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“You’re a patriot, then?”
She shrugged. “Not a vehement one. I would like to be part of something important. There’s not much opportunity for that. Not for women.”
True enough. Which was the way things should be. Women on campaign were a nuisance. Although there had been one — he quickly pushed that thought away. He couldn’t think about Laura without pain and anger, and he’d brooded too much anyway. Now he had a job to do, and it was important to keep his mind clear. “And just what do you think you can do for us?” he asked.
“I don’t know, whatever is necessary, I suppose. Many trading expeditions do have secretaries, and my education may be useful to you.”
Nathan laughed softly. “I doubt it.” And I doubt further if you’d do the only thing I think of that might really be useful, he thought. Or will you? She could be a highly trained agent. Haven was said to employ women in their secret-police forces, but the few that Orleans’s security forces had encountered had been obvious, lower class women pretending to be from good families. This girl wasn’t like that. She had the ma
“I studied a little of everything, Trader. Since there are so few girls in the University, I could study almost anything I liked. My professors didn’t know what to make of me, anyway. Such serious old men, you could almost hear them clucking their tongues when they discovered they were expected to listen to a girl read them papers. But since they didn’t take my efforts to get an education seriously, I could study what I wanted to and go to lectures that interested me. Really, it’s a wonderful way to study.”
“You still haven’t said why you went, freelady.”
“Please call me Mary. After all, I do work for you. Don’t I?” She sipped cold wine, and MacKi
“So you have no romantic attachments?”
“Not now. I was engaged once. To the son of one of my father’s friends. But that’s all over.”
“What does you father think of your entering the Service and going off to another planet?” MacKi
“He gave his approval, Trader,” she said stiffly. “I have all the necessary permissions duly notarized. Are you afraid he might challenge you?” Her eyes flashed briefly, then she thought better of what she had said. “Oh, I didn’t mean that. Please don’t be angry with me, but I get so tired of having to ask Father’s permission for everything I do.”
“I take it you would prefer some such equality-of-sexes nonsense like Therean.”
“Not that equal, Trader. I’ve no wish for the life of a camp follower or a tavern girl. But — surely there’s a place for us in some honorable work. Not all of the secretaries in Haven were born in the charity wards. If freeladies can manage affairs for Magnates and Traders, why can’t they own property themselves? Academician Longways says they did in the Old Empire. Why, there were even women in Parliament and nobody thought anything of it.”
“Do you believe that?”
“Well, it seems a little strange, but why not? We’re not brainless, you know. Not all of us, anyway. Who managed the estates when the men were off on campaign? You know as well as I do that not all of the wives and companions had guardians … if they could manage their property as long as the men were alive, even when they were away for months, why couldn’t they do it after their men were killed?”
MacKi
None of which was important. It was obvious that Dougal was sending Mary Graham for reasons of his own, so MacKi
She reached into her pouch and shuffled through papers until she found a bulky sheaf. “Here is the list. The items checked off have already been moved to the Imperial landing dock.”
“And the armor?”
“Citizen Dougal has arranged for the Haven armory to prepare the chain mail. They seem to have found something which works, and one of their people will measure us this evening. The ta
“Duncan and Larue,” MacKi
I learned the new ways, he thought. Learned them well, when a lot of my brother officers wouldn’t. They couldn’t change. Insisted that elan and military spirit were more important than weapons and tactics, and they got their regiments butchered for their pains. I learned the new ways, but I never liked them. He looked up from his reverie. “That’s one company that will profit by this expedition. Assuming we find something worth importing.”
Dougal arrived an hour later. “You will meet the Imperial Traders shortly,” the policeman a
“Yes,” MacKi