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  The used covers were a perk of the stewards. They were in demand among dockside whores in each of the Empress's ports of call.

  "Of course . . ." Ran said professionally while his eyes searched his immediate surroundings and his brain dealt with three problems:

  What was the emergency?

  Where was the IR head serving this huge worn?

  How could he get shut of these lonesome passengers without off ending them?

  Some minds lock up when faced with simultaneous tasks. Others deal stolidly with one problem at a time, even though everything's going to hell in a handbasket outside their immediate narrow focus. Ran Colville treated batches synergistically. His responses weren't deep and they didn't even attempt to be "best"; but he was very fast, and fast got you a long way in a crisis.

  "Right over here, madam," he said.

  The IR head would be central, so he needed to move the passengers if his commo unit was to face the correct direction. He took the female passenger by the arm and swept her a short distance to the side where a cleaning robot industriously polished the floor.

  In keeping with the decor, the robot was disguised as a meter-high column base, covered with contorted acanthus vines. Ran toggled off the mechanical switch and dropped the unit firmly to the deck. With the woman in the crook of his left arm, he said, "Lieutenant Colville. Go ahead."

  The passengers beamed, and Bridge—in this case the central control AI buried somewhere deep in the Empress—spewed information through the ship's structure and up the flex to the commo pod, which broadcast it to Ran's ear clip microphone.

  Like her husband, the woman was well into middle age, overweight, and as desperately good-natured as a puppy. She was dressed in high style, a pleated dress of natural linen and a great deal of gold and faience jewelry, both mimicking Egyptian taste of the Amarna Period. She was obviously uncomfortable in such garb, but she was determined to be In on the voyage of a lifetime.

  "Stateroom eight-two-four-one," said the artificial intelligence. "There has been a double booking. The Purser has requested aid."

  The man's camera was a skeletonized handgrip supporting a body the size of a walnut. The triple lenses were of optical fibers as fine as spidersilk, with a 150-mm spread to create a three-dimensional image. The unit whirred as Ran turned to the woman and kissed the tips of her fingers. "Madam, sir," he said with a broad smile. "Enjoy your voyage on the finest vessel in the galaxy!"

  Ran spun on his heel and strode from the Social Hall with a set expression that dissuaded other passengers from accosting him. Three steps along, he realized that he'd forgotten to turn the cleaning robot back on.

  The hell with it. That was a problem the stewards could handle.

  * * *

  The prefix 8 indicated a First Class cabin. 241 was a location: Deck B, starboard rank. Deck A cabins were often thought to be the premium units because entrances to the main public rooms were off that lower deck, but a number of sophisticated travelers preferred the higher level for just that reason. Traffic in Deck B corridors was only a small fraction of that on A

  Passengers, stewards, and luggage on static-repulsion floats littered the halls in sluggish movement, like cells in human blood vessels. Cabin doors stood open as stewards fed cases inside one at a time while occupants discussed shrilly where the items should be stowed. It would all get where it was going, eventually; but Ran Colville at the moment regarded the bustle as a moving obstacle course.

  A party of Rialvans stood with their backs to the stretch of balcony overlooking the Dining Salon. They waited stolidly while, across the corridor, the dominant Rialvan female looked over their two-cabin suite with the steward. The process might take more than an hour, but it wasn't a problem. The heavy-bodied Rialvans were painstaking to a degree that would be considered insane in any human culture, but they tipped well and they never made active problems for the staff.

  No, the trouble was down toward the end of the corridor. Two stewards, dark-skinned men from New Sarawak like most of the Trident cabin staff, snapped to attention when Ran appeared—not because of his rank, but because they were so glad to pass the problem on to someone else.

  A pair of male passengers, Caucasians who looked to be about 70 years old, waited in the corridor as well. One of them was a trim, tall man who stood with military stiffness. His fellow was short, soft, bald, and seated on a cabin trunk. The plump man leaned against the corridor wall—a mural of a prairie in late summer, with the milkweed pods beginning to open—with his right ankle crossed over his left knee.

