“No. My father says this is no time for us to show off our wealth, and I’m not in the Royals anymore, so I don’t need that size allowance. I think he’s trying to get me to go do something with my life. You know?”
“I know.” Ronnie stared at the wall, took a deep breath, and intoned, “It’s time you made something of yourself young man, and when I was your age I had already—that speech.”
“He doesn’t say it like that, but he’s hinting. At least he’s not pushing me to take classes at the University.”
“Brun had fun on a mixed-cargo ship,” Ronnie said. “We should be able to survive.”
Survival won out over fun, when they discovered that there were no—absolute zero—eligible girls on the Sekkor Vil. No eligible anythings, in fact; the other passengers were bored middle-aged middle managers on business trips. Once they discovered that Ronnie and George were Chairholders’ sons, and not active in any corporation, they went back to their handcomps and ignored them. Ronnie spent hours with the Guernesi language tapes, because it was better than listening to George complain about the way the cards fell when they tried to play a hand.
Finally they arrived in the Guerni Republic and transferred to a local line for the run to Music. At last there were other passengers, not only Guernesi, and not all over forty. Ronnie had no trouble enacting the rich young man, and although he missed Raffa, he had to admit that evenings spent dancing in the passenger lounge were more restorative than those spent lying in the bunk wishing she were there.
On Music, they delivered their samples, and the datacubes, to the pharmaceutical industry’s combined quality control laboratory. “We’ll have the preliminary results in a day or so,” the director said. “But you’ll want more precise tests, if anything shows up. If these were not manufactured here, for instance, I presume you would like some idea where else they might have been made.”
“Well . . . yes.” Ronnie hadn’t known that was possible.
“You’re not a chemist or pharmacist,” the man said. It wasn’t a question at all.
“No,” he said. He hated to admit he was nothing but an ignorant errand boy, but that was the truth.
“I understood that you had the . . . er . . . confidence of your new prime minister or whatever you call him.” That with a doubtful look, as if he might have fabricated the whole thing.
“Yes . . . that is, he’s a good friend of our family.”
“Mmm. Well . . . we’ll be in touch. If you’ll just give me your local address.” Clearly a dismissal. Ronnie looked at George and shrugged. Whatever the man thought, they were the Familias in this matter, and when he viewed the cube he would probably feel differently about it. In the meantime, they had a world to explore.
Naturally, they spent that evening discovering the many ways in which young people of the city amused themselves.
“Let’s not stay too long anywhere,” George said, as he watched two stunning women stroll out of the bar they were just entering.
“Mmm. No.” Ronnie, with Raffa at the back of his mind, was more interested in music. He had chosen this bar not quite at random, from the music drifting out when the door opened. “Come on, George—we still haven’t eaten yet.”
“That’s not what I meant,” George said, but he settled at the table Ronnie chose, and punched up the table’s menu. “Ah—I’m hungry too, and they have an illustrated menu. Makes up for their incomprehensible language.” George, having declined to “waste any time” with the Guernesi language tapes, was finding it difficult without his usual audience for repartee. Ronnie, who had known he had no aptitude for language learning, now had a serviceable set of travelers’ phrases, although he suspected his accent was atrocious. Ronnie leaned back and looked at the musicians clumped on a tiny stage. He saw two instruments new to him, one with strings and one that he guessed was a woodwind. His gaze drifted toward the bar itself . . . and he grabbed George’s arm.
“George—look over there. Who’s that remind you of?”
“Who—good lord, it is. Gerel. But he’s dead—your aunt said he died on her yacht.”
“Well, that’s not dead. If it’s not Gerel, it must be a clone. Do you suppose the Guernesi did it?” Through Ronnie’s mind ran all the grisly possibilities he’d ever heard of, mostly from wild adventure yarns. Clones developed from the cells of dead men, raised to seek vengeance on murderers and the like.
“It hasn’t been that long—I thought they took years to grow.” George, clearly, was thinking of the same stories.
“We’d better find out,” said Ronnie. “Suppose Aunt Cecelia was wrong? Someone ought to know.” Memory tugged at him with that phrase. Who’d said that, with disastrous results? He watched the prince—or his clone—take a long swallow of something in a tankard. It had to be the prince. That way of holding his head, the way his shoulders moved when he drank—it couldn’t be anyone else.
“Wait for me,” he said. “I’ve got to check this out.” Without hearing whatever George tried to say, he moved closer, his awareness narrowing to the young man at the bar as if he were a hunter stalking prey. When he was close enough, he cleared his throat; the young man looked around, the very picture of slightly bored courtesy.
“Excuse me,” Ronnie said. “I believe we met—you’re Gerel—”
“You’re mistaken,” the young man said, interrupting. “My name is Gerald Andres Smith, but we’ve never met.” His eyes had betrayed him, with a moment of fear now shuttered in caution.
“Ah,” said Ronnie, who had no idea what to say next. This close, the young man looked exactly like the prince, but a prince not as stupefied as he had been in the last few years. Even the little scar on the temple, from the time he’d fallen against a goalpost playing soccer. “I’m . . . sorry to bother you,” Ronnie went on. “But you remind me very much of someone I grew up with. Extraordinary resemblance.”
“I’m sorry,” the young man said, with what appeared to be genuine sorrow. “But I think we need not continue this conversation. Under the circumstances.”
“But—” Ronnie felt a little nudge under his pocket and glanced down. Something glinted there, something his mind recognized, refused, and recognized again.
“I’m sorry,” the young man said again. “But I’m not going back.”
“But I didn’t mean—” Ronnie got that out as fast as he could. The young man’s eyes, Gerel’s eyes, met his.
“Whatever you meant, it’s trouble for me. I don’t want trouble. I want to live here, and be left alone. My treatments are almost finished.”
“Ronnie—what’s wrong?” That was George, finally aware that Ronnie was in trouble. But he was in danger too. Ronnie couldn’t think what to do or say. Then he glanced beyond George, and saw another prince—or clone—or whatever they were.
“We need to go outside,” said the one whose weapon nudged his ribs. “Don’t we?”
Anti-terrorism lectures had instructed Ronnie that going with an abductor made things worse—resist in place, he’d been told. But the lectures hadn’t told him about the sudden hollow feeling under his breastbone, or the way his knees would tremble, when he thought about the weapon pressed to his side. And he was sure this was Gerel, whom he’d known all his life. Gerel might want to have their postponed duel at last, but he was honorable . . . wasn’t he?
“Are you planning to kill us outside?” he asked, just to be sure.
“I very much hope not,” the young man said. “But it’s imperative that we talk without witnesses, and I don’t intend to argue with you.”
Much more decision than Gerel had shown in years, but Ronnie felt vaguely comforted. “All right,” he said. “Don’t hurt George. He went through enough last time.”