The Third Lynx

let me know if he spots a double becoming available.'

'You okay with open seats?'

'I'll manage,' she said. 'Ian-apof is only two days' journey away.'

It was a little more than that, actually, but I wasn't about to quibble. 'Fine,' I said. 'What about Morse and Penny?'

'Mr. Morse didn't want me making their arrangements,' Bayta said, a slight flush coming into her cheeks. 'I told the stationmaster to reserve seats in our car for them in case it fills up before they reach the ticket counter.'

I nodded and looked around, automatically picking out the best dressed of the travelers milling around us. So far there was no indication that the local Modhri mind segment was aware of our presence. 'Have the Spiders keep an eye on them,' I instructed her. 'Watch especially for any attempt to split them away from us.'

'Are you sure we really need them?'

I took another, closer look at her. 'She really got to you, didn't she?' I asked.

'I don't trust her,' Bayta said flatly.

'Because she doesn't like us?'

'Because she trusts Mr. Morse too much.'

'She's EuroUnion,' I reminded her. 'Morse is EuroUnion Security Service. Of course she's going to take his word over mine.'

'You do realize we still don't know anything about him, don't you?'

I did, and it was starting to worry me. It had been over three days since the Spiders had sent my message to Losutu. There could have been a reply as early as Homshil; there certainly should have been something waiting here at Jurskala.

But so far not a peep. Either Losutu was ignoring me—always a possibility—or he was too involved in his UN duties to bother with something this low profile.

Or else there wasn't any data to be had on an ESS agent named Ackerley Morse.

'We do know that he wants Stafford and the Lynx, too,' I reminded Bayta. 'For now, that makes him an ally.' I raised my eyebrows. 'Ms. Auslander is one, too, whether she likes it or not.'

Ms. Auslander didn't, of course. The suspicious look she sent Bayta and me as she and Morse settled into their first-class seats showed that abundantly. But she wasn't annoyed enough to walk off the train.

Her friends—four girls and two guys—greeted her with the surprise and delight of someone meeting a long-lost cousin. Their enthusiasm faded considerably with the news of Gerashchenko's death. The train was barely moving before they all disappeared together into one of the two compartments, no doubt to hear all the details. Before we hit the thirty light-year mark, I suspected, there would be six more people aboard whispering together as they gave me dirty looks.

It was just as well, I reflected, that government service had given me such thick skin.

Meanwhile, I had more urgent matters to attend to. Settling our seats into one of the car's corners, Bayta and I once again began to monitor the comings and goings from the compartment car ahead.

The walkers, as I'd surmised, had changed, with none of the original Gang of Fifteen aboard. But the Modhri's basic strategy seemed to have remained the same. Once again, we were able to account for nearly everyone in there as they made their individual and group sorties to the dining car for food and drink. Once again, we observed meals being brought up from the rear.

But where the Gang of Fifteen had had two of their number on permanent guard duty, this batch of escorts seemed to have only one.

'Not really surprising,' I told Bayta as we compared notes in the bar. 'On the first leg of the trip, the one from Bellis. the Modhri had time to plan everything out and make sure he got connecting compartments. This time, with the scramble to send the Hawk in a new direction, he had to take pot luck.'

'I'm not sure how that's going to help us,' Bayta said doubtfully. 'As long as there's still a walker in there we're not going to get in.'

'It's going to help because there are now two ways into the compartment instead of one,' I said. 'The connecting wall locks from both sides, right?'

She was starting to get that suspicious look again. 'Yes,' she said cautiously.

'All handled electronically?'

'Yes.'

'And if there was a brief power outage, what would the default setting be?'

Her look changed from suspicious to aghast. 'No,' she said firmly. 'Not a chance.'

'Why not?' I asked. 'Don't walkers sleep?'

'The walkers sleep,' she said. 'I'm not so sure about the polyp colonies inside them.'

'We'll just have to chance it,' I said.

'Frank, you can't—' She broke off, her eyes abruptly glazing over.

'Bayta?' I asked, resisting the impulse to wave my hand in front of her face like they always do in old dit rec dramas. Instead, I gave the bar a quick sweep, then shifted my attention to the corridor. There was nothing out of the ordinary that I could see.

Abruptly Bayta's eyes came back. 'Come on,' she said, standing up and heading for the corridor.

But instead of turning forward toward our seats, she headed aft. 'Where are we going?' I asked.

'Just come.'

She led the way through the other first-class car, through the second-class section, and into third. We kept going, passing the Humans and aliens reading or talking or dozing in their seats, and into the first baggage car.

'We're starting to run out of train,' I warned Bayta as she led us through the meandering passageway that led between the stacks of safety-webbed crates. 'What are we looking for, anyway?'

'We're not looking for anything,' she said over her shoulder as we went through the door and vestibule and entered the second baggage car.

And now we really had run out of train. 'What now?' I asked as she finally came to a halt a few steps inside the car.

'We wait,' she said. Sitting down, she rested her back against the nearest crate and closed her eyes.

Thirty seconds later, while I was still looking around for some clue as to what we were doing here, there was a gentle lurch and my inner ear told me we were gradually but definitely slowing down. 'Have we just been disconnected from the train?' I asked carefully.

Before Bayta could answer there was a second lurch, a stronger one this time, and the gradual deceleration switched back to an equally gradual acceleration. 'Uh-oh,' I muttered.

Bayta nodded, her eyes still closed, tension lines tightening her cheeks. 'The Chahwyn want to talk to you.'

The first time I'd had this particular detached-car trick pulled on me I'd been gassed and unconscious for most of the trip. Now, fully awake and alert, I decided being unconscious had definitely been the better way to go. Standing around a Quadrail baggage car, watching the stacks of crates swaying inside their webbing as we went around slight curves, was breathtakingly boring.

Which meant nearly a hundred percent of my available brain power could concentrate on the unpleasant question of what the Chahwyn had up their sleeves for me this time.

Fortunately, they'd timed things so that the trip didn't take very long. We'd been trundling along for no more than twenty minutes when I again sensed that we were starting to slow down. Five minutes after that, with the usual creak of brakes, we came to a halt. 'We're here, dear,' I said to Bayta as she got back to her feet. 'You want to get the luggage while I see about a rental?'

'This isn't a joke, Frank,' she warned as we moved to the door near the front of the car. 'Behave yourself.'

The door irised open as we reached it, and as we stepped out onto the platform I found that we were in one of the Spiders' secret sidings: smaller than a standard station, with only four sets of tracks and lots of drab, functional-looking support buildings. Bayta walked us past the engine that had pushed us here, leading the way to one of the smaller buildings.