“Gramps Tassiday’s estate,” she said. Her mother looked guilty, which confirmed it. “He was after my money?”
“I don’t know that for a fact,” her mother said quickly. She had never allowed herself an expression of bitterness; she had never allowed Peka to express anger or resentment of her absent father. Consider all sides, she had said. Everyone has reasons, she had said. “But it did seem odd that he hadn’t wanted you until after my father died, and the will became available to the public.”
Peka could think of nothing more to say. Her mother went on with her meal; Peka tried to do the same but the food stuck in her throat. She glanced around the restaurant. The couple they’d startled had left; she could imagine the story they’d tell. As her gaze shifted past the entrance again, she saw Einos coming in. She ducked her head, hoping he wouldn’t see her.
“Peka!” Too late. She had to look up, had to see the alert interest on her mother’s face, had to greet him—but he was rushing on, not giving her time. “Peka, there’s a problem with the second collar installation—I hate to interrupt, but—”
She could feel her face going hot; bad enough to have lost her poise with her mother, but to have her mother aware that her work had failed… she managed to smile at her mother. “Excuse me—”
“Of course,” her mother said. “I hope I’ll get to talk to you some more—perhaps if this doesn’t take too long…?”
“Have to see,” Peka said, struggling with a napkin that seemed determined to stick to her lap. She felt like a preschooler again, clumsy and incapable. Einos wasn’t watching her; he was giving her mother the wide-eyed look of admiration he usually gave Peka.
“I’m sorry to interrupt your dinner, ma’am, but I’m glad to have the chance to meet you.” He reached out a hand, which her mother took. “I’m Einos Skirados, in traffic control—we’re really fortunate to have you on the station—your daughter’s been a great help, but there’s this problem—”
Rage flooded Peka as she peeled the napkin off and threw it on the table. The scum-sucking rat was going to ask her mother to solve the problem because he thought she had messed up! And her mother would step in, all cool competence, and show everyone why she was famous, and why Peka would always be Alo Attenvi’s daughter, not someone with a name and career of her own.
Her mother’s voice, ice-edged, stopped her. “Excuse me,” she said to Einos. “Are you offering me a contract?”
Einos turned red himself. “Well—not me—I mean, ma’am, I don’t have the authority myself, but—but I just thought since you were here, and it was your daughter, you could sort of help her out.”
Peka had not seen her mother really angry for years; even now, she was glad when she realized the famous temper was turned on someone else. “Young man, let me make this quite clear. In the first place, I do not take on consulting jobs without a contract. In the second place, I doubt you can afford me—since, as you say, you don’t have authorization from your employer. In the third place, you have a perfectly competent engineer—not only one in whose training I have complete confidence, but a member of my family. Even if you were offering me a contract, I wouldn’t take it—you have insulted my daughter. If she had asked me first, I might advise her—but in the present circumstances, I think the only advice she needs is to have nothing whatever to do with you.”
“But I—” Einos began. Peka’s mother ignored him, and looked at Peka.
“I do hope we’ll have time to chat after you deal with your problem,” her mother said. “You have my number—”
Peka found her voice and her intent at the same moment. “Why don’t you come along to my office—perhaps this will only take a few minutes.”
“Thank you,” her mother said. “Just let me take care of dinner—”
On the way to Peka’s office, her mother said nothing. Peka walked along feeling the edges of what had happened like someone exploring the hole where a tooth had fallen out… something had changed, something important, but she wasn’t sure yet what it meant. Was it just a hole, or would something grow out of it?
In the office, Peka called up the design stats on one screen, and then called Hal. He looked a little surprised, and not much concerned.
“I thought Einos said you were having dinner with your mother… I told him not to bother you.”
“He said it was urgent—some problem with the second collar installation.”
“Yeah, but it could’ve waited an hour or so. But since you’re here—” Hal plunged into a description. As often happened during construction, the electrical and other connections in the area had been installed a little differently than the specifications ordered. “It wasn’t a bad idea, really, because someone moved the whole thing five or six meters to allow for the bulk cargo handler’s turn radius, after they decided to make this the bulk cargo shuttle dock, instead of the one they’d first planned. It makes sense, because this one’s in a direct line to service the FTL traffic when we get it. But you weren’t here when they rerouted the plumbing, and they didn’t document it in the main specs, so you didn’t know. Here’s the modification—” Hal fed in the local scanner’s analysis, and it came up on Peka’s screen.
She glanced at her mother, who was studiously ignoring the screen and looking at the framed diplomas on the wall. She could read nothing of her mother’s expression. She looked back at the screen.
“What I’d like to do,” Hal went on, “is run the connections like so—” New lines, highlighted in the standard red, green, blue, yellow, orange of the necessary components, overlaid the black and white of the original. “My question is whether there’s any reason to worry about the interaction of the control power supply with the main lines here—” An arrow showed, along with the measured clearance.
“Let me check,” Peka said. She wasn’t going to answer off the top of her head, with her mother standing there behind her. She didn’t work that way anyway. On another screen, she called up the relevant references, and considered the influence of incoming shuttle avionics as well. Close, but reasonable—but was there a better solution? She peered at the displays, thinking. Something tickled the side of her head that she thought of as the seat of new ideas. “That’s reasonably safe,” she said to Hal, “but I’d like to come take a look. There’s still a possibility, especially if someone’s onboard systems were running hot for some reason…”
“That’s why I asked,” Hal said cheerfully. “Coming down now?”
“I suppose so. Yes.” She turned to her mother. “I have to go out to the docking bay—you could wait here, or come along—”
“If you don’t mind, I’d love to come,” her mother said.
Did she mind? She wasn’t sure which she would mind more, leaving her mother here to rummage in her office, or taking her along. Five hours before, either would have been intolerable, but now…. “Come on,” she said. “We’ll have to get p-suits somewhere. It’s aired up, but—” Then she remembered whom she was talking to, and shut up. One chapter in her mother’s textbook dealt with safety procedures necessary in chambers at different pressures.
Hal greeted her mother courteously but with none of the covetous glee Einos had expressed. He turned at once to Peka. “Here’s the challenge,” he said, and then stood quietly to let her get a good look at it. She saw at once that Hal’s solution had the virtues of simplicity and directness, which made it hard to put his solution out of her mind to think of her own. She walked back around to the cargo lock side of the docking bay. The bulk handler took up most of the space… it would turn like so… it would have to have service access here and here. She squinted, her mind tickling persistently. Then she saw it.