Miles, Mystery & Mayhem - Lois McMaster Bujold [217]
Dropping Miles from his attention with an almost audible thump, Ryoval stood back with his hands on his hips and regarded the null-gee bubble's inhabitant. "My agent didn't exaggerate her charms."
Fell smiled sourly. Nicol had withdrawn—recoiled—when Ryoval first approached, and now floated behind her instrument, fussing with its tuning. Pretending to be fussing with its tuning. Her eyes glanced warily at Ryoval, then returned to her dulcimer as if it might put some magic wall between them.
"Can you have her play—" Ryoval began, and was interrupted by a chime from his wrist com. "Excuse me, Georish." Looking slightly annoyed, he turned half-away from them and spoke into it. "Ryoval. And this had better be important."
"Yes, m'lord," a thin voice responded. "This is Manager Deem in Sales and Demonstrations. We have a problem. That creature House Bharaputra sold us has savaged a customer."
Ryoval's greek-statue lips rippled in a silent snarl. "I told you to chain it with duralloy."
"We did, my lord. The chains held, but it tore the bolts right out of the wall."
"Stun it."
"We have."
"Then punish it suitably when it awakes. A sufficiently long period without food should dull its aggression—its metabolism is unbelievable."
"What about the customer?"
"Give him whatever comforts he asks for. On the House."
"I . . . don't think he'll be in shape to appreciate them for quite some time. He's in the clinic now. Still unconscious."
Ryoval hissed. "Put my personal physician on his case. I'll take care of the rest when I get back downside, in about six hours. Ryoval out." He snapped the link closed. "Morons," he growled. He took a controlled, meditative breath, and recalled his social manner as if booting it up out of some stored memory bank. "Pardon the interruption, please, Georish."
Fell waved an understanding hand, as if to say, Business.
"As I was saying, can you have her play something?" Ryoval nodded to the quaddie.
Fell clasped his hands behind his back, his eyes glinting in a falsely benign smile. "Play something, Nicol."
She gave him an acknowledging nod, positioned herself, and closed her eyes. The frozen worry tensing her face gradually gave way to an inner stillness, and she began to play, a slow, sweet theme that established itself, rolled over, and began to quicken.
"Enough!" Ryoval flung up a hand. "She's precisely as described."
Nicol stumbled to a halt in mid-phrase. She inhaled through pinched nostrils, clearly disturbed by her inability to drive the piece through to its destined finish, the frustration of artistic incompletion. She stuck her hammers into their holders on the side of the instrument with short, savage jerks, and crossed her upper and lower arms both. Thorne's mouth tightened, and it crossed its arms in unconscious echo. Miles bit his lip uneasily.
"My agent conveyed the truth," Ryoval went on.
"Then perhaps your agent also conveyed my regrets," said Fell dryly.
"He did. But he wasn't authorized to offer more than a certain standard ceiling. For something so unique, there's no substitute for direct contact."
"I happen to be enjoying her skills where they are," said Fell. "At my age, enjoyment is much harder to obtain than money."
"So true. Yet other enjoyments might be substituted. I could arrange something quite special. Not in the catalog."
"Her musical skills, Ryoval. Which are more than special. They are unique. Genuine. Not artificially augmented in any way. Not to be duplicated in your laboratories."
"My laboratories can duplicate anything, sir." Ryoval smiled at the implied challenge.
"Except originality. By definition."
Ryoval spread his hands in polite acknowledgment of the philosophical point. Fell, Miles gathered, was not just enjoying the quaddie's musical talent, he was vastly enjoying the possession of something his rival keenly wanted to buy, that he had absolutely no need to sell. One-upmanship was