She was a survey ship rather than a warship, was Seeker. The Survey Service, in its first beginnings, had been just that—a survey service. But aliens being what they are—and humans being what they are—police work, on large and small scales, had tended to become more important than mere exploration and charting. The Survey Service, however, had not quite forgotten its original function. It maintained a few ships designed for peaceful rather than warlike pursuits, and Seeker was a member of this small squadron. Nonetheless, even she packed quite a wallop.
Lieutenant Commander John Grimes was her captain. His last assignment, during which he had stumbled upon a most peculiar Lost Colony, had been census taking. Now he had been actually sent out to find a Lost Colony. He suspected that anything might happen, and probably would. It wasn't that he was accident prone. He was just a catalyst.
Nothing had happened yet; after all, it was early in the voyage. He had lifted from Lindisfarne exactly on time, driving through the atmosphere smoothly and easily, maintaining his departure trajectory until he was clear of the Base Planet's Van Allens. Then, with the inertial drive shut down, the ship had been turned about her short axis until she was lined up, with due allowance for drift, on the target star. The Mannschenn Drive had been started, the inertial drive restarted—and passage was commenced.
Satisfied, he had filled and lit his pipe, and when it was going well had ordered, "Deep space routine, Mr. Saul." He had made his way to his quarters below and abaft the control room and then, ensconced in his easy chair, had opened the envelope containing his orders.
The first sheet of the bundle of papers had contained nothing startling. You will proceed to the vicinity of the star Gamma Argo and conduct a preliminary survey of the planets in orbit about same, devoting especial attention to any of such bodies capable of supporting human life. "Mphm . . . "he grunted. The rest of the page consisted of what he referred to as "the usual guff."
At the head of the next page was the sentence that brought an expression of interest to his face.
We have reason to believe that there is a humanoid—or possibly human—settlement on the fourth planet of this system. Should this settlement exist it is probable that it is a hitherto undiscovered Lost Colony. You are reminded that your duties are merely to conduct an investigation, and that you are not, repeat not, to interfere in the internal affairs of the colony.
"Mphm," grunted Grimes again. Noninterference was all very well, but at times it was hard to maintain one's status as a mildly interested spectator.
Appended hereto are reports from our agents at Port Llangowan, on Siluria, at Port Brrooun, on Drroomoorr, at Port Mackay, on Rob Roy, at Port Forinbras, on Elsinore, at . . .
"Mphm." The Intelligence Branch seemed to be earning its keep, for a change. Grimes turned to the first report and read:
From Agent X1783 (Commander, I.B.,F.S.S.)
Dated at Port Llangowan, May 5, Year 171 Silurian (17113157 TS)
To O.I.C. Intelligence, Federation's Survey Service, Port Woomera, Centralia, Earth.
Sir,
POSSIBLE LOST COLONY IN ARGO SECTOR
I have to report the possibility that there is a hitherto undiscovered Lost Colony in the Argo Sector, apparently on a planet in orbit about Gamma Argo.
It is my custom, whilst stationed on this world, to spend my evenings in the Red Dragon tavern, a hostelry that seems to be the favorite drinking place of whatever merchant spacemen are in port.
On the evening of May 3 several officers from the Dog Star Line's Pomeranian were lined up at the bar, and were joined there by officers of the same company's Corgi, newly berthed. As was to be expected, the personnel of the two vessels were old friends or acquaintances.
The table at which I was seated was too far from the bar for me to overhear the conversation, but I was able to make use of my Mark XVII recorder, playing the recording back later that night in the privacy of my lodgings. The spool has been sent to you under separate cover, but herewith is a suitably edited transcript of what was said, with everything of no importance—e .g. the usual friendly blasphemies, obscenities and petty company gossip—deleted.
First Mate of Pomeranian: And where the hell have you been hiding yourselves? You should have been in before us. I suppose that you got lost.
Second Mate of Corgi: I never get lost.
First Mate of Pomeranian: Like hell you don't. I remember when you got your sums wrong when we were together in the old Dalmatian, and we finished up off Hamlet instead of Macbeth . . . But what's twenty light-years between friends?
Second Mate of Corgi: I told you all that the computer was on the blink, but nobody would listen to me. As for this trip, we had to deviate.
First Mate of Corgi: Watch it, Peter!
Second Mate of Corgi: Why?
First Mate of Corgi: You know what the old man told us.
Second Mate of Corgi: Too bloody right I do. He's making his own report to the general manager, with copies every which way. Top Secret. For your eyes only. Destroy by fire before reading. He's wasted in the Dog Star Line. He should have been in the so-called Intelligence Branch of the clottish Survey Service.
First Mate of Pomeranian: What did happen?
First Mate of Corgi: Nothing much. Mannschenn Drive slightly on the blink, so we had to find a suitable planet on which to park our arse while we recalibrated.
Second Mate of Corgi: And what a planet! You know how I like sleek women . . . .
First Mate of Corgi: Watch it, you stupid bastard!
Second Mate of Corgi: Who're you calling a bastard? You can sling your rank around aboard the bloody ship, but not here. If I'd had any sense I'd'a skinned out before the bitch lifted off. Morrowvia'll do me when I retire from the Dog Star Line! Or resign . . .
First Mate of Corgi: Or get fired—as you will be, unless you pipe down!
Second Mate of Corgi: You can't tell me . . .
