For Love and Glory

XXXIII

The Baltica enjoyed a setting as elegant as itself, a clear dome atop one of the tallest towers in Inga. City lights shone, flashed, fountained to the edge of sight, under a moon ringed with a frost halo. Designer flowers bedded among the tables deployed multitudinous colors, animated the air, and trilled a melody that evoked springtime in the blood. Stepping in and seeing the customers, Hebo felt distinctly underdressed. Nonetheless, when he spoke Romon’s name he was conducted with deference to a table in a reserved alcove. He’d come a trifle early, so he wouldn’t be in strange surroundings, and ordered a beer to keep him company while he looked around. Quite a few of the women on hand were worth looking at.

Romon entered on the dot, immaculate in blue tunic, red half-cloak, and white trousers tucked into silver-buckled boots. On his left shoulder, a ring of tiny diamonds glinted around the emblem of his House. Contrast made the man with him doubly slovenly. Besides, the fellow was short, squat, ugly—a kind of arrogance, not getting that dark, hooknosed face remodeled. He stood unsmiling as Romon introduced him: “Captain Torben Hebo, I’d like you to meet Dr. Esker Harolsson Seafell.”

Hebo rose. The other ignored his proffered hand, though a shake was customary on Asborg, and gave him a nod. “Esker Harolsson?” Hebo blurted. “The physicist who—observed those black holes? But I thought you were a Windholm.”

He never had been much good at tact, he realized, and doubtless never would be.

“I changed my patrons,” Esker snapped. Evidently he hadn’t wanted that publicized. They could have arranged it.

“House Seafell was honored to adopt him,” Romon said, as if to gloss over the surliness.

“And I’m, uh, honored to meet you,” Hebo said. The honor didn’t feel overwhelming.

They sat down. Romon ordered a martini, Esker a whiskey over ice. Hebo decided to bull ahead. “Why’ve you come along, if I may ask? What you did, what you’re working on, is way beyond me.”

“I thought you might have questions you’d like authoritative answers to,” Romon made reply. His manner intensified. “Inasmuch as you’ve been retrieving not just popular accounts of the matter, but everything, including new interpretations and theories as they appear.”

“How do you know that?”

The drinks slid up from the table port. Romon sipped his before replying, “You didn’t request an anonymous address.” Esker took a pretty deep swallow of his.

“No, why should I?” Hebo countered. “And why should you keep watch for everybody who wants full reports?”

“Everybody who has no clear reason to do so,” growled Esker.

Romon frowned at him, obviously not liking even this slight giveaway. “You were from offplanet, and not in any registry of scientists known to us. Don’t you agree, that’s interesting?”

“Why?”

Romon shrugged. “A natural curiosity, reinforced by having previous acquaintance.”

“You said ‘everybody.’ ”

Esker leaned forward, tumbler gripped tight in a hairy hand. “The potentialities of this phenomenon are unpredictable,” he stated. “Revolutionary new technologies may well spring from it. Dangerous, in ignorant or irresponsible possession.”

“Those Susaians didn’t go there from a disinterested love of pure science,” Romon added.

And parts of the story are still untold, Hebo thought, not for the first time. And these two aren’t about to share them with me.

He forced a laugh. “I don’t qualify,” he said. “Anyhow, that particular cat is long since out of the bag.”

“Too many cats are.”

The old saw had escaped Hebo without forethought, as old saws were apt to do. It surprised him that Romon knew this one. The man must be a reader. What more was there to him that didn’t show on the surface?

“Even the discovery at Jonna should not have been broadcast to any and every world,” Romon continued. “We should at least have released the data gradually and discreetly. House Seafell urged it. But no, the other Houses knew better.”

The bitterness in his tone made Hebo wonder aloud: “Who’re you afraid would benefit, besides us? The Susaians?”

Romon’s manner turned thoughtful. “I suppose you mean the Dominance. No, not that per se. I don’t share the paranoia of too many people about it. We may not much approve of the regime, but we have no military or political conflict with it worth worrying over, and, as a matter of fact, it’s having internal problems.”

Hebo had likewise heard such news, leaking out across light-years, economic troubles and unrest which refused to stay repressed. Susaians as a race seemed to fare no better under totalitarianism than humans. Nevertheless, he didn’t quite agree with Romon’s assessment. That interstellar violence made no sense and hadn’t happened didn’t mean it never could.

He realized fleetingly that once upon a time he had had a different opinion. His revised mind didn’t think in quite the same way as before.

Romon was saying, “I simply have in mind whatever technology may be gotten from the knowledge. And, no, we’d not be able to monopolize it for long. But a head start, a competitive advantage—”

Better return to our muttons, Hebo thought. Aloud: “Well, amongst all those big astropolitical questions, why such a concern over me?”

Romon lifted a palm. “Please. It’s entirely friendly. I recognized your name when I was most recently checking the list of retrievals. Naturally, I was surprised, but also glad of a chance to meet you again.”

Esker sneered. “Alas, the fair Lissa Davysdaughter wasn’t here to greet you.”

