Smuggler, p.10
Smuggler, page 10
part #2 of Spacer, Smuggler, Pirate, Spy Series
In any case, all aboard Tyche knew full-well where they’d next stop, and Dansby had been able to pass that on to Kaycie via Milhouse.
It wasn’t until they were well on their way, though, that he was finally able to settle into his upper bunk with his new tablet and begin any real work.
“Well, that’s a fancy one, now, ain’t it?” Kel said, setting his arms on Dansby’s bunk edge and peering at the device.
“It’ll do,” Dansby allowed, glad he had nothing incriminating on his screen yet.
“What you need that for?” Prat asked from his own bunk opposite Dansby’s.
There was a rustle of blankets and Jordan sat up on his bunk below Prat’s. “What’s he got, then?”
“Fancy tablet,” Kel said. “Like t’be what a lieutenant’d have, seems.”
“Aye, what y’gone and got that for?” Jordan asked.
Dansby sighed. There was no such thing as true privacy aboard ship, not in the berthing area, at least, and he needed the others to ignore him as much as possible. He cleared his throat. “Entertainments,” he said distinctly, meeting Kel’s eyes at the edge of his bunk.
“Well, aye, but —”
“Of a certain nature.” Dansby stared at him, then raised an eyebrow. “Would you like to see?”
“Oh —” Kel said.
“Ah —” Jordan said. “No. No — won’t judge your … proclivities — not after good advice — but …” He lay back down and pulled his blanket up. “Don’t need to see that, me.”
“Never mind.” Prat laid down and turned his back to Dansby, then rolled over quickly, then cast his eyes about as though deciding where to look — though he’d be sleeping and his eyes would be closed — then rolled back over and settled for pulling the blanket tight under his buttocks.
Kel opened his mouth, then looked around at the others and sank out of sight to his own bunk.
Each pulled a short curtain about their bunk to give themselves what privacy they might have — and in Prat’s case, perhaps, what protection he thought it might offer his buttocks.
Dansby did the same, finally tapping at the new tablet to begin his real work.
The thing had power enough, and he’d been able to add some tools aboard Corders Hole, but there was still much do and he had no access to the references he’d had back at school on Lesser Sibward. There he’d had not only the system and network references publicly available, but a legacy of documents and tools from past students in how to attack the school’s systems and records.
Aboard Tyche he had little but his own wits and remembrances.
He tapped the screen late into the night, developing bits of code and agents to do the work he wanted, ignoring, for the most part, the systems of the ship itself. Those were hardened and inaccessible, with no few traps that would alert the fellows in engineering if they were accessed by one such as Dansby. In fact, he doubted there was any true connection between the gundeck, where he was berthed, to the engineering spaces or quarterdeck systems.
Luckily, he didn’t need to defeat those protections, he was only, really, concerned about other tablets, and there were a plethora of those around him to test his workings on. Admittedly, the common spacers’ tablets would be a step or two below his ultimate target’s, but not by so very much.
It was three days’ — nights’ — work before he was satisfied, and he ventured down to visit Fell in the purser’s stores.
“Ah, young Dansby,” Fell said, “come to wheedle on about a tablet again? Or, no, I’ve heard you have a fine example already, yes?”
Of course, the purser’d heard about his fine tablet, the rumors and talk aboard ship being what they were.
“I did, Mister Fell. Good luck at the card tables on Corders Hole, it turned out.”
“Hhhmmm.” Fell drew the sound out through pursed lips. “Or sold what you had to sell?” Fell shrugged. “No concern of mine, no, what a man does off ship, though if the rumors are true …”
Damn me, Dansby thought. Is that what’s going around now? That I sold my backside on Corders Hole to get this bloody tablet? Should’ve caught Rabbit and dragged her to the ship’s hatch to give good report on how I truly spent my time.
“No, Mister Fell,” he said calmly, concentrating on the work at hand. “I’ve only come for a bit of coffee for my mess, if you please.”
