“I can’t. She and the ship decided it between them after letting me off.”
“As I expected,” Venator said calmly. “What you don’t know can’t be extracted from you. Not that it matters. One may guess. The goal clearly isn’t Mars, which would be a hazardous choice in any case. Several asteroids are possible, or conceivably a Lunarian-colonized Jovian satellite. She’s running on trajectory now, conserving her delta v and thus her options. Unless she comes to fear we may close in, and accelerates afresh, it will take a while for her to reach whatever goal she has in mind.”
Whereupon she would be in communication range. Kestrel’s antiquated laser wouldn’t carry an intelligible message across two or three astronomical units; her radio would require a high-gain receiver; and who yonder would be listening for either? Close by, Aleka’s intent to signal would be unmistakable. She might perhaps land.
“Your scheme worked, fantastical though it ^vas,” Venator continued. “I think it worked precisely because it was fantastical. We can’t overhaul her before she completes her mission, and we aren’t trying any longer.”
Yes, Kenmuir thought, he and she had estimated a reasonable probability of that. The ships of law enforcement were few and widely scattered through the Solar System, because their usual work was just to convey personnel or sometimes give aid to the distressed. Besides, even today, the Falcon class counted as high-powered. It had become mostly robots and sophotects that crossed space. They seldom demanded energy-wasting speed. It was humans who were short-lived and impatient.
“You see, we don’t want to provoke her into haste,” Venator explained. “We want time to persuade you two of your folly, so you’ll stop of your free choice.” He frowned. “Consider. Do you imagine the revelation of a minor planet out among the comets will make you heroes? Think about it. Your brutal destruction of the Beynac download will shock the world.”
Kenmuir sighed. “I told the police and I told, them, she made me promise.”
“Need you have kept the promise?”
Kenmuir nodded. “She’d been betrayed once.”
Venator’s smile was briefly unpleasant. “To your benefit, as it turned out.”
Kenmuir made a grin and gestured around his cell. “This?”
“I didn’t mean you were after personal gain,” Venator said. “I confess that your motives puzzle me, and suspect they puzzle you also.”
Once more Kenmuir had the sense—nonsense, cried his rationality, but the feeling would not goaway—that he and Aleka had been the instruments of some great blind force, and it was not done with them yet, and they themselves were among its wellsprings. But he had better stay with immediacies. He could take advantage of the huntsman’s desire for conversation.
“What’s the situation on Luna?” he asked. His interrogators there had given him no news.
Venator’s voice and bearing eased. “Well,” he said as if it were interesting but of little importance, “the lady Lilisaire caused us considerable trouble, in which several of her colleagues gleefully joined. Fortunately, we avoided significant damage or casualties on either side, and things are quiet now. Officially they’re under house arrest. In practice, what we have is an uneasy truce. The outcome of that will depend largely on you, my friend.”
“How?”
Venator turned serious. “You can still halt what you’ve set moving. Tam has ignored our calls, but Kestrel must have taken note of them and will doubtless inform her of any that come from you.”
“What could I have to say?” Not, in the presence of machines, that he thought he loved her.
“You, and you alone, can make her come back, keeping the secret of Proserpina.”
“Why should I?”
“Criminal charges can be dismissed, you know, or a pardon can be granted.”
Emotion stirred anew in Kenmuir. The sharpest part of it was anger. “See here,” he stated, “I never proposed to serve as a martyr, nor does she. If and when the news comes out, the Solar System will decide whether we did wrong. In spite of—“ his voice faltered “—the download—when that story too is made clear … I dare hope for pardon from the whole human race.”
“Spare me the rhetoric, please,” Venator scoffed. “You’ve calculated that the government will be in so awkward a position that its best move will be to quietly let infractions go unpunished, while the more radical Lunarians prepare to emigrate to Proserpina. In exchange, you won’t emphasize any irregularities we may have committed.”