sent him muttering toward the galley cubicle for coffee, or beer, or the chocolate bars he ate after difficult flights that unjustly never fleshed out his middle; even his tailored dress uniform hung on him like a mechanic's coverall.

    Jensen's lips thinned in distaste. Harris's sloppiness was tolerable only because he could fly the shorts off just about all of his peers. And if Harris resented his assignment on Sail, a three-man scoutship commanded by a lieutenant whose father had stonewalled all reasonable opportunity for advancement, the pilot was too lackadaisical to care. Jensen despised such lack of ambition, but kept his contempt to himself. Without Harris, Sail had no prayer of intercepting the Marity. Longingly, Jensen reached out and fingered the single green pin in the display. How would his pilot respond, he wondered, if he knew that Daddy's allowance had gone toward the spreading of false information? Would Harris file for transfer if he understood that the green pin marked a trap most painstakingly laid to entice the Marity's master, precisely so that Sail could effect a capture?

    But the Marity, damn her wayward, disingenuous traitor of a captain, appeared not to be buying; instead she was making a third run to Guildstar, decorously scheduled as the merchanter she assuredly wasn't.

    Jensen loosened a clenched fist and retrieved a marker, a blue one; with determined steadiness he imbedded the pin by the existing pair over Guildstar, then muttered, 'It makes no sense.'

    Though Harris could overhear from the galley, Jensen felt no embarrassment. While other officers jockeyed for leave to visit wives and families, the lieutenant curried favor with Intelligence. He was first among the lower ranks to hear that the Khalia had been armed and financed by the Syndicate; the shock just beginning to filter down from above was that war was far from over. The heated issue now was location of the Syndicate's worlds. Weasel sources held no clue, spies in the most sensitive positions drew blanks, and the brass was reduced to screening hearsay in a vain search for coordinates. Jensen viewed the dilemma with an eye for opportunity. His passion to trap MacKenzie James took on increased importance: a skip-runner who trafficked in state secrets and whose record held multiple charges of treason would be acquainted with the Alliance's enemies. The Syndicate should be numbered among his customers. If James did not know their home

ii