But what was the big deal about that? Even though Foodlines had exclusive development rights for Solferino, surely other ships were free to orbit the planet.
“Three minutes.” Hag interrupted Josh’s thoughts. “She said, give her three minutes. Is it that long yet?”
“Must be.” Rick moved to the door and looked out, to check that no one would be watching when they ran for the fence. “Come on. Let’s go.”
No one seemed to be around, but they all felt edgy until they were at the gate and Josh could swing it closed behind them.
“How far?” Hag asked. “She didn’t say how far.”
“She said put it where nobody will find it,” Rick said. “Hey, I know. The unit would sink in water if it wasn’t in that bag. Let’s put it in the bodger pool.”
“Great.”
The twins glanced at Josh to see if he agreed.
He nodded. “Perfect place. Only trouble is, it’s way over on the other side of the compound.”
“Think we should go back through?” asked Hag.
“Are you crazy?” Rick started to walk, following the line of the fence as closely as he could. “Winnie didn’t say she could hold Brewster forever. We’ll go round.”
It sounded easier than it was. The umbrella trees, fighting for sunlight, pushed their stalks to within half a foot of the fence. Something in the soil, or a field projected by the fence itself, prevented them from growing closer. However, as Rick and Josh quickly proved, a human, even one without a trash bag full of equipment, could not squeeze between the fence and the rigid tree stems.
They had to move farther out into the forest and make a much bigger circuit around the compound. There was no chance of getting lost, because the fence was always visible on their right. There was also no danger that they would overshoot, since they must eventually reach the second gate. But Josh, struggling along in purple gloom through the wilderness of trees, realized that without the guiding fence it would be easy to become completely lost within fifty yards of the compound.
With that thought came another. Sig had suggested two alternatives: Either make another trip to the Barbican Hills, or find a smart rupert close to home.
The first idea seemed completely impossible. It meant stealing the aircar, flying it (which none of them knew how to do) back to the campsite, and locating a rupert in a forest where everyone except Dawn seemed to get lost in the first five minutes.
Now he realized that the second idea was just as bad. Not because there was no such thing as an intelligent rupert. He still believed the evidence of what Dawn had drawn, and he was more and more convinced that no matter what Brewster might tell them, humans didn’t know one thousandth of what there was to know about Solferino. This was a whole world, and humans had been here for only three years.
And not because there were no smart ruperts in this area. The odds were the other way round. If their party could plop itself down at a random place in the Barbican Hills and meet smart ruperts on their first outing in the forest, they must be in many places. They might be shy, and they might be nocturnal, so they had not been discovered in the planetary surveys. Maybe only a few of them were intelligent. But you had to find a rupert, before you could know any of that.
The difficulty was a practical one. In their spare time—and Brewster had made it clear how little of that there was going to be—they had to explore far from the compound without becoming lost; they had to discover a colony of smart ruperts; and they had to return with a specimen. It all must be done secretly, without Sol Brewster or Winnie Carlson having any idea what was going on.
Josh didn’t see how it could happen.
And then, suddenly, he did. But before anything could be done he would have to find Sapphire, and obtain her permission. And to get that—Josh was learning—he would first have to convince Sig Lasker. Saph trusted Sig’s judgment. Any way you looked at this, it wasn’t going to be easy.
Josh was blundering along, deep in his own thoughts, following Rick and Hag and relying on them to know where they were going. He stopped when they did—suddenly—and stared around him. “Is this the place?”
“You tell us.” Hag had dropped the sack. “We passed the gate all right, and it looks like the same cleared area down there, though the plants have started to grow back. But there’s no sign of the bodger.”
“It must have wandered away,” said Josh. “You didn’t leave it tied up.”
“I know. But where’s the lean-to?”
They walked together into the clearing. Josh found an upright tree stalk in the right place, with chafe marks from a rope around it; but the leaves and stems of the tent like lean-to had been scattered far and wide.
“Do you think animals did it?” asked Rick.
“Nah.” Hag was on hands and knees, inspecting the ground. “Not unless they could untie knots. The rope has gone, and it was artificial fiber—not the sort anything could chew through. Look at this, though.” He stood up holding a piece of rope about six inches long, frayed at one end but severed cleanly at the other. “Someone did that with a knife.”
“Brewster,” Rick said. “Has to be. But why would he come down here and take the place apart?”
“Looking for something?” Josh suggested. “I noticed that somebody had been rummaging through my stuff, back in the compound. I thought it might have been one of you.”
“Not guilty,” said Hag, and they went on down the slope to the stagnant purple pool. Hag hurled the broken data unit into the middle and they watched it sink out of sight.
“Nothing makes sense anymore,” Rick said morosely. “You know what I think? Winnie Carlson didn’t send us out here to get rid of that thing because she wanted to help us. She did it because she wanted us out of the way, so she could do something by herself in the computer center.”
“Like what? “asked Josh.
Rick shook his head and they headed back up the slope. “I have no idea. I’m just saying, I don’t trust her to do us favors, any more than I trust Sol Brewster.”
At the gate they paused.
“You worry too much,” Hag said to his brother. “So here’s one more thing for you to worry about. What do we tell Brewster we’ve been doing, if we go through—and he’s waiting for us on the other side?”
They opened the gate cautiously and slipped through. As soon as they were within the compound they found that they could not see Brewster—but they could hear him. He was angry, and he didn’t mind who knew it.
Rick was ready to head right back through the gate, but Josh grabbed his arm. “Not us,” he said. “Listen.”
“You incompetent, flat-faced halfwit.” The roar blew across the compound at gale force. “You present yourself as a qualified maintenance technician—something I never asked to be sent—and you ruin the first thing you put your fat soft hands on. If you don’t know what you’re doing, the least you can do is leave things alone.”
“He’s chewing out Winnie,” Josh said softly. “We’d better stay clear.”
But they found themselves edging toward the computer center anyway, as though an invisible string was quietly pulling them along. The other members of the training group were already there, listening in fascinated silence. Josh moved to stand next to Topaz.
“What did she do?” he whispered.
“Shhh.” She put a finger to her lips. “You’ll hear.”
“Sir, I was not the cause of the computer problems.” Winnie’s voice was polite and lifeless. All trace of personality seemed to vanish from her when she faced Sol Brewster. “Also, I cannot understand how such a situation could possibly have occurred.”
Rick and Hag stared at each other, but Josh shook his head. “We’re all right,” he said softly. “She’s not going to say anything about us.”