And then the tip of her tongue pushed between my lips; and abruptly, my twingeof sympathy vanished in a sudden flush of surprise and cautious excitement.

It seemed like a long time before the pressures fore and aft slackened off andshe pulled away, though it was probably no more than a few seconds. As herhead moved out of my line of sight, I saw that Tera was looking at me with acast-granite expression on her face. Irreverently, I found myself wonderinghow many other expressions of surprise, outrage, or disgust she'd gone throughwhile I wasn't looking. Even a scoundrel as low-class as I was shouldn't act thatwayin the presence of a lady.

"Just remember, there's a lot more where that came from," Jennifer said, usingher seductive voice again as she rose leisurely to her feet. Clearly, she wasfeeling very pleased with herself. "If you spot the Icarus, call the Morsh PonStarrComm exchange and leave a message for Jennifer at Shick Place." With onelast smile all around, plus a smirk for Tera, she sauntered away.

The others were all looking at me, varying degrees of expectation on theirfaces. "Well, don't just sit there," I said. To my perhaps hypersensitive earsmy voice sounded a little slurred. "Drink up, and let's get out of here."

They did so without comment. I let my own cola sit where it was, keeping a surreptitious eye on Jennifer as I sorted out the proper number ofsmall-denomination coins. She returned to her table and spoke briefly with herfriend there; but as the four of us stood up she left that table and wanderedoff again, this time heading in the general direction of the three Lumpies.

"Let's go," I told the others, putting a hand on Tera's back to encourage herforward, a friendly gesture I instantly abandoned at the glare she flashed me.

We headed to the door; and as I ushered the others through, I took one finallook behind us. The pirates were looking back at us, with the universalsuspicious expressions of men permanently on the run. Nurptric the barkeep wasbusily puttering around the bar, his eyebrow crest fairly glowing with theeageranticipation of customers on their way in. Jennifer's friend had a smallmirror out and was checking her makeup, with much the same air of anticipation.

And Jennifer herself was at the back table leaning over one of the Lumpies, speaking solicitously to him as if trying to wake him up, her ring againcatching the light as she patted him soothingly on the back of his neck. Hereyes caught mine; and though she didn't smile, I knew we understood eachother.

The trip back was very quiet. After what had happened back at the taverno, noone seemed interested in talking to me, and I certainly wasn't going to startany conversations myself.

We reached the Icarus to find Ixil in the process of paying off the fuelers. Iordered everyone to their stations, then waited in the wraparound until Ixilwas finished so that I could personally retract the ladder and seal the hatch.

Heading up the now deserted mid-deck corridor to the bridge, I sealed the doorbehind me and sat down in the command chair.

And only then, with no one around to see, I pulled from its resting placebetween my gum and cheek the poker-chip-sized object that Jennifer hadtransferred from her mouth to mine during our kiss. Unscrewing the top, Icarefully extracted the folded microprint document nestled inside, and the sixsmall borandis tablets that had been packed tightly together beneath it.

Uncle Arthur had come through.

THE DOCUMENT, ANNOYINGLY but not surprisingly, was written in Kalixiri.

"I hate it when he does that," I sighed, handing the reader over to Ixil andflopping onto my back on my bunk. "Here, you do it. I'm not up to decipheringKalixiri right now."

"Certainly," Ixil said, resettling himself comfortably against the door of mycabin and showing the good sense not to lecture me yet again as to why UncleArthur did things this way. Kalixiri was probably one of the least-knownlanguages in the Spiral, which made for automatic security if the wrong personhappened across one of his missives, though it was surprisingly easy fornon-Kalixiri to learn. Furthermore, the way the alphabet was laid out, thewords themselves were generally much shorter than the English equivalents, whichmeant he could cram in more text per square centimeter.

And from what I'd seen of this one, he had those square centimeters very wellcrammed indeed.

"We start with Almont Nicabar," Ixil said. "We have a photo. Slightlyout-of-date... but yes, it does appear to be him. Certificate in starshipdrive and unofficial training in mechanics—the dates and details are here; you'llwant to look them over later. Ten years in the EarthGuard Marines, just as he said, achieving rank of master sergeant... Interesting. Had you ever heard of anattempt six years ago by EarthGuard to get hold of a Patth Talariac Drive?"

"I hadn't until Uncle Arthur mentioned it," I told him, wondering why themention of six years sounded familiar. "Was Nicabar involved with that?"

"I would say so," Ixil said dryly. "He was on the commando team thatpenetratedthe Patthaaunutth Star Transport Industries plant on Oigren."

I turned my head to look at him. "You're kidding. Our Almont Nicabar?"

"So it says," Ixil assured me. "Furthermore, from the listed dates, it appearshe resigned from the service barely three months after the mission's failure."

A funny sensation began to dig into my stomach. That was when I remembered sixyears being mentioned: Nicabar had said that was how long ago he'd resignedfrom the Marines. "Is there any mention of why the mission failed?"

Ixil gave me an odd look. "As a matter of fact, there's a note that suggestsinside information might have been leaked to the Patth. Are you seeing aconnection?"

"Could be," I said grimly. "Three months is just the right length for aprivateconfidential court-martial."

"You sure?"

"Trust me," I assured him. "I went through one, remember? One other thing. Itold you about seeing three more of the Lumpy Clan back in that taverno. WhatI didn't tell you was that Nicabar reacted rather strongly when we got our firstglimpse of one of them. Strongly for Nicabar, anyway."

For a moment Ixil digested that in silence. "Still, there must not have been areal case against him, or he wouldn't have been allowed to resign and leavegracefully."

"But there must have been enough of one for them to hold him for court-martialin the first place," I pointed out.

"Unless there was no court-martial involved," Ixil also pointed out. "It mighthave just been three months of general debriefing."

"And he then picked up and left a promising ten-year career just for the hellof it?" I shrugged. "Well, maybe. Still, bad feelings might explain why he jumpedhis last ship just because they were mask-shilling for the Patth. Is thereanything else?"

"Various details of his life," Ixil said, scanning down the text. "Nothing allthat interesting, though again you'll want to look them over when you're up todeciphering Kalixiri again. Mostly public and official-record material—UncleArthur must not have had time to have anyone dig deeper than that."

"I'm sure he'll have the really juicy details later," I said. Uncle Arthur'sknack for getting his hands on supposedly confidential information waslegendary. "The trick will be how we get hold of it. Who's next?"

"Hayden Everett," he said. "He was indeed a professional throw-boxer for twoyears, leaving the ring twenty-two years ago."

"Was he any good?"

Ixil shrugged. "His win/loss record would say no. Still, he did last two yearson the circuit, so he must at least have had stamina."

"Or was just a glutton for punishment," I said. "I wonder if the circuit backthen went into Patth space."

"I don't know," Ixil said. "However, you might be interested in knowing thathis last fight was a contested loss to Donson DiHammer. That name sound familiar?"