"Right, sir." He wriggled his heavy body from behind the small table,
resealed his tunic, and settled his cap with as much precision as if he
were about to represent the Queen before the assembled nobility of
Sargol.
Dane hurried down the ladders, coming to a halt beside Ali. It was the
turn of the man at the foot of the ramp to bark an impatient demand:
"Well?" (Was that the theme word of every Captain's vocabulary?)
"You wait," Dane replied with no inclination to give the Eysie officer
any courtesy address. Close to a Terran year aboard the Solar Queen had
inoculated him with pride in his own section of Service. A Free Trader
was answerable to his own officers and to no one else on earth--or among
the stars--no matter how much discipline and official etiquette the
Companies used to enhance their power.
He half expected the I-S officers to leave after an answer such as that.
For a Company Captain to be forced to wait upon the convenience of a Free
Trader must be galling in the extreme. And the fact that this one was
doing just that was an indication that the Queen's crew did, perhaps,
have the edge of advantage in any coming bargain.
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