Fleet of the Damned (8 page)

He turned to the cargo compartment of his gravsled. Instantly weapons came up. The salesman just pulled several small bottles out of a carton. He held one out for the farmer, his face total innocence.

"My calling card," he said.

Cautiously, the Tahn farmer reached over the fence and took one of the bottles. He looked at the printing on the side. The salesman figured that the time was ripe for introductions.

"Ian. Mahoney," he said. "Fine cider and fertilizer… Go ahead. Try it. Whipped that batch up myself. A little raw, but it'll do the job."

The farmer opened the bottle and sniffed. The sweet smell of apples drifted out. And underlying it, there was the sharp odor of alcohol.

"It's nothing serious," Mahoney said. "Maybe seventy-five proof or so. Take a shot."

The farmer sipped, then sucked in his breath. It was good stuff all right. Without hesitation, he chugged down the rest of the bottle.

"That's damn fine cider," he said.

Mahoney snorted. "You oughta see my fertilizer. Nothing clotting organic in it. All pure, sweet-smelling chemicals. Great for the plants, and you don't have to worry about the kids getting ringworm—long as you keep 'em away from your cattle."

The farmer laughed. Mahoney noted the weapons being lowered. Then, with some relief, he saw the Tahn wave his hulking children over to him in a friendly gesture.

"Say, mister," the farmer said. "You got any more of that cider?"

"Sure thing."

And with a honk of his nose, a grin, and a scratch of his behind, Major General Ian Mahoney, commander of the Imperial First Guards Division, reached into the back of his gravcar to buy the boys a drink.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

I
t was a country inn—large, gleaming white, with exposed stained beams of expensive wood. The gravcars lined up outside were all reasonably new and worth many, many credits. For kilometers around, the farmland was sleek and water-proud. The name of the place was the Imperial Arms Inn.

Bloody figures, Mahoney thought as he reached for the door.

He heard voices shouting from within in heated debate.

"Clottin' low-life Tahn. Up to me, police'd clear out every one of them."

"Clot the police. We gotta take care of our own business. A being oughta kill his own snakes. I say we all get together one night and—"

Mahoney was spotted instantly as he walked inside. A church-hall hush fell over the room. Mahoney automatically honked into his handkerchief—cursing mentally to himself that he had ever dreamed up that touch—and strolled over to the bar.

He eased his bulk into a stool. "Shot and a beer, friend," he told the bartender.

All around him, every person was listening intently to each word he said. The bartender filled up a mug and placed it before him. A second later, a shot glass chinked beside it.

"Traveling through?" the bartender asked, sounding way too casual.

"Sure am," Mahoney said. "But real slowly, today. Hell of a hangover."

He took a sip of his beer and chased it with the full shot. The bartender refilled it.

"Party too hard, huh?"

Mahoney groaned. "You don't know the half of it," he said. "I happened by the McGregor place, yesterday. You know the spread—maybe thirty klicks out?"

The bartender nodded, as did the rest of the room. Everyone knew the McGregors.

"They just married off their last kid," Mahoney said. That was far from news to the crowd in the inn. "I showed up just at reception time. Hit it right off with those nice people. They made me stay and filled me right up with all I could eat and drink." He snorted through his increasingly reddening nose. " 'Course, they didn't have to twist my arm much."

Mahoney felt the room relax. A moment later it was all a-babble again. The bartender even bought him the next shot. Mahoney sipped at it and peered about the bar, just one friendly face looking for another.

A well-dressed, overstuffed man strolled over to him, carrying his drink. He sat down beside Mahoney.

"You look like you might be in sales," the man said.

Mahoney laughed. "Hell, does it change a fellow that quick? Farmed two-thirds of my life. Now I'm into sales. Sorta."

"What do you mean by sorta?"

Mahoney instantly warmed to the man. He began dragging out circulars and brochures.

"Fertilizer plants is my game," he said. "Look at these boys. Small, cheap, and you get an output for anything from a kitchen garden to a big sucker of a farm."

The man seemed genuinely interested. "Say, maybe we could use something like that."

Mahoney peered at him through his old man's bushy eyebrows. "No offense, but you don't seem the farmin' type."

