‘So there’s only Hoop for you to get. What happens when you do get him - when you’ve killed him?’

Keech looked down at the lozenge of metal on its chain around his neck. ‘Option one is that I die completely,’ he said. ‘I am exploring other options.’

‘That is a changer nanofactory?’ said Tay, pointing at the lozenge.

‘It is. Tell me more about Hoop.’

‘The mission you were on drove Hoop and his crew from here and scattered them. With their wealth and the experience of a couple of centuries of life, they established themselves in niches across this sector. The Talsca twins and David Grenant were hunted down and killed by the Friends of Cojan. It’s believed they were lowered feet-first into boiling water.’ Tay stopped talking when she saw Keech nodding.

‘I can confirm part of that,’ Keech said. ‘I knew Francis Cojan quite well. He kept a holocording of the event that he showed me. But I only saw the Talsca twins on that recording. It took them a long time to die and they died hard.’

‘I see . . . Gosk Balem returned here and died in the sea. Hoopers who were the direct descendants of slaves the Eight kept here, or were original slaves themselves, threw him into a leech swarm in Nort sea. That one is well documented. Frane and Rimsc were the ones you tracked down. Frisk and Hoop fled from the sector and lived on a world in Prador space for fifty years. That comes from Frisk. She left him there and just went and handed herself over to ECS. Attack of conscience? There seems no other explanation.’

‘And Hoop? What about Hoop?’

Tay looked at him very directly.

‘Hoop is here,’ she said.

Keech said nothing. He moved not at all.

Tay went on, ‘A hundred and sixty-three years ago a craft was detected by the Warden. It went into orbit and attempted a sea landing. It was a very old craft. Unfortunately the Segre atolls got in its way and it crashed. The wreckage was found to be that of the Prador landing craft Hoop favoured - the craft he called Bucephalus. There was blood in the craft and it was Hoop’s. There was no trace of Hoop himself.’

‘It is not certain that he is still here then,’ said Keech.

‘It is. No spacecraft have come to Spatterjay since. The only way out is through the runcible gate on Coram, and the Warden monitors that. Humans might forget criminal activity. AIs forget nothing.’

‘He could be dead, then?’

‘He might have been injured enough to bleed, which is unusual for an old Hooper, but he is the oldest Hooper in existence, perhaps a thousand years. What do you think?’

‘Rumours?’

‘I’ve heard a few. Some have it that he is operating as a ship captain. Others have it that he went native and became something . . . horrible. Have you heard the legend of the Skinner?’