  "Ah," said the tall passenger as he noticed Ran. "Lieutenant, I believe? Very good to see you. I'm Richard Wade, this is my friend Tom Belgeddes—"

  The shorter man grunted to his feet. "Charmed," he said in a friendly tone. He sounded rather as if he meant something more than conventional pleasantry.

  "—and there seems to be a bit of a problem with our cabin," Wade continued without having paused for his friend to speak.

  The cabin door was open. Another man popped his head out, then disappeared back inside.

  "You'll take it from here, sir?" a steward asked Ran.

  "Stick around," Ran replied. "There's going to be some luggage to move in a little bit."

  He stood in the doorway. Wade and Belgeddes closed in to either side, making it look as though the Third Officer was the shock troop for their point of view—which was the last thing the situation called for. Ran stepped into the cabin and switched the door down behind him, closing the passengers out in the, corridor.

  Luggage, much of it in the form of bales and packets instead of purpose-built cases, filled the center of the bed-sitting room. A family of six was positioned around the gear like the Huns at Chalons prepared to defend their leader on a pile of saddles.

  "I am Parvashtisinga Sadek," announced the man who'd looked into the corridor. "This is my cabin. See!"

  He offered Ran his ticket, a data crystal etched on the outside with the company's trident. The crystal was a wafer, 1-cm by 2. Its information could have been contained on a microscopic speck: the additional size was necessary for handling by life-forms rather than by computers.

  Ran put the ticket in the palm-sized reader on his belt and projected the data in the form of a hologram that hung forty centimeters in front of his eyes. It was an Earth to Tellichery ticket, via the Empress of Earth in Cabin 8241, with everything in order. Five-person occupancy, which might be arguable, but a babe in arms would normally travel free. Date of issue was the twelfth of last month, three weeks before. The only unusual circumstance was that the ticket had been cut on Am al-Mahdi rather than either of the terminus worlds.

  "Thank you, sir," Ran said as he returned the wafer. "I'll check the other gentlemen's tickets, now."

  "This is our room!" Sadek said in a shrill, forceful voice. "We will not move."

  He, his wife, and three of the children stared at Ran as if they expected the white-uniformed ship's officer to draw a long knife at any moment and begin to butcher them. The infant on the mother's breast looked up, hid his/her face with a happy gurgle, and peeked out again.

  Ran winked, drawing another gurgle.

  Ran left the door in the up, open, position as he stepped back into the corridor. "Mr. Wade, Mr. Belgeddes," he said, "might I—"

  He paused, because Wade was already extending his hand with the two ticket chips in it

  "Of course, of course, my boy," Wade said. "By the book, just as it should be. I've been an officer myself, you know—at least a dozen times, if you count all the penny-ante rebellions that somebody decided to make me a general."

  "That's right," said Belgeddes as Ran fed a ticket into the reader. "Dickie here, he never could keep out of trouble."

  The ticket was Belgeddes' own, and it was perfectly hi order: Cabin 8241, round-trip, Port Northern at both termini. Issued through Trident's home office in Halifax on the first of the previous month. Eleven days earlier than the Sadek family's ticket

  Befor
e he spoke, because it was a lot easier to check now than clean up the mess later, Ran switched Belgeddes' ticket for Wade's in the reader. The ticket data were identical save for the name and retinal print of the passenger.

  Pity. It'd have been a hair easier if the proper cabin-holders were the people holding the cabin at present . . . but if they were all easy, Trident Starlines wouldn't need people like Ran Colville to back up the Empress's stewards.

  Ran aimed his transceiver link toward the IR head above the doorjamb. The Sadek family stared at him: the husband stiff, as though he faced a firing squad; the wife fierce, the children obviously frightened . . . and the infant gurgled again.

  "Colville to Bridge," Ran said. "Project a First Class occupancy plan through my reader."

  "Do you remember on Matson's Home, how the government made me a colonel after the rebels ambushed the sight-seeing train and I potted a few of them just to keep us from being shot?" Wade said. "Heaven knows, I didn't care anything about their politics."

  The Empress's controlling artificial intelligence obediently shunted data through deck-conduction radio to Ran's hologram projector. The lens system couldn't handle a double spread, so it switched rapidly between the A and B levels.

