Cole spent the next three days on Singapore Station, most of it at Duke’s Place, recruiting men and ships for his growing fleet. By the end of the third day he had seventy-four ships under his command, which was quite impressive until he remembered that only half of them could hold more than three men, and even less than that could withstand the pulse of even a Level 2 thumper.

"I wish I could convince myself I was doing our cause any good, getting all these little pleasure ships lined up," he confided to Sharon and David Copperfield as they sat at the Duke’s table.

"Then arm them, the way you’re going to be arming the station," offered David Copperfield.

"We’re not made of money, David," said Cole. "Every credit we’ve got has to go into protecting the station."

Copperfield was silent for a long moment. Finally he looked up. "It is entirely possible that I have some funds I haven’t mentioned to you, my dear Steerforth."

"It doesn’t seem entirely unlikely," agreed Cole.

"I shall donate five hundred thousand Maria Theresa dollars and five hundred thousand Far London pounds to the rearming of your fleet. Will that be of some help?"

"Thank you, David. What brought forth this unexpected attack of generosity?"

"If we lose the war, what good will the money do me?"

"You’re the only member of your race any of us has ever seen," said Sharon. "You could simply say we were holding you captive and demanding ransom for your release."

Copperfield frowned. "You could have mentioned that before I offered the donation," he said petulantly.

"I won’t hold you to it," said Cole, smiling.

"What are you grinning about?" demanded Sharon.

"He’s grinning because he’s read the immortal Charles, too, and he knows that David Copperfield would never renege on such a noble offer," said the little alien.

"It’s your own fault for falling in love with Dickens," said Cole. "You could have chosen Dostoevski."

"No well-bred Englishman would read such a morbid Russian writer," said Copperfield with a sniff of contempt.

"Well, I thank you for your offer, and we’ll put it to good use."

"Bloody well better," muttered Copperfield.

"You didn’t get that from Dickens," said Cole.

"I do read other British writers, you know."

Suddenly there was a commotion from one of the tables. As he turned to see the cause of it, Cole saw Val’s flaming red hair. A few seconds later the well-muscled body of a large man went flying through the air, landing with a bone-jarring thud! Val stayed in the area long enough to make sure he was still breathing, then walked over to the table, just as the Duke emerged from his office.

"What the hell’s going on?" he demanded.

"You’ve got a cheater down there on the floor," said Val. She shook her head. "Can you imagine it, using a shiner against me?"

"You’re sure?"

She reached into a pocket, withdrew a tiny mirror, and tossed it to him. "If you’re not going to shoot him, at least bar him from ever coming in here again."

The Duke examined the mirror. "I’ve seen smaller."

"And duller. I caught the light glinting off this one."

"I should have hired you as my manager the first time I saw you, twelve, thirteen years ago."

"What fun is that?" she said. "I come here to drink and gamble. I can break heads anywhere."

"Honest and to the point," said Cole. "Enjoy the rest of the evening, but be back at the ship by 0700 hours."

"We’re finally going to go hunt down some Navy ships?" she asked.

He shook his head. "We’re going to go a little further afield to do our recruiting. Not everyone on the Frontier comes to Singapore Station."

"0700?" she repeated.

"That’s right."

"Then I’d better cash in my chips and get over to the Gomorrah while I’ve still got time."

"Be gentle with them," said Cole. "They’re only steel and titanium, you know."

She laughed and headed off to the cashier.

"I used to say that if I had fifty of her I could conquer the galaxy," remarked Cole as he watched her walk away. "Looks like I’m going to have to do it with just one. Probably lowers the odds to even money."

"Did you really mean that—about 0700 hours?" asked Sharon.

"Yeah. I had Christine pass the word to the crew. The station’s well has pretty much run dry, at least for the time being. We’ll try again in a couple of weeks, when there’s a new batch of potential recruits." He turned to the Duke. "You want to have your computer send Christine a list of locations where we’re likely to find people with a grudge against the Republic?"

"Try anywhere on the Frontier," said the Duke.

"You know what I’m looking for: men with ships, men with crews, and men who hate the Republic enough that they’ll join us without demanding any pay."

