The Big Black Mark (20 page)

"And yours, Bos'n. (He thought,
This may not be the finest beer in the universe, but it'll do till something better comes along.)

"Here's to your luck, Captain. I knew
our
luck would change as soon as we got
you
in command."

"I hope it stays that way," said Grimes. (Damn it all, the man seemed positively to
love
him.)

He took a bite from his sandwich. It was excellent steak, with a flavor altogether lacking from the beef in the ship's tissue culture vats.

Dr. Rath drifted up. His informal civilian clothing was dark gray—but, amazingly, even he looked happy. He was smoking a long, thin cigar. "Ah, so you've joined us, Captain. Miss Russell was wondering when you were going to turn up."

"Oh. Where is she now?"

"Haven't a clue, my dear fellow. She sort of drifted off among the dunes with one of the local lads. Going for a swim, I think. At least, they'd taken off all their clothes."

"Mphm." What Vinegar Nell did, and with whom, was her own affair—but Grimes felt jealous. He accepted another mug of beer, then fumbled for his pipe.

"Have one of these, Captain," said Rath, offering him a cigar. "Not exactly Havanas, but not at all bad."

"Better than Havanas," said Langer.

And you'd know,
thought Grimes uncharitable.
With your flogging of ship's stores you could always afford the best.
He accepted the slim, brown cylinder from the doctor, nonetheless, and a light from the attentive Sally.

Not bad,
he thought, inhaling deeply.
Not bad. Must be a local tobacco.

He turned to Mavis and said, "You certainly do yourselves well on this world, darling." She seemed to have changed, to have become much younger—and no less attractive. It must, he thought, be the effect of the firelight. And how had he ever thought of her abundant hair as silver? It was platinum-blonde.

She said, "We get by. We always have got by. We had no bloody option, did we?" She took the cigar from his hand, put it to her own lips, drew in. She went on, "Still an' all, it's good to have you bastards with us at last, after all these bleedin' years."

How had he ever thought her accent ugly?

She handed the cigar back, and again he inhaled. Another mug of beer had somehow materialized in his free hand. He drowned the smoke with a cool, tangy draft. He thought,
This is the life. Too bloody right it is.

By the fire the singing had started again, back by thrumming guitars.

 
Farewell to Australia forever,
Good-bye to old Sydney, good-bye,
Farewell to the Bridge an' the Harbor,
With the Opera House standin' on high.
Singin' tooral-i-ooral-i-addy,
Singin' tooral-i-ooral-i-aye,
Singin' tooral-i-ooral-i-addy,
We're bound out fer Botany Bay!

"The opera house isn't all that high," complained Grimes. "Never mind, dearie. It's only a song." She added almost fiercely, "But it's
ours.
"

 
Farewell to the Rocks an' to Paddo,
An' good-bye to Woolloomooloo,
Farewell to the Cross an' the Domain,
Why were we such mugs as ter go?

"You're better off here," said Grimes. "You've a good world. Keep it that way."

"That's what I thought, after talkin' to some o' yer people this arvo. But will you bastards let us?"

"You can play both ends against the middle," suggested Grimes. He was not conscious of having been guilty of a grave indiscretion.

"Wodyer mean, Skip?"

"Your world is almost in the territorial space of the Empire of Waverley, and the emperor believes in extending his dominions as and when possible."

"So . . . the thot plickens." She laughed. "But this is a
party,
Skip. We're here to enjoy ourselves, not talk politics." Her hands went to a fastener at the back of her dress. It fell from her. She stood there briefly, luminous in the firelight. She was ample, but nowhere was there any sag. Her triangle of silvery pubic hair gleamed brightly in contrast to the golden tan of her body. Then she turned, ran, with surprising lightness, into the low surf. Grimes threw off his own clothing, followed her. The water was warm—
pee-warm,
he thought—but refreshing. Beyond the line of lazy breakers the water was gently undulant. He swam toward a flurry of foam that marked her position. She slowed as he approached her, switched from a crawl to an energy-conserving breaststroke.

