Gabriel thought about that. "Refund guarantee? If we go to these coordinates and don't find a planet—" Rather suddenly, Grawl loomed over him. "Thereis," she growled, "a planet."
"Grawl, I think he was making a joke," Enda said hurriedly. "It can be a strange thing, the human sense of humor. There is this story about a wire brush—"
"Contract becomes effective immediately on sale?" Gabriel said, refusing to move, no matter how Grawl tried to intimidate him.
Angela nodded. "The only thing that would affect the contract would be transmission time to a Concord Survey facility."
"Well," Gabriel said, "we're infotraders. We can carry the contract transfer ourselves, if you're comfortable with that."
"It's going encrypted, so it's fine with me," Angela said with a shrug. "A deal, then," Gabriel said. They struck hands on it.
The remainder of the deal took little time. Gabriel had to go back over toSunshine for his accounting chip. He brought it back aboardLalique, and they recorded the sale in both ship's computers at the same time, passing the software and other files intoSunshine's databanks. Gabriel took possession of the "hard" documentation and software copies on solids, and then looked around one last time.
"Well, a pleasure doing business with you," he said. "I hope all this works out well for you."
"So do I," Angela said, "because otherwise we're going to need a ride to Aegis."
"Well," Gabriel said, hoping this wouldn't happen, "let's see what happens first. We'll break the ships' connection and stand away the usual safe distance—"
"Right," Angela said. Suddenly she looked anxious to be gone, as well. "Come on, Grawl, let's get her hot."
At least she walked them down to the airlock first. "Listen, Gabriel, Enda," she said, "if this does work out all right, our comms info is in the solids and the contracts. Get in touch when you make Aegis. We can get together."
"Certainly," Enda said, They slipped into the tube again, and the door closed behind them.
When they were on their side again, Enda asked Gabriel, "Is that what humans call 'impulse buying'?"
"Probably," Gabriel said. He looked down at the solids in his hands. "It was kind of a hunch."
"I think it was stress," Enda said. "Having things burn holes in your pocket seems to make money do the same."
Gabriel smiled, though weakly, and they made their way back up to the pilot's cabin. Gabriel paused by the door and reached down to gingerly touch the stone. It was as cool as it had ever been. "Weird." "You do not seem terribly eager to put it in your pocket at the moment," Enda said as Gabriel stowed the manual and contract solids.
"No, and you won't see me acting eager until we're out of this system. Let it just sit there until I'm sure it wants to behave." Gabriel sat down in the right-hand chair and opened a comms channel. "Helm?"
"Hey, you're back. How bad was her drive busted?"
"Maybe not at all. We'll find out." He changed channels."Lalique?"
"Here," said Angela's voice. "We'll be ready to test in thirty seconds. Hey, Gabriel, I meant it about dinner."
"Uh, thanks," Gabriel said. "Half a moment while we move out of range."
He backedSunshine well away, then gave the system drive a two-second pulse, pushing them some kilometers away fromLalique. "Good luck," Gabriel said. "Thanks"
The seconds ticked by as they watched out the viewport. "Please," Gabriel muttered, "please let it work." Enda threw him an amused glance. "Here we go," said Angela. "Five, four, three—"
She broke off. Gabriel swallowed, hoping desperately that their drive had not failed again. Starfall light sheeted in brilliant gold all overLalique s shape, and she vanished. Gabriel breathed out.
From Longshot, Helm said, "Are they gone now? Can we talk?"
"There's plenty of time for that," Gabriel said. "A few days to recharge, then we'll get out of here. Come on over and we'll have dinner." "Bring the autolaser," Enda said.