On Basilisk Station

expedition. Few other colonial ventures had even considered such a thing, given the long years of travel which would lie between their new worlds and Sol, but Winton was a farsighted man, and six centuries of compound interest had left the colony with an enviable credit balance on Old Earth.

And so Winton and his surviving fellows had been able not only to recruit the reinforcements they needed but to pay those colonists' passage to their new and distant homes, if necessary. Yet, because they were concerned about retaining political control in the face of such an influx of newcomers, the survivors of the original expedition and their children had adopted a new constitution, converting their colony from one ruled by an elective board of directors into the Star Kingdom of Manticore under Roger I, first monarch of the House of Winton.

The Manticore Colony, Ltd.'s, initial shareholders had received vast tracts of land and/or mineral rights on the system's planets, in direct proportion to their original capital contributions. The new constitution transformed them into an hereditary aristocracy, but it wasn't a closed nobility, for even vaster tracts had remained unclaimed. The new colonists who could pay their own passage received the equivalent of its cost in land credits on their arrival, and those who could contribute more than the cost of passage were guaranteed the right to purchase additional land at just under half its 'book' value. The opportunity to become nobles in their own right had drawn the interest of an extraordinarily high percentage of young, skilled, well-paid professionals: physicians, engineers, educators, chemists and physicists, botanists and biologists—exactly the sort of people a faltering colonial population required and all too few out-worlds could attract. They'd arrived to claim and expand their guaranteed credit, and many of those so-called 'second shareholders' had become earls and even dukes in their own right.

Of those who hadn't been able to pay their own passage in full, many had been able to pay much of the cost and so had received the difference in land credits on arrival. Small by Manticoran standards, perhaps, but enormous by core-world lights. Those people had become Manticore's freeholding yeomen, like Honor's own ancestors, and their families retained a sturdy sense of independence even today.

Yet for all that, the majority of the new arrivals had been 'zero-balancers,' individuals unable to pay any of their passage, who, in many cases, arrived on Manticore wearing all they owned upon their backs. Individuals like Heinrich Hauptman.

Today, there was little to differentiate, aside from the antiquity of original homestead land grants and certain purely honorific forms of address which were used with steadily decreasing frequency, between the descendants of yeomen and zero-balancers. But traditional memories of social status remained, and the Hauptman clan had never forgotten its hardscrabble roots. The family's rise to its present greatness had begun two Manticoran centuries before with Heinrich's great-grandson, yet Klaus Hauptman, who could have bought or sold a dozen dukedoms, still chose to regard himself—publicly, at least—as the champion of the 'little man.' It didn't prevent him from cementing business alliances with the aristocracy, nor from enjoying the power and luxury of his merchant prince status or becoming deeply involved in Manticoran politics, but his 'commoner heritage' was fundamental to his fierce, prideful self-image. He regarded himself as a self-made man and the descendant of self-made men, despite the wealth to which he had been born.

And that image of himself was what had brought him here today, Honor told herself, for she'd hurt it. She'd caught him, or his employees, at least, dabbling in illegal trade, and to a man of his pride and self-aware importance that constituted a direct attack upon him, no mere business reverse or legal embarrassment. In his own eyes, Klaus Hauptman was the Hauptman Cartel, and that made her actions a personal insult he could not tolerate.

'Very well, Commander Harrington,' he said at last, 'I'll come straight to the point. For reasons of your own, you have seen fit to harass my interests in Basilisk. I want it stopped.'

'I'm sorry you see it as `harassment,' Mr. Hauptman,' Honor said calmly. 'Unfortunately, my oath to the Crown requires me to execute and enforce the regulations established by Parliament.'

'Your oath doesn't require you to single out the Hauptman Cartel for your enforcement, Commander.' Hauptman didn't raise his voice, but there was a vicious snap under its smooth surface.

'Mr. Hauptman,' Honor faced him levelly, folding her hands tightly under the edge of the table, 'we have inspected all commerce with the surface of Medusa or the Basilisk orbital warehouses, not simply that consigned here by your firm.'

'Nonsense!' Hauptman snorted. 'No other senior officer on this station has ever interfered so blatantly with Basilisk's legitimate merchant traffic. More to the point, I have numerous reports from my factors here to the effect that your `customs' parties spend far more time `examining' my shipments than anyone else's. If that's not harassment, I would very much like to know what you feel does constitute harassment, Commander!'

'What may or may not have been done by previous senior officers has no bearing on my responsibilities or duties, Mr. Hauptman,' Honor said with cool precision. 'And if, in fact, my inspection parties have spent more time on Hauptman Cartel shipments, that is entirely because our own experience has indicated that they are more likely than most to contain illegal items.'

Hauptman's face darkened dangerously, but she made herself gaze back without any sign of her inner tension.

'Are you accusing me of smuggling, Commander Harrington?' The baritone was deeper and darker, almost silky.

'I am saying, Mr. Hauptman, that the record demonstrates that the incidence of contraband in shipments registered to your firm is thirty-five percent above that of any other firm trading with Medusa. Whether you are personally involved in those illegal activities or not, I cannot, of course say. For myself, I doubt it. Until such time, however, as we have satisfied ourselves that no contraband is passing under cover of a Hauptman Cartel manifest, my boarding officers will, at my orders, devote special attention to your shipments.' Hauptman's face had grown steadily darker, and Honor paused, regarding him calmly. 'If you desire an end to what you regard as `harassment,' Sir, I would suggest that you insist that your own managers see to their internal housekeeping.'

'How dare you?!' Hauptman exploded, half-surging to his feet. Honor's hands tightened further under the table, but she sat motionless. 'I don't know who you think you are, but I refuse to sit here and be insulted in this fashion! I'd advise you to watch your wild allegations, Commander!'

'I've stated only facts, not `wild allegations,' Mr. Hauptman,' she said unflinchingly. 'If you prefer not to hear them, then I suggest you leave.'

'Leave? Leave?!' Hauptman was fully on his feet now, bracing his weight on the table as his voice filled the briefing room like thunder. 'I came here to give you a chance to correct your gross mishandling of the situation! If you prefer, I can take it up with the Admiralty—or the government—instead of dealing with a jumped-up, over-inflated commander who insults me to my face by accusing me of illegal activities!'

'That is, of course, your option.' Honor felt McKeon's coiled-spring tension beside her, but her own anxiety was fading, licked away by the steadily rising lava of her own anger. 'In the meantime, however, you are a guest in my ship, Mr. Hauptman, and you will keep a civil tongue in your head or I will have you ejected from it!'

Hauptman's mouth dropped open in shock at her icy tone, and she leaned into his silence.

'I have not accused you, personally, of any illegalities. I have stated, and the record amply demonstrates, that individuals within your firm are engaged in illegal activities. Your threats to resort to higher authority do not alter that fact, nor will they alter my discharge of my responsibilities in light of it.'

Hauptman sank back into his chair, jaw muscles bunched. Hushed silence hovered in the briefing room, and then he smiled. It wasn't a pleasant expression.

'Very well, Commander. Since you choose to see the possibility of my seeking redress through the Admiralty as a `threat,' and since you seem unwilling to see the justice of extending even-handed treatment to my interests here, perhaps I can put this in terms you can understand. I am telling you, now, that you will cease harassing my ships and my shipments or that I will hold you personally—not the Navy, not the Government, you —responsible for the damage you are inflicting upon my business and personal good name.'

'Whom you choose to hold responsible and for what is your affair, not mine.' Honor's voice was cold.

'You can't hide behind your uniform from me, Commander,' Hauptman said