Gateway To Xanadu (24 page)

“Certainly, sir,” the girl answered immediately, coming up with another smile. “The accommodations are yours to arrange as you like, most especially as they’ll only be for this one evening. Please follow me.”

Val sent Little a satisfied look as he and I followed the woman, but Little hadn’t seemed quite as satisfied. The last glimpse I had of him was an attempt at smiling approvingly at Val, but an angry frustration was fighting hard to flare out of his eyes. Something had just happened that I didn’t understand, but there was no immediate way of finding out what it was.

When the girl opened the next door down the line and gestured me inside, I stepped past her to find that the open, partitioned part of the vessel was what was used as cabins. The entire far wall of the area was gone, showing that we were just casting off from the dock and beginning to move, slowly pulling away from the bank and heading toward the middle of the lake. I stopped in the middle of the cabin to stare in professional dismay at the countryside moving past, and the woman came over to put her hand on my back.

“Don’t be frightened, dear, there’s a force field there to keep you from falling overboard,” she said in a gentle, unamused way. “It lets air and light through, but it won’t let a human body past it. Would you like me to walk over there with you so you can see that for yourself?”

I gave her a half-hearted smile and shook my head, which brought me another reassuring pat and smile before she left to get Val settled in. I followed her to the door and closed it behind her, then turned back into the cabin to look around. The area was no more than twelve by ten and made entirely of a dark, polished wood like the corridor, with a single bunk along the wall the door was in, a piece of colored cloth hanging on a peg set in the wall to the right, and what had to be communicating doors in both left and right walls. There wasn’t a sign of my luggage or Val’s, and there wasn’t even a chair to sit down on.

I sat down on what proved to be an unbelievably comfortable bunk. There was nothing to do but wait to see what happened next, and there was no telling how long that would take.

What happened next came about ten minutes later, after I had put my cigarette out on the cabin floor and was taking that ridiculous hat off. The white gloves were already thrown down next to the purse on my bunk, and I was seriously considering letting the dress follow the rest when a sound came at the right-hand door, the one leading to Val’s cabin. I got up from the bunk and slid back the latch holding the door closed, and Val opened it then gestured me into his cabin. I stepped through the doorway, but when I tried to close it behind me, Val shook his head.

“Leave it open,” he said very softly in the trade language, our secret, unbreakable code. “I have a feeling Little knows his way past these latches, and I don’t want him wondering what we’re talking about.”

“What are we talking about?” I asked in the same language, relieved at the lack of tingling in the round white earrings I was wearing. That meant our conversation hadn’t triggered any listening devices, which probably meant we weren’t being monitored in any other way either. “Is the conversation going to include the reason we played swap with the sleeping arrangements?”

“Among other things,” he nodded, keeping one eye on what he could see of my cabin through the opened door. “First I want to know if you’re all right. You looked badly shaken before, but now you seem calmer.”

He took most of his attention away from my cabin to look me over carefully, just as though he were searching for tears or something. I found it very hard to believe he was serious, but was very much afraid that he was.

“Hey, Val, remember me?” I said, waving a hand to get his attention. “This is your intrepid partner you’re looking at, the one who can look shaken at the drop of a sneer. You’re not going to start believing what I say and do again, are you? All that happened was that I changed my line of attack because of Little’s reaction to the first version; I’m not frightened, I’m not upset, and I’m sure as hell not in need of comforting. I also won’t be any of the above even if I hang sniveling on your sleeve and coat. Do you think you can remember that?”

“I’m not sure I can,” he came back, a peculiar look mixed in with a tinge of embarrassment. “Don’t you know how real it looks, when you do things like that? You weren’t pretending to be frightened earlier, you were frightened, and even Little believed it. Staying in character to gloat was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done; what I wanted to do was put you behind me, then smear Little all over the landscape. If you have to do it, can’t you tone it down a little?”