He’s heard about us on Jonna, Hebo thought. His feelings on the subject sound pretty strong. I wish there were more grounds for it. “I’ll admit I was disappointed,” he gave back. “What man with his glands working right wouldn’t be?”

That must have hit a nerve. Esker glared.

And did Romon wince ever so slightly? He made haste to interpose a smile and a chuckle. “Well, of course, a very natural reason to come. But the only one? The black hole material has been sent to a number of institutions elsewhere. Scientists communicate to and fro.”

“Why is a layman like you downloading it?” demanded Esker. “What use to you?”

“Sir, I don’t appreciate your tone of voice,” Hebo said, truthfully enough. “Is this a reunion dinner or an interrogation?”

“I’m sorry,” Romon responded fast. “We both are,” which Hebo doubted. “We seem to have expressed ourselves poorly. Of course we don’t expect anything… untoward. I repeat, I’m simply curious, and it occurred to me that Dr. Esker might be of some help to you. Or I might be.”

He drew breath. “Yes, I checked further,” he went on. “You’re collecting information on Freydis as well, the planet and the proposed Susaian colony. That suggests to me your main reason for coming to Sunniva has to do with it. You’re an entrepreneur. House Seafell is business-oriented, you know. If you care to discuss your ideas, we might perhaps find we can cooperate.”

Hebo took cover behind his beer mug while he reassembled his thoughts. Be wary, he decided, but not too standoffish to learn whatever may be here to learn. “I see. Well, I’m not broadcasting it yet, when nothing may come of it. But if the colony does get started, there’ll be a lot of work to do, a lot of inventions needed, and, if the project succeeds, a lot of money to make.”

Romon laughed. “Ah-hah! That’s what I thought.”

“But why your preoccupation with the black holes?” his companion persisted. “You must be spending hours per week sifting through the information in search of bits and pieces you can halfway understand.”

“Esker,” Romon clipped, “if you don’t keep a civil tongue, I’ll regret inviting you along.”

“I’m entitled to be curious too,” said the physicist. “Or am I merely another machine of yours, to be switched off when you aren’t using it?”

Hey, better lighten the atmosphere, or I’ll have wasted an evening that looked promising yesterday, Hebo thought. He constructed amiability. “It’s no riddle, Dr. Harolsson, and I do appreciate your taking the trouble to join us. If you’ve looked closely at my queries, and I’ll bet you have, you know I’m not only asking about astrophysics, or even mainly, but about the whole little-known stellar neighborhood. The event’s bound to have effects across parsecs. Radiation effects on biospheres are just the most obvious.”

“Slight, and in the course of correspondingly many years,” Esker retorted. “Those studies can wait.”

“I gather they are in fact waiting. Sure, the new hole is the urgent case, and has a lot more to teach us. However, later on, exploration may turn up things farther off.”

Romon raised his eyes and his drink. “Profitable things?” he murmured as mildly.

“What else, for me? I’m keeping an eye open, while I carry on my current fishing expedition.”

“Excuse me, but doesn’t that flood of… abstruse data and calculations… almost blind you?”

Hebo spread his hands. “At this stage, who can tell what’s going to give a new opportunity? Besides, it’s kind of a challenge.”

“Why?” muttered Esker. “You’ll never be a scientist.”

“I see,” Romon put in. “You want to keep expanding your mental horizons. And your physical ones.” His voice dropped to a murmur:

Esker scowled, puzzled by the archaic language and resentful.

Hebo blinked. “Hey, Tennyson’s Ulysses,” he exclaimed.

“Oh, do you know it?” Romon asked, in surprise of his own.

“Yeah, sure, and a bunch of other mostly forgotten stuff. I may not be any literary type, but I do go a long way back, and there’s been plenty of time with nothing better to do than read.”

“Well, well. I hope we can get together over drinks now and then and cap quotations.”

Esker broke in. “This is very fine, no doubt, but it makes me wonder still the more why you’re trying to understand astrophysics and cosmology.”

Hebo decided to smooth things over. “Just incidental, as I thought you realized.” The hell it is. “A change of pace from the Freydis work. And just in short little forays.”

“A hobby?” said Romon, likewise anxious to maintain politeness. “Good for you. To get practical, though, I repeat, possibly we can help each other as regards Freydis.”

“Possibly.” As he thought about it, Hebo felt more and more that the possibility might well be very real. Don’t tip the hand, though, especially bearing in mind that Lissa Windholm once mentioned having a certain coldness toward House Seafell. “I’ll have to see, or try to gauge, how things are developing. Maybe I’ll decide the business is not for me at all, and go away before I go broke. If something positive should occur to me, sure, I’ll let you know.” He knocked back his beer. “Before we have another round, what say we screen the menu?”

“Sheer genius!” Romon exclaimed with a bonhomie that Hebo didn’t think came natural to him. “Yes, indeed.”

The rest of the time passed fairly pleasantly, since Esker didn’t say much.

And then the next five years were amply eventful. And then Lissa returned.