Mel took it and immediately felt dirtier than when he’d entered the room. Without waiting for an invitation he sat himself down on a comfortable-looking old easy chair. It was covered in hand-stitched upholstery and was worth a few thousand credits at the least.

“Can I order something for you, Captain? Liquid refreshment, mayhap? The congenial companionship of a nubile young lady? Well-trained, I assure you.”

“A fast shot of bloodhype, perhaps?” said Mal evenly. He’d taken the offensive since sitting himself down and intended to maintain it until he left the island kilometers behind. “Don’t try and look startled. You knew I had it and you knew I knew what it was, or I wouldn’t be here now. No, skip the oh-so-coy verbal byplay, too. I don’t appreciate it and I’ve no time for it.”

Rose sighed with great care. “So few of the accepted verities remain these days. You youngsters ignore the pleasures of a game you don’t even understand. Such hurry, such rush, such haste to make money! But as you will. How much?”

“It’s not for sale.”

“Oh come now, Captain!” chuckled the old merchant. “Everything is for sale! I know. I’ve bought it. Your very livelihood depends on how astutely you hire your body and the bodies of your crew out to the highest bidder. And you profess to know what is and what is not available for sale!” The last words dripped contempt.

“I won’t shoot words with you, Rose. You’ve more experience at it than I, for one thing. For another, long dialogues full of double-entendres and metaphors bore the crap out of me. Also, you might just trick me into saying the wrong thing at the wrong time and I’d feel bound by it. Now, this is what I want:

“I want you to halt all traffic in bloodhype. I want you to destroy any not yet shipped. I want you to supply a list of known addicts—addicts, Rose; not pushers, not dealers, addicts—to Church authorities so that those few cases which haven’t passed the point of no return can be treated. I want you to make a respectable effort—if you have enough control, which I suspect you do—to shut off all production of the drug and to destroy whatever growths or synthetics that furnish the raw stuff for the refined product.”

“That’s interesting,” Rose said, helping himself to a transparent chocolate from a silver dish nearby. “One thing for you, Captain. Your threats are specific. I like that.”

“Shipwaste!” Hammurabi said in disgust. “I said I wouldn’t bandy words.” He slammed a fist the size of a small ham onto an ancient coffee table. The old wood groaned alarmingly.

Rose swallowed the last of the chocolate, licked two fingers daintily.

“Pardon, Captain, but somehow you did not impress me as the altruistic type.”

“Any man’s nature contains a certain number of variables, Rose. On rare occasions it behooves some of us to do a decent thing.”

“Never suffered the urge,” replied the drugger.