Merchanter's Luck

“You’ll have claims from WSC,” Dee advised him.

“Minor,” Allison said.

Again a stab of those dark, fathomless eyes. An elderly finger indicated the appropriate line and he signed.

“There we go,” Allison said, approving it. He shook hands with the banker and realized himself a respectable if mortgaged citizen. Allison shook hands with Dee and Dee showed them to the outer office in person. They were someone. He was. He felt himself hollow centered and scared with a different kind of fear than the belly-gripping kind he lived in onstations: with a knowledgeable, too-late kind of dread, of having done something he never should have done, a long time back, when he had walked into a bar on Viking and tried to buy a Dubliner a drink.

“You come,” Allison said as they walked out empty of their bundle of applications, with a set of brand new credit cards and clear ship’s papers in exchange. “Let’s get some of the outfitting done. I don’t know what you’re carrying in ship’s stores. Blast, I’ll be glad to get that customs lock off and have a look at her.”

“Got some frozen stuff. I outfitted pretty fair for a solo operation at Viking.”

“We’ve got five. What’s our du

“I really don’t think that’s a problem.”

“Accommodations?”

“Cabins 2.5 meters by 4. That’s locker and shower and bunk.”

“Sleep vertical, do you?”

“Lockers are under and over the bunk.”

“Private?”

“Private as you like.”

“Nice. Good as Dublin, if you like to know.”

He considered that and expanded a bit. “If you have extra— there’s always space to put it. Storage is never that tight.”

“Beautiful.—Hey.” She flagged one of the ped-carriers that ran the docks, a flatbed with poles, hopped on: Sandor followed, put his own card in the slot as it whisked them along the station ring with delirious ease. He had never ridden a carrier; never felt he could afford the luxury, when his legs could save the expense. All his life he had walked on the docks of stations, and he watched the lights and the shops blur past, still numb in the profusion of experience. “Off!” someone would sing out, and the driver would stop the thing just long enough for someone to step down. “Off!” Allison called, and they stepped off on white dock, in the face of a large pressure-window and a fancy logo saying WILSON, and in finer print, SUPPLIER. It was all white and silver and black inside. He swore softly, and let Allison lead him into the place by the hand.

Displays everywhere. Clothing down one aisle, thermals and working clothes and liners and some of them in fancy colors, flash the like of which was finding its way onto docksides on the bodies of those who could afford it New stuff. All of it. He looked at the price on a pair of boots and it was 150. He grabbed Allison by the arm.

“They’re thieves in here. Look at that. Look, this isn’t my class. Lucy outfits from warehouses. Or dockside.”

She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t know what you’re used to, but we’re not going to eat seconds all the way and we’re not using cut-rate stuff. You don’t get class treatment on dockside if you don’t have a little flash. And we’ll not be dressing down, thank you; so deaden your nerves, Stevens, and buy yourself some camouflage so you don’t stand out among your crew.”

He looked up the aisle at clothes he could not by any stretch of the imagination see himself wearing, stuffed his hands in his pockets. The lining on the right one was twice resewn. “You wear that silver stuff into Lucy’s crawlspaces, will you? You fit yourselves out for work, Reilly.”

“There’s dockside and there’s work. Find something you like, hear me?”

He studied the aisle, nothing on racks, no searching this stuff for burn-holes and bad seams. One asked, and they hunted it out of computerized inventory. “So I get myself the likes of yours,” he muttered, thinking he would never carry it well. “That satisfy you?”

“Good enough. What kind of entertainment system does she carry?”

“Deck of cards,” he muttered. “We can buy a fresh one.”

She swore. “You have to have a tape rig.”

“Mariner-built Delta system.”

“Lord, a converter, then. We’ll bring our own tapes and buy some new.”

“I can’t afford-”

“Basic amenities. I’m telling you, you want class crew, you have to rig out. What about bedding?”

“Got plenty of that. Going to have to stock up on lifesupport goods and some filters and detergents and swabs—before we get to extravagances. I’d like to put a backup on some switches and systems that aren’t carrying any right now.”

A roll of Allison’s dark eyes in his direction, stark dismay.

‘Two of them on the main board,” he added, the plain truth.

“Make a list. This place can get them.”

“Will. Going to be nice, isn’t it, knowing there’s a failsafe?”

He walked down the aisle alone, looking at the clothes. And all about him, over the tops of the counters, were other displays… personal goods, bedding, dishes, tapes and games, utility goods, cabinets, ship’s furnishings, interior hardware, recycling goods, tools, bins, medical supplies, computer softwares. Music whispered through his senses. He turned about him and stared, lost in the glitter of the displays he had never given more than a passing glance to—had never come in a place like this, where his kind of finances could get a man accused of theft.

A kind of madness afflicted him suddenly, like nerving himself for a bad jump. “Help you?” a clerk asked down his nose.

“Got to get some clothes,” he said. And yielding to the recklessness of the moment: “Like to have it match, jacket and the rest. Some dockside boots. Maybe a few work clothes.” Allison was out of sight: that panicked him in more than one sense. She was probably off buying something. And the clerk was giving him that look that bartenders gave him. He pulled his new card from his pocket. “Stevens,” he said, and clerkly eyes brightened.

“You’re the one that came in yesterday.”

“Yes, sir.” Lord, was it only yesterday? His shoulders ached with the thought. “Got in with nothing but my account money and I need a lot of things.”

The eyes brightened further. “Be happy to help you, Captain Stevens.”

Flash coveralls. A 75 credit pair of boots; a jacket; a stack of underwear. He looked at himself in the fitting room, haggard and wanting a shave, and took off the fine clothes and ordered it all done in packages.

And he found Allison Reilly at the commodities counter, perched on a stool and going through the catalogue. “Ordered anything?” he asked with a sinking feeling.

“Making a list.” She tapped the screen in front of her, a display of first line meals with real meat and frozen fruits and boxed pastries.

“Chocolates,” he added in a sense of fantasy. He had had chocolate once.

“Chocolate,” she said. “There we go.”

“Cancel that. It’s too expensive.”

“Chocolate and coffee. Real stuff. Leave it to me.”

“Allison—do you—get this stuff usually?”

He would have cut his throat rather than ask an hour ago. He looked into her face and suspected something as childish as his chocolates.

“For special days,” she admitted. “I got some staple stuff too.”

“I have 75 standard frozens. You can wipe that off.”

“Good enough.” She wiped the stylus over part of the order. “What about those hardware items we need?”

We, it was. He took up the seat next to her and keyed up the catalogue. “I can get better prices,” he muttered.

“There’s a discount system. Do your whole rig here and you get some off.”

“Better.” After the moment’s euphoria, his stomach was upset. He ticked through the things they really needed. He felt conspicuous sitting here, at the counter in this place, dressed as he was. The list went on growing, more and more expensive, because systems were, more than crew luxuries.