"No offense taken," the man said. "I'm into hardware. Got thirty-two stores and growing."

"Say, you
are
a find. Let me tell you about these little guys." And Mahoney went into what he called his dancing-bear act. It took many drinks and the good part of an hour. Other men joined the conversation. And soon Mahoney was handing out bottles of his "calling card."

By now his mission had taken him to eleven or more Fringe World planets in nearly that many systems. He had his cover story fine-tuned. Now he was winding up on the Empire's capital world for the Fringe System: Cavite.

Mahoney was passing himself off as an elderly farmer who had spent most of his life tending a large, rich spread on one of the key Imperial agricultural systems. He was also a habitual tinkerer, constantly inventing little devices to solve problems that irritated him.

Fertilizer was one of his big bugaboos. Mahoney could go on for hours about the rotten quality and expense of the average fertilizer—and he frequently did, to the dismay of casual dinner guests. Anyway, Mahoney the farmer had invented the dandy little fertilizer plant, then put his own money up to found a small company.

Presently, he was acting as his own advance man, touring agricultural areas to brag about his wares. The fact that he wasn't asking for any money out front but was merely asking people if one of his salesmen could visit in a month or so eased the suspicions of even the overly hostile settlers of the Fringe Worlds.

Mahoney also thought his homemade cider was a nice touch, as was his old man's chatter, with his knowledge of farming trivia and the ability to bore just about anyone. His only regret was the snort he had adopted to go with the act. Now he couldn't stop, and he was wondering if he would ever be able to cure himself of the self-made habit. He was also bemoaning the fact that his constant snorting was turning his nose bright red.

"Sounds great to me," the hardware man said. "Government give you any trouble in the licensing?"

Mahoney snorted a particularly snotty blast. "Licenses? Government? What kind of fool you think I am? Clot, dealt with the damned government all my life. Do everything they can to wreck a farm, if you let them."

There were angry mutters of agreement from the gathered farmers.

"Besides, I only got maybe thirty years or more in me. Time I got through those licensing butt bungs, I'd be long dead."

The logic was ancient and irrefutable.

"What about shipping? They givin' you any trouble about that?"

"Well, I ain't shippin' just yet. Right now, I'm gettin' to know people, show off my plants. Why? You think I'll have any trouble in these parts?"

The hardware man exploded. "Clottin' right! I got orders stacked all over the place. Cash orders. And with all this business of the Tahn going on, I'm about ready to go broke."

He went into a long litany of complaints, which were added to and spiced up by comments from a slowly growing crowd with Mahoney at its center.

They told him about the sneaky, lazy Tahn, about the attacks on their property and their counterattacks. They told him about an economy that was almost paralyzed, and about incompetent cops and worse than incompetent Imperial garrison troops.

They went on about their suspicions: mysterious lights over Tahn enclaves, probable stockpiling of weapons, and professional Tahn troops slipping in to reinforce their filthy brethren.

The Imperial settlers, of course, were blameless. They had tried so hard to bear up under the burden. Everyone in the bar had made a personal sacrifice, hadn't he? Why, they had even dipped deep into their bank accounts to buy weapons to protect their farms and Imperial property.

Through it all, Mahoney allowed his face to become grimmer and grimmer in agreement. He rarely interrupted, except to snort or to buy another round of drinks.

By the time the night was over, he could have filled an entire fiche with his report.

He was also beginning to realize that the situation with the Mercury Corps was even worse than he had told the Emperor. The intelligence he was getting was at complete odds with what the Emperor had been hearing. In the Fringe Worlds, the corps had been pierced, corrupted, and broken.

It was enough to swear a good Irishman off drink.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

"…
so then we told this Imperial piece of drakh to put his back taxes where the star don't shine and get the clot out of our county."

The big Tahn woman howled with laughter at Mahoney's story and pounded him on the back.

"Only way to deal with them," she said. She gave a huge beery belch and peered out into the night. "Turn here."

