any such influence? — No, but Rael appears to have an overdeveloped sense of what’s right, or maybe the sight of the downtrodden just sparks a powerful protective response in her. Whatever the cause, the result can be pure headache for her Captain and shipmates, if not outright disaster.
“Look at her behavior in that alley, Van. The starlight was scared out of her, but she was all set to march in for that scrap of bone and then blast off to the Stellar Patrol at warp speed. She never gave a thought to our strained relations with that organization or a Trader’s natural instinct to navigate clear of all brass as much as possible. Add to that the fact that she’s admitted to dragging her brother into more than one scrape he’d have preferred to duck and you have the makings of a problem of no mean magnitude.”
“Why court trouble ourselves? We’ll be rid of her soon.”
“Curiosity mostly,” the other responded. “Besides, she’s tied to us until we’re ready to lift anyway. I’d like to see if she’s any good in real Trade. The Queen might as well reap some benefit if she is.”
“All right, I’ll give her a shot at the market,” the CargoMaster promised willingly enough. “Come with us yourself. She’ll know she’s under observation anyway, and it’ll be late enough now by the time we’re ready to go that some of the big industrialists might be scouting around there. I understand they usually do when a new ship comes into port, and several have this past week. We could possibly pick up a charter.”
Jellico nodded. “I’ll do that,” he said. “I’d intended waiting a bit longer before giving it a walk-through, but it won’t hurt and might help to look the place over at once.”
12
Ali Kamil quickened his pace until he came up beside Rael.
“I’m sorry,” he told her quietly. “I was navigating right off the charts in there.”
“So was I,” she replied’ bitterly. “Firing off my mouth like that was inexcusable. I knew what you all had been through.”
“It was no more than you had.”
He frowned and stepped aside to allow Dane and Rip to pass. Sometimes, he thought sourly, finding a place to have a private conversation aboard a starship was about as easy as netting an asteroid made of pure platinum, at least for lowly apprentices lacking the luxury of a private office or work cabin.
The Medic sensed that something more was weighing on him, but Kamil was the last person to broach it in the busy corridor. “I want to check on some seedlings,” she said.
“You could lift out the germination trays for me if you’ve got the time and don’t mind.”
“I’m happy to assist, Doctor Cofort.”
Hael breathed deeply of the rich air in the hydro. It was her favorite place here, even as the one on the Roving Star had been when she had been serving under her brother’s command. All it needed was some lavender …
The Engineer-apprentice walked over to the tall bank of germination trays. “Which one?” he inquired.
“The top two. You’ve got enough inches on me that we won’t have to get out the ladder.”
It took only a few seconds to carefully remove the trays and set them on the nearby work bench.
He peered at the closely spaced, neat rows of minute plants, each of which bore two leaves. “What are they?” he asked curiously. “There are a couple of different kinds, I think, though it’s hard to be sure. They’re so small.”
“Most just put their heads up this morning, the others yesterday afternoon. They won’t be readily identifiable for a while yet. — One box contains tarragon, the other gray pepper. Mr. Mura wants them for the galley. He’ll be trying some new spices as well for more variety.”