Fell grunted. “How much?”
“Half a kilo,” Dansby said. “And a tin of biscuit, as well, please.” He frowned. “Add a packet of sweets. On my account.”
Fell grunted again, but Dansby merely smiled. He could treat his mess to a half kilo of decent coffee and treats, especially as he’d be long gone from Tyche before the accounts came due.
The purser left the counter to retrieve the items, leaving, for all the world as though there were no danger in the doing, his own tablet right there. No sooner had the man turned his back than Dansby had his own tablet from his pocket and tapped against the purser’s, activating its new and special capabilities.
Before the first of his ordered items was off the shelf, Dansby had his tablet back and tucked away. He wasn’t certain that it had worked — wouldn’t be until night when he could check — but it was as much as he could do just then.
Fifteen
A cursory look at what was on Fell’s tablet told Dansby he was on the right track, but a more detailed view of the data would take two more days. During the night, Tyche bespoke another ship traveling in the opposite direction, each exchanging what word they had of conditions ahead for the other.
Ahead of Tyche lay darkspace storms — not unusual for the time and area of space, but strong and destructive as dark energy winds howled and swirled between the coming systems, driving all before them.
Captain Stansfield took the opportunity of that knowledge to work the crew even harder than as they’d left Corders Hole, calling all-hands to make and change sail until he was satisfied that the mainsail could be taken in three reefs in as many minutes.
Food was hot, thankfully, as they weren’t yet within an actual storm that might toss the ship about despite its inertial compensators and make hot pans full of hotter liquids a danger, but it was eaten quickly by men both so weary that they’d not take the time to taste it and so certain the next call would come at any time that they wished to get as much into them as they could before donning vacsuits and returning to the masts and spars.
It was harder work than Dansby’d ever seen aboard ship, though easier than it would be in a true storm and he dreaded the thought of experiencing that. As scion of a merchant family, he’d been taught to avoid the storms or run before them, perhaps angling his ship as he might to avoid some system shoals — but never, as Tyche did, to shrug off the danger and maintain course, regardless of the conditions.
It was a difference between the common merchant spacer and these men of the Navy, and one that made Dansby respect them all the more.
Two days of that and Stansfield ordered the ship put on a steady tack toward Greater Ashton, their next destination, and allowed a make-and-mend day for the crew in recompense for their work. Dansby felt they must have done well, regardless of the bosun’s and his mates’ shouts through touched helmets, their shoving of men who were out of position, and the not infrequent landing of a heavy starter on the backside of a man not moving fast enough or pulling hard enough to satisfy them. Stansfield must have felt it was well-enough, as he ordered the purser to splice-the-mainbrace at lunch that day, and a grand keg of watered rum, flavored with sugar and citrus, was brought out.
Dansby lined up with the rest, mugs in hand to receive their full measure and idle away the rest of the afternoon.
“Fancy a bit of cards?” Prat asked.
There’d be no gambling allowed, at least not overtly, but one could still hone skills and pass the time.
“For a bit,” Jordan allowed.
“Aye,” Kel said.
“Dansby?” Prat asked.
“I fear I’m exhausted,” Dansby said, regretting it, though he longed to get at the purser’s data and learn all the man was up to. “I’ll likely crawl into my bunk and sleep until morning.”
“More entertainments,” Prat said to the others’ laughter.
“More that I’ve not worked so hard in my life,” Dansby countered. “I was aboard a merchantman before Tyche — we’d not sail into a thing that demanded such sail work.”
“Ah, the lazy life,” Jordan said. “All running and easy reaches, while we Navy fellows go hard against the winds.”
“Smaller crews,” Dansby said, feeling the need to defend his fellows a bit, “and no Admiralty to pay for a damaged ship.”
“Ah, but they’ll bear the risk when there’s profit on the other side of the storm,” Prat said, “and then it’s us Navy men have to drag a sorry bastard off some shoals.”
