beside her.
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Yes? she said.
He found it very hard to get the words out.
Ev, you know I ve been around here a long time, he said.
A long time? At that, she turned to face him with a slight look of
startlement. Four months? It seems like hours, only.
Perhaps, he said, doggedly. But it has been a long time. So perhaps it s
just as well I m leaving.
Leaving? Her eyes shot wide; hazel eyes, staring at him. Who said you were
leaving?
I have to, of course, he said. But I thought I ought to clear something up
before I go. I ve liked you a great deal, Ev
But she was too quick for him.
Liked me? she cried. I should think you should! Why, I haven t hardly had
a minute to myself for entertaining you. I swear I hardly know what it looks
like any more outside of this place! Liked me! You certainly ought to like me
after the way I ve put myself out for you!
He gazed at her furious features for a long moment and then he smiled
ruefully.
You re quite right, he said I ve put you to a great deal of trouble.
Pardon me for being so dense as not to notice it. He bent his head to her.
I ll be going now.
He turned and walked away. But he had hardly taken a dozen steps across the
sunlit library before she called his name.
Donal!
He turned and saw her staring after him, her face stiff, her fists clenched
at her side.
Donal, you ... you can t go, she said, tightly.
I beg your pardon? He stared at her.
You can t go, she repeated. Your duty is here. You re assigned here.
No. He shook his head. You don t understand, Ev. This business of
Oriente s come up. I m going to ask the marshal to assign me to one of the
ships.
You can t. Her voice was brittle. He isn t here. He s gone down to the
Spaceyard.
Well, then, I ll go there and ask him.
You can t. I ve already asked him to leave you here. He promised.
You what! The words exploded from his lips in a tone more suited to the
field man to this quiet mansion.
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I asked him to leave you here.
He turned and stalked away from her.
Donal! He heard her voice crying despairingly after him, but there was
nothing she, or anyone in that house could have done, to stop him then.
He found Galt examining the new experimental model of a two-man
anti-personnel craft. The older man looked up in surprise as Donal came up.
What is it? he asked.
Could I see you alone for a minute, sir? said Donal. A private and urgent
matter.
Galt shot him a keen glance, but motioned aside with his head and they
stepped over into the privacy of a tool control boom.
What is it? asked Galt.
Sir, said Donal. I understand Elvine asked you if I couldn t continue to
be assigned to your household during the upcoming business we talked about
with Patrol Chief Lludrow earlier today.
That s right. She did.
I did not know of it, said Donal, meeting the older man s eyes. It was not
my wish.
Not your wish?
No, sir.
Oh, said Galt. He drew a long breath and rubbed his chin with one thick
hand. Turning his head aside, he gazed out through the screen of the control
booth at the experimental ship. I see, he said. I didn t realize.
No reason why you should, Donal felt a sudden twist of emotion inside him
at the expression on the older man s face. I should have spoken to you before
sir.
No, no, Galt brushed the matter aside with a wave of his hand. The
responsibility s mine. I ve never had children. No experience. She has to get
herself settled in life one of these days; and ... well, I have a high opinion
of you, Donal.
You ve been too kind to me already, sir, Donal said miserably.
No, no ... well, mistakes will happen. I ll see you have a place with the
combat forces right away, of course.
Thank you, said Donal.
Don t thank me, boy. Abruptly, Galt looked old. I should have remembered.
You re a Dorsai.
Staff Liaison
Welcome aboard, said a pleasant-faced Junior Captain, as Donal strode
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through the gas barrier of the inner lock. The Junior Captain was in his early
twenties, a black-haired, square-faced young man who looked as if he had gone
in much for athletics. I m J.C. Allmin Clay Andresen.
Donal Graeme. They saluted each other. Then they shook hands.
Had any ship experience? asked Andresen.
Eighteen months of summer training cruises in the Dorsai, answered Donal.
Command and armament no technical posts.
Command and armament, said Andresen, are plenty good enough on a Class 4J
ship. Particularly Command. You ll be senior officer after me if anything
happens. He made the little ritual gesture, reaching out to touch a close,
white, carbon-plastic wall beside him. Not that I m suggesting you take over
in such a case. My First can handle things all right. But you may be able to
give him a hand, if it should happen.
Be honored, said Donal.
Care to look over the ship?
I m looking forward to it.
Right. Step into the lounge, then. Andresen led the way across the small
reception room, and through a sliding bulkhead to a corridor that curved off
ahead of them to right and left. They went through another door in the wail of
the corridor directly in front of them, down a small passage, and emerged
through a final door into a large, pleasantly decorated, circular room.
Lounge, said Andresen. Control center s right under our feet; reversed
gravity. He pressed a stud on the wall and a section of the floor slid back.
You ll have to flip, he warned, and did a head-first dive into the hole.
Donal, who knew what to expect, followed the J.C. s example. The momentum of
his dive shot him through and into another circular chamber of the same size
as the lounge, in which everything would have been upside down and nailed to
the ceiling, except for the small fact that here the gravity was reversed; and
what had been down, was up, and up was down instead.
Here, said Andresen, as Donal landed lightly on the floor at one side of
the opening, is our Control Eye. As you probably saw when you were moving in
to come aboard, the Class 4J is a ball-and-hammer ship.
He pressed several studs and in the large globe floating in the center of the
floor, that which he had referred to as the Control Eye, a view formed of
their craft, as seen from some little distance outside the ship. Half-framed
against the star-pricked backdrop of space, and with just a sliver of the
curved edge of Freiland showing at the edge of the scene, she floated. A
sphere thirty meters in diameter, connected by two slim shafts a hundred
meters each in length to a rhomboid-shape that was the ship s thrust unit,
some five meters in diameter at its thickest and looking like a large child s
spinning top, pivoted on two wires that clamped it at the middle. This was the
hammer. The ship, proper, was the ball.
No phase-shift equipment? asked Donal. He was thinking of the traditional [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]