Then the man flushed faintly. "Excuse me, but it isn't often we meet strangers. Everyone knows everyone else, of course. My name is Lindquist, Mr. Taine. Roger Lindquist."
Eric shook hands with him, stiffly, and he thought for a moment the man did not know the gesture. "Ah yes, handshaking," Lindquist laughed. "We simply show empty palms now, you know. But then, you don't know. I rather imagine you'll have a lot to learn."
Eric nodded, asked Lindquist if he might be shown about the ship. There was a lot he had to see, to check, to change if change were needed.
"Relax, my friend," Lindquist told him. "I'd—ah, like to suggest that we postpone your tour until you've met with our Council this afternoon. I'd very much like to suggest that."
Eric shrugged, said: "You know more about this than I do, Mr. Lindquist. We'll wait for your Council meeting."
"Thus, Mr. Taine," said Captain Larkin, hours later, "tradition has it that you become a king. King Lazarus Seven—with six Lazaruses before you. The first one, the histories say, was a joke. But it's stuck ever since. The people like this idea of a king who comes to them every twenty five years—and they've dubbed him with the name Lazarus, well, because if he didn't come back from the dead, he came back from something a lot like it."
Eric nodded. "What happened to Alan Bridges?"
"Who?" This was Lindquist.
"Alan Bridges, the man before me—your Lazarus Six."