He followed her as she swam, parallel to the beach. After a few moments of exertion he caught up with her. She kept on steadily until the fire and the music were well astern, then turned inshore. A low breaker caught them, swept them in, deposited them gently on the soft sand like stranded, four-limbed starfish. He got to his feet, then helped her up. Their bodies came into contact—and fused. Her mouth was hot on his, her strong arms Were around him as she pulled him to her—and, after they had fallen again to the sand, above the tidemark, her legs embraced him in an unbreakable grip. Not that he wished to break it. She engulfed him warmly.

When they were finished he, at last, rolled off her, falling on his back onto the sand. He realized that he and Mavis had performed before an audience. Somehow he was not at all embarrassed—until he recognized, in the dim starlight, the naked woman who, with a young man beside her, was looking down at him.

"I hope you had a good time, Commander Grimes," said Vinegar Nell acidly.

"I did," he told her. "And you?" he asked politely. "
No!
"
she snapped.

"Fuck orf, why don't yer?" asked the mayor, who had raised herself on her elbows.

The young man turned at once, began to trudge toward the distant fire. Vinegar Nell made a short snarling noise, then followed him.

"That Col," remarked Mavis, "never was any good. "That sheila o' yours couldn't've picked a feebler bastard. All blow, no go, that's him."

"The trouble," said Grimes, "is that she is, as you put it, my sheila. Or thinks she is."

"Then wot the hell was she doin' out with Col?" she asked practically. "Oh, well, now we
are
alone, we may as well make the most of it."

The next morning—not too early—Grimes held an inquest on the previous night's goings-on. He, himself, had no hangover, although he had forgotten to take an anti-ale capsule on his return to the ship, before retiring. He felt a little tired, but not unpleasantly so.

He opened by asking Brabham how he had spent the evening.

"I went to a party at Pete's place, sir."

"Pete?"

"The president of the Air Pilots' Guild."

"And what happened?"

"Well, we had a few drinks, and there was some sort of help-yourself casserole, and then we had a flight over the city and the countryside in one of the airships."

"Anything else?"

The first lieutenant oozed injured innocence. "What else Would there be, Captain?"

"Any relaxation of what we regard as normal standards? Any . . . promiscuity?"

Brabham looked injured.

"Come on, Number One. Out with it. As long as you do your job your sex life is no concern of mine. But I have a good reason for wanting to know what happened." He grinned. "Some odd things happened to me. Normally I'm a very slow starter."

Brabham managed to raise a rather sour smile. "So
that's
what Vinegar Nell was dropping such broad hints about! Well, sir, I had it off with one of our tabbies—I'll not tell you which one—during the flight over the city. Have you ever done it on the transparent deck of a cabin in an airship, with the street lights drifting by below you?" The first lieutenant was beginning to show signs of enthusiasm. "And then, after we got back to the airport, there was a local wench . . . I can't remember her name. I don't think that we were introduced."

"Mphm. And how do you feel?"

"What do you mean, sir?"

"Presumably you had plenty to drink, as we all did. Any hangover?"

"No, sir."

"Mphm. Commander MacMorris?"

"The Seamen's Guild laid it on for us, Captain. Plenty o' drinks. A smorgasbord. Plenty o' seawomen as well as seamen. There were a couple—engineers in the big schooners." He grinned. "Well, you can sort o' say it was all in the family."

"Mphm. Commander—or Doctor, if you prefer—Brandt?" The scientist colored, his flush looking odd over his pointed beard. "I don't see that it is any concern of yours, Commander Grimes, but I was the guest of honor at a banquet at the university."

"And were you—er—suitably honored, Dr. Brandt?" The flush deepened. "I suppose so."

"Try to forget your dignity, Doctor, and answer me as a scientist. What happened?"

"I've always been a reserved man, Commander Grimes. I was expecting an evening spent in intelligent conversation, not an—" He had trouble getting the word out. "Not an orgy. This morning I am shocked by the memory of what those outwardly respectable academics did. Last night I just joined in the party. Happily."

"As did we all," murmured Grimes. "Dr. Rath?" The medical officer had reverted to his normal morose self. "You should know, Captain. You were there."

"What I'm getting at is this. What is your opinion of it all as a physician?"

"I'd say, Captain, that we were all under the influence of a combined relaxant and aphrodisiac."

"The beer?" suggested Grimes.

"I didn't touch it. There was some quite fair local red wine."

