"Hello, Brock," I said. "What's new?"
Jack gave him a meaningless smile and said: "Hello, colonel." She was obviously not very impressed with either of us.
"Mind if I sit?" Brock asked.
We didn't, so he sat.
"I'm sorry I missed you at the spaceport," Brock said seriously, "but I had several of my boys there with their eyes open." He was quite obviously addressing Jack, not me.
"It's all right," Jack said. "I'm not going anywhere this time." She looked at me and gave me an odd grin. "I'm going to stay home and be a good girl this time around."
Colonel Brock's good-natured chuckle sounded about as genuine as the ring of a lead nickel. "Oh, you're no trouble, Miss Ravenhurst."
"Thank you, kind sir; you're a poor liar." She stood up and smiled sweetly. "Will you gentlemen excuse me a moment?"
We would and did. Colonel Brock and I watched her cross the room and disappear through a door. Then he turned to look at me, giving me a wry grin and shaking his head a little sadly. "So you got saddled with Jack the Ripper, eh, Oak?"
"Is she that bad?"