The 97th Step (9 page)

There are almost nine hundred of them, the largest only a kilometer or so across, dotted across the Inghetata Sea, in the Gheata Latitudes. They're the only place on the entire planet warm enough to grow semi-tropical vegetation. Most of Aqua's crops are waterculture, you know."

"I seem to recall," Ferret said dryly, pretending to be bored.

"Yes, well, the dish is prepared with walnut butter and fire-weed thimblebee honey, with a dash of sour cream and three drops of wormwood brandy."

"Fascinating," Ferret said, deadpan.

"I give it an eighty-three," Stoll said.

Ferret raised an eyebrow. A very good score. He had eaten with Stoll at places where the food only rated fifty, and it had been some of the best Ferret had ever tasted. The scale ran from one to a hundred, with most of Stoll's meals falling around the midrange. Stoll had yet to taste anything he would rate over ninety-one. His criteria were passing strange: A meal scoring a hundred would cause the eater to pass out from pure bliss-comparable to a few dozen orgasms, one after another, Stoll had told him. A meal that caused nausea and projectile vomiting usually rated around ten. Anything below that was usually too vile to look at or smell to consider eating; a food rated at one would be something one could not remain in the same room with for more than a few seconds, without fainting from revulsion. But there were a lot of people on a lot of worlds, and all manner of diets, so Stoll had a lot better than such fare from which to choose.

"This is wonderful and all, Shanti, but I left Shar's bed to come here, and I hope it is for a better reason that a lecture on candied fruits you have recently consumed."

"Your taste is all in your dick, boy."

"I'll tell Shar Li you said that."

"Considering that she finds you attractive, her tastes could use improvement, too."

"Shanti…"

"All right. Have you heard of the Immelhoffs?"

"The emerald mining family on Lee, in the Delta System?"

"The same. Well, as it happens, one of the daughters is about to be wed. She is a rather artless girl of tender years, pushing sixty T.S. Her father has finally found her a match that won't compromise the family integrity. He had to go offworld to do it; she's marrying a boy of fifty-one, from the planet next door. Rift.

He's the scion of a rich waste disposal dynasty; the family's money comes mainly from the development of a rather complex protozoa of the suctoria class, whose chief function is the ingestion and conversion of common sewage on the less well-developed planets."

Ferret shook his head. "I suppose it would kill you to get to the point."

"Out of deference to the high society types in the Delta System, the wedding is to be held on the more civilized world of Thompson's Gazelle." Stoll continued his monologue as though Ferret had not spoken.

"The bride, groom and assorted family and friends are spacing there for the ceremony and attendant celebration, courtesy of the doting fathers. It is to be a week-long bash, at the system-famous luxury casino and hotel, the Woodwind, in the capital city of Kazehi, on the subcontinent."

Ferret stood. "I'm going back to Shar's. Call me when you get to the end of your long, slow, epic broadcast."

"Sit down," Stoll said, shaking his head.

Ferret sat. "Jesu, Shanti, you're an old man! You don't have that much time left, you could be eating something instead of boring me." But he smiled, giving the lie to his words.

"I'll dance at your funeral, brat! Now shut up and listen!"

"Yes, master. To hear is to obey." Ferret grinned widely. He loved this fat thief, had thought of him as an older brother, maybe even the father he wished he'd had.

"As I was saying, the guests will be staying at the Woodwind. They will all want to dress up to the place's elegant reputation, not to mention trying to impress both the dirt diggers and the sewage magnates. The baubles will come out."

"Ah," Ferret said, "at last we get to it."

"There is a particular jewel which will likely make its appearance attendant to the festivities. It will be on one of the guests, a sheep rancher from Lee by the name of Petur Tagir. The item is a bracelet of bottle labradorite, carved into the shape of a supine woman."

Ferret was puzzled. "Labradorite? That's only a semiprecious stone, isn't it? What is it worth?"

"Intrinsically, not all that much. It's an antique, and the workmanship is fairly good, but the bracelet would probably only bring something around forty or fifty thousand stads on the open market."

"Then how are we supposed to get a quarter of a million out of it? Not counting expenses?"

