His pride was a beacon, a force which drove him to pace the room, to halt before the uncurtained window, to turn and pace again before the desk at which the cyber sat with poised immobility.
'So you have tracked him down,' said Caradoc. 'You know just where Dumarest is to be found. All that remains is to reach out and take him. Correct?'
'Not exactly.'
'Explain.' Caradoc listened then said, 'The Belzdek-how can you be so sure?'
'The name the woman gave me. It was that of a captain, large Krell. The Belzdek is his vessel.'
'And you assume that Dumarest must be on it?' As Bochner nodded the cyber added, 'But, of course, the woman could have lied.'
'No!'
'What makes you so certain? Have you yet to learn that nothing is ever certain? How can you be convinced she did not lie? After all, you could hardly have been regarded by her as a friend.'
Tortured, dying-no, she would not have considered him that.
Caradoc said, 'Assuming that Dumarest killed Menser, we have a time node from which to base extrapolations. If he left the site immediately, he would have arrived in the town by sunset. Allow more for him to have met the woman and be treated by her, more still for him to have gone to any rendezvous she might have arranged.'
'To meet Krell.'
'He or another. What is of more concern is the ship departures during the relevant period.' Caradoc picked a paper from a sheaf on his desk. 'Five vessels left in the period between Menser's death and our arrival; the Belzdek, Frame, Entil, Wilke and Ychale. The latter is an ore-carrier plying between Ealius and Cham on a regular schedule. The Wilke is a vessel of a commercial line operating a circular route and touching at Ninik, Pontia, Vult and Swenna. The others are traders going where the dictates of cargo and passengers take them.' Caradoc lowered the paper. 'Well?'
Bochner said, thoughtfully, 'Dumarest didn't pass through the gate.'
'He didn't subject himself to the lie detector at the gate,' corrected the cyber. 'Which means he either smuggled himself through or surmounted the perimeter fence. As that is watched and guarded by electronic devices, and as no alarm was recorded, it is safe to assume that he left Ealius by deception.'
'And he had to leave,' said Bochner. 'An animal on the run can only think of finding a safe place in which to hide. Where, on this world, could Dumarest find that? After killing Menser, he would be marked for assassination by the man's friends. Certainly he would have become prominent, and that would be the last thing he wanted.' He frowned, remembering the woman, her tormented eyes, the way she had spat before she had screamed out the name. Had she lied? Would she have retained sufficient resolve? 'The Belzdek,' he decided. 'I say Dumarest is on the Belzdek.'
'Which left for Gorion as we landed. The Entil left the previous noon for Vult. The Frame earlier for your own world of Pontia. Five vessels in all and the possibility remains that Dumarest could be on any one of them.' Pausing, he ended, 'Now tell me, hunter, how would you find your prey?'
'Set traps. Radio ahead and-' Bochner broke off, remembering. 'No,' he said bitterly, 'it's not as easy as that. We're in the Rift. In the Quillian Sector. Damn it! Damn it all to hell!'
Chapter Four
Vult was as Allain had claimed: a mad world inhabited by the insane. In the sky the sun, huge, mottled with flaring patches of lemon and orange, burned with a relentless fury, and at night the stars glittered like a host of hungry, watching eyes. Stars which were close, suns which filled space with conflicting energies, radiations which disturbed the delicate neuron paths of the brain, dampening the censor so that between thought and action there was little restraint. A harshly savage world where only the strong could hope to survive.
'A bad place, and we've arrived at a bad time.' Jumoke looked at the sky from where he stood, with Dumarest and Dilys at the head of the ramp. 'Look at that sun! An electronic furnace scrambling the ether. There'll be murder and raping abroad. Be sure you're not the victims.'
'Earl will see to that.' The woman touched his arm. 'Right, Earl?'
Her fingers lingered on the smooth plastic, a gesture the navigator chose to ignore if he saw it, but one Dumarest knew he would remember if he had. As if by accident he moved away from the caress, looking down over the field, the sagging fence around it, the cluster of people attracted by their arrival. One was on his way toward them.
'There's Inas,' said Dilys. 'I wonder what he'll have for us this time?'
Inas was the local agent, a Hausi, his dark face adorned by the pattern of his beard. He touched Jumoke's palm, nodded to the woman, stared at Dumarest.
'Our replacement for Gresham,' she explained. 'Any news?'
'With the sun the way it is?' Inas lifted his eyebrows. 'You know better than that, my dear. We can hope for nothing until the activity dies and even then the messages will have to be decoded. You?'
'Nothing but static all the way.' Jumoke stepped back and made way for the agent to enter the ship. 'Anything good for us?'
'A party for Ellge. They wait in town. Interested?'
'We could be, if the price is right and nothing better turns up. Still, that's up to the captain. He's in the salon with a bottle. Wait a moment and I'll take you up.' He turned to look at the others. 'Remember what I said now, be careful.'
A warning Dumarest intended to heed. Even as they crossed the field he could sense the invisible energies prickling his skin despite the protective mesh in his clothing, the gray plastic he had chosen to wear rather than his uniform. It was more comfortable, offered better protection and the knife in his boot was a sign most would recognize and be warned..
Dilys said, 'How many worlds have you visited, Earl? I don't mean called at like this, but actually lived on for a while. A dozen? A score?' She turned her head to look at his face. 'More than that?'
'I forget.'
'You didn't keep count?' She saw him smile and realized she was talking like an impressionable child. Well, he had impressed her, damn him! 'I suppose after the first dozen they all begin to look the same. Like women. Isn't that so, Earl? Isn't that what most men think?'
'I don't know what most men think, Dilys.'
'You must have heard them talk. Boast, even. About all cats being grey at night. Men!'
He said mildly. 'Are they like that? Men, I mean. Don't they all begin to act and sound and look alike after the first dozen or so?'
'How should I know?'
'You're a woman-'
'But not a whore!' Then, as she looked at him, her anger vanished and she smiled. 'All right, Earl, you win. I should know better than to talk like that. In our game, we're all the same. Sex makes no difference; we work together, take the same risks and share the same rewards.'
'You really believe that?'
'Of course. Why do you ask.'
He moved on, not answering, wondering if she was being deliberately obtuse; if any woman with her degree of femininity could ever delude herself that she was regarded as other than what she was. If so, Jumoke could educate her; the man was obviously in love with her. A love which he seemed to contain, to hold in private, as if to expose it would be to destroy it. A weakness, perhaps, but some men were like that; fearing to lose all if they hoped to gain too much.
'Mister!' A man, young, barely more than a boy, came running toward them, his eyes on Dumarest. 'You the handler on that ship? Can you give me passage? Please, mister, can I ride with you?'
'Where do you want to go?'
'Anywhere. Just as long as I get away from this place. Hell itself, if that's where you're going. It can't be worse than Vult.'
