Elizabeth Moon - Against the Odds

“I’m sorry,” Basil said, this time seriously. “I should have found a way. I will next time.”

“There’s going to be a next time?” Goonar asked.

“Not that I know of, but if,” Basil said.

“Well, then. What is the great secret we’re hauling? Did they tell you why the Benignity wants them? Or did you just fall for a pretty woman in distress?”

“It’s one of the stage hands, they said. He’s not a criminal, they said, but he is a fugitive.”

“ ‘I am innocent of all wrongdoing, but envious rumor has spread lies around my feet,’ ” Goonar sang. “Act Two, Scene Four. Is that it?”

“I don’t know,” Basil said, spreading his hands. “I did ask, but they just insisted he wasn’t a thief or murderer, and begged sanctuary.”

Goonar sat up straight. “Sanctuary. That’s a religious word. Did you speak to the person yourself?”

“Well . . . yes. I wanted to size him up. He’s a quiet fellow—older man, pleasant voice—”

“A con artist,” Goonar said.

“No . . . I don’t think so. Not plausible and charming—I had the sense of . . . of someone like a scholar, maybe. The quietness wasn’t fear or shyness, just a habitual quiet.”

“An escaping professor? Someone with technical information?”

“I don’t think so,” Basil said. “I know some of them are supposed to be halfwits in the real world, but this man isn’t that kind of halfwit. He doesn’t seem distracted or abstracted or whatever they call it—he’s right there with you when he’s talking to you, and he doesn’t try to drag the conversation to his pet theory.”

“Odd,” said Goonar. “And he used the word sanctuary, or the woman did?”

“He did. It wasn’t dramatic or anything.” Now that Basil was spilling all he knew, he seemed almost annoyed with himself that it was so little. “I asked if he’d committed a crime, and he paused a moment before saying no, no crime, but he had angered someone in power.”

“And you asked how—” Goonar prompted.

“Yes. And he didn’t say. He said he wished sanctuary, not to spread rumors.”

“Right. So now we’ve had a Benignity diplomatic ship giving orders to a Familias Station . . . and he thinks there won’t be rumors.”

“I haven’t talked to him since we came aboard,” Basil said. “Do you want me to?”

“No, I want to see him myself,” Goonar said. “But not now. Now we have other work to do. For one thing, I don’t want the Security team to know the troupe is aboard. They’re actors; they can pretend to be our crew. Brief them.”

Basil grinned. “That’s a great idea.”

“Meaning, you had it first. Fine. Just be sure it’s done thoroughly. At the same time, I don’t want the troupe having access to any of our critical information—see that our crew know that. And when you’ve straightened that out, find something for the Security team to do. Not all dirty work—they didn’t really ask to be here, and we don’t want them angry with us.”

“Right,” Basil said, jotting notes on his compad.

“I’ll speak to—what’s his name?”

“Simon. That’s all he said.”

“Right. I’ll speak to Simon three or four days from now. I don’t want to make him obvious at this point.” He sighed, and tapped his fingers on his desk. “I don’t know what’s wrong with Falletta Station . . . I don’t think much of a security team that didn’t notice a bunch of actors and actresses, plus a whole stage set . . .”

“Well . . . they didn’t exactly look like actors and stage sets . . . remember, we had the best part of two hours,” Basil said. “I wouldn’t be the cargomaster I am if I couldn’t dismantle and reassemble big loads to fit into available space.”

“So . . . the flats you broke down . . .”

“No, that wouldn’t have worked. We used them as is.”

“As is what?”

“Well . . . you know the crew’s rec compartment?”

“Of course,” Goonar said.

“It’s got that little raised area—actually for the cross-connecting vent pipes, but it makes like a little stage . . .”

“Yes, I know that . . . .wait . . . you mean you made it into a stage?”

“Yeah . . . they had scenery for more than one play, so we put up some of it, and stored the rest in plain sight, in the crew storage area. Now that wouldn’t do for the costumes, or all the props, or the lighting control panels—”

“Wait—I thought theaters had their own lighting.”

“They do, sort of, but many traveling troupes bring their own extras. It’s expensive stuff, and—”

“So—what did you do with the lighting?” Basil was dying to tell him, and Goonar thought he should know, just in case.

“I’ll show you.”

The tour that followed convinced Goonar that his cousin was wasted in the Terakian family business, as much talent as he had for it. The troupe’s stage lighting panels gave the shuttle bay better lighting than it had had since old Fortune came out of the yards . . . and only by climbing up among the overheads would anyone discover that it was an addition.

“They did compliment us on our safe lighting,” Basil said, clearly referring to the Station Security team. “Said lots of ships tried to hide things in a half-dark compartment.”

The costumes, bulky and spangled, were now on the programmable mannequins shipped by a famous fashion design firm, and the data cube in the container included those images. “It’s only a copy,” Basil said. “We have the original, so the shippers will never know. And Security didn’t know the mannequins are normally shipped neutral. They did comment that the costumes looked used, and I pointed out that they had already been through several runs—that the big shipping firms get the new stuff, and we’re stuck carrying last year’s trash to the smaller systems.”

“I see,” said Goonar. He was not surprised when Basil handed him a revised crew list that included an astonishing number of Terakian relatives he’d never heard of before.

Five days later, the Terakian Fortune was still accelerating toward the mapped jump point, and Goonar was still worried. They were alive. No one had shot at them. No one was following them. No one they could detect was following them, he reminded himself. The Security team had settled in, working their assigned shifts alongside his crew. His augmented crew.

One thing about actors, they could play a role, and they learned quickly. The Security team knew little about the crew arrangements on free traders, and had accepted that the Fortune had an entirely unlikely complement of Terakian family members aboard. Wives, sisters, cousins . . . all of them supposedly certified and practiced crew, except for the old costume mistress, who was thoroughly enjoying her role as an aged great-aunt with delusions of matchmaking. She had already queried the Security team about their status and prospects.

Goonar had avoided talking to the troupe’s leader himself—he’d had the excuse of being busier than usual—but finally he couldn’t put it off any longer. She wanted to see him, she said.

Betharnya looked as good close up as on the stage. Goonar, conscious of his role as staid merchant captain, tried to keep his gaze on her face, but he did not miss the lush shape of her, or the delicate scent.

“I wanted to thank you, Captain Terakian,” she said. “It was very brave of you—”

“Basil didn’t tell me anything about this until after the performance,” he said. “Then it was too late—but I have to say that while I admire you as an actress, I am not happy to have been misled. You may have irreparably damaged not just my reputation, but that of our family. We do not involve ourselves in politics.”