  All the cabins in both arrays were coded red, occupied.

  "Oh, for pity's sake!" Ran snapped. "Bridge, give me a list of empty cabins. The whole ship isn't full."

  "Be fair, Dickie," Belgeddes was saying. The two men were clearly playing out a well-practiced skit. "The general was going to make you a captain until he threw his arms around you and you knocked him down because you weren't sure of just what he had in mind. Then he made you a colonel."

  "The whole ship is not full," the AI replied tartly. "All the First Class cabins are occupied, however—as the plan I projected at your request clearly shows."

  "Why on earth are—"Ran began; and stopped himself, because it was the wrong thing to worry about when he had a real problem to solve.

  The artificial intelligence answered the half-spoken question anyway. "A Szgranian noblewoman has taken a block of sixty-four cabins and the Wu-Ti Suite, for herself and her entourage," it said. A long row on A Deck, starboard outboard—the rank of cabins directly beneath 8241, in fact—glowed yellow, then returned to red highlighting.

  "All right," Ran said, "tell me what is open."

  Cabin Class was a ring of accommodations amidships. They were designed for multiple occupancy by strangers, with two pairs of bunk beds in each room and relatively spartan facilities otherwise. There were only 204 places in Cabin. The real purpose of the class was to provide a physical separation of First Class and the packed mass of Third Class passengers further aft. Some people who could afford First preferred Cabin, however, because the very small number of passengers traveling together fostered friendliness and camaraderie.

  There were about a dozen empty bunks, scattered throughout the Cabin Class area.

  "Right," Ran said. "Bridge, clear me compartments four-thirty-two and four-thirty-four. Assign them to the Sadek party, six persons, in place of the eight-two-four-one assignment made in error."

  "Passengers already assigned aren't going to like moving," one of the stewards said, ostensibly to his fellow.

  "Berths in Cabin Class are assigned in accordance with the company's pleasure," Ran responded sharply. "If you mean that some stewards have already pocketed bribes for arranging lower bunks for people who'll have to move to top ones—that sounds like a personal problem to me."

  "We will not move!" Mr. Sadek cried. "Our ticket is correct!"

  "Sir," Ran said, "you have a valid ticket, and responsibility for the error rests with Trident Starlines. But there was an error, and—"

  "You say our ticket is correct and you say that the fault is yours!" Sadek said. His eldest daughter edged closer to her mother, and the two-year-old boy began to cry. "Racism is the only reason that you move us and not them!"

  Ran looked at the smaller man, considered his next words and their possible side effects—and spoke the flat truth anyway. "No sir," he said. "I said your ticket is valid, but it's not correct."

  He took a deep breath. "And I said Trident is responsible for the error . . . but as for what actually happened, I'd guess you knew the Empress was fully booked, but you got a friend at Golconda Travel Agency—"the issuing agency on the Sadeks' ticket"—to cut you a ticket through their Ain al-Mahdi office where the data base hadn't been updated. If necessary, I'll see to it that the company reviews its arrangements with Golconda—"

  Mrs. Sadek gasped and tugged her husband's sleeve. It was long odds that Golconda Travel Agency would turn out to be a relative from her side of the family.

  "—but for the moment, what's important is that they were authorized to ticket for the Empress at the time they did so, even though the space had been assigned some weeks earlier. Therefore, on behalf of the company, I'm arranging a double cabin for you with a little more than twice the space—full First Class entertainment in both cabins—"

  The hologram feeds were run to all living spaces as part of the emergency information net. Entertainment programming required only a software change.

  "—and of course, use of all the First Class public spaces. What I can't offer you—" Ran smiled tightly to underline the irony "—are programmable murals. Yours will be one scene apiece."

  "Cabin four-three-two is a Kalahari display," Bridge volunteered. "Cabin four-three-four is a coral reef."

  "You'll have a desert and an underwater scene," Ran said. "Or you can turn them off."

  Mrs Sadek tugged her husband's attention again and whispered furiously into his ear while he continued to watch Ran. The cadence of her voice was audible, though her words were not.