"If you'll quit interrupting, I'll tell you."

Ferret stared at the ceiling and gave a mock sigh. "Go on."

"Thank you. It seems that Herr Tagir's father acquired the bracelet from a competitor as part of a transaction that was somewhat less than scrupulous. The competitor then fell upon hard times, and it was a number of years before he could regain his financial footing. At this point, he offered to buy the bracelet back from the senior Tagir. Despite what was a generous offer, Tagir refused to sell."

"This bracelet became a point of conflict for the competitor and Tagir. Both men continued to grow quite wealthy, and eventually, both men passed on. The bracelet was left to the younger Tagir, who fancied it as much as his father. But the son of the competitor had been charged by his father to retrieve the family heirloom, or suffer eternal shame. Which is where we come in."

"We are working for the son of the competitor?" Ferret said.

"Just so. The sentimental value of this trinket is worth over half a million stads to our client."

"Tagir will know who took it."

"Knowledge is not proof. And certain clues will be provided to the local cools that will point a suspicious ringer elsewhere." Stoll grinned widely. "Our contract with our client is to return the bracelet. I'm afraid I might have underestimated somewhat when I told you the value of this caper."

"Huh?"

"Well, there will be other baubles there, now won't there? In order to throw the cools off the scent, we'll
have
to take some of them, don't you agree?"

Ferret laughed. "Of course."

Stoll's face grew serious. "We've got some protection on this one, Willy. Our client has covered some holes for us. These people like precious rocks, and they like to show them off. Emeralds, rubies, diamonds, pulsestones. If we walk carefully, this could be the caper that lets us retire. We might pull five million out of it."

Ferret's mouth seemed dry, of a moment. He had trouble swallowing the lump in his throat. Five million!

He could stick his half in a bank and live on Vishnu almost permanently, on the interest alone! Never have to leave the world except for an immigration day every few months, if he didn't want to, never have to leave Shar Li. He could be a rich man, respectable, living high and comfortable. That would be quite a rise, to millionaire from a dirt farm runaway and thief. The excitement flowed through him in epinephrinic waves, filling him with a desire to run and shout and dance.

But he thought he sounded quite calm when he spoke. Quite calm. "I see. So—when do we go?"

Nine

SHAH'S BODYSUIT WAS soaked with sweat, as was her hair, despite its being tied up on top of her head with a scarf. A cloth band around her forehead kept the perspiration from her eyes, but it, too, was heavy with moisture. As Ferret watched her, he marveled at how much work went into making something look effortless.

She finished the sequence of steps, shook her head in dissatisfaction, and walked to the edge of the stage where Ferret sat, his back to the wall and his arms wrapped around his knees. She grabbed a towel lying on the floor next to him and used it to wipe her face.

"It looks great," he said.

"It stinks," she said. "My timing is
off
, my balance is for shit, and I feel as stiff as a day-old road-killed slatcrawler."

"Colorful metaphor."

"It's all your fault."

He raised an eyebrow. "My fault?"

"I wish you wouldn't go on this caper. I'm worried."

"Hey, come on, you know what my job is."

"This is out of your league."

"Thanks a whole lot. I should stick to fifth and demistad petty theft, huh?"

"I didn't mean that." She dropped into a squat next to him, then sat back and extended her legs to the sides in a stretch.

Easily, she rocked forward into a full side split, her crotch touching the stage floor. She leaned farther forward, stretching her lower back muscles.

"What exactly
did
you mean?" He heard the anger in his own voice, and felt fully justified at it.

She continued to work at her muscles. "This is for big stads and there's a lot of risk in it."

"Not all that much if Shanti is right. We've got inside help on a lot of it."

"
If
Shanti is right. You don't dance in and lift five million in jewels and dance away, just like that."

"All of a sudden you're an expert on my business?"

She stopped her stretching and sat up. She reached out and took his hands in hers. "No, you know that's not true. I realize that you're good at what you do, but something rings wrong about this one. A feeling."

