stone mantel hung a crossed pair of oars, dried and cracked. The first Nordbo who settled here had used them after the motor in his boat failed, to fetch a son wrecked on Horn Reef.
Saxtorph liked this place. It spoke to something in his blood. 'You've got roots,' he remarked. 'Not many folks do these days.'
Seated on his left, Tyra nodded. Her hair was the sole real brightness. 'The honor of the house,' she said, then grimaced. 'No, forgive me, I do not mean to be pretentious.'
'Hut you shouldn't be afraid of speaking about what truly matters,' said Dorcas on her far side.
'I am not. Your husband knows. But—' The com that they confronted chimed and blinked. Tyra stiffened. 'Accept,' she snapped.
The full-size image of a man appeared, and part of the desk behind which he sat, and through the window at his back a glimpse of the Drachenturm in Munchen. 'Good day,' he greeted. Half rising to make a stiff little bow: 'Frau Saxtorph, at last I get the pleasure of your acquaintance.' He must have worked to flatten out of his English the accent his sister retained.
Dorcas inclined her head. The mahogany-hued crest and tail of her Belter hairstyle rippled. 'How do you do, Herr,' she answered as formally. The smile on the Athene visage was less warm than usual. 'Someday I may have the pleasure of shaking your hand.'
Ib Nordbo took the implied reproof impassively. He was in his mid-forties, tall and low-gee slim, smooth- chinned, bearing much of Tyra's blond handsomeness but none of her verve and frequent merriment. At least, during his previous two short encounters with Saxtorph he had been curt and somber. Insignia on the blue uniform proclaimed him a lieutenant commander of naval intelligence.
'Why would you not come in person today?' burst from Tyra. 'I tell you, this is the one spot on Wunderland where we can be sure we are private.'
'Come, now,' her brother replied. 'My office was and is perfectly secure, there is no reason to imagine your town apartment or the Saxtorphs' hotel room were ever under surveillance, and I assure you, this circuit is well sealed.'
Anxious to avoid a breach, for the earlier scenes had gotten a bit tense, Saxtorph said, 'You'd know, in your job. Actually, my wife and I were glad of Tyra's invitation because we were curious to see the homestead.'
'We hoped to get some feel for your father, some insight or intuition,' Dorcas added.
'What value can that have, on a search through space?'
Nordbo's question would have been a challenge or a gibe if it had been uttered less flatly.
'Perhaps none. You never can tell. If nothing else, this was an interesting visit; and to hold his actual notebook in our hands was… an experience.'
'I fear nobody else would agree, Frau.' Nordbo's attention went to his sister. 'Tyra, I hesitate to say you have become paranoiac on this subject, but you have exaggerated it in your mind out of all proportion. What cause does anyone have to spy on you? How often must I repeat, the Navy-no part of officialdom-will concern itself?'
Saxtorph stirred. 'And I repeat, if you please, that I have trouble believing that,' he said. 'Okay, one kzinti ship was lost thirty years ago, among hundreds. There was an avalanche of matters to handle in the years right after liberation. This business was forgotten. Sure. But if we did show them your father's notes and reminded them that the kzinti reckoned it worthwhile dispatching a ship—'
'Nothing special is now in that part of the sky,' Nordbo retorted. 'What he detected must have been a transient thing at best, an accident leaving no trace, perhaps the collision of a matter and an antimatter body.'
'That'd have been plenty weird. Who's ever found so much loose antimatter? But we've still got that infrared anomaly.' Saxtorph had insisted on Nordbo's retrieving the entire record of the naval observation.
'Meaningless. Its intensity against the cosmic background falls within probable error.' The officer stirred where he sat. 'We need scarcely go over this ground again for your lady wife's benefit. We have trodden it bare, and you must have relayed the arguments to her. But to complete the repetition, Frau Saxtorph, I have pointed out that the kzinti may well have had some entirely different destination, and took my father along merely because his noticing this phenomenon put them in mind of him as an excellent observer. They quite commonly employed human technicians, you know. Our species has more patience for detail work than theirs.'
