Read Online Sargasso of Space (Solar Queen Series) by Andre Norton - Free Book Online

on his own problem Dane climbed from level to level until he reached Rip’s confined quarters on the fringe of control territory. The astrogator-apprentice was huddled on a snap-down seat, a T-camera in his hands.
    “I got a whole strip of the ruins,” he told Dane excitedly as the other paused in the doorway. “But that Rich—He’s a free-rider if I ever saw one. Wonder Sin-bad didn’t hunt him out with the rest of the cargo gnawers and turn him in as legitimate prey——”
    “What’s he done now?”
    “With the biggest thing yet in Forerunner finds out there,” stabbing a finger toward the wall, “he’s sitting on it as if it is his own personal property. Told Captain Jellico that he didn’t want any of us going over to see things—that ‘the encroachment of untrained sightseers too often ruined unusual finds’! Untrained sightseers!” Rip repeated the words deep in his throat, and, for the first time since Dane had known him, he registered real resentment.
    “Well,” Dane pointed out reasonably, “even with four to help him he can’t cover the whole planet. We’re going to send out a scouting team after the regular system, aren’t we? What’s to prevent your running down some class-A ruins of your own? I don’t think Rich’s found the only remains on the whole planet. And there’s nothing in the rules which says we can’t explore the ones toe find.”
    Rip brightened. “You’re blasting with all jets now, man!” He put the T-camera down.
    “At least,” Kamil’s carefully enunciated words cut in from the corridor, “one can never accuse the dear Doctor of neglect of duty. The way he rushed off to the scene of his labors you’d think he expected to find some- one there cutting large slices out of the best exhibits. The dear Doctor is a bit of a puzzle all around, isn’t he?”
    Rip voiced his old suspicion. “He didn’t know about Twin Towers—”
    “And that red-headed assistant of his carries an astro-gator’s computer text in his kit bag.” Dane was very glad to have information of his own to add to the discussion, especially since Kamil was there to hear it. The quiet with which his statement was received was flattering. But as usual Ali provided the first prick.
    “How did that amazing fact come to your attention?”
    Dane decided to ignore the faint but unpleasant accent on “your.”
    “He dropped his kit bag, the book rolled out, and he was in a big hurry to get it out of sight again.”
    Rip reached out to pull open a cupboard. From within he produced a thick book with a water-and-use-proof cover. “You saw one like this?”
    Dane shook his head. “His had a red band—like the one on Wilcox’s control cabin desk.
    Kamil whistled softly and Rip’s dark eyes went wide. “But that’s a master book!” he protested. “No one but a signed-on astrogator has one of those, and when he signs out of any ship that goes into the Captain’s safe until his replacement comes on board. There’s just one on every ship by Federation law. When a ship is decommissioned the master book for it is destroyed——”
    Ali laughed. “Don’t be so naäve, my friend. How do you suppose poachers and smugglers operate? Do they comb their computations out of the air? It wouldn’t surprise me if there was a brisk black market trade in computer texts, long since supposed to be burnt.”
    But Rip still shook his head. “They wouldn’t have the new data—that’s added on each planet as we check in. Why do you suppose Wilcox goes to the Field control office with our volume every time we set down on another world? That book is sent straight to the local Survey office and is processed to add the latest dope. And you couldn’t present anything but a legit text—they’d spot it in a minute!”
    “Listen, my innocent child,” drawled Kamil, “for every law the Federation produces in their idealist vacuum there is some bright boy—or boys—working day and night to break it. I’m not