"I've been thinking," said Maril evenly. "I think I can get you a hearing for—whatever ideas you may have to help Dara."
"Kind of you," murmured Calhoun. "May I ask whose influence you'll exert?"
"There's a man," said Maril reservedly, "who—thinks a great deal of me. I don't know his present official position, but he was certain to become prominent. I'll tell him how you've acted up to now, and your attitude, and of course that you're Med Service. He'll be glad to help you, I'm sure."
"Splendid!" said Calhoun, nodding. "That will be Korvan."
She started.
"How did you know?"
"Intuition," said Calhoun drily. "All right. I'll count on him."
But he did not. He worked in the tiny biological lab all that ship-day and all the next. The girl remained quiet.
On the ship-day after, the time for breakfast approached. And while the ship was practically a world all by itself, it was easy to look forward with confidence to the future. But when contact and—in a fashion—conflict with other and larger worlds loomed nearer, prospects seemed less bright. Calhoun had definite plans, now, but there were so many ways in which they could be frustrated! Weald's political leaders could not oppose hysterical demands for action against blueskins, after a deathship arrived with no signs whatever of blueskins as responsible for its cargo of corpses. It was certain that a starving Dara would tend to desperate and fatal measures against hereditary enemies.
Calhoun sat down at the control-board and watched the clock.