the far walls, seen through the double arches. The images flowed, as if the figures stirred, but David could not be sure if they really moved or if he was still recovering from the whirling of the stars.
A pink scarf lay draped over Charles's shoulders. Pink was the color of approval. For a moment, Charles simply stood there. Then he lifted his free hand to touch the scarf, to check its color. His chin shifted, just a little, but David knew him well enough to know that he was pleased. He bowed, low, to the precise degree by which a duke honors the emperor, dipping to touch one knee to the floor. Then he straightened and regarded Naroshi in silence.
In this light, David could discern no slightest tint of color in Naroshi's pallid complexion. 'I will watch your progress with interest,' said Naroshi.
Charles inclined his head in acknowledgment, but said nothing more.
The steward reappeared and led them out the way they had come. By unspoken consent, the three men did not talk at all until they left the secured line on Staten Island and transferred to a lev-train that would take them back to London. Charles sank into a seat. He draped the silver braid across his thighs. It was as heavy as gold, and as supple as the finest silk. David and Marco sat on either side of him. It was the old pattern from their university days: Marco on the right, David on the left.
' 'I'll be watching you,' ' mused Charles as he stared out the window at the gray ocean. 'But is Naroshi for me or against me?''
Marco shrugged. 'Does our concept of dualism even apply to the Chapalii? Maybe he's for you and against you.'
'I hate equations that don't add up,' muttered David.
CHAPTER THREE
As soon as Yomi called the break, Diana fled the rehearsal space.
'And if Hyacinth keeps flinging himself all over the stage like that, I'm going to scream!' Anahita proclaimed.
'I don't think she's got more than one tone to play Titania with,' muttered Quinn to Hal. 'If she's going to go on like that for the whole trip shut up in this boat, then I'm going to scream.'
Hal pulled a hand through his hair, tousling it, and heaved a great sigh. 'What an awful day. I feel further from this scene than I ever did.'
Gwyn stared at the plain wooden floor, and by the way his right hand turned up and then down, Diana could see that he was still thinking about the scene they had just rehearsed, a scene from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. Phillippe was massaging Hyacinth's shoulders and Hyacinth was, of course, smirking. Owen and Yomi had lapsed into a cabal, heads together over the table that was the only furniture in the space. Ginny sat in a chair, keying furiously into a notepad.
'Di?' called Hal. 'Do you want to go to dinner?'
Then the door closed behind her, and she was mercifully free of them. What a bad day it had been. The tempo ran slow and they kept clumping together in the ensemble scene. She was beginning to feel claustrophobic. That was one thing she liked about Chapalii ships: they built their passageways wide, even if they were a strikingly ugly shade of orange and heated right to the level of sticky hot. She waited outside the door while a pack of human university students swarmed by her, chattering and giggling, ignoring her except for one red-haired young woman who threw her a startled and surprisingly vindictive glance; then a trio of alien nar skittered by, flicking their secondary dwarf wings at her in polite acknowledgment. She answered with a brief bow and set off in the opposite direction, toward the dining hall.
It still surprised Diana that Charles Soerensen ate his meals in the regular dining hall, along with all the other passengers. All the non-Chapallii passengers, of course; the Chapallii themselves remained in segregated quarters. He had somewhere developed the ability to sit at a different table every meal while making it seem as if he was as much graced by his tablemates' presence as they were by his. Marco Burckhardt sat on his right. Marco looked up, saw her, and smiled.
Don't do it, she told herself fiercely as she picked up her meal. Twenty steps later she stopped beside Marco's chair.
At least he didn't stand up. 'Golden fair, please, sit down.'' Marco had the ability to look at you as if you were the only object in the world of interest to him.
She sat down. Her heart pounded in an annoying yet gratifying way.
'You've met Charles, of course,' said Marco. 'This is David ben Unbutu, and this is Suzanne Elia Arevalo.'
Soerensen greeted her with polite interest, David with evident good nature, and Suzanne with a pitying glance. Then Soerensen, Suzanne, and the two mining engineers they sat with fell back into a heated discussion about the ratio of volume to cost in the transport of metals in the Dao Cee system from the asteroid belt to the processing plants orbiting the planet Odys.
'How is rehearsal?' Marco asked.
'Slow. A little frustrating today. Owen says you've actually met the nomadic people we're going to be traveling with, once we've left Jeds. What are they like?'
He rested his chin on one hand, tilted his head to the side, and regarded her with amusement. 'What do you imagine they'll be like?'
Diana laughed. 'Don't think I'll fall for this trap. Gorgeous clothes, of course, and beautiful jewelry. Dashing horses. Stern men and shy women who possess honor and simple dignity in equal measure. I suppose they'll have weapons. And lots of dirty but sweet-faced children.'
'Yes, I think you covered most of the cliches,' he said approvingly, and she laughed again, half from relief and half because the whole scene between them was so transparent, without losing any of its intensity.
A hush fell over the hall. Marco's attention jerked away from her. A Chapalii dressed in the pale tunic and trousers of the steward class stood in the far doorway, holding a gold wand in his hands.
Soerensen rose. 'Excuse me,' he said to others at the table. 'Suzanne.' She rose as well, and together they collapsed their trays, deposited them in the sort bin, and walked over to the door. Soerensen received the gold wand from the steward, and after a brief conversation with the alien, he and Suzanne left the hall. At once conversation flooded back along the tables.
David ben Unbutu, unruffled at being abandoned, went back to his meal. The engineers begged pardon and left. Marco glanced at the strip on the back of his left hand. 'Ah,' he said. He returned his attention to Diana. 'My heart, it grieves me to part from you, but I must go.' He lifted her hand to his lips, brushed a kiss there, and hurried out of the hall.
Don't watch him go. Even as she thought it, she wrenched her gaze away from Marco's back only to find David ben Unbutu watching her with a wry smile on his face. Instantly, she blushed.
'Sorry,' said David. 'I noticed your necklace. Are you a Trinitarian, or is it just a family heirloom?'
She lifted a hand to touch the necklace, with its intertwined star, book, and cross. 'I was brought up in the worship, yes,' she replied. How kind of him to change the subject.
'Have you visited the chapel on board? It's very… quiet. I'm going there now.'
Diana smiled, a softer smile than the one she had offered to Marco Burckhardt. She felt like an idiot, sitting down by Burckhardt only to be deserted; probably he had gone off on Soerensen's business. Probably David ben Unbutu understood her plight. 'Oh,' she said, noticing the four short, beaded braids hanging from his coarse black hair down the back of his neck to dangle over the collar of his tunic. 'You're Orthodox.'
'Orthodox Judaeo-animist,' he agreed with a chuckle.
'Our village is one of the last pockets of Trinitarian animism left in western Africa, and, of course, there's a long history of engineers in our family because of it.'
Behind them, through the other doors, a horde of actors swept into the dining hall.
Diana jumped up, collapsing her tray over the uneaten food. 'I'd love to see the chapel.'
Along the red curve passageway, down a slow lift to yellow core, and they came to the Three Faiths chapel. Diana expected it to be untenanted at this time of ship's cycle, but someone had arrived there before them. David tried to stop her in the door, but he was too slow.