Mahoney did as directed, and soon he was topping a rise. Just before them was the glow of the Tahn communal farm that his companion was headwoman of. Mahoney had met her at a local watering hole. Frehda was a big middle-aged woman who had spent most of her years managing the fortunes of a large Tahn enclave. Over vast quantities of beer, chased by a dozen bottles of his cider, they had become fast friends.

Mahoney had readily accepted her invitation to spend a few days at her enclave "to see how we do things in these parts." She assured him it would be an education. Mahoney had other reasons to believe her; little prickles of rumor and bar talk had led him in this direction.

Even at night the enclave was impressive. As they approached, Mahoney could see many large steel barracks surrounded by what seemed to be a fairly sophisticated security system and nasty razor-wire fencing. As he approached the gated main entrance, the figures of two heavily armed Tahn farmers loomed out.

Frehda shouted a few friendly obscenities at them by way of greeting.

"Who's the fella, boss?" one of them wanted to know.

"Salesman pal," Frehda said. "Good man. Drink anybody 'cept maybe me under the table."

There were chuckles at this. Mahoney gathered that alcohol consumption was just one of many things Frehda was noted for. He had secretly used up nearly half of his ready supply of sobriety pills during the evening to keep even vaguely straight.

"I'll put him up at my place," Frehda went on. "Maybe one of you can give him a look-see around in the ayem."

"Anything in particular you wanna see, mister?" one of the Tahn asked. Mahoney caught an undertone of suspicion. Frehda might be the boss lady, but she was way too drunk for someone to take her at her word on a stranger.

"Got any pigs?" he asked.

" 'Course we got pigs. What do you think we are, sharecroppers?"

Mahoney snorted. "No," he said. "Just that I got a soft spot for pigs. Been studying all my life. I could write volumes on pigs."

"He can talk them, too," Frehda said. "Just about wore my ear out till I got him drunk enough to go on to somethin' else."

The two Tahn guards relaxed. They chuckled among themselves and waved the gravcar through.

Mahoney came awake to blinding sunlight piercing the barred windows of his room, and loud, barked shouts. His head was thumping from last night's excess—he hadn't been able to get away from bending elbows with Frehda for hours.

There were more shouts. They had a peculiar quality to them. Like commands? Giving an automatic snort that burned his delicate nose membranes, Mahoney got out of his cot and started dressing. Let us see, Ian, what we can see.

Mahoney blinked out of Frehda's portion of the barracks. And the first thing he noted surprised even him.

Several men were putting twenty or more teenage Tahn through what seemed to be a very militarylike obstacle course. Ho, ho, Mahoney, me lad. Ho, clotting ho. He wandered over by one of the men and watched the kids go at it. Whenever any of them slowed or got tangled in an obstacle, there were immediate shouts of derision from the adults.

"Whatcha got here, friend?"

The man looked at him. "Oh, you the salesman guy staying with Frehda, right?"

Mahoney snorted an affirmative.

"To answer your question, mister, we're just givin' the kids a little physical training. Whittle off some of the baby fat."

Riiight, Mahoney thought.

"Good idea," Mahoney said. "Kids these days are lazy little devils. Gotta keep the boot up."

He looked over at a coiled barbed-wire fence that a large farm boy was vaulting over.

"What's that contraption?" he asked.

"Oh, that's a hedgehog. About the same size as all the fencing around here."

Mahoney had to grab himself by the throat to keep from reacting in some obvious way. So, you call it a hedgehog, do you, mate? Mahoney
knew
that the man standing next to him was no poor Tahn farmhand. He was a professional soldier sent out by the Tahn military to train young meat for the slaughter to come.

"Must be hell on the britches," Mahoney joked, rubbing an imaginary sore spot on his behind.

The man thought this was pretty funny. "Least you can sew up pants," he said.

Mahoney spent the next two days lazily touring the farm—which was well off even by Imperial settler standards—making casual talk and casual friends and wolfing down the enormous meals the communal farm kitchen shoveled out.

Except for that first obvious soldier he had met and possibly one or two others, everyone seemed to be exactly as he appeared. What he had here were several hundred hardworking Tahn farmers who had gotten tired of the poverty imposed on them by the Imperial majority. So they had pooled their talent and funds to make a life of it.