First Mate of Corgi: I can, and I bloody well am telling you! Come on, finish your drink, and then back to the ship!
At this juncture there are sounds of a scuffle as Corgi's chief officer, a very big man, hustles his junior out of the Red Dragon.
Third Mate of Pomeranian: What the hell was all that about?
First Mate of Pomeranian: Search me.
The rest of the recorded conversation consists of idle and futile speculation by Pomeranian's officers as to the identity of the world landed upon by Corgi.
To date I have been unable to identify this planet myself. There is no Morrowvia listed in the catalogue, even when due allowance is made for variations in spelling. Also I have checked the Navy List, and found that the master of Corgi is not, and never has been, an officer in the FSS Reserve. None of his officers hold a Reserve commission. It may be assumed, therefore, that the master's report on the discovery of what appears to be a Lost Colony will be made only to his owners. Corgi, when she deviated, was bound from Darnstadt to Siluria. Her normal trajectory would have taken her within three light-years of Gamma Argo. The planetary system of Gamma Argo was surveyed in the early days of the Second Expansion, and no indigenous intelligent life was found on any of its worlds . . . .
"Mphm . . . " Grimes refilled and relit his pipe. This was interesting reading.
He turned to the report from the agent at Port Brrooun. He, the shipping advisor to the Terran Consul, had been spending most of his free evenings in an establishment called the Beer Hive. Brrooun had been Corgi's next port of call after Llangowan. Her second officer had confined his troubles to a sympathetic Shaara drone. At Port Mackay, on Rob Roy, he had gotten fighting drunk on the local whiskey and had beaten up the chief officer and publicly abused the master. Normally such conduct would have led to his instant dismissal—but Captain Danzellan, Corgi, had been most reluctant to leave the objectionable young man behind, in the hands of the civil authorities. The Intelligence Officer at Port Mackay, although knowing nothing of the Lost Colony, had been intrigued by the failure of the master to rid himself of an obvious malcontent and had wondered what was behind it. His own theories, for what they were worth, included a Hanoverian plot against the Jacobean royal house of Waverley . . . . It was from Port Fortinbras, on Elsinore, that the next really interesting report came. The agent there was a woman, and worked as a waitress in the Poor Yorick, a tavern famous for its funereal decor. The agent, too, was famous insofar as the Intelligence Branch of the Survey Service was concerned, being known as the Bug Queen. Her specialty was recorders printed into the labels on bottles.
Transcript of conversation between Harold Larsen, owner-manager of Larsen's Repair Yard, and Peter Dalquist, owner of Dalquist's Ship Chandlery:
Dalquist: An' how are things at the yard, Harald?
Larsen: Can't complain, Pete, can't complain. Southerly Buster's havin' a face lift.
Dalquist: Drongo Kane . . .
Larsen: You can say what you like about Drongo—but he always pays his bills . . .
Dalquist: Yeah. But he drives a hard bar gain first.
Larsen: You can say that again.
Dalquist: An' what is it this time? General maintenance? Survey?
Larsen: Modifications. He's havin' his cargo spaces converted into passenger accommodation—of a sort. An' you remember those two quick-firin' cannon I got off that derelict Waldegren gunboat? Drongo's havin 'em mounted on the Buster.
Dalquist: But it ain't legal. Southerly Buster's a merchant ship.
Larsen: Drongo says that it is legal, an' that he's entitled to carry defensive armament . . . . Some o' the places he gets to, he needs it! But I checked up with me own legal eagles just to make sure that me own jets are clear. They assured me that Drongo's within his rights.
Dalquist: But quick-firin' cannon, when every man-o'-war is armed to the teeth with laser, misguided missiles an' only the Odd Gods of the Galaxy know what else! Doesn't make sense.
Larsen: Maybe it doesn't—but Drongo's got too much sense to take on a warship.
Dalquist: What if a warship takes on him?
Larsen: That's his worry.
Dalquist: But he must be thinkin' of fightin' somebody . . . . Any idea who it might be?
Larsen: I haven't a clue. All that I know is that his last port, before he came here, was Brrooun, on one o' the Shaara worlds. He told me—he'd had rather too much to drink himself—that he'd fed a couple of bottles of Scotch to a talkative drone. He said that he'll buy drinks for anybody—or anything—as long as he gets information in return. Anyhow, this drone told Drongo what he'd been told by the drunken second mate of a Dog Star tramp. .
Dalquist: Which was?
Larsen: Drongo certainly wasn't telling me, even though he'd had a skinful. He did mutter something about Lost Colonies, an' finders bein' keepers, an' about the Dog Star Line havin' to be manned by greyhounds if they wanted to get their dirty paws into this manger . . .
Dalquist: An' was that all?
Larsen: You said it. He clammed up.
Unfortunately Captain Kane and his officers, unlike the majority of spacemen visiting Port Fortin-bras, do not frequent the Poor Yorick, preferring the King Claudius. On the several occasions that I have been there as a customer, at the same times as Southerly Buster's personnel, I have been unable to learn anything of importance. Attempts made by myself to strike up an acquaintance with Captain Kane, his mates and his engineers have failed.
Grimes chuckled. He wondered what the Bug Queen looked like. It seemed obvious that she owed her success as an agent to her skill with electronic gadgetry rather than to her glamour. But Kane? Where did he come into the picture? The man was notorious—but, to date, had always managed to stay on the right side of the law.
But it was time that he, Grimes, put his senior officers into the picture.