“You mean, make it unbelievable?” I asked, trying to be as gentle as possible in response to the plaintive note in his voice. “Val, I’ve been doing this a long time, and I’ve always had an aptitude for it, so it’s not surprising that it looks real to you. It’s supposed to look real, otherwise I’m wasting my time. You have to make yourself understand that no matter how real it looks outside, inside it’s just another gag I’m pulling, on you and everyone else. Inside I’m laughing at everyone who believes me, and you don’t want to be laughed at, do you? Isn’t it better to be in on the gag than taken in?”

“That was a good try, but it’s not helping,” he said with a sigh, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand as he looked down at me ruefully. “Every time you wilt under Little’s stare, I get the urge to wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze. I’ll try to stay in character the way I’ve been doing, but the longer this goes on, the harder it will be. If you want to go back to the Station and wait for Radman to show up there, I’ll get started making the arrangements.”

“Going back to the Station is out,” I growled. “This whole thing is so stupid. Look, can’t we agree that if I really need your help I’ll ask for it? In this language, so there won’t be any chance of confusion? If I don’t start yelling in the trade language, I’m still putting on an act and everything’s fine. How does that sound?”

“It helps,” he agreed with only a trace of enthusiasm, then he grinned faintly. “Most women would want to be protected from something like Little, but you’re still running counter to the breed. Just don’t run so far counter that you close your eyes and walk blindly into whatever he puts in your way. If you do, yelling probably won’t help.”

“What has he been telling you?” I asked with a frown, finally understanding why Val was being so reflexively protective. “I know he didn’t like my high and mighty act, but backing down should have helped at least a little. He was certainly gloating hard enough.”

“That’s because he enjoys seeing fear in women,” Val said with disgust thick in his voice and eyes, his attention back on my cabin. “When you treated him as less than a bug, you made a permanent enemy of him, and nothing you do now can change that. He’s been trying to talk me into selling you to the Pleasure Sphere.”

“Before or after you told him selling me was what you had in mind?” I asked, making sure none of the chill I felt reached a place where Val could see it. My partner still didn’t know how far things could be taken in the Pleasure Sphere, and considering his protective reflex, I wanted to keep it that way.

“Before,” came the answer, and those eyes still kept themselves away from mine. “Selling you was his idea, one that scared me but still brought a certain amount of interest. I told him that even if I did sell you it would have to be a private buyer, but he’s still pushing for the Sphere. A private buyer would probably not give you everything you deserve, he insists.”

I described Little’s personal habits briefly but colorfully, then turned away from Val to walk to the open side of his cabin. We were out in the middle of the lake now, and the fiery red of the setting sun was playing over the ripples our transportation was making.

“Whatever you do, don’t even pretend to agree to that,” I said after a minute, feeling the fresh lake breeze tickle through my hair and over my face. “If he’s keeping after you, he’s probably prepared to record any sort of agreement he can drag out of you, and once he has that they’ll come after me at light speed. Stick to the private buyer line, and there won’t be a problem.”

“I’m glad you think so,” he said from behind me, and somehow I had the feeling he was looking at me.

“According to my friend John, no matter whom I sell you to, I first have to have you appraised. You know, to find out what your potentials are. He’s been trying to get me to agree to having it done tomorrow, when we get where we’re going. That’s why I switched cabins with you; if we were right next door to each other, he would have been at me non-stop. I was hoping having to go a distance through the corridor would keep him away for a while, at least while he’s still pretending to be interested only because of our ‘friendship.’ He thinks I did it so that the two of us can keep an eye on you more easily.”

“I wish to hell we didn’t need him to lead us to Radman,” I muttered, then turned away from the lake view to find that I’d been right about being stared at. Val was not happy in the least, and I didn’t have to tell him he had company in that. “Your friend is right, so you can stop avoiding him and start agreeing.

Tell him you do want me appraised after all.”

“Diana, you’re out of your mind,” he said harshly, those black eyes flaring at me. “If Little wants it done, you can bet there’ll be nothing but unpleasantness in it for you. Do you expect me to just stand by and watch them do whatever they please to you?”