"You could pay a few if you had to," noted the Duke.

"If I pay one man, I have to pay every man in our fleet, and that is beyond our ability to do. Besides, any man you recommended that I pay would just have to give you a kickback, and we’re already spending most of our money on the station’s defenses."

"Wilson, you cut me to the quick."

"Do I really?"

The Duke shrugged. "Well, you would if everything you said wasn’t true." He laughed heartily. "I’ll have the list to Christine before you take off."

"Thanks," said Cole. He turned to David. "You can stay here if you’d prefer."

"Desert my old school chum?" said Copperfield. "Not even when he’s been amusing himself at my expense. Besides, you’re just on a recruiting mission. It’s not as if you expect to get into a pitched battle."

"True enough," replied Cole. "And speaking of your expense, you might transfer some money here so they can start arming the smaller ships while we’re off finding more small ships for you to spend your money on."

"Do you enjoy teasing me, Steerforth?"

"If I didn’t, I wouldn’t keep doing it," answered Cole.

"Well, at least you’re honest about it," said Copperfield with a deep sigh.

They remained at the Duke’s for another half hour, then made their way back to the ship.

Cole was awakened at 0705 hours and informed that all personnel were aboard the ship except for Val.

"It’s just a recruiting mission," he said. "We’re not waiting for her."

He shaved, took a Dryshower, got dressed, and was heading to the mess hall for some coffee when he bumped into Val, who was looking a bit disheveled.

"You’re late," he said.

"I’d explain why, but you look silly when you blush," she said, continuing on her way to her cabin.

"Yeah, probably I do," he said when she was out of earshot. "And probably I would."

He got his coffee, decided not to go up to the bridge, and gave the order to release from the dock and take off for Freeport, a commercial center some two hundred light-years away. Wxakgini announced that the quickest route would be through the McAllister Wormhole, with an ETA of six hours and two minutes, as opposed to seventeen days at top speed through normal space.

The trip was uneventful, and they emerged half a light-year from the Beyer system, of which Freeport was the third planet. They began approaching it, and as they passed the fifth planet Briggs announced that a small private ship was being pursued by two Navy ships. It had been hit by a charge from a thumper—a pulse cannon—and was following an erratic course, as if some of its stabilizing gyros had been damaged.

"Has it got any chance at all?" asked Cole, arriving on the bridge from his office.

Briggs shook his head. "It’s losing oxygen. Even if they get it moving at speed again, they’ve barely got enough oxygen to get out of the system. I don’t think they can even make the wormhole. They’ll certainly never come out the other end."

"Who’s in Gunnery?" asked Cole.

"I’m not sure, sir," said Briggs.

Christine Mboya checked her computer. "Mr. Pampas, sir."

"Wake Val up, and tell her to go join Bull down in Gunnery," said Cole.

"Yes, sir."

"Is Jacovic awake?

"No, sir. His shift ended before we entered the wormhole."

"Wake him and have him come to the bridge."

"Yes, sir."

"Malcolm," said Cole, "what kind of weaponry are these Navy ships carrying?"

Briggs had his computer analyze the ships. "Level 3 or Level 4 thumpers, and Level 5 burners."

"Okay, we can handle the lasers, and the Level 3 thumpers. If they both come after us with Level 4 thumpers at once, we’re in deep shit— so let’s hope they don’t have them." He studied the holoscreen for a moment. "I’m going to let you handle the defenses, Malcolm. I know we can aim our own weapons from the bridge, but Val and Bull can adjust faster down in Gunnery."

"Should we give them a warning, try to call them off?" asked Christine.

"They’re not going to listen, so why let them know we’re intervening? Is Val down there yet?"

"Just this moment," said Christine.

"Patch me through." He waited the few seconds for Christine to make the connection. "Val, Bull, we’re going to get as close to these two Navy ships as we can. I don’t want you firing until you’re sure you can disable them. They probably have superior weaponry, so I want to make sure our first shots do the trick."

"Got it," said Val.

He nodded to Christine to break the transmission as Jacovic reached the bridge.

"Pilot, I assume you’ve been paying attention. Plot an intercept course and get us as close to those two ships as you can."

