Harvest of Stars Read Online Free PDF Page B

their logic either. They’re doing it, however. I’d better not say how I learned, but never mind, the whole Solar System will soon hear. Davis and I have, uh, extremely important information to convey. Uh, we can’t trust any communication lines any longer, you realize. We’ve got to go in person.”
    Tahir’s glance drifted across the table and downward. Kyra thought uneasily that he wasn’t admiring her legs. He looked back at Lee. “I am glad to pay some of the debt I have owed you,” he said, “and by your trust you honor my people and me. Gracias. We will try to be worthy of it.”
    A memory flitted through Kyra, someone historical whom she’d once read about. Yes, Saladin.
    “You’ve done Señor—Sheikh Tahir a favor, consorte?” she asked. Too late she recalled Lee’s warning, that she should play passive.
    Their host took no umbrage. He must be used to dealing with outsiders. “Indeed he did,” he told her. “Two years ago, a nephew of mine fell into trouble. He is a proud young man, fire is in him. All of us know that Avantism will bring our way of life to oblivion if it goes on. Most of us bide our time, believing that God will not let this happen. Hamid studied biotic engineering. The blasphemies he was required to study also, Xuanist doctrine, and that he met even in the scientific programs, at last enraged him beyond endurance. He began to speak out openly, in public, until he was arrested. When Robert Lee heard, he got Hamid released, and then enrolled in a company school safely off in Ecuador.”
    “Aw, it wasn’t much,” the other man mumbled. “Fairly minor charge, first offense, and he was still classed as ‘developmentally disadvantaged,’ which meant he might not have known any better. All I had to do was speak to my coordinator, who influenced the right person in the government. Fireball and the Synod were at odds, yes, had been for a long time, but no open break had come yet, and plenty of people on both sides were anxious to avoid one. Of course, with the charges dropped, Hamid would’ve been marked ever after, and probably soon come to real grief. But he’s bright, and the company likes to acquire new blood when it can, you know. Actually, I got some boost out of the affair myself.”
    Alarm prickled in Kyra. “But that shows you have connections here!” she exclaimed.
    “No, no. I told you I went through Fernando Pardo, my superior. He passed it on to somebody else, who ‘took aninterest in the case’ and did the negotiating. No records were kept where they could be traced. Fireball’s been heedful of such things in North America since before I went to work for it.”
    Guthrie taught it how, Kyra thought.
    “I hope your nephew is happy now,” she said to Tahir.
    Did pain flit across his countenance? “Yes,” he answered slowly. “We hear from him. Of course, he is becoming … a full dweller in the High World … the secular world. But that was … inevitable. And he is free. They will never take him and remake his mind.”
    Best shift the subject. “You must have been well acquainted here already, to learn about the matter,” Kyra remarked to Lee.
    “Only a bit,” he said. “Sheikh Tahir and I happened to fall into talk in a coffeeshop one evening. We repeated that a few times, he invited me to dinner in his home, I showed him through local company workplaces. Don’t worry, that was on multiceiver, not in person. Nobody there knows about the relationship. But it was just mutual curiosity and, uh, friendliness, nothing more. I was surprised when he told me about his nephew.”
    “I was full of rage and grief,” Tahir said. “Sr. Lee struck me as a compassionate man. He might have influence. What could I lose? God provides.”
    “Gracias,” Lee said ruefully. “You flatter me. To tell the truth, I never read you even that well. This culture is too foreign to me. No offense. I didn’t grow up dealing with a lot of different kinds of people, the way you