Debts of My Fathers (Father Chessman Saga Book 2) Page 18

  I hear tales of increasing pirate attacks near the border, and to come in and steal a prize like Sophia … makes me feel a bit like one of them. And not in the sexy rogue kind of way. More of the deceitful scumbag way.

  Honest, I really was trying to do the right thing.

  Chapter 16

  “There are easily a dozen ways people can lie to you: little white lies, lies of omission, misleading statistics, half-truths, and so on. But at the core, it’s all the same deceit. I have no stomach for it.” – Peter Schneider

  CELESTE DAVIES CLOSED the cabin door behind her. Elsa paused in the tying of her boots to look up at her. “You must want more than just a word, Miss Davies.”

  She hesitated. “Are you packed, ma’am?”

  “No. Should I be?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Why? I’m only going on station for a few hours.”

  “Because you might not be let back on board.”

  She stopped mid-knot and looked up at the first officer. “Is that your captain’s order?”

  Davies shrugged. “He did not phrase it as an explicit order, but he made his meaning clear.”

  “And he sent you to do his dirty work?”

  She shook her head. “As I said, ma’am, he did not phrase it as an explicit order.”

  Elsa chuckled. “Insubordination is a fine line to walk.”

  Davies grinned. “If you’ve read my file, you should know that I’ve walked it before. Besides, right now I’d rather think of it as loyalty to the larger organization.”

  Elsa stared at her for a moment. “And if I don’t feel like going onto Ballison station after all? Will he give you an explicit order to kick me off?”

  “Probably.”

  “And what then?”

  “I suppose I would be duty bound to execute that order—assuming, of course, that I had not been given a conflicting order by someone else with authority on this ship.”

  Elsa smiled at the young officer. “And if you had such a conflicting order, say, backed with the authority of Father Chessman?”

  She shrugged. “That would put the matter outside the realm of such a lowly mortal as the first officer, so I suppose I would refer the matter back to Captain Gallows.”

  Elsa nodded. “I see you’ve learned some lessons since your court martial in the Union.”

  “Technically that was for slugging my superior officer, so yes, I’ve learned other ways to fight since then.”

  “Tell me, does Captain Gallows enjoy a good fight?”

  She shook her head. “I believe ambush is his preferred tactic.”

  “Mine as well,” Elsa replied and began to unlace her boot. “I believe I will stay aboard the Grizzly, Miss Davies. As long as I’m on it, this ship is under the authority granted me by Father Chessman’s orders, and I intend to stay on board. You are hereby ordered to facilitate my stay.”

  She gave a satisfied nod. “Aye, ma’am.”

  “Now, if you would be so kind as to tell my associate Mr. Perry to come see me. It seems my team will be going on station without me.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “And Davies, I appreciate the warning. I won’t forget this.”

  “A pleasure, my Lady.”

  Michael paged idly through Malcolm’s files. Tonight, he was looking through his old war records from the Hammerhead. In particular, there were thirty-eight battle reports, written up for the navy’s privateer oversight board. The destruction of the Kaiser’s Folly was there, of course. He did not particularly want to peruse those records. Seeing his parents’ deaths again was not something he wanted to do anytime soon.

  Even then, he shook his head at it. When he had finally seen those records and discovered Malcolm’s failed rescue of the Kaiser’s Folly, he had mostly thought about it as his mother’s death. He had seen her face and heard her voice. That alone had brought so much back that the experience was too much to face again. But after reading Peter’s journals, he realized that he was now thinking of the destruction of the Kaiser as not merely Sophia’s death but Peter’s as well. That was even more reason not to read it tonight.

  He flipped through several more until a name caught his eye: the Magellan Aurora. The Hammerhead had come across a passenger liner being harassed by a Caspian privateer, the Cold Zephyr. There was very little cargo to be had from the Aurora, but according to Malcolm’s notes, there was an ambassadorial delegation aboard from the Solarian Union. That delegation was on its way to negotiate with the Confederacy over the Union’s stance in the Caspian Rebellion.

