"So . . . what does he see in Dr. Toscane, d'you think? Besides brains, beauty, a nice personality, a good sense of humor, social grace, wealth, and non-Vor genetics, that is?"

Alys vented a small, ladylike snort. "I think it's even simpler and more fundamental than that, though I doubt Gregor is conscious of it. Not to imitate one of your mother's annoying Betan-style instant psychoanalyses, but . . . Gregor's mother was murdered when he was five years old." Her red lips crimped briefly in old pain; Lady Alys had known Princess Kareen, back then. "Look at Dr. Toscane's figure. It's . . . maternal. Not a bone in sight anywhere. All that time I wasted herding tall, slender beauties past him, when I should have been rounding up short, plump beauties. I could cry." She ate a decisive bite of cream cake, instead.

Miles cleared his throat, neutrally. Gregor and Laisa rounded a corner, turned away, and passed up an alley of topiaried yew trees. Tall, thin Gregor strode at Laisa's stirrup, gesturing animatedly, smiling and talking. Laisa leaned half-toward him, over the saddle-bow, eyes shining, lips parted, listening with . . . all her heart, Miles feared.

"So, Miles," Alys went on, her voice cooler, "tell me about your Captain Galeni. It's not clear to me where he fits in all this."

"He's not my Captain," Miles said. "He's Gregor's Captain."

"But he's your friend, according to Ivan."

"Ivan worked with him much longer than I did."

"Quit evading the question. I have a feeling it's important, or could be. It's as much my job to prevent domestic disasters for Gregor as it is Simon's to prevent security ones or as it was your father's—it's Minister Racozy's job now, I suppose—to prevent political ones. Simon's ImpSec report claims Galeni and Dr. Toscane are not lovers."

"I . . . no. I don't think so either. He was courting her, though. That's why I invited them along to the Imperial State dinner in the first place. To help him out." Miles's Imperial luncheon was turning heavy, in his belly.

"But they are not formally engaged?"

"I don't think so."

"Had they talked about matrimony?"

"I don't know. I'm not exactly intimate with Galeni, y'know. We've just . . . worked together, thrown together once by accident in that mess with Mark on Earth, later by assignment during an ImpSec investigation of a certain nasty incident on Komarr. I think Galeni had marriage on his mind, yes. But he's a very closed man, for a lot of good reasons. I think it's been hard for him to try to get close to Laisa. Not because of what she is, but because of how he is, or how he's made himself. Slow, and deliberate, and careful."

Lady Alys tapped one long enameled fingernail on the lace tablecloth, unmarred, around her place, by crumbs or spills. "I need to know, Miles. Is Captain Galeni likely to be a problem over this? I don't want any more surprises."