The others nodded, except Jordan. “Some poor sod in the system’s Halo Guard, more like,” he said.
“Mad buggers,” Prat said. “Spendin’ all their time with naught but shoals to leeward.”
Dansby nodded along with the rest. What Navy and merchants alike could agree on was that the fellows who patrolled a system’s edges, where the dark energy winds always blew against the most concentrated of the system’s dark matter halo, were the maddest of buggers.
The line moved on and Dansby collected his portion of drink while his messmates went about convincing a few others to engage in a bit of card play.
Dansby returned to his bunk, hopped up to sit and set his mug on a little shelf set into the bulkhead, then pulled his curtain tight against the edges. He wanted those outside to get the impression he was a man intent on sleeping until the next call to work the sails and would brook no interruption of it.
He took a long drink of his grog, trying to ignore the under-taste of ship’s water, and settled back with his tablet.
Fell, the purser, like so many of his breed, was utterly mad for records.
He had records of every milligram and milliliter of stores brought aboard Tyche, the slightest measure doled out to cook, carpenter, or man, the barest milliamp of power from the ship’s fusion plant and where each might go — had he been able to engrave an ID on the very molecules to aid his tracking, Dansby suspected he would do so.
Such meticulous record keeping, Dansby found, did not extend to wholly accurate record-keeping, however — at least not where it might profit Fell.
There were fully a dozen dead men still on Tyche’s rolls — one who’d died before Fell came aboard — and each was still issued his monthly pay, his daily tot of spirits, and all the other stores and consumables a man might need. There was no doubt Fell was pocketing the difference, but that was only what one might expect from a man in his position, who’d had to purchase his warrant and office from Admiralty and was personally responsible for all the costs and stores of the ship. Such things were considered only right and proper — a sort of perquisite of the position’s responsibilities.
Dansby was looking for a more perfidious bit of dealing, and he found it buried deep in Fell’s tables and charts.
It wasn’t labeled as addle dealing, of course, Fell was smarter than that, but when Dansby matched the dates in the ledger against his own recollection of Tyche’s ports of call, it all came clear. Such and such amount taken aboard at Penduli itself, which gave Dansby Fell’s source for the stuff, and such and such amount offloaded at these systems — all with mining as their main focus. If the ledger was accurate, and Dansby had no reason to believe it wasn’t, there was quite a bit more of the addle aboard than the crates he’d found — perhaps as many as twelve, or more if Fell was selling more than a full crate to some of the systems on Tyche’s route.
The ledger for the addle itself led, of course, to the ledger for the money, causing Dansby to both raise his brows and frown — his brows because the total was something more than he’d expected, Fell’s sideline being immensely profitable, and his frown because there were some odd notations in the ledger.
He’d get to those in a moment.
First was to track who was involved, and it quickly became clear that Fell was the leader of the enterprise. His own mate, Beardsley, was involved, and profited by it, but not nearly so much as Fell. Of the other men aboard Tyche, Fell made no note — so either he kept such payments secret, even from his own ledgers, a thing Dansby found unlikely, given the man’s detail in all else, or there were no other crew members, warrants, or officers involved.
Dansby had to give Fell credit for the sheer amount of work that must have been involved in setting this operation up, much less keeping it so secret from those aboard the ship — and the reward he reaped was commensurate with that effort.
That did make Dansby’s course clearer and easier.
With none of Tyche’s officers involved in Fell’s scheme, he could just alert one of the lieutenants or Captain Stansfield to the location of the addle and trust them to take care of the errant purser. That their care would be a summary trial aboard ship and a hanging, with Fell’s body consigned to drift in the Dark until it was broken up on some dark matter shoal — well, best for all concerned if such a thing were never more to Admiralty than a brief entry in the ship’s log, which would in all likelihood never be reviewed by anyone.
Not that he’d tell an officer face to face, of course. That would leave one Avrel Dansby far more involved and with far more visibility to the Navy and Navy men than he cared for.
