"Maybe later," she said. "I know it's kinda early in the day, but..."

"Hm?"

"Can we make love?"

He rose, pulled her upright, and gathered her to him. "There's no wrong time of day for that."

Barton Morelon rose to answer the knock, opened the door to his little office, and fell back a pace in confusion.

Douglas Kramnik stood with his hands folded before him. His expression was funereally solemn.

"Do you have a moment for me, Bart?"

Barton stepped aside and gestured him in. Douglas took the guest chair as Barton returned to his seat at his desk. Each glanced once furtively at the other, then looked away. Neither spoke for a protracted interval.

Presently Douglas said "Nice office."

"It's not much," Barton said, "compared to yours." He nodded at his sole filing cabinet. "Fortunately, I don't need a lot of space."

"What about the back records?"

"We don't keep most of them for long. The ones we do are stored downstairs, just off the hearthroom." Barton smirked. "I'd say you, personally, have more paper clutter than all of Clan Morelon."

"I probably do, what with the investment tracking." Douglas smirked. "I don't mind. Better that than all the computer junk Althea is always complaining about."

It prompted a snort from Barton. "She does swear at it a lot. If it weren't for Martin, she'd probably have pitched it all into the Kropotkin ages ago and gone back to paper records." He sobered and leaned forward. "How have you been?"

Douglas shrugged. "Mostly very busy."

After four years, that's all he has to say.

"And the clan?"

"Things are pretty good...back home." Douglas shrugged. "The new textiles are a big hit, especially the sheets. We're solidly in the black. The extra money from my gig over here helped a lot, at first. These days it just pays for...luxuries and indulgences."

Barton nodded. "Do 'luxuries' include Hallanson-Albermayer treatments for the other adults? Or would those be 'indulgences?'"

"Son-"

Barton held up a hand. "Stop right there."

Douglas's eyes widened in obvious dismay. "I didn't mean-"

"Don't say that." Barton swallowed. "Maybe you didn't mean it. But maybe you did. Leave me my hopes." Something was rising through his chest. He tried to repress it, but it was larger and stronger than he. He closed his eyes as tightly as he could, fought vainly to hold back his tears, but they leaked out anyway.

"Tell me, Dad," he forced out, "was I your son on the day you told me my desires didn't matter to you? Or on the day you put a soporific needle in me, trussed me up, and locked me in a storeroom? Or on the day I married?" He opened his eyes and stared hard at his father. "Or on any day since then, you callous bastard?"

Douglas gaped at him, aghast.

"You want something," Barton said. "You must. You shook my hand at my wedding without looking at me or saying a word. You kissed Charisse and Althea-Charisse, who threatened to have you killed, and Althea, who very nearly did-but you wouldn't go near Nora. For four years you've worked on the damned investments with Patrice and Chuck, and all that time I've been right here, in this office, keeping the clan's books, but you've never come to see me even once. So you must want something, and it has to be huge. Tell me what it is and leave me in peace with my new family."

He glared at his father, all the fury he'd suppressed over his abandonment unleashed at last.

Douglas Kramnik met that glare but did not return it. His eyes were sadder than any memory of loss. Presently he broke the embrace of their gazes and bowed his head.

"You're right," he said softly. "I did want something. I was going to ask for a few details about Morelon family financial arrangements. There's a discrepancy on the investment side, an overage that Patrice and I have been puzzling over. But I can see now that it was wrong of me to come to you for it."

He rose and met his son's eyes again.

"I'm sorry, Bart. I'll leave you alone. Forever, if that's your wish."

He pulled open the office door, stepped through it, and closed it silently behind him.

Barton listened to the diminishing cadence of his father's receding footsteps, buried his face in his arms, and wept.

Chapter 16: Quartember 6, 1307 A.H.

As the Grenier Air Guppy turned from the taxiway onto the runway, its twin propellers went to maximum speed, announcing the pilot's intentions with a piercing blast of wind and sound. The plane rolled down the runway, gathered speed, and seemingly at the last possible moment rotated off the tarmac and into the sky. It gained altitude swiftly, banked into the gloom to the west, and was soon lost to sight.

"Neither of you," Adam Grenier said, "has ever done that. I hope you don't think it's easy."

Althea grinned. "Our job will be easier than what that pilot had to do. In atmosphere, Freedom's Horizon is a single-engine jet. That one engine generates more thrust than all your planes put together, and then some. The combined lift from the wings and fuselage should get us off the runway before we pass the midpoint."

Grenier cast a skeptical eye back at the spaceplane. "Should."

"It's not our favorite word, either," Martin said, "but the math and the dyno tests have us pretty confident. Anyway, the only way to find out is to fire her up and try it."

