* * * * * He reached into his coat, took out a small gun in a fabric holster. Duomart glanced at it, then her eyes went back to his face. "Might clip it to your belt," Dasinger said. "It's a good little shocker, fifty-foot range, safe for shipboard use. It's got a full load, eighty shots. We may or may not run into emergencies. If we don't, you'll still be more comfortable carrying it." Duomart holstered the gun and attached the holster to her belt. She slid the tip of her tongue reflectively out between her lips, drew it back, blinked at the flight screens for a few seconds, then looked across at Dasinger and tapped the holster at her side. "That sort of changes things, too!" she said. "Changes what?" "Tell you in a minute. Sit down, Dasinger. Manual course corrections coming up...." She slid into the pilot seat, moved her hands out over the controls, and appeared to forget about him. Dasinger settled into a chair to her left, lit a cigarette, smoked and watched her, glancing occasionally at the screens. She was jockeying the Mooncat deftly in and out of the fringes of a gravitic stress knot, presently brought it into the clear, slapped over a direction lever and slid the palm of her right hand along a row of speed control buttons depressing them in turn. * * * * * "Nice piece of piloting," Dasinger observed. Duomart lifted one shoulder in a slight shrug. "That's my job." Her face remained serious. "Are you wondering why I edged us through that thing instead of going around it?" "Uh-huh, a little," Dasinger admitted. "It knocked half an hour off the time it should take us to get to your planet," she said. "That is, if you'll still want to go there. We're being followed, you see." "By whom?" "They call her the Spy. After the Mooncat she's the fastest job in the Fleet. She's got guns, and her normal complement is twenty armed men." "The idea being to have us lead them to what we're after, and then take it away from us?" Dasinger asked. "That's right. I'm not supposed to know about it. You know what a Gray Fleet is?" Dasinger nodded. "An Independent that's turned criminal." "Yes. Willata's Fleet was a legitimate outfit up to four years ago. Then Liu Taunus and Calat and their gang took over. That happened to be the two Fleet bosses you slapped handcuffs on, Dasinger. We're a Gray Fleet now. So I had some plans of my own for this trip. If I can get to some other I-Fleet or to the Hub, I might be able to do something about Taunus. After we were down on the planet, I was going to steal the Mooncat and take off by myself." "Why are you telling me?"