“That’s exactly what I expect,” I came back just as harshly. “It’s part of the job, and that’s what we’re here for, to do a job. If you can’t remember that, you’re useless to me, and worse than useless. And how many times do you have to be told that my name is Jennifer? Are you trying to get me killed or taken?”

His eyes showed hurt before he turned them away from me, and that told me he didn’t realize I’d slapped at him on purpose. I had to do something to make him shed that protectiveness, or we were both going to be in it hip-deep.

“Being appraised isn’t as bad as you think it is,” I told the stiffened back facing me. “It’s humiliating and degrading, but not painful. Some of the people who come here send themselves through it, others get sent through by the people they’re traveling with, as a joke. It’s main purpose is to measure the physical potential of the individual being appraised, to see if they’ve reached full sexual maturity or could use some additional development. Little may want the report to turn over to Radman if the need arises to bring his boss into it.”

“And everything that brings you closer to Radman is worth whatever you have to pay for it,” he said very flatly, turning back to face me with a look in his eyes to match the tone. “I know how dedicated you’ve told me you are, Jennifer, but I can’t help wondering if in this case the dedication runs a little stronger than usual. It looks to me as though you might be crossing the line between dedication and obsession.”

“If you want to know if I’m personally out for Radman’s blood, the answer is yes,” I told him without any bush-beating, making no effort to avoid his gaze. “If I hadn’t been given the assignment I probably would have come after him anyway, which is why Ringer got that death warrant back into effect so fast.

He knows me well enough to know what I’ll do, but he also knows I can handle it. Professionally. If this was purely a personal hunt I would pull back and pick a better time and place, but it’s not. When it’s business you don’t always get to pick your spot and minute; this is business, so we stay with it. Do you understand?”

“The way you mean it, yes.” He nodded, expressionless but not soothed. “In all other definitions of the phrase, I don’t even begin to understand. What’s supposed to happen after you’ve been ‘appraised’?”

“We go deeper into the Sphere no matter what Little suggests,” I said, sighing. “He must have approached us originally with the idea of spotting us for his own organization, then got side-tracked when I ‘insulted’ him. If we get him close enough to where his boss is, we may force him into forgetting his own plans and going through with the original one. ”

“Which would get you sold to a small organization rather than a big one,” he summed up, still expressionless. “What I don’t understand is how Little can suggest selling you to the Sphere, and you confirming it can be done. Didn’t you say Pleasure Sphere customers are protected?”

“From each other,” I clarified, shifting my weight where I stood and wishing there was a chair to sit down on. “The Sphere won’t let its clientele do what it pleases to others like them, since they’re all paying customers. What you have to remember is that Little wasn’t stretching things too far when he said my ‘age’ puts me in a different classification from other guests. Even if I become a confirmed Sphere enthusiast during this visit, a number of years have to pass before I can come back on my own, and I have to have the bucks as well as the desire to do it. What money I have now might be from a trust; at what age do I get control over that trust? How good are the administrators of the trust’? What happens if there’s nothing left when I get my hands on it, or if I turn out to hate the visit? There are too many variables involved for the Sphere to clearly classify me as part of their clientele. You’re my guardian and you’re picking up the tab this time, don’t forget; coming here at all marks you as a wastrel, so neither one of us might have the wherewithal to make any further visits. If they buy me their profit is guaranteed right now, and that would be tempting for them-if you were to offer them the deal. If you don’t that’s another story entirely, and I don’t think they’d give in to the temptation and come after me on their own.”

“You don’t think they would,” he repeated, back to a flattened tone and stare. “I’m glad you can reassure me with such positive statements. If you couldn’t, I might have thought about worrying.”

“People who spend their time worrying never get anything else done,” I told him, unable to keep the sourness out of my own tone. “If you want to waste time like that that’s your business, but I’d rather be doing something constructivelike making sure they don’t get too interested in me. Which means I have to adjust my character.”