“So what caused today’s big argument?” Solari wanted to know.

Blackstone returned just in time to field the question. “The boat,” he said, succinctly. “Four berths, one of which fell vacant when Delgado was killed. If anyone was its captain, he was, which means that no one knows how to decide whether the empty slot goes to Matthew here, or whether Tang should take it.”

“I should get it,” Matthew was quick to say. “I’m down here as Bernal’s replacement.”

“And Lynn will back you up. Ike Mohammed too. They think that’s a majority, since they were the other two-thirds of the original transfer team and still are two-thirds of the remnant of the boat’s intended crew. Tang isn’t happy with that way of deciding things. Maryanne’s on Tang’s side in everything now. Dulcie didn’t want to commit herself; God never does; I wanted to meet you before casting a vote, if I have one. Democracy in action!”

Matthew assumed that “God never does” was a criticism of Kriefmann’s indecisiveness rather than the Almighty’s.

“What about me?” Solari put in. “Do I have a voice?”

“Don’t tell me youwant to go too,” Blackstone said.

“That’s not what I meant,” Solari said. “I was asking whether I have any voice in who goes and who stays … and whenthe boat is cleared for departure.” He obviously felt that the answer ought to be yes in both cases—which would allow him to hold the expedition back until he’d completed his investigation, lest the murderer should slip away unapprehended.

“No, you don’t,” Blackstone told him, brusquely. “The boat trip’s scientific business—nothing to do with you. Long overdue. The moment we figured out that the aliens had to be downriver in the glass-roofed grass forest we should have set off to find them. I was ready to walk, but I got outvoted. I even got voted off the expedition in favor of Dulcie.”

“If it’s scientific business,” Solari pointed out, “it’s nothing to do with you, either.”

“Maybe it isn’t,” Blackstone came back at him, “but if they run into trouble down there, they might need a man who can shoot straight. That’s why I was sent here in the first place, when we thought they might still be skulking in the hills. If it were up to me, I’d be the one taking Bernal’s place.”

“It’s not up to you,” Matthew put in. “I’m Bernal’s replacement. The berth has to be mine, if I want it.”

“Do you?” Blackstone wanted to know.

“Yes.”

Blackstone opened his mouth to offer some further objection, but he was seized by a sudden doubt and hesitated. He deliberated, lowered his voice and said: “Look, I’m sorry about all this. We know we shouldn’t be in this mess. If we could get out of it with a few handshakes and a group hug we would. I wish I could say that your arrival will help, but it won’t. Some of us think the last thing we need is a cop asking questions, trying to make one of us into a murderer. Some others probably think the second last is someone who just came out of the freezer thinking he can solve all our other problems when people who’ve been here for years haven’t even scratched the surface. Sorry, but that’s the way it is.”

Matthew was too taken aback by the change of conversational pace to reply, but Vince Solari wasn’t. “I’m not trying to make one of you into a murderer,” he said, quietly. “Whoever killed Bernal Delgado did that.”

“It wasn’t one of us,” Blackstone said. Matthew had rarely heard a sentence uttered with less conviction. The Australian hesitated again, almost as if he’d resolved as a child always to count to ten before losing his temper. “Personally,” he said, eventually, “I don’t mind either of you being here, as long as you don’t start making waves before you understand what’s what. But even I have to admit that Mr. Solari is an extra complication in a situation that already has a few too many. Can I show you to your bunks now? I have to get back to the shuttle—it’s going to take at least three trips to get all the cargo back here.”

“Fine,” said Matthew, although he felt in his heart of hearts that it was anything but.

EIGHTEEN

Matthew slept far longer than he intended to, and far longer than was comfortable, considering the quality of his dreams. Although the images fled as soon as he was shaken awake he was left with a bitter taste in his dry mouth and a fugitive memory of having struggled in vain to move out of harm’s way, while various no-longer-specifiable dangers threatened to wreak havoc with his lumpen and overly massive body.

The first thing he did when he opened his eyes was check out the other bunk, but it was empty. Vince Solari had been very enthusiastic to get on with the job. The room wasn’t empty for long, though; almost as soon as he moved the privacy curtain slid into its daybed and a woman he recognized as Dulcie Gherardesca appeared in the gap. She had brought him a mug of tea and a bowl of what looked like fortified rice-manna.

“It’s the fresh air that knocked you out,” she said, as he stretched his muscles and rubbed his eyes. “The weight isn’t so bad, but even when it’s filtered the air is flavored and perfumed with all manner of subliminal sensations. It’s a real jolt to the system.”

“Thanks,” he said, as he drained the mug. “I needed that. You’re right about the jolt. I never anticipated the subtle differences. The big ones, yes, but not the ones that hover just out of reach of direct perception. Blackstone seems to be oblivious to them, though—to him, this seems to be the outback painted purple. Or maybe Botany Bay.”

“Rand believes in taking bulls by the horns,” the anthropologist said. “And it wasn’t entirely kindness that brought me here. Your friend Vincent didn’t waste any time at all. I was the one who found the body, so I was the one he came after first. I needed an excuse to make a graceful exit. I guess that’ll make him all the keener to make me a suspect.”

“Vince is a bull-by-the-horns kind of guy himself,” Matthew told her. “But he seems pretty levelheaded to me. He’ll do his best to sort this business out properly, and he isn’t the type to be led astray by preconceptions. You’ve nothing to fear from him—unless, of course, you did it. I’m assuming you didn’t.”

“Nobody here wants to think that any of their friends and colleagues could do such a thing,” she told him, quietly. “Not just because they’d have to worry about being next on the list, but because nobody wants to think anybody else capable of doing that to a man like Bernal.”

“Whereas if it had been a man like Blackstone …” Matthew said, jokingly. He saw immediately that the joke had been ill-advised. Dulcie Gherardesca had been living with the fact of the murder for some time. She had not the slightest wish to consider the question of how much difference it would have made to her feelings and fears if someone else had been the victim. “Sorry,” he said. To cover his embarrassment he thanked her again for bringing his breakfast. Then he took a mouthful of the manna porridge and almost withdrew his thanks.

“Sorry about that,” she said. “We’ve been cutting the manna shipped down from Hopewith the produce of our own converters. It’s certified edible, but edible and palatable aren’t quite the same thing. Base One has food-tech people working on the problem, but it’ll be a while before the delicacies are sorted out. As you say, it’s the subtle differences that make the most impact.”

“It’s not that bad,” he assured her, insincerely.

“I’m sure Lynn would have brought you breakfast if she’d been here,” Dulcie said, awkwardly. “She’s working on the boat with Ike while Maryanne and Tang help Blackstone with the last of the dropship’s cargo. She’s told us a good deal about you—more than Ike has, although I gathered that he knew you better.”