Read The Gripping Hand for Free Online Page A

Empire, largely at his own expense, and I'm the guy the Navy assigned to watch him. He's dedicated, too. I've never caught him doing anything that would get in the way of his mission." Except once, he remembered.
     
     

    "Why Outies? Vengeance? Outies gored his ox?"
     
     

    Renner sighed. "Horace doesn't give a damn about Outies. Outies take up time and resources. Anything that distracts the Empire from dealing with Moties is a threat to the human race and the children of Allah. Moties frightened Horace once. Nobody does that twice. Horace wants them extinct."
     
     

    Ruth Cohen looked puzzled. She glanced at the recorders. "Captain, if the Moties did break out, would they be that big a threat?"
     
     

    "I don't know," Renner said. "It's not impossible. It isn't that their technology is so much better than ours, as that their instinct for technology is beyond anything we know. Humans are better at science, but once the principles have been discovered, the Moties—the Browns, anyway, the Engineers—are better at turning them to practical use than any humans who ever lived.
     
     

    "Example. They'd never heard of the Langston Field when we arrived at Mote Prime, and before we left their system they'd made improvements we never thought of! Another example: the magic coffeepot we got off MacArthur . By now that technology is all over the Empire, even here. I'm sure some variant of the coffeepot is used to get the alcohol out of the sake I was drinking night before last."
     
     

    "Thank you. Have you other observations?"
     
     

    "Yeah. My own plans. Bury's paranoia can be useful sometimes, but I don't like seeing him so nervous. He might do something . . . hasty. Anyway, I trust he'll be busting his arse to find what he thinks are Moties. That leaves me free to track Outies, if that's what we're facing. I want to show Bury that the Moties are still safely bottled up.
     
     

    "We can't trust anyone but Bury's people, so we don't have any troops. Can't use the local cops. But there are some . . . mmm, avenues. Where has Captain Fox been sending his cargo pods? Is there an Outie base in the asteroids? Why the peculiar flow of money? Imperial Autonetics is constantly being picked at by embezzlers. Robbing a corporation, it's like robbing a machine, for some people. Here, it doesn't look like anyone's being robbed."
     
     

    She was smiling again. "Is that bad?"
     
     

    "Well . . . it's odd . Something is hidden but nobody's being robbed."
     
     

    "What will you do?"
     
     

    "I'll do Renner." He grinned at her. "I'll spend money. I'll make passes at pretty girls, and ask shopkeepers about whatever they're selling, and buy people drinks and generally get them talking. Maybe . . . yeah, maybe I'll look into where opal meerschaum comes from."
     
     

    She was looking at him, frowning. "Alone?"
     
     

    "More or less. I'll keep Bury's household posted as best I can. This is what I do."
     
     

    "Anything else to report?"
     
     

    Renner shook his head, and Ruth turned off the recorders. "I always did wonder about the regulations about Moties," she said. "What do we do now?"
     
     

    "First, you get this recording off to Sector. You do understand that no one on this planet sees it first?"
     
     

    "Give me a little credit—"
     
     

    "Oh, I've always known that beauty and brains go together. There are implications, you know."
     
     

    "Lots of them," Ruth said. "Kevin, have you thought this through? The True Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints has power. And a lot of members. If you're threatening it . . ."
     
     

    "They'll have plenty of gunmen. Sure. Now think about what we could be doing to threaten that Church."
     
     

    "I did. So far I got nothing."
     
     

    "Me either," Renner said. "So I'll keep poking around."
     
     

     
     
     

    Shopping centers had never come into vogue on the Purchase. Big and little shops were scattered through the city, a sudden surprise