It was no more than the truth. She didn't mind so much that Quillan wouldn't tell her what he thought of Lyad Ermetyne's standing on the suspect list now—there hadn't really been much opportunity for open conversation so far. But he and that unpleasant Belchik Pluly had engaged in some jovial back-slapping and rib-punching when he and Trigger went over to join Lyad's party at her request; and Quillan cried out merrily that he and Belchik had long had one great interest in common—ha-ha-ha! Then those two great buddies vanished together for a full hour to take in some very special, not publicly programmed Sensations Unlimited in the Dawn City's Inferno.
Lyad had smiled after them as they left. "Aren't men disgusting?" she said tolerantly.
That reflected on her, didn't it? She was supposed to be very good friends with somebody like that! Of course Quillan must have some bit of Intelligence business in mind with Pluly, but there should be other ways of going about it. And later, when she'd been just a little stiff with him, Quillan had had the nerve to tell her not to be a prude, doll!
Trigger shoved the solidopic under the pillow. Then she rolled on her side and blinked at the wall.
Naturally, Major Quillan's personal habits were none of her business. It was just that in less than an hour he was to pick her up and take her to the Ermetyne suite for that dinner. She was wondering how she should behave towards him.
Reasonably pleasant but cool, she decided. But again, not too cool, since she'd obligated herself to help him find out what the Tranest tycooness was after. Any obvious lack of friendliness between them might make the job more difficult.
Trigger sighed. Things were getting complicated again.
While Quillan was indulging his baser nature among the questionable attractions of the Inferno, she'd shot three hundred of her Precol credits on a formal black gown ... on what, yesterday, she would have considered a rather unbelievable gown. Even at an Ermetyne dinner she couldn't actually look dowdy in it. And then, accompanied by Gaya, who had turned out to be a very pleasant but not very communicative companion, she'd headed for a gambling room to make back the price of the gown.
It hadn't worked out. The game she'd particularly studied up on turned out to have a five hundred minimum play. Which finished that scheme. The system she'd planned to use looked very sound, but she needed more than one chance to try it in. She and Gaya sat down at another table, with a different game, where you could get in for fifty credits. In eight minutes Trigger lost a hundred and twenty and quit.
Gaya won seventy-five.