No, he could feel safe about skipping from Tyche at the first opportunity and then sending a message to Captain Stansfield anonymously. Avrel Dansby would be listed as having Run, but have no further connection to Fell or the addle — and once aboard Elizabeth again, a brief message to Eades with his Foreign Office connections would ensure that the Navy would think the Avrel Dansby who’d run was someone else all entirely from Avrel Dansby, captain of Elizabeth.
Such a course would tie things up nicely, and certainly satisfy both the Kaycie in his head and the real one that the right and proper thing had been done.
Still, there were those odd notations — and Dansby did like to understand a thing in full.
Fell’s ledger didn’t just show cash in return for the addle — each value there was linked to yet another ledger, this one with multiple entries and not labeled in pounds or shillings. These were noted with other codes: Au, Pt, Ag. They weren’t the typical currencies Dansby was used to, and he’d been trained to trade in nearly any system’s coin that might make its way from one place to another.
Bloody bugger — it’s not coin at all, or rather not yet.
He ran down the list again to be certain.
Gold, silver, platinum, and more — even gallenium, the metal that insulated ships from the radiations of darkspace and made travel between systems possible.
Fell wasn’t receiving coin for his addle, he was taking payment in the very ore the miners pulled from those systems. Quite a bit of it, if the ledger were to be believed — and quite a bit of gallenium, though trade in that most precious of metals was heavily regulated and every speck of the stuff was supposed to be sold first only to the Crown.
Well, if one’s going to trade in one capital substance a second isn’t much of a risk, I suppose. I’s not as though they can hang him twice.
Fell had already collected hundreds of kilograms of valuable metals on this run. Previous voyages showed a transfer of metals off to another system when Tyche arrived there — which left Dansby to ponder the implications of that.
If Fell had taken payment in coin or transfer of credit, then he’d have been able to deposit such in his own accounts at each system, making the ill-gotten gains nothing more than electrons floating about the kingdom’s banking systems.
Ore was quite another matter.
Kilograms — tens, no hundreds of kilograms of metal had to have a place. A physical home of sorts. And if something of such value had a physical home, one so very close to Avrel Dansby as Fell’s ill-gotten gains must be aboard Tyche at this very moment …
Dansby leaned his tablet against his leg so that he could scratch at a suddenly itchy palm.
If he simply ran from Tyche and notified Captain Stansfield of Fell’s doing, then all that metal would be found by the ship’s officers.
He scratched harder.
It wasn’t as though Admiralty needed the money, now was it?
Sixteen
Dansby’s mind ran away from him with thoughts of what was next to do.
He could simply leave Tyche, reboard Elizabeth, and then send that anonymous notice to Captain Stansfield. That might be the wise course.
It would not, however, be the course that would enrich Avrel Dansby by several thousand, perhaps tens of thousands, of pounds.
Nor would it enrich the crew of Elizabeth, who’d spent the last weeks haring off after Tyche and Dansby with no cargoes and no hopes of coin to fill their own purses.
Dansby had no delusions about his crew — they were loyal to him, to a point, and that point was the knot in their purse strings. Beyond that, they’d leave for greener pastures and he’d be left with a ship, Kaycie, and have to recruit a new crew — a new crew which hadn’t been broken out of slavery, or had objections to being made into slavers by the old captain of Elizabeth and her owners, the Marchant Company.
Another thing Dansby had no delusions about was the difficulty he’d have recruiting a new crew from scratch — one willing to involve themselves in the sort of shadiness he intended.
Add to that, they had been loyal to him — he assumed they’d followed Kaycie’s orders, but also assumed none had jumped ship as yet. They’d come after him with no hope for profit, only their captain’s return.
One could almost say I owe them the profit, couldn’t one? Dansby thought. They do deserve something, for their efforts, after all.
And, if one were to come right down to it, he’d not be in this position if the Navy hadn’t Impressed him — they owed, damn them.