He couldn't argue with that. More than once, he'd had bad feelings about a situation. Sometimes he was wrong, but sometimes, he was right. He'd learned to start trusting his gut-level reactions when they came up. Maybe it helped keep him out of trouble, maybe not, it was hard to tell. Once, he backed away from a simple job, made some excuse, and the thing had gone sour. Confed troopers had shown up, and two of the people on the caper had been fried, the others caught and sent to the Cage on Kontrau'lega.

Sometimes called Omega—the end of the line—the place was hellish and desolate, and the Cage was the worst spot on the prison planet. Nobody ever came back and nobody had ever escaped from the Omega Cage. Maybe if he'd gone, the job would have run the way it should have, and things would have been different. There was no way to tell.

He didn't get any glimmerings of a problem with this one. Maybe that was because the shine of precious stones was too loud and bright. Whatever. There was excitement, yes, but no rumblings of disaster. He could trust his feelings, but—should he trust hers?

"Listen," he said, "it'll be all right."

She pulled her hands away from his, and cradled his face. "I love you," she said softly. "You're the best thing that's ever come along in my life. It doesn't make sense, I know, but we're connected, here." She touched his chest over his heart then pressed her hand to her own breast. "I have had better lovers—"

"Oh, thank you so much—"

"Hush and listen to me. It isn't your looks or your cocky attitude or anything physical, no matter what you think. From the first minute Shanti brought you by, I knew you were for me and I for you. Maybe it's just chemical, but I don't think so. For me, it is spiritual. Yes, I know that makes you-uncomfortable, talking about spirit, but it's true. You threw that part of yourself away when you left your home, but I have enough for both of us. I don't know what I would do if I lost you."

He caught her hand and pulled it to his chest. "I'll be back in a few weeks, and it will be for good, this time. I won't have to go offplanet to make enough to stay here ever again."

"You don't have to do it," she said. "I would go to another world with you. I can dance anywhere there's enough gravity and a place to stand. Anywhere."

He shook his head. "No, love. This is your world, and I am about to make it mine. It'll be all right.

Really."

They sat there for a moment, not speaking. Then, she stood, and tossed the towel at him. "You have a mind like-a stone," she said. "Is there anything I can do to talk you out of it?"

He smiled at her, but did not speak. There was one thing. She held a hammer that would shatter his resolve like a thrown rock would break fine thincris dinnerware. She had only to say she would not be waiting when he got back, and he would call it off. But, maybe she didn't know how much he needed and wanted her. Maybe she didn't know he would do anything to keep her. Anything. She had the hammer, but—she didn't know to use it.

He wasn't going to tell her, either.

She went back to her dance, and he watched her, in awe of her talent, knowing he would soon have her and her world forever. That was worth a little risk. That was worth almost any risk.

During the Bender trip to Thompson's Gazelle, Ferret and Stoll went over the portions of the plan they had developed thus far. Naturally, the final pieces of the picture had to wait until the surveillance and investigation of the hotel itself: where the guests would be, the security and so forth, but there were some basic lines to be developed in advance.

The ship was one of the newer luxury A-class intersystem starliners, the
Muto Kato
, built and registered out of the planet of the same name. The layout was much like an ocean-style luxury vessel, with multiple decks, shops, and the amenities of a small town. The people on board were mostly very important souls, else they would not be able to afford the trip or be allowed to make it. And, since most of them were cits. Ferret knew that they would assume he and Shanti must be important, too. Traveling first class tended to allay suspicion, simply because it was so hard to do without a lot of money or a lot of influence, or both. Naturally, one had to keep a watchful eye out for suspicious Confed agents, who could be anywhere, but the risks were small when one had a six-deep fabricated background, bought from and built by computer experts.

The two men sat amidst the tiny bit of greenery the starliner called a park, little more than three small trees and some shrubbery, surrounding a bench perched on the lip of a bathtub-sized pond containing five or six lethargic goldfish. On the off chance that somebody might have decided to record the conversations at the bench, they both wore scramble transceivers, earplug and throat patches, and sub-vocalized their conversation. A passerby would have heard nothing, but to Stoll and Ferret, it was as if they were talking aloud.