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Rafik reflected that if his uncle really intended to feed his new acquisition
upon marzipan and cream cakes, she might well be incapable of lifting a finger
in a few years. Even now, "gazelle" was hardly the word that came to mind when
describing her.
"Is she not voluptuously beautiful beyond your wildest dreams?" his uncle
sighed rapturously. "Even my Yasmin could hardly have compared with Karina."
Mention of Hafiz s first wife, the long-dead Yasmin, reminded Rafik that his
uncle had already shown a definite predilection for women whose most prominent
attributes lay somewhere south of their brains. Yasmin had been a dancer in a
zero-G topless bar when Hafiz abducted her.
"Karina, my little lily," Hafiz said to his new wife, "pray do not exhaust
yourself in using your powers to contact the Linyaari. They will awaken soon
enough of their own accord, and I would not see your lovely face lined -with
fatigue. Sit here and rest yourself, and I will see to it that some light
refreshment is brought to restore your psychic energies."
Karina smiled up into his face with a look of such radiant love and trust that
Rank's last objections to the marriage melted like snow on Laboue, and he was
devoutly thankful that the words "gold digger" had not passed his lips. No one
looking at the pair could doubt that they were truly infatuated with one
another. Still, when he remembered his uncle's cynical strictures on the
subject of women and marriage, he could not but be amused to see Hafiz, of all
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people, swept away on a tide of sugary-sweet romance.
"What are you laughing about?" Calum inquired out of the side of his mouth
after Rafik had greeted Karina with all the respect due to his uncle's wife
and retired to the farside of the Haven's main cabin to release his amusement.
"Hafiz," Rafik said. "To see him billing and cooing with that.. . I mean, with
my beloved aunt. . . and if you had ever heard the Old Earth poets he used to
quote on women and marriage! He used to compare marrying to buying a horse."
And he recited four lines of Hafiz's favorite poet's from memory:
If it be pleasant to look at,
young man try ltd temper anS pace ere he bay7 If She be pleasant to look on,
what ^oe^ the young man .say7 'Lol She if pleasant to look on. Give her to me
tooayl
"And if she produces a son to cut you out of your inheritance?" "Is it not
written in the Book of the Third Prophet, 'Count not the light from a distant
star among your assets, for that star may have been long dead by the time its
light reaches thine eyes'? I have not been such a fool as to count on stepping
into the shoes of a healthy man with many years to live, Calum. While trading
for Uncle Hafiz I have built up quite a respectable line of credit on my own
account. . . which, come to think of it, he may need to borrow against." Rafik
raised his voice. "Tell me. Uncle, how stands the credit of House Harakamian
after these disasters?"
Hafiz interrupted a low-voiced colloquy of his own with Admiral Ikwaskwan and
Johnny Greene. "What disasters, my beloved nephew?"
"Well . . . the interruption to your trade . . . and, ah, paying the . . ."
Rafik stammered. He had been so flabbergasted by the introduction of Karma as
his uncle's wife that he had not even noticed Admiral Ikwaskwan s arrival, and
now he had to hastily suppress the comments that had risen to his lips about
rapacious mercenaries.
Hafiz gave the broad, closed-lip smile that many competitors had learned to
dread. It usually meant he had just swallowed their pet canary.
"I confess there were some minor difficulties initially," he said pleasantly.
"In fact, Delszaki Li and I were forced to combine our businesses in order to
command enough liquid credits for the initial great expenses. But -with the
advantage of House Li's trading contacts and capital added to my own superior
communications system, I am happy to say that House HarakamianLi now commands
an even greater share of the galactic market than before . . . and from what
Mr. Greene here tells me of the technology to be discovered in the captured
Khieevi ships, we expect to recoup our initial losses quite quickly. There is
also," he said thoughtfully," the small matter of trade agreements with the
Linyaari. Now that Delszaki and I are no longer in competition, that should
also be resolved quite profitably."
"House Harakamian-Li?" Calum repeated, stunned.
"What's the matter -with that?" Gill demanded. "Sounds like a good idea to
me." Calum groaned. "Gill, you have no business sense whatever. With those
two . . . rapacious old pirates . . . working together . . . and about to reap
obscene profits off their contacts with the first two space-faring alien races
we've ever encountered ... well, let's just say they make the Khieevi look
like a minor threat to civilization!"
Admiral Ikwaskwan cleared his throat. "As to the matter of profits," he
reminded them, "a half share in the Khieevi captures belongs to the Red
Bracelets."
"One-third," Hafiz said quickly.
Ikwaskwan hooked his thumbs in his belt and rocked back and forth slightly on
the balls of his feet. "The agreement was that all parties to the contract
should share equally in the spoils of war. Since Harakamian and Li are now one
House, clearly they constitute only one contracting party and should share
half and half with the other party - me."
"One-third," Nadhari Kando said from behind Hafiz and Greene. "You were
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content with that originally. Play fair, Ikki!"
Ikwaskwan's bony face looked even sharper and more angular at sight of
Nadhari. "But..."
"E'kosi Tahka'yaw," Nadhari said, sounding relaxed, as if she were saying a
private mantra to the ceiling. "M'on Na'ntaw. And, of course, Skomitin. You
haven't forgotten Skomitin, have you, Ikki?"
"Skomitin's dead," Ikwaskwan said quickly.
Nadhari gave him a sweet smile. "But I'm not . . . am I, Ikki? " Her light
rocking movement mirrored Ikwaskwan's own, but she seemed considerably more
relaxed; one hand was on the back of her head, the other in a pocket of her
dark, close-fitting coveralls. Calum remembered that Nadhari was said to keep
poison darts in those tight black braids that coiled around her head.
Ikwaskwan moistened his lips. "You seem in the best of health ... as I am. I
trust we all expect to stay that way! Onethird, then," he said more loudly,
turning back to Hafiz, "as was agreed in the original contract. God forbid I
should seek to defraud my honored clients! The Red Bracelets' reputation for
probity and fair dealing is known throughout the galaxy. "He didn't say what
it was known as," Calum muttered in Rafik's ear.
"Can't use the appropriate language in front of the ladies," Rafik responded,
equally sotto voce.
What exactly constituted a fair one-third share of the captured ships required
quite a lot more haggling, as neither Ikwaskwan nor Hafiz wished to allow the
other party to conduct a detailed survey of exactly what had been captured
before the spoils were divided. By the time they had agreed on how to share
out the loot, another complication had arisen. Des Smirnoff and Ed Minkus,
rested and recovered from their ordeal on Rushima, put in their own claim for
credit to the salvaged pod known as the Jurden.
Ikwaskwan listened to their claim without speaking, while his dark eyes slowly
looked over the two very junior Red Bracelets from head to foot and back
again. "What recruiting officer took these in?" he demanded eventually. "If I
had known any of my officers thought us so desperate for warm bodies ..."
"Hey," Des interrupted, "you're looking at experienced men. Trained with
Kezdet Guardians of the Peace, y'know." He puffed his chest out and threw his
shoulders back, looking as tough and military as he could manage.
"Tchah! Howotiawak, thsi6w6tiya"the!" Ikwaskwan dismissed the claim with a [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]