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"Somebody Nikky Gratham, or the Everrards, or maybe Viktor himself paid them to tell us that, to pin our ships down here. Or they made it up themselves, so they could make hay on our trade-planets." "Let's go down to the Ghetto and clean out the whole gang," somebody else took up. "Anything one of them's in, they're all in together."
The double cellars of Gratham House had, in their time, been one of the sights of London. Rumour had it that Kara, who was no lover of wine, had bricked up the cellars, and their very existence passed into domestic legendary. The door was opened by a well-dressed and deferential man-servant and T. X. was ushered into the hall.
"Inside a year, four or five of these small planet-holders like Gratham and the Everrards would combine against us and make a slag-pile out of Tanith." Harkaman nodded agreement. "Since we warned him the first time, Viktor's kept his ships away from our planets. If we attacked Xochitl now, without provocation, nobody'd know what to expect from us.
It was peculiarly English in appearance with its window boxes, its discreet curtains, its polished brass and enamelled doorway. It had been the town house of Lord Henry Gratham, that eccentric connoisseur of wine and follower of witless pleasure.
"The Grendelsbane went back to Beowulf; she'll stop at Amaterasu to do a little trading on the way. The Black Star went to Xochitl. Just a friendly visit, to say hello to Prince Viktor for you. Ravallo has a lot of audiovisuals we made during the Dagon Operation. Then she's going to Jagannath to visit Nikky Gratham." Harkaman approved his attitude and actions with regard to King Angus.
Half an hour later, there was another one at five light-minutes; a very small one, and then a third at two light-seconds, and this was detectable by radar and microray as a ship's pinnace. He wondered if something had happened on Amaterasu or Beowulf; somebody like Gratham or the Everrards might have decided to take advantage of the defensive mobilization on Tanith.
Capable of building a complete ship, in fact. I never saw a ship come into a Viking base planet with any kind of a cargo worth dickering over that hadn't taken some damage getting it. Prince Viktor of Xochitl makes a good half of his money on ship repairs, and so do Nikky Gratham on Jagannath and the Everrards on Hoth." "And engine works, hyperdrive, normal space and pseudograv," Trask added.
People like Nikky Gratham and Tobbin of Nergal and the Everrards of Hoth get nervous around unpredictable dangers, and when they get nervous they get trigger-happy." He puffed slowly on his pipe and then said: "Then you'll be going back to Gram." "That doesn't follow; just because Valkanhayn and Ravallo and that crowd are wrong doesn't make Valpry and Rathmore and Ffayle right.
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