“So, the Drake’s Lake Mining and Refinery is in business?”
Everyone laughed and, when he raised his glass in a toast, no one refuted the title.
“And I’ve news for you,” he said after he drank. “We’re all to go back to Landing three days from now.”
His announcement was met with great consternation. Grinning with anticipated pleasure, Drake raised his free hand for silence. “For a Thanksgiving.”
“For this? How’d they know?” Valli asked.
“That should be in the fall, after harvest,” Sallah said.
“Why?” was Tarvi’s simple response.
“For this auspicious start to our new life. The last load from the starships has reached Landing. We are officially landed.”
“Why make a fuss over that?” Sallah asked.
“Not everyone is a workaholic like you, my lovely Sallah,” Drake said, pinching her chin affectionately. Seeing that he meant to kiss her, Sallah ducked away, grinning to take away the sting of her rejection. He pouted. “Our gracious leaders have so decided, and it is to be the occasion of many marvelous announcements. All the exploratory teams are being called back, and a grand time will be had by all.”
Sallah was almost resentful. “We only got here last week!”
As an escape from several unpalatable but unprovable conclusions, she had taken on the assignment of flying the geologists and miners to the immense inland lake where the EEC survey had reported ore concentrations. She had hoped that distance might provide some objective answers to the events she had witnessed.
A week before, returning one evening to the Mariposa to look for a tape she had left on board during one of her early stints as Admiral Benden’s pilot, she had seen Kenjo emerging from the small rear service hatch, a brace of sacks in each hand. Curious, she had followed him as he hurried off into the shadows. Then he had seemed to disappear. She hid behind a bush and waited until he had reemerged empty-handed. Then she retraced his steps, and tried to find out where he had put his burden.
After some scrambling about, a couple of bruised shins, and a scraped hand, she had stumbled into a cave—and she was appalled to see the amount of fuel he had purloined. Tons of it, she judged, checking a tag for the quantity, all stashed in easily handled plasacks. The rock fissure was well hidden at the extreme end of the landing grid behind a clump of the tough thorny bushes that the farmers were clearing from the arable acres.
Two nights later, she had overheard a disturbing conversation between Avril and Stev Kimmer, the mining engineer whom Sallah had seen her with the day the landing site had been announced.
“Look, this island is stuffed with gemstones,” Avril was saying, and Sallah, dropping into the shadow of the delta wing of the shuttle, could hear the sound of plasfilm being unrolled. “Here’s the copy of the original survey report, and I don’t need to be a mining specialist to figure out what these cryptic symbols mean.” The plasfilm rippled as Avril jabbed her finger at various points. “A fortune for the taking!” There was a ring of triumph in her wheedling voice. “And I intend to take it.”
“Well, I grant you that copper, gold, and platinum are useful on any civilized world,” Stev began.
“I’m not talking industrial, Kimmer,” Avril said sharply. “And I don’t mean little stones. That ruby was a small sample. Here, read Shavva’s notes.”
Kimmer snorted in dismissal. “Exaggerations to improve her bonus!”
“Well, I have forty-five carats of exaggeration, man, and you saw it. If you’re not in this with me, I’ll find someone who can take a challenge.”
Avril certainly knew how to play her hook, Sallah thought grimly.
“That island’s not on the schedule for years,” Stev pointed out.
Avril gave a low laugh. “I can navigate more than spaceships, Stev. I’m checked out on a sled and I’m as free as everyone else on this mudball to look for the measly amount of stake acres I’m entitled to as a contractor. But you’re charter, and if we pool our allotments, we could own the entire island.”
Sallah heard Kimmer’s intake of breath. “I thought the fishers wanted the island for that harbor.”
“They only want a harbor, not an island. They’re fishermen, dolphineers. The land’s no use to them.”
He muttered, shifting his feet uneasily.
“Who’d know anyhow?” Avril demanded silkily. “We could go in, on the weekends, begin on the most accessible stuff, stash it in a cave. There’re so many that you could search for years and never find the right one. And we wouldn’t have to draw attention to our activities by staking it officially, unless we’re forced to.”
“But you said there was stuff in the Great Western Range.”
“And so there is,” Avril agreed with a little chuckle. “I also know where. A short hop from the island.”
“You’ve got it all worked out, haven’t you?” Kimmer’s voice had an edge of sarcasm.
“Of course,” Avril agreed easily. “I’m not going to live out the rest of my life in this backwater, not when I’ve discovered the means to live the style of life I very much prefer.” Again there was that rippling laugh and then a long silence, broken by the sound of moist lips parting. “But while I’m here, and you’re here, Kimmer, let’s make the most of it. Here and now, under the stars.”
Sallah had slipped away, both embarrassed and disgusted by Avril’s blatant sexuality. Small wonder Paul Benden had not kept the woman in his bed. He was a sensual man, Sallah thought, but unlikely to appreciate Avril’s crude abandon for long. Ju Adjai, elegant and serene, was far more suitable, even if neither appeared to be rushing a noticeable alliance.
But Avril’s voice had dripped with an insatiable greed. Had Stev Kimmer heard what Sallah had? Or had her enticement clouded his thinking? Sallah had always been aware of Pern’s gemstone wealth. The Shavva Ruby had been as much part of the legend of Pern as the Liu Nugget. Pern’s distance from the Federated Sentient Planets outweighed any major temptation its gem deposits might have held for the greedy. But if a person did manage to return to Earth with a shipload of gems, he or she would undoubtedly be able to retire to a sybaritic lifestyle.
Avril’s plot would hardly deplete Pern’s resources. What worried Sallah was how Avril would contrive the fuel for such a journey. Sallah knew that there was fuel left in the Admiral’s gig, the Mariposa. That was not common knowledge, but as a pilot, Avril would have access to that information. Judging by the computations Avril had made during her time on the Yokohama, Sallah knew that the woman could actually make it to an uninhabited system. But then what?
Sallah had liked surveying with Ozzie, Cobber, and the others, and she had been kept too tired to think of her dilemma. But with return to Landing imminent, her questions came flooding back. While she had no compunction about reporting Avril, she realized that she would also have to mention Kenjo’s activities. She wished she knew why Kenjo had held back fuel. Did he have some crazy notion about exploring the two moons? Or the wayward planet which was expected to cross Pern’s orbit in roughly eight years?
It was impossible to imagine Kenjo being involved with someone like Avril Bitra. Sallah was certain that the obvious animosity between the two was not feigned. She suspected that to Kenjo flying was both a religion and an incurable disease. But he did have all of Pern to fly over, and the packs that powered the colony’s air sleds would, if used circumspectly, allow for several decades of such flight.