"Gordon R. Dickson & Harry Harrision - Lifeship" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dickson Gordon R)

at him, but he plunged on.

A darker, narrower-than-human figure loomed suddenly out of the smoke before
him. A long, oddly boned hand, a threefingered hand, caught his bright-orange
shipsuit and held him.

"To a lifeshipl" brayed the Albenareth crewman, almost buzzing the human
words. "Turn about. Go forward! Not to the
stern."

Giles checked his instinct to surge against the restraining hand. He was
large and powerful, stronger by far than any arbite, except those bred and
trained to special uses; but he knew better than to try to pull loose from
the apparently skinny fingers holding him.

"My Honor!" he shouted at the alien, using the first words he could think of
to which an Albenareth mind might respond. "Duty тАФmy obligation! I'm SteelтАФ
Giles Steel Ashad, an Adelman! The only Adelman aboard heie. Don't you
recognize me?"

The alien and he were trapped in a moment of motionlessness. The dark,
lipless, narrow face stared into his from inches away. Then the hand of the
Albenareth let go and the alien mouth opened in the dry cackling laughter
that meant many things, but not humor.

"Go!" said the crewman. Giles turned and ran on.

Just a little farther brought him to the door of his suite. The metal handle
burned his fingers and he let go. He kicked the door with a grunt of effort,
and it burst open. Within, the bitter taste of thick smoke took him solidly
by the throat.

He groped his way to his travel bag, jerked it open, and pulled out the metal
box inside it. Coughing, he punched out the combination, and the lock of the
box let go, the lid sprang open. Hastily he pawed through the mass of papers
within. His fingers closed on the warrant for extradition, crammed it into a
suit pocket, and dipped down to rip open the destruct trigger that would
incinerate the box with all the rest of its contents. A whitehot flare shot
up before him and the metal frame of the container collapsed like melting
ice. He turned, hesitated, and pulled tools from inside his shipsuit. He had
meant to hide these carefully, once his job was done; but there was no point
in hiding anything now. Still coughing, he tossed the tools into the heat of
the stillflaring container, turned, and plunged once more into the clearer
air of the corridor, heading back finally toward the bow of the vessel and
the particular lifeship he had been assigned to.

The Albenareth crewman was gone from his post when Giles passed that point
again. Under the ceiling lights, the corridor was misty with smoke, but free
now even of the figures of arbites. A small hope flickered in him. Perhaps
someone else had taken charge of them by this time. He ran on. He was almost