The actors playing Stacey’s ancestors had joined the clowns behind the crematorium. They’d handed the deathmasks to footmen from the families which’d provided them and were removing their costumes; attendants folded the chairs on which they’d been sitting.
The man who’d impersonated Stacey was talking to the undertaker. He was the contractor as well as the principal performer, for the undertaker handed him a purse. He weighed it in his hand and bowed.
Adele stood alone just beyond the ranks of chairs. When she caught Daniel’s eye she nodded, turned, and walked away. Tovera, who must’ve been watching from the other side of the fence during the ceremony, trailed her mistress closely.
Daniel smiled in appreciation. Adele wouldn’t intrude, but she hadn’t wanted to leave without saying goodbye.
“Lieutenant Leary?” said a voice at his elbow. Daniel turned abruptly and found the principal actor beside him. “My name is Shackleford, Enzio Shackleford. I trust our performance was to your taste?”
It was disconcerting to see the fellow still in uniform but without the mask and wig, for his wild white hair was utterly unlike anything a spacer would wear. In a cramped, weightless vessel, such strands would’ve drifted in all directions.
Daniel swallowed the swig of brandy that’d been in his mouth when the man startled him. Part of it went down the wrong pipe; he sprayed it onto the sleeve of his Dress Whites that he got over his mouth and nose in time.
Hogg muttered and snatched the kerchief from Daniel’s cuff to mop at the liquor. It would’ve made better sense to sneeze on the actor’s utility uniform. . . .
Shackleford pretended his attention was fastened on matters of supernal interest on the horizon. “A most gratifying house, if I may say so, Lieutenant. A turn-out that would’ve done honor to the most respected admiral or statesman. I was pleased to be in charge of the performance.”
“Your pardon, Master Shackleford,” Daniel managed through spasms; the strong brandy burned like spattering thermite on the soft inner tissues of his nose. “Yes, yes, you did splendidly.”
“I like to think that the Enzio Shackleford Company gives value far above our small additional increment of cost compared to just any self-styled thespians,” Shackleford said with an airy gesture of his hand to indicate they both were true aristocrats. “Allow me to provide you with my card, sir.”
He did so with a flourish that suggested he performed card tricks when nothing more lucrative offered itself.
“You may have occasion at any moment to require similar services,” Shackleford continued. “How well it has been said, ‘We know not the day and hour of our passing.’ In your moment of grief, sir, do not fail to call on the first name in posthumous impersonations—the Enzio Shackleford Company!”
Daniel frowned, trying to imagine who else might die for whom he’d be responsible. Adele, perhaps? Though she was at no obvious risk unless catastrophe struck the Princess Cecile, in which case the vessel’s commander was unlikely to be in a position to arrange the funeral.
Thought of the Princess Cecile lowered a gray curtain over Daniel’s mind; he took a long, deliberate drink from the flask, drawing its contents far down. He’d been tense throughout the day, afraid that some mistake would turn the proceedings into a farce. He’d felt no sadness, though; this had been a celebration of Stacey’s life and—as it turned out—a triumph. The flesh, frail even in life, was now ash; but the name of Commander Stacey Bergen was on the lips of everyone in Xenos.
Uncle Stacey’s glorious send-off was past, and now present reality was intruding on the euphoria of the afternoon. Daniel had Admiral Anston’s word that the Admiralty would find him a command; that counted for more than a signed and sealed commission from anybody else. The thought of the Sissie being gutted and turned into an intra-system tramp, though—that was troubling.
Gutted—or simply bought by a breaker’s yard for her masts, electronics and drives. Though the boom in trade that came with peace should give all spaceworthy hulls enough value to spare the Sissie that final indignity for a few years further.
Daniel took another drink. When he lowered the flask empty, he saw Lieutenant Mon coming toward him against the grain of the departing crowd.