"Perhaps."
"You are modest." He fumbled at a pocket of his jacket, produced a scroll-sheaf. I recognized it. Blackstone's figures. The calculation Blackstone made of the asteroid we had passed.
"I am interested in these," Miko went on. "I want you to verify them. And this." He held up another scroll. "This is the calculation of our present position and our course. Hahn claims he is a navigator. We have set the ship's gravity plates—see, like this."
He handed me the scrolls. He watched me keenly as I glanced over them.
"Well?" I said.
"You are sparing of words, Haljan. By the devils of the airways, I could make you talk! But I want to be friendly."
I handed him back the scrolls. I stood up. I was almost within reach of his weapon, but with a sweep of his great arm he knocked me back to my bunk.
"You dare?" Then he smiled. "Let us not come to blows!"
In truth, physical violence could get me nothing. I would have to try guile. And I saw now that his face was flushed and his eyes unnaturally bright. He had been drinking alcolite; not enough to befuddle him, but enough to make him triumphantly talkative.
"Hahn may not be much of a mathematician," I suggested. "But there is your Sir Arthur Coniston." I managed a sarcastic grin. "Is that his name?"