  Sadek suddenly and unexpectedly smiled. "Twice as large?" he said. "And a separate room for the children?"

  "You bet," Ran said. "It'll take a moment to configure the beds the way you decide you want them, but it'll be more comfortable than this."

  8241 was set up with two twin beds. The Sadek's steward had brought a crib and an inflatable which now rested in the corridor on the opposite side of the door from the Wade/Belgeddes luggage.

  Mrs. Sadek whispered again.

  "And there will be no difficulty for my brother-in-law?"

  "Not on this one," Ran agreed. "But you might pass on the word that if I personally have a situation like this arise on a Golconda ticket again . . . then I personally will see to it that the next time's the last time."

  Sadek giggled. "Yes," he said, "yes, of course." He straightened. "Let us go, then!"

  Ran glanced at the stewards. "Your move, gentlemen. Four-three-two and four. Oh—and make sure full holo is enabled."

  He nodded to Wade and Belgeddes as he backed away from the cabin.

  Wade stepped close and murmured, "Fine job, my boy. Good to see that the sons of Earth haven't forgotten how to handle these fringe-worlders. Why, I remember when I was supervising a prospecting team on Hobilo before the Long Troubles—"

  "Thank you, sir," Ran said firmly. "I very much regret the delay, but I trust you'll enjoy your trip with us nonetheless."

  He strode off down the corridor, heading toward the bow to permit him to turn his back on Wade. He didn't like having Sadek call him a racist. He liked much less to have Wade approving of him as a racist.

  And while the Sadeks' home planet, Tellichery, had a highly developed industry and culture, Ran Colville's own Bifrost was a fringe world in every disparaging sense of the term.

  * * *

  "Whoopie ti-yi-yo," Mohacks sang in a low voice, "git along, little doggie. . . ."

  "Don't you let Commander Kneale hear you saying that sorta crap," Babanguida warned. "He'd have your guts for garters."

  "It's your misfortune and none of my own. . . ." Mohacks continued.

  Third Class loaded along a single meter-wide walkway instead of a broad ramp like that which accommodated First and Cabin Class. The passengers were segregated by sex rather
than family, with the only exceptions being children less than ten years old who were permitted to stay with their mothers upon request

  "Where's this lot going?" Mohacks asked.

  "Biscay, the most of them," said his partner. "A few of them's for Hobilo, for the mines."

  Ground personnel conducted the mass movement—Trident's Emigrant Staff here, officials from the labor contractor or other receiving agency on the destination world. All aspects of the Empress of Earth's loading were ultimately the responsibility of the ship's crew, however. Mohacks and Babanguida stood at the head of the gangway where they could see both the interior of the hold and the long column shuffling forward.

  The emigrants were nervous but hopeful. Each wore company-issue coveralls and carried the company-issued 20-liter pack which contained absolutely all the personal effects an emigrant was permitted to bring aboard. A few mothers staggered under two or three packs, their offspring's allotment as well as their own.

  "Poor stupid bastards," Mohacks said. "Don't they know what they're getting into—for the rest of their life?"

  "You don't know what they're leaving behind," Babanguida replied.

  "I don't need to," Mohacks said with a snort. "I've seen Biscay mebbe fifty times since I've been working this route. Each trip is one more time too many."

  The emigrants moved in units of forty-eight, each led by a member of the Emigrant Staff with a blazing red holographic arrow. Unoccupied segments of the Third Class section were open and lighted in bright pastel colors. The single bunks, laid with plaid or paisley bedding, were in four-high stacks.

  The guides took their groups left or right alternatively at the head of the walkway. Individual barracks areas were set out by lines glowing on the deck. Only when a group had been marshaled within the proper position did bulkheads drop smoothly from the ceiling.

  The guides remained inside the barracks rectangle until the emigrants' first trapped panic had subsided. This was where the Emigrant Staff earned its pay. The guides spoke calmly, either through the translators on their shoulders or directly if they knew the dialect of the emigrants. Only when a section was calm did a guide back out through the door keyed to staff ID chips.