"You'd better?" echoed Gwenlyn, scolding. "My father stayed with the fleet to try to explain what Talents, Incorporated can do! He kept most of the Talents with him, for demonstrations! The Department for Predicting Dirty Tricks is there! Don't you remember what that Department works on? Of course you've got to send those news-reports!"
Bors ordered a space-boat to come from the cargo-ship for the reports.
"Would you like to come to dinner on the yacht?" asked Gwenlyn. "You're all living on emergency rations. Nobody asked us to divide our supplies with the fleet. I can give you a nice meal."
"Better not," said Bors curtly, and mumbled thanks.
He ordered the cargo-ship to send as much of its stores as the space-boat could conveniently carry.
"Then how about some cigars?" asked Gwenlyn. She seemed at once amused and approving, because Bors would not indulge himself in a really satisfying meal while his crew lived on far from appetizing emergency foodstuffs.
"No," said Bors. "No cigars either. You said you had some news for me. What is it?"
"I brought along our ship-arrival Talent," said Gwenlyn blandly. "He can only tell when a ship will arrive at the solar system where he is, so he had to come here to precognize."
Bors felt again that stubborn incredulity which Talents, Incorporated would always rouse in a mind like his.
"There'll be a ship arriving here in two days, four hours, sixteen minutes from now," said Gwenlyn matter-of-factly. "He thinks it's a fighting ship, though he can't be sure. It could be a cruiser or something like that doing mail duty, coming to deliver orders and receive reports. You can't run an empire without a regular news system, and Mekin wouldn't depend on commercial ships for government business."