He paused before finishing: 'This is how they will think in the Navy if we tell them. I have sounded out various high-ranking persons, at Tyra's request. Besides, I am Navy myself; I ought to know, ought I not? It might be decided to go take a look, on the odd chance that my father did stumble on something special. But they would not care about him or his fate. Nor would they want civilians underfoot. You, Captain Saxtorph, would be specifically forbidden to enter that region.'
'I understand that,' Tyra said. 'At least, it is possible. Therefore Rover must go first, before anything has been revealed. What information it brings back can jumpstart some real action.'
'Frau Saxtorph, I appeal to you,' Nordbo said. 'My sister has involved me—'
'It was your right to know,' Tyra interjected, 'and I thought you would help.'
'She wants me, if nothing else, to withhold from my service word about this ill-advised space mission of yours. Can you not see what a difficult position that creates for me?'
'I agree your position is delicate,' Dorcas murmured.
Did Nordbo wince or flinch? If so, he clamped control back down too fast for Robert Saxtorph to be sure. Either way, the captain felt momentarily sorry for what had happened of late.
Not that the Rover crew were at fault. They'd had no way of foreseeing. They simply carried back to Alpha Centauri the news that Commissioner Markham had been a spy for the kzinti. It provoked a hunt for others. And- soon after liberation, when Ib Nordbo was a young engineer working in the asteroids, Ulf Reichstein-Markham, still out there settling assorted affairs, had befriended him. They returned to Wunderland together, Nordbo enlisting, Markham going unsuccessfully into politics and later rather brilliantly into astronautics administration. Markham's prestige, the occasional overt recommendation or conversational suggestion, helped Nordbo rise. They met fairly often.
Well, but suspicion found no grounds. 'It must die away altogether,' Tyra had pleaded to Saxtorph. 'Must it not? Ib fought for freedom-not like Markham, only in one uprising, that crazy try of young men to take back the Ritterhaus, but he did suffer injuries. And Markham was in fact a hero of the Resistance, maybe its greatest. He did not change till long afterward. How could Ib tell? Yes, they did things together, dining, hunting, talking. What does that mean? They were both lonely. They have-they had not sociable personalities. Ib was always of dark spirit. He has never married. I think he still carries the torment of our father inside him. Remember, he is seven Earth-years older than me. He lived through more of it, and then through the years alone with our mother, at that impressionable age. Now he is fine in his work. He would have risen higher if he had a wife who knew all the unspoken social rules, or if he could just be smooth. But he is too honest. He does not share those filthy dictatorial ideas you told me Markham held. I am his sister, I would know if he did. We are not close, he is not close to anyone, but we are the children of Peter Nordbo.'
Dorcas, who was tactful when she cared to be, went directly on: 'However, nothing illegal or unethical is involved. We plan a scientific mission. Amateurs, yes, but if we get in trouble, nobody will be harmed except us. That land of personal risk is not prohibited by any statute or regulation I know of—'
Thus far, Saxtorph thought.
'— nor do the terms of our insurance and mortgage require more than 'informed prudence,' the interpretation of which clause is a matter for the civil courts. You are merely assisting an undertaking that may prove beneficial to your nation.'
Nordbo shook his head. 'I am not,' he answered. 'I have given it the serious thought I promised. Today I tell you that I will have no further part of it.'
'Ib!' Tyra cried. Her hand went to her mouth.
'It is lunatic,' he stated. 'If we turned those notes over to my service, at least any investigation would be competently handled. My apologies, Captain and Mate Saxtorph. I am sure you command your ship well. You have been persuaded to enter a field outside your competence. Please reconsider.'
Tyra said something unsteadily in her childhood dialect. He replied likewise. In English: 'Yes, I will keep my promise, my silence about this, unless circumstances force me. But I will not make any contribution to your effort, nor lend any more aid or counsel, except my earnest advice that you abandon it. That is final.'
His tone softened. 'Tyra, you sit in what we have left of our inheritance, our father's and mother's and
