"That's a lot of money," Chandris commented, stirring the coins around with her finger. Most of them were normal Empyreal currency, but there were a few that she didn't recognize. "You get her address?"

"Oh, sure—real fancy neighborhood in Magasca." He jerked a thumb at the scorer. "The problem is that he doesn't want to go there."

"Me, in a fancy neighborhood?" the scorer chimed in, looking plaintively at Chandris. "Come on. I wouldn't fit in there. Someone'd call the police before I even got to the door."

"And I told you that no one would accuse you of stealing them," the targ said, starting to sound a little annoyed. "She told me herself she lost them."

"All I want is for him to take them there," the scorer said, still to Chandris. "He'd be okay up there, now, wouldn't he?" He looked at the targ, almost sadly. "Fit right in with the rich people."

"But it's your money," the targ insisted. "Five hundred ruya. I can't take that."

"So just give me part of it," the scorer said. "I'll sell 'em to you right now." Again, he pushed his hand toward the targ. "I'll take whatever you want to give me."

The targ looked helplessly at Chandris, back at the scorer. "But I don't have that kind of money with me."

"I'll take whatever you can give me," the scorer said again, more plaintively this time.

"But—"

"May I see them?" Chandris put in. Before the scorer could react, she plucked the coins out of his hand, sorting the unfamiliar ones out for a close look. It was a variant on the old antique ring score she'd pulled a number of times: the scorer would get whatever he could, leaving the targ with a phony address and a fist full of worthless coins.

Which he obviously thought were worth a five-hundred-ruya reward. If she went ahead and confirmed their value, she would have her contact with the scorer clinched. Her contact, and the doorway she needed to get out of here.

"Okay, look," the targ said suddenly, reaching for his wallet. "I've got—I don't know; maybe sixty ruya on me. If that's really all you want I'll go ahead and take them. But I'd be glad—really—to just go out to Magasca with you so that you can get the whole thing." He reached into his wallet and began counting through the bills.

Maybe it was the offer to escort the scorer to Magasca to claim his reward that did it. Or maybe it was the earnest expression on his face as he pulled out the money, an expression that somehow reminded her of Ornina hunched over a circuit board.

But whatever it was, something deep inside Chandris suddenly snapped.

"I'd save my money, if I were you," she spoke up, dumping the coins into the hand that had been outstretched to take the targ's money. "These things aren't worth anything."

The targ blinked. "What?"

"I said they aren't worth anything," she repeated, watching the scorer out of the corner of her eye. At the moment he looked as if he'd been hit in the face with a brick, but the shock wouldn't last long.

And with his cord popped he might decide to flip this over into a straight robbery. "I know what I'm talking about," she added. "My father used to collect coins."

"But the woman said she'd pay five hundred ruya to get them back," the targ protested, still not ready to believe it. "She said she'd put an ad on the nets to get them back."

"Ads with her phone number on them?"

The targ looked at the scorer, back at Chandris. "I suppose so," he said. "She didn't say."

"Probably someone's idea of a stupid joke," Chandris shrugged. "They read the ad, got a half-ruya's worth of coins together, and dropped it with her number on the envelope." She let her gaze sweep the area. "In fact, he might be watching right now to see what happens."

"Lousy thing to do," the targ growled, looking around as he stuffed his money back into his wallet.

"Getting that woman's hopes up for nothing. I suppose I ought to call her back and explain."

Except that the hook would be long gone from whatever phone she'd been using. And if the targ tumbled now, the scorer would be in for it. "I wouldn't bother," Chandris said off-handedly as the targ put his wallet away and reached for his phone. "It'll teach her not to put phone numbers on the net instead of a netsign where she'd know who was at the other end."

"But—"

"And anyway," the scorer chimed in, "you call back now and tell her they're not worth nothing and she might think you're just trying to steal them."

The targ grimaced. "You may be right," he said at last, reluctantly. "Probably are." With a sigh, he dropped his hand empty to his side. "So much for that."

"They're probably still worth a couple of ruya at a coin shop," Chandris told the scorer helpfully. "Or else you could just keep them as a souvenir."

"Thanks," the other murmured, lip twitching in a wry smile. A smile solely for the targ's benefit.

"Thanks for your help. A lot."

"You're welcome," she said. For a long moment she held his gaze, warning him with her eyes. Then, turning her back, she continued on her way.

Heading nowhere.

She knew it right away, down deep. But she walked another block before finally admitting it to herself. She'd had the chance to lock in with the Seraph underground, or at least one small corner of it. Had had the chance to get off this nurking planet, to be rid of the Daviees and their nurking huntership and their nurking middle-class naivete.

And she'd blown it. She'd deliberately blown it.

And the most frightening part was that she didn't know why.

The only alcohol she could find on the Gazelle was four small bottles of cooking sherry stuck way back in one of the galley bins. It tasted terrible, especially chased by peppermint tea. But she managed.

She had finished three of the bottles and was working on the fourth when the Daviees finally returned.

"Well—home at last," she growled when they poked their heads in the galley door. "Have a good little shopping trip?"

"We got what we needed, yes," Ornina said cautiously, her eyes taking in the empty bottles. "I see you've been having a little party. Any particular occasion?"

"I'm drinking to stupidity," Chandris told her. "Yours."

Their reactions were a great disappointment. She'd been hoping for anger or hurt, or at least surprise.

But all she got was that maddening patience of theirs.

And, of course, jokes. "A wide ranging subject, that," Hanan said, clumping into the room to sit down across the table from her. "Our stupidity has been toasted from here to the south edge of Magasca. Toasted by experts, too, I might add. You're not going to set any records with four bottles of cooking sherry."

"Is that your answer to everything?" Chandris snapped. "Jokes?"

Hanan shrugged, his eyes hardening just a little. "What's your answer? Getting drunk?"

Chandris glared at him, trying hard to hate the man. But up his shirt sleeves she could see the glint of his exobraces...

She looked at Ornina. Maybe she'd be able to hate her. "You want to know why you're stupid? Do you? Well, I'll tell you why. You left me here alone. Here. With your ship. Alone."

"We trust you," Ornina said quietly.

"Well, you shouldn't," Chandris flared. "What kind of fools are you, anyway? You know what I am—I'm a thief, damn it." Abruptly, she ducked down to haul the angel holding box up off the floor.

"You see this?" she demanded, banging it down on the table. "You see it? It's your stupid nurking angel, that's what it is."

"I see it," Ornina said. "I also see that it's still here."

"No thanks to you," Chandris bit out. "You leave the damn thing just sitting there, the first damn place a thief would look. You don't have any alarms or trippers or—nurk it all, I had it out of the ship and halfway to the damn Gabriel office."

Ornina nodded. "And then you brought it back."