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The party from the Queen was given a peremptory challenge as they reached the other ship's ramp. Rip demanded to see the officer of the watch and then told the story of the wounded man as far as they knew it. The Eysie was hurried aboard nor did his shipmates give a word of thanks. "That's that." Rip shrugged. "Let's go before they slam the hatch so hard they'll rock their ship off her fins!"
If the Eysies were responsible for the present plight of the Queen he would welcome trouble, the kind which would plant his fists on some sneering Eysie face. "We'll see about that when we come to it," Rip went on to the control cabin with his figures. Carefully he punched the combination on the plotter and watched it be compared with the course Jellico had set before his collapse.
"You wait," Dane replied with no inclination to give the Eysie officer any courtesy address. Close to a Terran year aboard the Solar Queen had inoculated him with pride in his own section of Service. A Free Trader was answerable to his own officers and to no one else on earth or among the stars no matter how much discipline and official etiquette the Companies used to enhance their power.
"But how no Eysie came on board no Salarik either, except for the cub who showed us what they thought of catnip." Rip shrugged. "How would I know how they did " he was beginning when Dane cut in: "If they didn't know about our immunity the Queen might stay in Hyper and never come out there wouldn't be anyone to set the snap-out." "Right enough.
"Now we're in for it maybe right up the rockets! By the Spiked Tail of Exol, this is certainly not our lucky day!" He quickened pace until they were close to trotting. "That's far enough, Eysie!"
No infection bothered him or Survey " "But you've got to admit it hit us," Weeks protested. "Yes, and the Eysie ship was able to foresee it report us before we snapped out of Hyper. Sounds almost as if they expected us to carry plague, doesn't it?" Shannon wanted to know. "Planted?" Ali frowned at the banks of controls.
Rip waited until the man began to run down and then he broke in with his pleasant soft drawl. "Oh, sure, we're all that. But time runs on, Eysie, and I'd like a couple of answers which may mean something to you. First when do you expect your relief?" That set the agent off again.
And now he stood there in the early morning, stripped down to shorts and boots, wearing nothing on which a net could catch and so trap him. The Free Traders were certain that the I-S men having any advantage would press it to the ultimate limit and the death of Captain Jellico would make a great impression on the Salariki. Jellico was taller than the Eysie who faced him, but almost as lean.
They had left the trade enclosure of the Salariki barely three-quarters of an hour ago. But below now stood the bebadged Captain of the I-S ship and his Cargo-master. "I want to speak to your Captain " snarled the Eysie officer.
But it was when the Eysie moved out to meet the Captain that Rip's fingers closed about Dane's upper arm in an almost paralyzing grip. "He knows " Dane had not needed that bad news to be made vocal. Having seen the exploits of the Salariki duelists earlier, he had already caught the significance of that glide, of the way the I-S champion carried his net.