Man-Kzin Wars III by Larry Niven (good short books TXT) 📕

Meanwhile, this has been a long dry voyage until now. Carita was right, she told me you are good.”

He beamed. “Why, thank you, ma’am. And you are terrific. Tomorrow?”

“Every tomorrow, if we can, until journey’s end. Now, if you excuse, I am ready for happy dreams.”

“Me too.” Ryan blew a kiss, shut the door, and tottered off. He didn’t see who stood at his back.

After a space Saxtorph began to think again. Well. So that is how it is. Du kannst nicht treu sein.

Not that I have any call to be mad at either of them. I’ve got no claim. Never did. On the contrary.

Even so—

Vaguely: That’s the barbed wire I’ve been hung up on. Because the matter, the insight that hit me, touches Tyra, no, grabs her with kzin claws, I couldn’t bring myself to consult Dorcas. I couldn’t bring myself to see that she is the one living soul I must turn to. Between us we’ll work out what our course ought to be.

Later. Later.

He walked on, found himself at Peter Nordbo’s quarters, and knocked. The Wunderlander opened the door and gazed at him with surprise. “Hi,” Saxtorph said. “Am I disturbing you?”

“No. I read a modern history book. Thirty years to learn about. What is your wish?”

“Sociability. Nothing special. Swap stories of our young days, argue about war and politics and other trivia, maybe sing bawdy songs, definitely get drunk. You game? I’ll fetch any kind of bottle you like.”

Chapter XXII

Both suns were down and Munchen gone starry with its own lights. Downtown traffic swarmed and throbbed around the old buildings, the smart modern shops. Matthiesonstrasse was residential, though, quiet at this hour. Apartment houses lined it like ramparts, more windows dark than aglow, so that when Saxtorph looked straight up he could make out a few real stars. A breeze flowed chilly, the first breath of oncoming fall.

He found the number he wanted and glanced aloft again, less high. Luminance on the fifth floor told him somebody was awake there. He hesitated. That might be a different location from the one he was after.

Squaring shoulders, setting jaws: Come on, boy, move along. Rouse him if need be. Get this goddamn thing over with.

In the foyer he passed by the fahrstuhl and took the emergency stairs. They were steep. He felt glad of it. The climb worked out a little of the tension in him. Nonetheless, having reached the door numbered 52, he pushed the button violently.

After a minute the speaker gave him an uneven “Ja, was wollen Sie von mir?” He turned his face straight toward the scanner, and heard a gasp. “Sie!” Seconds later “Captain Saxtorph?” sounded like a prayer that it not be true.

“Let me in,” the Earthman said.

“No. This is, is the middle of the night.”

Correct, Saxtorph thought.

“You had not even the courtesy to call ahead. Go away.”

“Better me than the patrol,” Saxtorph answered.

He heard something akin to a strangled sob. The door opened. He stepped through. It shut behind him.

The apartment was ascetically furnished and had been neat, but disorder was creeping in. The air system failed to remove the entire haze and stench of cigarette smoke. Ib Nordbo stood in a civilian jumpsuit. His hair was unkempt, his eyelids darkly smudged. Yes, thought Saxtorph, he was awake, all right. I daresay he doesn’t sleep much anymore.

“W-welcome back,” Nordbo mumbled.

“Your father and sister were disappointed that you weren’t there to greet them personally,” Saxtorph said.

“They got my message. My regrets. They did? I must go offplanet, unfortunately, at that exact time. A personal difficulty. I asked for compassionate leave.”

“Except you holed up here. I figured you would. No point going anywhere else in this system. You’d be too easily found. No interstellar passenger ship is leaving before next week, and you’d need to fix up identity documents and such.” Saxtorph gestured. “Sit down. I don’t enjoy this either. Let’s make it as short as possible.”

Nordbo retreated, lowered himself to the edge of a chair, clutched its arms. His entire body begged. Saxtorph followed but remained standing above him.

“How long have you been in kzinti pay?” Saxtorph asked.

Nordbo swallowed dryness. “I am not. I was not. Never.”

“Listen, fellow. Listen good. I don’t care to play games. Cooperate, or I’ll walk right out and turn this business over to the authorities. I would have already, if it weren’t for your sister and your father. You damn near got them killed, you know.”

“Tyra— No, I did not know!” the other screamed. “She lied to me. If I knew she was going with you, I would have gotten your stupid expedition stopped. And my father, any reasonable person believed him long dead. I did not know! How could I?”

“Bad luck, yah, but richly deserved,” Saxtorph said. “I might not have guessed, except that a clue fell my way. At that, the meaning didn’t dawn on me till a couple days later.”

He drew breath before driving his point home. “You’ll have followed the news, as much of our story as has been released. Before then, being who you are and in the position you are, you’ll have been apprised of what we told the Navy officer we requested come aboard as we approached. A kzinti warship caught us at the black hole, later than you expected it might, but still something you knew was quite likely.”

“I—no, you misjudge me—”

“Pipe down till I give you leave to speak. The encounter could have been by chance. The kzinti might have happened on the beamcast from the earlier ship and dispatched this one at the precise wrong moment for us. Her captain knew who I was and what vessel I command. He could have heard that on the starvine or through his intelligence corps. Rover’s name wouldn’t matter to that mentality and would scarcely have been in any briefing he got, but conceivably he’d heard it somehow, lately, and it was fresh in his mind. Yah. The improbable can happen. What blew the whistle, once I realized what it