David Drake: When the Tide Rises

"One moment, mistress," said Ward Spears, the civilian clerk from the Navy Office, who was seated across from her. "I notice that you've increased depreciation on the hull as well, and that you're using the high figure for hull valuation…"

Daniel cleared his throat. "Ah, Deirdre?" he said. "The missiles have arrived and I believe I'd best oversee their stowage. You'll call me when you're ready for my signature?"

She flicked a hand toward him in dismissal. "Yes, of course we're applying the additional half percent to the hull, Master Spears," she said sharply. "While it's easier to measure the additional strain on the running gear, you surely don't claim that it doesn't involve the hull as well?"

The lieutenant commander who'd accompanied the clerk to represent the uniformed establishment watched longingly as Daniel started down the outside stairs. He must be as bored as Daniel was and, unlike the vessel's owner, didn't have the option of leaving the business to people wholiked this sort of pettifoggery.

Which Deirdre really must. Her bank was leasing agent on thePrincess Cecile, but that didn't mean she personally needed to handle these negotiations. She was haggling over a few hundred florins when she frequently dealt in tens of millions.

Better her than me, thought Daniel as he reached the concrete quay where Miranda stood beside Mon. A crew under Woetjans was swinging the fourth of twenty missiles cautiously from a lowboy and through the C Level port serving the stern magazine. Even empty the missile weighed several tons. Filled with reaction mass-normally water-and accelerated to terminal velocity by its antimatter motors, it could deal a crippling blow to even a battleship.

If it hit, of course, and a corvette's small missile magazines made a hit over normal combat distances unlikely. Still, theSissie had done some good in the past and might easily do so again. The present mission ought to provide a sufficiency of targets, at any rate.

"Oh, there's Daniel!" called Miranda happily. She was wearing green pastel slacks and a tunic with a floral pattern, cheerful without being garish. She was pretty rather than a classic beauty, but her personality made her the center of men's attention in almost any group. "Daniel, did you realize that these missiles are dual-converter RCN units? The manifest says they're a mix of single-converter foreign missiles."

Mon coughed and turned away in mild embarrassment. He'd been a good but unlucky officer during fourteen years of service with the RCN. When Daniel learned he owned the shipyard upon his Uncle Stacey's death two years before, he'd hired Mon to run it.

Mon now had a contented expression and an additional twenty pounds of comfortable fat. Daniel had a completely trustworthy manager who saw to it that Uncle Stacey's long-time employees were well treated. And the shipyard was making money hand over fist.

Of course renewed hostilities with the Alliance had something to do with profitability. Navy House was getting first-rate workmanship on jobs that it hired done in the Bergen yard, though, so Daniel felt no embarrassment about being paid better as a civilian contractor than he was as a commander in the RCN.

"Well, Miranda," Daniel said, turning so that she could give him a friendly kiss on the cheek. "There may be some problems with paperwork, and it's even possible that I encouraged some problems with paperwork. But as I see it, missiles I ship aboard thePrincess Cecile are very likely to be launched against enemies of the Republic. It's to everybody's advantage that they be modern units that accelerate quickly, don't you think?"

"Oh," said Miranda, looking stricken. "Oh, you must think I'm afool!"

"Mistress, nobody thinks you're a fool!" said Mon fervently. He looked from her to the corvette, cleared his throat, and went on, "Well, what do you think of her, Commander? I don't mind saying thatI think we did a good job."

The corvette's access ports were open while she was on the ground. Vesey-Lieutenant Vesey, Daniel's first officer-looked out from the bridge and waved.

"She's checking the astrogational updates," Mon said quietly. "Will Lady Mundy be able to help with the crewing situation, sir? Seeings as this really will be a combat mission."

Daniel grimaced. "We decided against pressing our luck," he said. Adele's ability to enter RCN databases at will and change assignments had been very useful in the past and might be again. Repeating the trick that'd gotten thePrincess Cecile a crew when last she lifted from Cinnabar raised the risk of being caught to an unacceptable level. "And we've got eighty, that's enough to work and fight a corvette. They're all veterans, and they've sailed with me before."

"That's including the Pellegrinians, isn't it?" Mon said.

Daniel shrugged. "They're good men," he said. "And perfectly trustworthy."

A number of enemy spacers captured on Dunbar's World had preferred to join the RCN rather than return home and explain to Chancellor Arruns how they'd survived a disaster which'd claimed the life of his son and heir. In practice all members of the crew of a starship did their best in combat, regardless of their nationality or politics. That was their only chance of survival.

"Oh, they'll do, I know," said Mon. He laughed and added, "They'll have Captain Leary commanding them, after all. But a hundred and twenty would be better than eighty, even if it makes the berths a little tight."

Daniel tried to look at thePrincess Cecile critically; to his surprise, he couldn't. Oh, he could rattle off the statistics: a three-hundred foot cylinder with rounded ends; six rings of four antennas each, telescoped and folded along the hull while she was on the planetary surface. The plasma thrusters which drove her in an atmosphere were on the lower hull, clear of the water. High Drive motors annihilated antimatter to provide thrust more efficiently in a vacuum; they were recessed into the outriggers which steadied the ship after she'd landed.

TheSissie mounted paired 4-inch plasma cannon in turrets on the dorsal bow and ventral stern; the latter was inboard at the moment because it'd be under water if it were extended. For choice a starship always landed in water, which damped the flaring plasma exhaust and cushioned the process of settling many tons (1300 in the corvette's case, and she was small) onto a surface. Thrust reflected from rocky soil could flip a vessel if her captain were careless or unlucky.

"I think she's beautiful," Miranda said softly. "Generally I think Kostroma-built ships look stumpy, but theSissie 's lines are perfect."

"I'm glad you think so, dear," Daniel said, choosing his words carefully.

To him the corvette was simply right: not pretty, not functional, just the way the universe had made her. He felt about theSissie the same way he did about his nose. He knew there were many women and not a few men who obsessed about the details of their physical appearance, but not Daniel Leary; and the corvette was part of him.

He chuckled. Miranda looked at him and cocked an eyebrow in question. "I was thinking about theSissie the way I do about my nose," Daniel said, wondering if that made any sense to the others. "Actually, she's more like my right hand, isn't she?"

The first lowboy was crawling down the quay to find room to reverse; a second, loaded with a further quartet of missiles, pulled up in its place. A stake-bed produce truck drove with a crashing of gears past the three more waiting lowboys and stopped beside Daniel and his companions.

Hogg got out of the cab. "All right, Bantries," he bellowed. "Hop down and wait till the Master tells you where he wants you!"

He turned to Daniel, looking pleased, and said, "Good morning, young master. Woetjans thought you could use a heftier crew, so I went back to the estate and brought you twenty tenants that I was willing to vouch for. They'll need training before you can all'em spacers, but it seems to me some of what you need in this business is folks who'll jump when the master says jump. Aye, and knock heads when they're told, that too. This lot qualifies."