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She inhaled.
Teki cut in. "Aw, c'mon, Helda, give the guy a break. He did help us out with
those blasted tweetybirds." Winking, he took Ethan by the arm and towed him
toward the chamber's other exit. "Just go get it and bring it back, all
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right?"
The woman said, "Well!" but the counterman nodded.
"Don't mind Helda," whispered the young man to Ethan as he pushed him past the
inner door, through a UV-and-filtered-air lock, and out a final airseal. "She
drives everybody crazy. That fat kid of hers emigrated downside just to get
away from her. I don't suppose she said thanks for the help?"
Ethan shook his head.
"Well, I thank you." He nodded cheerfully; the airseal doors hissed closed on
his smile.
"Help," said Ethan in a tiny voice. He turned around. He was in another
standard Station corridor, identical to a thousand others. He squeezed his
eyes shut briefly in spiritual pain, sighed, and started walking.
* * *
Two hours later he was still walking, certain he was circling. Station
Security posts, frequent and highly visible in Transients' Lounge, disappeared
here in the Stationers' own areas. Or maybe like the equipment in the walls
they were merely cryptically marked, and he was walking right past them. Ethan
swore softly under his breath as another blister rubbed up by his ill-fitting
boots popped.
Glancing down a cross-corridor, he gave a joyous start. The stuff on the walls
had labels, lists, and locks again. He turned that way. A few more junctions,
another door, and he found himself in a public mallway. Not far along it,
beside a fountain, shimmered a directory.
"You are here," he muttered, tracing through the holovid. Colored light licked
over his finger. Nearest Security post, there: he looked up to match the map
with a mirrored booth on the balcony at the farthest end of the mall. Just one
level below this mallway was his own hostel. Quinn's hostel was over a bit, up
two. He wondered anxiously where the one in which the Cetagandans had
questioned him was. Not far away enough, he was sure. He steeled himself and
hobbled up the mall, glancing out of the corner of his eye for men in bright
face paint or women in crisp gray-and-white uniforms.
KLINE STATION SECURITY, glowed the legend atop the booth. The mirroring was
one-way. From inside there was a fine view overlooking the mall, Ethan found
upon entering. Banks of monitors and com links filled the little room. A
Security person sat, feet up, eating little fried morsels of something from a
bag and gazing idly down at the colorful concourse.
A Security woman, Ethan corrected himself with an inward moan. Young and
dark-haired, in her orange-and-black quasi-military uniform she bore a faint,
generic resemblance to Commander Quinn.
He cleared his throat. "Uh, excuse me . . . Are you on duty?"
She smiled. "Alas, yes. From the time I put on this uniform to the time I take
it off at the end of my shift, plus whenever they beep me after. But I get off
at 2400," she added encouragingly. "Would you care for a newt nugget?"
"Uh, no no thank you," Ethan replied. He smiled back in nervous uncertainty.
Her smile became blinding. He tried again. "Did you hear anything about a
fellow firing a nerve disruptor in one of the mallways this morning?"
"Gods, yes! Is it gossip in Docks and Locks already?"
"Oh . . ." Ethan realized where some of the disjointedness in this
conversation was coming from; the red coveralls were misleading her. "I'm not
a Stationer."
"I can tell by your accent," she agreed cordially. She sat up and rested her
chin on his hand. Her eyes positively twinkled. "Earning your way across the
galaxy as a migrant worker, are you? Or did you get stranded?"
"Uh, neither . . ." Ethan continued smiling, since she did. Was this some
expected part of exchanges between the sexes? Neither Quinn nor the ecotech
had used such intense facial signals, but Quinn admitted herself atypical and
the ecotech was definitely weird. His mouth was beginning to hurt. "But about
that shooting . . ."
"Oh, have you talked to anybody that was there?" Some of her glowing manner
fell away, and she sat up more alertly. "We're looking for more witnesses."
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Caution asserted itself. "Uh why?"
"It's the charge. Of course the fellow claims he fired by accident, showing
off the weapon to his friend. But the tipster who called in the incident
claimed he shot at a man, who ran away. Well, the tipster vanished, and the
rest of the so-called witnesses were the usual lot full of contagious drama,
but when you pin 'em down they always turn out to have been facing the other
way or zipping their boot or something at the actual moment the disruptor went
off." She sighed. "Now, if it's proved the fellow with the disruptor was
firing at someone, he gets deported, but if it was an accident all we can do
is confiscate the illegal weapon, fine him, and let him go. Which we'll have
to do in another twelve hours if this intent-to-harm business can't be
substantiated."
Rau under arrest? Ethan's smile became beatific. "What about his friend?"
"Vouches for him, of course. He shook down clean, so there was nothing to be
done with him."
Millisor on the loose, if he understood the Security woman correctly. Ethan's
smile faded. And Setti, whom Ethan had never seen and would not recognize if
he walked right into him. Ethan took a breath. "My name is Urquhart."
"Mine's Lara," said the Security woman.
"That's nice," said Ethan automatically. "But "
"It was my grandmother's name," the Security woman confided. "I think family
names give such a nice sense of continuity, don't you? Unless you happen to
get stuck with something like Sterilla, which happened to an unfortunate
friend of mine. She shortens it to Illa."
"Uh that wasn't exactly what I meant."
She tilted her head, chipper. "Which wasn't?"
"I beg your pardon?"
"What thing that you said wasn't what you meant?"
"Er . . ." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]