  Xavier Foshey had been on board that ship, Michael remembered. He wondered if he had perhaps been part of that delegation, so he dug deeper into the file, hoping to find more information on the delegation or at least a passenger manifest. The only thing about the delegation was a brief note of thanks from an Ambassador Ellison, but there was a larger thank-you card from the Aurora’s captain. Malcolm had kept a high-resolution scan of it, but it looked to be the kind of thing that had must have been half a meter across, filled with handwritten notes and signatures. The bold letters at the top read “Our most heartfelt thanks to Captain Malcolm Fletcher and the crew of the Hammerhead, from the Magellan Aurora’s passengers and crew. Ours is a debt we can never repay.”

  He panned over it for few minutes, looking at all the names. There must have been over a hundred, possibly two hundred. Eventually, his eyes began to tire, so he opened up a command window in the image processor. “Find signature for Xavier Foshey.”

  “Xavier Foshey not found,” was the reply.

  “Find signature for phonetic and spelling variations of Xavier Foshey.”

  “Xavier Foshey and variations not found. Closest match is Pavel Furst.”

  This was odd. Had he simply not signed the card? “Scan all names and alphabetize into two lists, by first name and by last name.”

  Two lists appeared on the screen and he scrolled down through each of them. Two hundred twelve names appeared in each list. They were all individual signatures, nothing like “the Weldon family” or similar groupings. One of the signatures was the kind of misshapen scrawl that he remembered from his own youth, drawing on the corridor walls of the Hammerhead.

  So, a toddler had signed it but Xavier Foshey had not?

  He backed out from the card and pulled up the information on the Aurora. There he found his explanation. Passenger capacity was rated at 420, and it listed a crew of seventy-two. In that context, 212 signatures no longer seemed like such a vast number. It was probably not quite half of those who had been on board. In all the rush, Michael could understand not signing such a public display of thanks. He was not sure he would have, come to think of it.

  Perhaps that was why Mr. Foshey had been so eager to help. Maybe after all those years, it bothered him that he had not made that simple gesture.

  “What do you mean she’s still here?” It was not quite a roar, but for Captain Gallows, it was close.

  Davies stood still, holding at parade rest. “She has not left the ship, sir. Was I unclear?”

  “Maybe not with me, but you must have been unclear with her. I want her off my ship.”

  “I believe I made that clear to her.”

  “No, Miss Davies, I don’t believe you did. If you had made it clear, she would no longer be on board. Usually this kind of message is delivered with a boot.”

  “As you say, sir.”

  He glared at her from behind his desk. “And what is that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing, sir.”

  “Then get back down there and deliver the message properly.”

  “Are you ordering me to forcibly remove her from the Grizzly, sir?”

  “I shouldn’t have to,” he said.

  She did not reply, letting the silence stretch out.

  Finally he sighed with a bit of a grumble. “All right, I am ordering you to forcibly remove her from the ship, Miss Davies. Take Watkins and Burton, and throw that bitch out onto the station deck
. That is an order.”

  “I regret to inform you, sir, that the Lady has already countermanded your order.”

  “What?” This time it truly was a roar.

  “She stated that she intends to remain aboard the Grizzly and exercise the authority that was granted to her by Father Chessman. She then ordered me to facilitate her stay.”

  “By God, you can bloody well facilitate her ass out through the hatch. I’ve given you an order.”

  “Yes, sir, but she claims a superseding authority, so until you sort it out with her, my understanding of Yoshido protocols requires that I refer it back to you.”

  He sat in silence for a moment, taking deep breaths. “Tell me, Miss Davies, is this the kind of shit that got you kicked out of the Union Navy?”

  Behind her back, her right hand formed a fist. “No, sir, it is not.”

