Jack McDevitt - POLARIS

Windy passed the bracelet to the retainer and Alex decided the time had come to negotiate for more selections. “Winetta,” he said, “I have several people who would love to have items from this collection-”

She looked pained. “I wish I could help, Alex. I really do. But the agreement is six. I’m not authorized to go any farther.”

“We’re more than willing to pay fair prices, Windy. I shook hands with your dictator. And Chase made a play for him. That should be worth something.”

She pressed her lips together, imploring him to keep his voice down. “You have my gratitude, Alex. Really. And you, too, Chase.” That seemed below the belt. “But there’s no negotiating room.”

“You could say you had to make the commitment to get me over here.”

“Look.” She sighed. “I’ll toss in an extra one. Make it seven. But that’s all.”

“Windy, look at all this stuff. Nobody’ll ever miss it. I need twelve pieces. You have enormous influence here, and it would mean a lot to me.” He actually managed to look downcast. I knew the routine. I’d seen him in action too often. He was good.

He always made you feel sorry for him. “How many times have I spoken to audiences here about the Christopher Sim thing?”

“A lot,” she admitted.

“Have I ever declined an invitation?”

“No,” she conceded, “you haven’t.”

“Have I ever charged a korpel?”

“No.”

“It must all have been volunteer work?”

“Yes, Alex, it was all volunteer work.”

“You bring other speakers in at a hundred per. Benedict does it free.”

The reason for that, of course, was that Benedict saw his appearances at Survey as an important channel for meeting and impressing prospective clients. Windy’s eyes slid shut. She was no dummy, and she knew the routines, too. But she didn’t want to offend him.

“You run the place, Windy. Everybody knows that. Whatever decision you make, Ponzio will go along with.”

“Nine,” she said, finally. “And so help me, Alex, that’s it. Fini. Completo. ”

“You’re a hard woman, Winetta.”

“Yes, we can all see that.”

He smiled. “We’ll try to get by. And thanks. I’m grateful.”

She looked at him sidewise. “When I get fired, Alex, I hope you can find room for me at Rainbow.”

“Windy, Rainbow will always have a place for someone with your talents.”

There were countless items, tableware, safety goggles, VR bands, towels, washcloths, even a showerhead.

“Windy,” I said, “where are the ship’s logs?”

She looked around, checked her pad. “Over in the corner.” She indicated the rear of the room. “But we’re holding them back.”

“Why?”

“Actually, we’re not putting everything up for sale. We’re saving a few items for the Polaris exhibition.”

It turned out they were withholding some prime stuff. In addition to the logs, there was Martin Klassner’s leatherbound copy of Sangmeister’s Cosmology, with comments penned in the margins, many of them believed to have been done during the flight (according to the data card); Garth Urquhart’s notes, which had allowed his son to complete the memoirs of his political years, published a decade after his disappearance as On the Barricades; and Madeleine English’s certification for interstellars. There was also a picture of the pilot and her passengers taken on the space station just prior to departure on that final flight. Copies of the picture, a data card said, would be available in the gift shop the next day. Alex picked up a glass imprinted with the ship’s seal. It was long-stemmed, designed for champagne. For celebrations. “How do you think this would look in the office?” he asked.

It was gorgeous. Arrowhead. Star. CSS 117.

“You could never drink from it,” I said.

He laughed. The glass went into the container, and we moved on.

He found a command jacket that he liked. It was Maddy’s, of course, blue and white, with trimmed breast pockets and a Polaris shoulder patch. He asked my opinion again.

“Absolutely,” I said.

He turned to Windy. “Why weren’t the personal items returned to the families?”

We’d stopped beneath the banner depicting Nancy White. Even in that still image, she was a woman on the move, her eyes penetrating the jungle, while she listened, perhaps, to the rumble of a distant waterfall. “Quite a woman,” said Windy.

“Yes. She was.”

“The personal stuff was retained during the investigations. But they went on for years. Until recently, they’d never really stopped. At least not officially. I guess Survey just never got around to giving the stuff back. The families probably forgot about it after a while, or lost interest, so it just remained in storage.”

“What would happen if the families came forward now?”

“They no longer have a claim. They get seventeen years, after which the items become Survey’s property.” She looked down at a pendant. “Another reason they weren’t anxious to return this stuff was the possibility it might be contaminated in some arcane way. With a virus or maybe a nano.”

“A nano that makes people disappear?”

She softened. “What can I tell you? I wasn’t there. But they must have been desperate for some kind of answer. They put everything into safekeeping, assuming that eventually something might be needed. I don’t guess it ever happened. They even sterilized the hull, as if a plague might somehow have caused the problem.”

“And eventually they sold the ship.”

“In 1368. To Evergreen.” Windy sounded unhappy. “Evergreen got a bargain price. The Polaris became the Sheila Clermo, and last I heard she was still hauling engineers and surveyors and assorted VIPs around for them.” She smiled and checked the time. Got to move on. “Now,” she said, “what else would you like to look at?”

We picked up a leather-bound Bible with Garth Urquhart’s name on the inside title page. And a plaque commemorating the eight earlier missions of the Polaris.

Koppawanda in 1352, Breakmann in 1354, Moyaba in 1355. That was a Mute world.

Or at least, it was in their sphere of influence.

“They thought they’d found a white hole,” said Alex, reading my mind.

Windy smiled. “Now that would have been earthshaking.” But they don’t exist.

Theoretical figments. White holes sound good, sound like something that should be there because they’d add a lovely symmetry to cosmic processes. But the universe doesn’t pay much attention to our notions of esthetics.

Other destinations were listed, all places they’d named as they arrived, usually after one of the passengers. Sacarrio, whose sun was going to go supernova within the next ten thousand years; Chao Ti, once thought to be a source of an artificial radio signal; Brolyo, where a small settlement had taken root and prospered. The mission durations had extended as long as a year and a half.

I was headed toward a notebook, which, according to the attached certificate, had belonged to Nancy White. Its contents, to respect her privacy, had been deleted.

That, of course, considerably reduced its value. But it was good to know there was still some integrity in the world. Alex lowered an eyebrow and went instead for a vest. It was the one Maddy could be seen wearing in some of the pictures from the flight. “Priceless,” he said, shielding the remark from Windy.

“That’s seven,” I told him.

Before we’d arrived, he’d remarked that the items connected with Maddy would be especially valuable. I had my doubts. “She was carrying celebrities,” I told him.

“Historical figures.”

“Doesn’t matter,” he said. “The captain is the tragic figure in this. Add to that the fact that she’s beautiful.”