"Andre Norton - Dark Piper" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norton Andre)

stood on the edge of a grav shaft. Lugard did take precautions there, tossing his kit bag out. It floated
gently, descending very slowly. Seeing that, he calmly followed it. I had to force myself after him, my
suspicions of old installations being very near the surface. We descended two levels, and I sweated out
that trip, only too sure that at any minute the cushioning would fail, to dash us on the floor below. But our
boots met the surface with hardly a hint of a jar, and we were in the underground storeroom of the hold. I
saw in the subdued glow shrouded machines. Perhaps I had been wrong to think Lugard would miss
transportation when I left. But he was turning to the right and some alcoved spaces, where there were
containers and cases.
тАЬYou seeтАФI am well provided for.тАЭ He nodded at that respectable array. I looked around. There
were weapon racks to the left, but they had been stripped bare. Lugard had gone past me to pull the
covering off one of the machines. The plastic folds fell away from a digger, its pointed pick nose
depressed to rest tip against the surface under us. My first hopes of a command flitter, or something like
it, faded. Perhaps, just as the weapon racks had been stripped, so had such transports been taken.
Lugard turned away from the digger, and there was a new briskness about him. тАЬHave no doubts,
Vere. I am well situated here.тАЭ His tone was enough to send me to the grav, and this time he signaled
reverse, so we rose to the entrance hall. I was on my way to the door when he stopped me.
тАЬVereтАФ?тАЭ
тАЬYes?тАЭ I turned. He was looking at me as if he were hesitant to say what was in his mind, and I had
the impression that he fought to break through some inner reserve.
тАЬIf you find your way up here again, look in.тАЭ It could not be termed a warm invitation; yet, coming
from him, I knew that it was as cordial a one as I would ever have, and it was honestly and deeply
meant.
тАЬI will that,тАЭ I promised.
He stood in the doorway, a light sundown wind stirring up the drifted sand, driving some of it over the
threshold to grit in the bare hallway, to watch me go. I deliberately circled once as I left and waved, to
see his hand raised shoulder high in return.
Then I headed to Kynvet, leaving the last of BeltaneтАЩs soldiers in his chosen retreat. Somehow I
disliked thinking of him alone in that place, which must be for him haunted by all the men who had once
trod its corridors and would never now return. But that it was a choice no one could argue against, I
knew, Griss Lugard being who and what he was.
When I put the hopper down at Kynvet, I saw the wink of lights through the summer dusk.
тАЬVere?тАЭ GythaтАЩs voice called from the house. тАЬAnnet says hurry. There is companyтАФтАЭ Company?
Yes, there was the other hopper with the Yetholme code on its tail, and beyond it the flitter Haychax
kept in flying orderтАФalmost as if we were entertaining half the Committee. ButтАФwhy? I quickened pace
and for a space forgot about Butte Hold and its new commander.
 II
IT MIGHT NOT be a full meeting of the Committee gathered under AhrenтАЩs roof that night, but the
men whose voices murmured behind closed doors were those who would dominate any such meeting. I
had expected to have to answer for the presence of the hopper and was prepared to stand up for
LugardтАЩs rights, only to discover that had I presumed to take a flitter, it would not have been noted then.
Annet, busy at dishing up before summoning the men now entrenched in her fatherтАЩs study, informed
me of the reason for such an unusual convocation. The ship that had brought in Lugard and the other
veterans had, in addition, a second mission. The captain had been contacted, as he came out of hyper
into orbit, by a ship now above Beltane, of whose presence we had not been aware. And a plea had
been delivered to the Committee.
It was as Lugard had predicted, though his view of the matter had been gloomy. There were ships
now without home ports, their native worlds burn-out cinders or radioactive to the point that life could
not exist on their deadly surfaces. One such load of refugees now wove a pattern in our sky and asked
for landing rights and settlement space.
Beltane had, by the very reason for its settlement, been a тАЬclosedтАЭ world, its single port open only to