"Well, of course, I'm prejudiced," Sylvie said, "but I don't think getting us out of the hands of that bloodthirsty maniac and his cutthroats was nothing."
"Wiping out the Perales gang wasn't nothing, Conn," Tom Brangwyn said. "You got no idea at all how bad things were, the last couple of years."
"I know. I'm sorry." He was ashamed of himself. "But I needed a ship, and now we have no ship at all."
"A ship means something to you?" Yves Jacquemont asked.
"Yes." He told him why. "If we could get to Koshchei, we could build a hypership of our own, and get our brandy and things to markets where we could get a decent price for them."
"I know. I was in and out of Storisende on these owner-captain tramps for a couple of years before I decided to retire and settle here," Jacquemont said. "The profit on a cargo of Poictesme brandy on Terra or Baldur is over a thousand percent."
"Well, don't give up too soon," Nichols advised. "You can't keep the Harriet Barne, of course, but you're entitled to prize-money on her, and that ought to buy you something you could build a spaceship out of."
"That's right," Jacquemont said. "Everything else besides the frame can be made here. Look, these pirates burned me out; except for the money I have in the bank, I lost everything, home, business and all. As soon as I can find a place for Sylvie to stay, I'll come back and go to work for your company building a spaceship. And a lot of the men who were working here are farm-tramps and drifters, one job's as good as another as long as they get paid for it. And I know a few good men in Storisende—engineers—who'd be glad for a job, too."
"You think it would be all right with Mother and Flora if Sylvie stayed with us?" Conn asked.
"Of course it would; they'd be glad to have her." Rodney Maxwell turned to Yves Jacquemont. "Let's consider that fixed up. Now, suppose you and I go into Storisende, and...."