Fire Time by Poul Anderson Read Free Book Online Page A

a mattress spread on the floor to face three armchairs. Nearby, a wheeled table held an executive-desk console. ‘What’ll you have? Beer, if I know you.’
    ‘Beer indeed,’ Larreka replied. ‘In many large mugs.’ He meant brew of breadroot flavored with domebud; to him, the stuff gotten from Earth grains tasted vile. That wasn’t true of all such plants. After a hearty shoulderclasp with Sparling, he drew a pipe from his pouch and drawled, ‘Furthermore, I haven’t blown tobacco for seven years.’
    The engineer grinned, offered his supply, and on getting it back stuffed a briar of his own. He was a tall man – two full meters, which put him brow to brow with Larreka – in his mid-forties, wide-shouldered but otherwise gaunt and raw-boned, hands and feet large and knobbly, movements looking awkward though they did everything he wanted them to. High cheekbones, curved nose, deep creases around the thin lips, weather-beaten skin, unruly black hair tinged with gray, tuneless voice, eyes big and brilliantly gray-green, had little changed since last time. Unlike Hanshaw, Sparling was as careless a dresser as Jill, but lacked her flair.
    ‘How’re the wife and youngster?’ Larreka asked him.
    ‘Oh, Rhoda’s about as usual,’ he replied. ‘Becky’s a student on Earth – you didn’t know? Sorry. I always was a rotten correspondent. Yes, she’s back there. I saw her last year on a trip. She’s doing fine.’ Larreka recalled that humans were entitled to home leaves every four of theirnative years. Some, like Jill, had never taken any; this was home to them, and they were in no hurry to make an expensive tour. But Sparling returned oftener than that, to present his latest plans and argue for support of them.
    ‘I’ve kept better track of your work than of your family.’ Larreka meant no offense. Whatever would ease the disasters ahead was top-rank in every civilized mind. ‘Your flood control dams–’ Seeing the engineer scowl, he stopped.
    ‘That’s become part of our whole problem,’ Sparling said stiffly. ‘Let’s settle down and get at it.’
    Olga Hanshaw brought the refreshments her husband had ordered by intercom, and announced lunch in an hour. ‘I’m afraid it’ll be nothing fancy,’ she apologized to Larreka. ‘The storms this past summer hurt the crops, your people’s as well as ours.’
    ‘Well, we realize in your position, you’ve got to set an example of austerity,’ Jill said to her. ‘I know a hog from a Hanshaw.’
    Sparling alone chuckled. Maybe, Larreka thought, her English-language remark referred to something on Earth, where the engineer had been born and spent his earlier youth. Did she notice how his gaze, having gone to her, kept drifting back?
    ‘Let’s save the jokes for later,’ the mayor urged. ‘Maybe this evening we can have a poker game.’ Larreka hoped so. Over the octads he’d become ferociously good at it, and kept in practice by introducing it to his officers. Then he saw Jill gleefully rub her hands and remembered how she’d played slapdash chess but precocious poker. How tough had she become since?
    They sobered when Hanshaw continued, ‘Commandant, you’re here on unpleasant business. And I’m afraid we’ve got worse news for you.’
    Larreka tensed on the mattress where he couched, took a long gulp of beer, and said: ‘Unleash.’
    ‘Port Rua sent word the other day. Tarhanna has fallen.’
    Larreka had kept too much Haelener in him to yelp or swear. He sought what comfort he could find in the smoke-bite of tobacco before saying flatly, ‘Details?’
    ‘Not a hell of a lot. Apparently the natives – the barbarians, I mean, not the few civilized Valenneners you’ve got – apparently they made a surprise attack, took the town, threw everybody out, and told the legionary chief as he was leaving that they weren’t there for loot, they intended to garrison it.’
    ‘Bad,’ Larreka said after a while. ‘Bad, bad, and bad.’
    Jill