"C. J. Cherryh - Chanur 02 - Chanur's Venture" - читать интересную книгу автора (Cherryh C J)

"Yes," Tully said, and looked at her in that way he had, his pale stare
desperately intense.
Her ears twitched, her nostrils widened with the scent of something more than
Meetpoint-sized amiss, more than a corrupt stsho and closed routes and xenophobe
stsho councils back in Llyene, atwitter over humanity that wanted through stsho
space. Mahen connivances. Kif greed. She looked back at Goldtooth. "Presents.
One fine present. Ha!"
Goldtooth lifted his head, his brown eyes half-lidded. "Tell you this, old
friend. Kif don't forget. They hunt me. Soon hunt you. Not revenge. Kif-thought.
Skikkik. Hunt me, hunt you. Tully come here -- Got one fine trouble this time.
This business Tully bring us only -- hurry things. Make timetable ours, not
kif's."
"Huh," she said. "So I take this gift. I don't like things coming at my back.
You watch yourself. You run far, mahe. You do good. Wish you luck."
"You got," Goldtooth said. "Wish you luck, hani."
She flicked her ears, indecisive, turned and stalked out the airlock through the
parting crowd of tall mahendo'sat.
Luck.
Luck indeed.


Her mind was not in it as she walked on down the dock. It kept sorting troubles
past and troubles future -- dangerous, she thought, catching a whiff of some
scent not mahendo'sat nor stsho, but something she could not, in this large,
cold space . . . identify.
Cargo, maybe. Maybe something else. It set her nose to twitching and set an itch
between her shoulderblades.
She did not look about, here on Meetpoint's docks, padding along the cold
deckplates, beside the gapings of ship accesses, out of which wafted more
friendly scents. There were other hani ships at Meetpoint. She had read the list
before she had put The Pride into dock: Marrar's Goiden Sun; Ayhar's Prosperity;
oh, yes, and Ehrran's Vigilance. That ship. That one, that Goldtooth had
mentioned, but not by name . . . that han's eyes, which were doubtless on other
business at the moment, but which were capable of catching small furtive moves
-- like a Chanur captain paying calls on mahen ships.
There were a dozen other mahen vessels in port: Tigimiransi, Catimin-shai,
Hamarandar were some she had known for years. And familiar stsho names, like
Assustsi, E Mnestsist, Heshtmit and Tstaarsem Nai. Round the wheel of Meetpoint,
beyond the great lock that separated oxy- from methane-breathers, ships went by
stranger titles: tc'a and knnn and chi names, if knnn had names at all. Tho'o'oo
and T'T'Tmmmi were tc'a/chi ships she had seen on docking lists before.
And kif. Of course there were kif. She had made a particular point to know those
names before she put The Pride in dock . .. names like Kekt and Harukk,
Tikkukkar, Pakakkt, Maktikkh, Nankktsikkt, Ikhoikttr. Kif names, she memorized
wherever she found them, a matter of policy -- to recall their routes, their
dockings, where they went and trading what.
The kif watched her routes with as much interest this last year. She was very
sure of that.
She did not loiter on the docks, but she made no particular haste which might
attract attention on its own. She stared at this and that with normal curiosity,