  He drummed his fingers on the desk for a moment, and then sat up. “Very well, Miss Davies. I yield to her authority on this point. I will be going on station later today, but if you even think of obeying any orders to deny me back on board, you can believe me that I’ll be back on board with an armed party, and your head will join hers in the sludge tank. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Dismissed.”

  She walked out. If it would not compromise the Lady’s mission, Davies would not mind pushing back against her captain again. She had thoroughly enjoyed it.

  Commander Collins crowded around the terminal in the security offices of Cenita station. The local naval liaison officer stood nearby chatting with the civilian shift commander. The technician ran the search on the integrated system for him. He could have done it himself, but part of having the full support of the local law enforcement meant having them actually do the work for you. He knew he should not be impatient. He had been on station only two hours, and he was already closer to tracking Bishop down than he had been after two weeks on Tsaigo.

  “Is this your guy?” the technician asked.

  Collins leaned in to examine the image on the screen. The identification read Victor Trent, but Collins recognized Robert Bishop. “Yes, that is indeed my guy. Can you tell me where he went?” Five navy couriers were in system at the moment, and he could be on his way to any of their destinations within three hours.

  “He’s still here, Commander.”

  Collins could not help but grin. “You’re sure?”

  The technician pulled up a financial query. “Yeah. He’s been staying at the Cabellos Casa for the last twenty days.”

  “You’re sure it’s not just an empty room?”

  “Well, I can’t say for sure, but he’s been out and about.” He typed another query. “Restaurants, shopping, even a number of visits to Warrick’s.”

  “Warrick’s?” he asked.

  “Well, it’s a, um …”

  The shift commander stepped over. “It’s a marrow club, down on ring four. It’s not as wild as the ones dirtside, but it’s legitimate.”

  Collins nodded. He remembered a few drunken shore leaves that ended up in such places. “Where is he now?”

  “It’s hard to say. He bought a meal on ring three a couple of hours ago, his second for the day.”

  “Do you want us to flag him?” the shift commander asked.

  “Can you do it without tipping him off?”

  “Absolutely,” the technician replied. “He’ll never know, but we’ll get the alert as soon as he uses his ID or banking accounts anywhere on station. If we get a warrant, we can even watch for his room key at the hotel.”

  “Do that,” Collins urged. “But I urge caution. This one is a mean and slippery bastard.” He shuddered, thinking of the various hidden compartments under Bishop’s charge back on the Blue Jaguar. “It’s not going to be enough to send a pair of officers after him. You need to cordon him off and hit him hard.”

  “We know how to do our job, Commander Collins,” the shift commander assured him. “Believe me, we’ll have your man within the day.”

  Elsa sat in her cabin, working on the navigation at her console. Once Stefan Carrillo had control of the Sophie, she wanted him to divert away from the Arvin trajectory and head for the Sanhurst transfer station. It had been abandoned thirty years ago and then set adrift during the war. Located in the outer reaches of a barren system, it was one of Yoshido’s most useful meeting spots in the sector.

  The only question was when Carrillo would reach it. If he could take control within the first day, he might actually arrive before the Grizzly could, even on a direct course. Precise information on the Sophie was scarce, but her best estimate still marked her as perhaps 50 percent faster than the Grizzly. On the other hand, if he had trouble taking the ship, it might be better to try to shadow them, but again it came down to the problem of speed. With that much of an advantage, the Sophie’s tachyon wake would become so dispersed, they would not be able to detect it past the first eight or nine hours.

  Much of the plan would depend on how easily Stefan was able to take the ship. His early report had been optimistic, but it was also very short on detail. She really wanted a sit-down meeting with him and the rest of the team, but now she was hesitant to leave the ship at all. Yes, the dear Captain Gallows had left the ship, but if she were in his shoes, she would be waiting for her errant passenger’s exit to make a quick end to liberty and pull out. She did not intend to give him that opportunity. Not that it mattered now. The Sophie’s Grace had still not made port and was not expected until at least the next day.

  A chime alerted to a call. “Incoming secure message, ma’am.” It was Miss Davies, her surprising ally.

