‘Now,’ she said, reaching up and pulling apart her toga to expose breasts just like those of the girl he had killed. Snow searched himself for an adverse reaction to that, and when he found there was none he stood up and unclipped his dust robes.
‘You’re white as paper,’ said Aleen in amazement as he peeled off his under suit, and then her eyes strayed to the covered stump terminating his left arm. She said nothing about that.
‘Yes,’ said Snow as he knelt between her legs and bowed down to run his tongue round her nipples. ‘A blank page,’ he went on as he worked his way down. She caught his head.
‘Not that,’ she said. ‘I want you inside me, now.’
Snow obliged her, but was puzzled at something he had heard in her voice. It had almost been as if that part of the act was the most important. Perhaps she wanted white-skinned children.
Hirald called out before approaching the fire. It had been her observation that the Andronache got rather twitchy if you walked into one of their camps unannounced. As she walked in she was surprised to see that these were not Andronache. There were two men and two women dressed in monofilament survival suits that looked to be of Mars manufacture. Hirald noted this but pretended not to notice the weapons laid out on a groundsheet that one of the men had hastily covered at her arrival. She walked to the fire and squatted down. One of the women tossed on another crab-bird carapace and watched her through the flames. The man who had covered the weapons, a tall Marsman with caste markings tattooed on his temples, was the first to speak.
‘You’ve come a long way?’ he asked.
‘Not so far as you,’ said Hirald. She looked from him to the woman across the flames, who also had caste marks on her face. The other couple: the man a Negro with incongruous blue eyes and the woman Hirald thought could have come from anywhere until she noted the caps over the neural plugs behind her ears. She was corporate then; from one of the families.
‘Yes, we have come a way,’ said the man, touching his caste mark.
‘We search,’ said the Negro intently. ‘Perhaps you can help us. We search for one who is called Snow. He is an albino.’
They all looked at Hirald then, avidly.
‘I have heard of him,’ said Hirald, ‘and I have heard that many people look for him. I do not know where he is though.’
The woman with the neural plugs looked suspicious. Hirald continued to forestall anything more she might say.
‘You are after the reward then?’
The four looked to each other, then the latter three looked to the Marsman. He smiled to himself and casually reached for the covered weapons next to him. Hirald glanced at the corporate woman, who was staring back at her.
‘Jharit, no.’
Jharit stopped with his hand by the covering.
‘What is it, Canard Meek?’
The woman, now identified as a member of the Jethro Manx Canard corporate family, slowly shook her head then looked to Hirald, who had not yet moved.
‘We have no dispute with you, but we would prefer it if you left our camp, please.’
‘But she knows. She might tell him,’ said Jharit.
Canard Meek looked to him and said, ‘She is product.’
Jharit snatched his hand from the weapons and suddenly looked very frightened. He flinched as Hirald rose to her feet. Hirald smiled.
‘I mean no harm, unless harm is meant.’
She strode out into the darkness without checking behind. No one moved. No one reached for the weapons.
Snow removed the pistol from its holster in his dust robes and checked the charge reading. As was usual it was nearly at full charge. The bright sunlight of Vatch acting on the photovoltaic material of his robes kept the weapon constantly charged through the socket in the holster. The weapon was a matt black L, five millimetres thick with only a slight depression where a trigger would normally have been. It was keyed to Snow. No one else could fire it. The beam it fired was of antiphotons; a misnomer really, as what it consisted of was protons field-accelerated to the point where they became photonic matter. Misnomer or not, this beam could burn large holes in anyone Snow cared to point it at.
David Songrel was a family man. Snow had observed him lifting a child high in the air while a woman looked on from the background, just before the door to his apartments closed.
Snow wondered why Aleen wanted him dead. As the owner of the water station she had much power here, but little over the proctors who enforced planetary law, not her law. Perhaps she had been involved in illegalities of which Songrel had become aware. No matter, for the present. He rapped on the door and when Songrel opened it he stuck the pistol in his face and walked him back into the apartment, closing the door behind him with his stump.
‘Daddy!’ the little girl yelled, but the mother caught hold of her before she rushed forward. Songrel had his hands in the air, his eyes not leaving the pistol. Shock there, knowledge.
‘Why,’ said Snow, ‘does the Androche want you dead?’
‘You’re. . the albino.’
‘Answer the question please.’
Songrel glanced at his wife and daughter before he replied, ‘She is a collector of antiquities.’
‘Why the necessity for your death?’
‘She has killed to get what she wants. I have evidence. We intend to arrest her soon.’
Snow nodded then holstered his pistol.
‘I thought it would be something like that. She had two proctors come for me you know.’
Songrel lowered his hands, but kept them well away from the stun-gun hooked on his belt.
‘As Androche she does have the right to some use of the proctors. It is our duty to guard her and her property. She does not have freedom to commit crime. Why didn’t you kill me? They say you have killed many.’
Snow looked to Songrel’s wife and child.
‘My reputation precedes me,’ he said, and stepped past Songrel to drop onto a comfortable-looking sofa. ‘But the stories are in error. I have killed no one who has not first tried to kill me. . well, mostly.’
Songrel looked to his wife.
‘It’s Tamtha’s bedtime.’
His wife nodded and took the child from the room. Snow noted the little girl’s fascinated stare. He was quite used to such. Songrel sat himself in an armchair opposite Snow.
‘A nice family you have.’
‘Yes. . will you testify against the Androche?’
‘You can have my testimony recorded under seal, but I cannot stay for a trial. If I was to stay this place would be crawling with Andronache killers in no time. I might not survive that.’
Songrel nodded.
‘Why did you come here if it was not your intention to kill me?’ he asked, a trifle anxiously.
‘I want you to play dead while I go back and see the Androche.’
Songrel’s expression hardened.
‘You want to collect your reward.’
‘Yes, but my reward is not money, it is information. The Androche knows why the Merchant Baris has a reward out for my death. It is a subject I am understandably curious about.’