Grenier chuckled, shook his head, and peered off to the east. Despite the onset of twilight, the sky was clear to the horizon. The wind was a gentle easterly breeze. "If the weather holds, and you two remain as crazed as you are today, you can launch tomorrow at 1600." He cocked an eyebrow at them. "What about the landing? How long should I keep the field clear?"

"Can you hold it open for us until 2000?" Althea said. "If our figures are right, that's more than twice what we'll need for the first flight, but I'd rather not take any chances."

"Done," Grenier said. "And to whom do I deliver the sad news when you auger in?"

The line was delivered through a smirk and in a jocular tone, as if Grenier intended to suggest that such a conclusion was impossible. It sobered Althea even so. She wrapped an arm around Martin's waist and pulled him against her.

"I'd rather not discuss that possibility," she murmured. "Anyway, if it happens, we'll try to leave our corpses somewhere other than your airstrip, so you won't have that duty, okay?"

The humor went out of Adam Grenier's face. He nodded. Martin extended a hand, Grenier shook it, and they parted for the day.

As they neared Morelon House, Althea squeezed Martin gently and said, "Excited?"

He glanced down at her. "Nervous."

"About the engine?"

He nodded.

"The prototype worked okay."

"Yes, it did," he said, "at one-twentieth of its full power, fastened down to a dyno bench with enough cable to lasso the Relic and pull it out of orbit. And in case you've forgotten, the real engine is about four hundred times more powerful."

"Martin-"

He chuckled mirthlessly. "Let me be nervous, love. One of us has to do the worrying, and you're not a good fit to the job."

"Okay."

It was enough to make her feel guilty about her own state of high excitement.

-Don't take that onto your shoulders, Al. One of you brooding is quite enough.

Oh, hi, Grandpere. Yeah, I guess so. But it makes me wonder.

-About what, dear?

About whether I'm too much of an optimist.

-(humor) You're an optimist for good and sufficient reasons, Al. Name one thing you've failed at.

Well...I'm not a terribly good cook.

-You're a lot better than you were, at least if Martin's reactions are any criterion. But that's a continuous scale. Give me a case of absolute failure. Something you tried to do with all your might but got nowhere with it.

She thought hard.

I'm not coming up with anything, Grandpere.

-Let me know when you do. Until then, be as optimistic as you please. You've got plenty of justification.

"Atmospheric flight only tomorrow, love," she said as he reached toward the mansion's front doors. "We'll be okay even if the engine quits completely."

He pulled open the door and waved her inside. He did not look at her.

"I hope so."

They passed the dinner hour in silence.

Charisse looked up in irritation as the door to her office swung open. Her features softened as her husband stepped through. She rose and went to greet him as he pushed the door closed behind him. Her arms went snugly around him, and he kissed the top of her head.

"You work too much, darlin'," he said.

She nodded against his chest. "It has to get done."

He peered down into her face. "Is there really that much more than back when we married?"

She thought about it.

"I can't say," she said at last. "It does seem that way, sometimes. The farm is the source of most of it, but the farm isn't much larger than it was back then." She snorted. "The clan is, though."

"Not that much since...these past few years," he said. "Three new spouses, a handful of kids, and a couple of charity cases."

"Not enough kids," she said.

He squeezed her gently. "Still fretting about that?"

"No, not really." She kept her tone casual by main force. "But it would have made some things a lot simpler."

"The succession?" he said.

She nodded again. "Althea's madness puts a lot of things at risk."

"You're that worried for her?"

"For her and the clan," she said. "Who becomes scion if this latest stunt gets her killed?"

His brow furrowed. "Why is that a problem? We've got several-"

"Chuck," she said, "this clan has always been managed by a direct descendant of Alain Morelon. Ever since the Hegira."

A shadow passed over his features.

"That's why, isn't it?"

"Hm?"

He fixed her with a solemn look. "Why you tried so hard to keep Alice and Agatha from marrying out of the clan and took it so badly when they did."

She said nothing.

"Either of them would have taken the job whenever you were ready to lay it down. You crapped out with Althea, even if you didn't think so at the time. She's not just the last Morelon from that line, she's the best of us by far. She'll never agree to accept your duties." He waved an arm at the skies. "There's a lot of world out there, and she's determined to see all of it."

"Or have all of it," Charisse muttered.

"Hm?"

She scowled at him. "Have you any idea of the size of her personal account? She's richer than all the rest of the clan, even if we throw in the capital value of our land and tools. At the rate she's making money, within three years she'll be Hope's first billionaire. And she's ready to blow it all, down to the last cent, all because my dead brother wanted her to go to Earth!"