"And I was on what they call Scotch," contributed MacMorris. "It ain't Scotch, but you can force it down."

"And I," said Brandt, "do not drink."

"But all of us smoked, presumably."

"I do not smoke," said Brandt.

"But you were in a room where other people were doing just that," Grimes went on. "You were inhaling the fumes whether you wanted to or not."

"I think you've the answer, Captain," said Rath. "I wish I'd thought to bring a cigar stub aboard so I could analyze it."

"And we all feel fine this morning," said Grimes. "Even so, I want none of those cigars aboard the ship."

"Not even for analysis?" demanded the two doctors simultaneously.

"Oh, all right. Analyze if you must—although no doubt a complete analysis of the weed will be made available to you if you ask in the right quarters. Our hosts were just being hospitable, that's all."

"And how," murmured Brabham happily. "And how!"

The mayor came on board late in the forenoon. Grimes asked her about the cigars.

"Oh, we don't smoke 'em all day an' every day," she told him, "though there are some as'd like to. We regard 'em as hair-let-downers, as leg-openers. An' no party'd be a party without 'em."

You can say that again,
thought Grimes. In the broad light of day, with nothing, not even alcohol, to blunt his sensibilities, Mavis no longer seemed quite so attractive. Her accent again jarred on his ear, and he didn't really like
big
women; Vinegar Nell was far more to his taste. Nonetheless, he did not regret what had happened the previous night and hoped that it would happen again. He was sorry about the paymaster, though; it must have been galling for her to witness a man whom she regarded as her own property making love to somebody else. But whose fault Was that? If she had waited for him instead of wandering off with the highly unsatisfactory Col—

He said, "You've a good export there. Are they made from a native plant?"

"No, Skip. They first comers brought terbaccer wif 'em. Musta mutated like a bastard, or somethin'. An' now, I've a full day for yer. To begin wif, an official lunch wif all the mayors o' the planet, followed by a Mayors' Council. An' you'll be sayin' yer piece at the meetin'. About wot you were tellin' me last night about the Empire o' Waverley an' the Federation an' all the rest of it."

What did I say?
Grimes asked himself. But he remembered all to well. He had been hoping that she would have forgotten.

Botany Bay was a good world, but speedily Grimes came to the conclusion that the sooner
Discovery
lifted from its surface and headed for Lindisfarne Base the better. She had never been and never would be a taut ship—and, in any case, Grimes hated that expression—but now standards of efficiency and discipline were falling to a deplorably low level. Rank meant nothing to the people of Botany Bay. In their own ships—air and surface—the captain was, of course, still the captain, but every crew member was entitled to officer status, an inevitable consequence of automation. Their attitude was rubbing off on to the ratings, petty officers, and junior officers of the spaceship.

Grimes set a date for departure. In the four weeks that this gave him he was able to make quite a good survey of the planet, using
Discovery's
pinnace instead of one of the local aircraft. The mayors of the city-states cooperated fully, as did the universities of the state capitals. Loaded aboard the survey ship were microfilmed copies of the history of the colony from its first beginnings, from several viewpoints, as well as samples of its various arts from the first beginnings to the present time. There were the standard works on zoology, botany, and geology, as well as such specimens as could safely be carried. (The box of local cigars Grimes locked in his safe, of which only he knew the combination.) There were manuals of airmanship and seamanship. There was all the literature covering local industry. Mavis—who was no fool—insisted on taking out Galactic Patents on their contents after discovering, by shrewd questioning, that the captain of a survey vessel can function as a patents office director in exceptional circumstances.

It was, however, by no means a case of all-work-and-no-play. Grimes went to his share of parties. At most of them he partook of what Mavis referred to as hair-let-downers, the cigars made from the leaves of the mutated tobacco. He had been assured by Dr. Rath that they were not habit-forming and no ill results would ensue from his smoking them. Usually his partner at such affairs was the mayor of Paddington, but there were others. On one occasion he found himself strongly attracted to Vinegar Nell—but she, even though she was smoking herself, rejected him and wandered away with the City Constable. Grimes shrugged it off. After all, as he had discovered, she wasn't the only fish in the sea, and on his return to Lindisfarne Base he would, he hoped, be able to resume where he had left off with Maggie Lazenby.