Robert Asprin – Tambu

“Very well,” Tambu managed, recovering himself. “Egor?”

The big man rose slowly to his feet and surveyed the room carefully before he spoke. Tambu tried to read the expression on his old friend’s face, but found he could not. The only thing he could say for certain was that Egor looked older.

“I’m not as good a talker as most of you,” Egor began hesitantly, “but there’s something I’ve got to tell you about. Something that affects all of us in this room.”

He paused for a moment, frowning as if trying to choose his next words.

“Most of you know Whitey,” he said at last. “She was captain of the Raven before Pepe. She’s an old friend of mine, and I kept in touch with her after she left the fleet and settled on Elei. I’ve found out… well, she’s dead.”

There was a moment of stunned silence. Then everyone tried to talk at once. Pepe was on his feet, his face pale and drawn, trying to say something to Egor, but his words were lost in the clamor.

Despite his own shock at hearing the news, Tambu’s mind was churning with suspicion. Why hadn’t Egor informed him of this sooner? More important, why had he chosen now to make his announcement?

Egor was holding his hands up now, motioning for quiet. Slowly, the other conversations subsided as the captains turned to listen.

“What is particularly important,” he continued, “is not the fact that Whitey’s dead, but rather how she died. The Defense Alliance killed her. One of the Alliance ships visited Elei, and someone told its crew that Whitey used to be with our fleet. They went to her home, dragged her out in the street, and hung her. There was no formal arrest by the Elei authorities, no trial, nothing! Just a lynch mob–a Defense Alliance lynch mob!”