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XVIII

GIVE CHASE . . .

It was easier said than done. The surviving frigate had restarted her Mannschenn Drive, had slipped back into the warped continuum where, unless synchronization of precession rates was achieved and held, contact between vessels would be impossible. The Carlotti Beacon in Epsilon Sextans' hold was worse than useless; it had been designed to be homed upon, not to be a direction-finding instrument. (In any case, it could function as such only if the beacon aboard the Waldegren ship were working.) Neither Craven nor Grimes knew enough about the device to effect the necessary modifications. The interstellar drive engineers thought that they could do it, but their estimates as to the time required ranged from days to weeks. Obviously, as long as it was operating it would be of value to the enemy only.

So it was switched off.

There was only one method available to Craven to carry out the pursuit—psionic tracking. He sent for his Psionic Radio Officer, explained the situation. The telepath was a young man, pasty faced, unhealthy looking, but not unintelligent. He said at once, "Do you think, Captain, that the other officers and myself are willing to carry on the fight? After all, we've made our point. Wouldn't it be wisest to carry on, now, for Waverley?"

"Speaking for meself," put in Baxter, who had accompanied Jane Pentecost to Control, "an' fer any other Rim Worlders present, I say that now the bastards are on the run it's the best time ter smack 'em again. An' hard. An' the tame time-twisters think the same as we do. I've already had words with 'em." He glared at the telepath. "Our snoopin' little friend here should know very well what the general consensus of opinion is."

"We do not pry," said the communications officer stiffly. "But I am willing to abide by the will of the majority."

"And don't the orders of the Master come into it?" asked Craven, more in amusement than anger.

"Lawful commands, sir?" asked Grimes who, until now, had been silent.

"Shut up!" snapped Jane Pentecost.

"Unluckily, sir," the young man went on, "I do not possess the direction-finding talent. It is, as you know, quite rare."

"Then what can you do?" demanded Craven.

"Sir, let me finish, please. The psionic damping device—I don't know what it was, but I suspect that it was the brain of some animal with which I am unfamiliar—was in the ship that was destroyed. The other vessel carries only a normal operator, with normal equipment—himself and some sort of organic amplifier. He is still within range, and I can maintain a listening watch—"

"And suppose he listens to you?" asked the Captain. "Even if you transmit nothing—as you will not do, unless ordered by myself—there could be stray thoughts. And that, I suppose, applies to all of us."

The telepath smiled smugly. "Direction-finding is not the only talent. I'm something of a damper myself—although not in the same class as the one that was blown up. I give you my word, sir, that this vessel is psionically silent." He raised his hand as Craven was about to say something. "Now, sir, I shall be able to find out where the other ship is heading. I know already that her Mannschenn Drive unit is not working at full capacity; it sustained damage of some kind during the action. I'm not a navigator, sir, but it seems to me that we could be waiting for her when she reemerges into the normal continuum."

"You're not a navigator," agreed Craven, "and you're neither a tactician nor a strategist. We should look rather silly, shouldn't we, hanging in full view over a heavily fortified naval base, a sitting duck. Even so . . ." His big right hand stroked his beard. "Meanwhile, I'll assume that our little friends are headed in the general direction of Waldegren, and set course accordingly. If Mr. Grimes will be so good as to hunt up the target star in the Directory . . ."

Grimes did as he was told. He had made his protest, such as it was, and, he had to admit, he was in favor of continuing the battle. It was a matter of simple justice. Why should one shipload of murderers be destroyed, and the other shipload escape unscathed? He was still more than a little dubious of the legality of it all, but he did not let it worry him.

He helped Craven to line the ship up on the target star, a yellow, fifth magnitude spark. He manned the intercom while the Captain poured on the acceleration and then, with the ship again falling free, cut in the Mannschenn Drive. When the vessel was on course he expected that the Old Man would give the usual order—"Normal Deep Space routine, Mr. Grimes,"—but this was not forthcoming.

"Now," said Craven ominously.

"Now what, sir?"

"You have a short memory, Ensign. A conveniently short memory, if I may say so. Mind you, I was favorably impressed by the way you handled your armament, but that has no bearing upon what happened before."

Grimes blushed miserably. He knew what the Captain was driving at. But, playing for time, he asked, "What do you mean, sir?"

Craven exploded. "What do I mean? You have the crust to sit there and ask me that! Your snooping, sir. Your violation of privacy. Even worse, your violation of the Master's privacy! I shall not tell Miss Pentecost; it would be unkind to embarrass her. But . . ."

Grimes refrained from saying that he had seen Miss Pentecost wearing even less than when, inadvertently, he had spied upon her. He muttered, "I can explain, sir."

"You'd better. Out with it."

"Well, sir, it was like this. I knew that we'd stumbled on the enemy—or that the enemy had stumbled upon us. I'd sounded Action Stations. And when you were a long time coming up to Control I thought that you must have hurt yourself, somehow . . . there have been such cases, as you know. So I thought I'd better check—"

"You thought . . . you thought. I'll not say that you aren't paid to think—because that's just what an officer is paid for. But you didn't think hard enough, or along the right lines." Grimes could see that Craven had accepted his explanation and that all would be well. The Captain's full beard could not hide the beginnings of a smile. "Did you ever hear of Sir Francis Drake, Ensign?"

"No, sir."

"He was an admiral—one of Queen Elizabeth's admirals. The first Elizabeth, of course. When the Spanish Armada was sighted he did not rush down to his flagship yelling 'Action Stations!' He knew that there was time to spare, and so he quietly finished what he was doing before setting sail."

"And what was he doing, sir?" asked Grimes innocently.

Craven glared at him, then snapped, "Playing bowls."

Then, suddenly, the tension was broken and both men collapsed in helpless laughter. In part it was reaction to the strain of battle—but in greater part it was that freemasonry that exists only between members of the same sex, the acknowledgment of shared secrets and shared experiences.

Grimes knew that Jane Pentecost was not for him—and wished Craven joy of her and she of the Captain. Perhaps they had achieved a permanent relationship, perhaps not—but, either way, his best wishes were with them.

Craven unbuckled his seat strap.

"Deep Space routine, Mr. Grimes. It is your watch, I believe."

"Deep Space routine it is, sir."

Yes, it was still his watch (although so much had happened). It was still his watch, although there were barely fifteen minutes to go before relief. He was tired, more tired than he had ever been in his life before. He was tired, but not unhappy. He knew that the fact that he had killed men should be weighing heavily upon his conscience—but it did not. They, themselves, had been killers—and they had had a far better chance than any of their own victims had enjoyed.

He would shed no tears for them.

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Framed