  “Forward it to me here.”

  It arrived in her queue with only a number to identify the sender. In years past, this would have seemed suspicious to her, but now she merely assumed that it was a missive from the secretive Father Chessman. She entered her decryption key, and the system churned through it. When it opened up at last, the sender was confirmed as Chessman.

  My Winged Lady,

  I do hope that your current project is on schedule, because I just received some troubling news from a most reliable source. Your young target was recently seen on Cenita, not merely alive and well, but boasting of his intent to find you and hand you over to his friends at Naval Intelligence. Not only that, but he was under the misguided notion that he was going to put me in the same cell with you.

  Beyond mere annoyance, though, there may be real danger because your fears of his father’s years of gathered intelligence are apparently well founded. The boy has full access to them and intends to share the bounty with Naval Intelligence at Arvin. If they do not already have that information, it would be quite a boon in their efforts to track us down and could be more disastrous than your recent debacle at Arvin.

  So let me be clear. Under no circumstances are you to let that ship reach Arvin. Capture it or destroy it. I simply don’t care. If you fail at this, I will have to escalate it out of your hands, and I will be most unhappy with you and those who failed me.

  -Father Chessman

  Chapter 17

  “Meeting old friends in port is one of life’s best gifts. Meeting old enemies, not so much.” – Malcolm Fletcher

  THE TUGS TOOK OVER at ninety kilometers, and Michael stood up from the pilot seat. It was late afternoon by ship’s clock, and Ballison station was only three hours behind them. Richard had gotten up early to man the communications during their approach. “Looks like we’ll be on ring four,” he said.

  Michael stepped over to look at the display. “Any familiar neighbors?”

  “Nothing from the last three ports if that’s what you mean, but I recognize a couple.” Richard pointed to the display. “Take a look for yourself.”

  He scanned over the list and two names jumped out at him. The first was the Lucky Ludwig, registered to Schneider & Williams. It was more or less the same design as the Heavy Heinrich but three years older. The Ludwig and the Great Gunter were paired sisters, just as t
he Heinrich had been with the Windy Wilhelm. He did not think he would know anyone aboard the Ludwig, but his brief experience meeting the crew of the Wilhelm led him to believe they would be friendly enough.

  The second name that caught his eye was the Hamilton James. She was a remnant from the war, an aging privateer like Malcolm’s old Hammerhead, and her captain had known him reasonably well in those days. The Hamilton also had a young woman that Michael was eager to see again if she was still aboard.

  “I know that look, sir,” Richard said beside him. “Friends of yours?”

  “A few.”

  “My offer is still good, sir. I can do the legwork this time and then hand it up for your approval. Give you a bit more liberty.”

  Michael considered it. “And in exchange?”

  Richard grinned. “If we ever run across the Light Mariner, you might not see me until you’re about to close the hatch.”

  Michael found himself nodding before he knew he had agreed. “Yeah, you have a go at it, and I’ll keep my link handy. Just be sure to get us settled enough for the crew to join me at the Guild Hall.”

  “When?”

  “Say nineteen hundred, station time. That should give you five hours.”

  “No problem,” Richard replied. “I’ll have them out of here in three.”

  “Then I shall leave it to you to declare liberty and arrange the watch schedule. I’m going to go change.” He nodded to Carlos who had clearly been eavesdropping. Carlos replied with a thumbs-up and a conspiratorial wink.

  Docking went smoothly, and he made his way out onto the dock in his dress uniform. An agent from the stationmaster was there, but Michael waved him aside. “My first officer is handling the unload.” The agent nodded and let him pass without a challenge.

  Michael headed counterclockwise along the ring. He was not sure which of the two ships was more important to him, but the Hamilton James was closer, a mere two-thirds of the way around this ring. He got there and found an older woman sitting at the small kiosk at the bottom of the ramp. The Hamilton had a crew of twenty, so unlike the Sophie, she could afford to put watch standers both inside and outside the ship.