‘Didn’t say he was. But whatever Rackamore is, a captain’s part of it, and what drives the likes of them isn’t what drives the rest of us.’

‘So what does drive him?’

She drew a laboured breath. ‘They tell you about his daughter?’

I brought the water and cloth to her bedside. ‘Not much.’

‘Good. All things considered, maybe it’s better that way.’

Gradually it became clear who was and who wasn’t going down to the bauble. A few hours before the field was supposed to drop, they all gathered in the galley, half in and half out of their spacesuits, with their helmets on the magnetic table like trophies. Cazaray – he’d been with us in the bone room until the last minute – was the least prepared, and he was being helped into his suit by Prozor and Triglav, while Hirtshal helped the others check that their connections and lungstuff seals were all secure.

The suits were familiar to me now, and we had been shown how to use them in an emergency. Every part of them was brown, or some metallic shade that contained or reflected that hue: brown fabric, brown alloy seals, brown concertina joints, brown helmet, brown glass on the little porthole of the faceplate, brown bars across the front of that faceplate. Only a few smears of colour on the helmets and shoulders identified one suit from the others.

‘They’re old,’ Rackamore said. ‘And there’s not much in them that you wouldn’t have found a thousand years ago. Old isn’t always bad, though. It’s what we can afford, which is one thing, but it’s also what we know we can trust and repair easily.’ He knuckled the white crown of his own helmet. ‘Short-wave squawk. That’s all that you can bank on. No in built sensors or navigation overlays. No power amplification for the rest of the suit. If you have it, you’ll soon come to depend on it and you’ll lose the strength you need to get out of a jam when the suit goes limp on you. No energy weapons or cutting gear. Nothing that relies on power works well in a bauble, and you’re better off not counting on it. Gas torches work, most of the time. Electrical pumps and supply valves for the life support, hard to avoid those, but if they seize up – and sooner or later they will – you can run on pressure alone for a few hours. Can’t rely on a heater, either.’ He had dredged up a smile. ‘There’s a reason we like to get in and out quickly. Saves on the frostbite.’

Trysil was working her fingers in the glove, easing some movement into the stiff articulation of the joints. The gloves squeaked as if they needed oiling. I remembered Rackamore exercising his fingers and understood why.