"We may not make it before they kill the ship that’s escaping them," said Wxakgini.

"Not to worry," said Cole. "The second they realize this is the Teddy R, they’re going to forget all about that other ship."

He half-expected to hear Forrice’s voice saying "Hard to disagree with that!" and then hooting with alien laughter, but there was no response except silence.

Suddenly Cole shouted, "Pilot, belay that order! Keep your distance!"

The ship almost lurched to a halt and hung dead in space.

"Val?" said Cole as Jacovic joined them on the bridge.

"Yeah?" she said. "What the hell is going on?"

"They haven’t spotted us yet," said Cole. "That means all they’re concerned with is that little ship that’s trying to escape."

"So?"

"So they won’t have their screens and shields up. If you and Bull can each man a weapon and make the first shot count …"

"Right," she said.

"Take your time and aim right, because you’ll never get a second shot with their defenses down."

"Leave it to us," said Val.

"Malcolm," said Cole, "kill our defenses until Val and Bull take their first shots."

"Sir?"

"If either of those ships see a ship our size with screens up, even if they don’t recognize that we’re the Teddy R, they’re going to raise their own defenses, just to be on the safe side."

"Defenses down, sir."

"What’s keeping them?" asked Christine nervously.

"They’re trying to lock on to a fast-moving target that is at the outer range of our cannons," replied Jacovic. "They know they only have one chance—and they have to fire simultaneously."

"Right," agreed Cole. "Wound or kill one ship before firing on the other and whatever we’re shooting will just bounce off its shields."

Suddenly the viewscreen was filled with a burst of light, as one of the ships was blown into a million pieces. The other took a hit, veered crazily, and fired a wild shot at the Teddy R.

The energy bursts from the Teddy R’s pulse cannons bounced harmlessly off the Navy ship’s shields, but at the same time the laser cannon was probing the surface of the ship—and finally it found a weak point, the spot where the initial hit had occurred. A brief adjustment, and the next pulse from the thumper went directly into the spot the laser had pinpointed, and that was the end of the second ship.

"Textbook," said Jacovic approvingly.

"Pilot, we’d better get that ship they were chasing before it runs out of air," said Cole.

Wxakgini was silent for a moment as he and the navigational computer he was tied into analyzed the ship’s trajectory, plotted its course, and made arrangements to intercept it in another two minutes.

It took them one hundred seventeen seconds to catch up with the ship. They radioed ahead that they were friends, that indeed they were the ship that had killed his two pursuers, but it made no response or acknowledgment of their signal.

"Either it can’t answer or it doesn’t trust us," said Christine.

"Or it’s out of oxygen already," added Briggs.

"Let’s find out," said Cole.

The Teddy R drew alongside the ship, matched velocities with it, and sent Slick, the Tolobite with the sentient second skin, out to secure the ship. Once that was done, they opened both hatches and Cole and Jacovic entered the smaller ship.

"Jesus, he’s a mess!" said Cole, staring at the only occupant, a young man who was fully conscious but sprawled on the floor of his ship.

"He’s in urgent need of medical attention," concluded the Teroni, looking at the young man’s blood-streaked face and garments, with fragments of bone sticking out through torn flesh. He alerted the Teddy R’s infirmary that they’d shortly be bringing in an emergency case.

"Can you stand?" asked Cole.

"I don’t know," said the young man. He tried his limbs, then shook his head. "I think I’ve got some broken bones." He made a second effort and passed out.

"Come on, Jacovic," said Cole, stepping forward. "Give me a hand with him."

"Be careful, sir," said Briggs’s voice. "I just checked his ship’s registration, and it’s a phony."

The two of them managed to get him through the hatch and into the Teddy R, where Luthor Chadwick and Braxite were waiting with an airsled.

"Do you think he’ll make it, sir?" asked Rachel, who had just come onto the bridge to replace Christine.

"I hope so," said Cole. "Anyone who’s an enemy of the Navy’s is automatically a friend of ours." He paused thoughtfully. "Good-looking kid. I wonder who he is and where he comes from?"

He would find out before long.