full of inflammable gas."
"Oh, hell." Kostolitz seemed suddenly struck. "That stuff will go off, mixed with oxygen. I almost . . ." He cut himself off, cleared his throat again. "You don't miss much, do you?" A sudden suspicion filled his face. "Did you know about this setup in advance?"
"Not exactly. But I figured something must be up when I counted the three breath masks in the instructor's pocket."
"You—" Kostolitz paused, turned. "Did you really lose track of your light-pen?"
"No."
"Hell," Kostolitz muttered again. He scuffed around the corridor a moment, hunched, red, dismally recalcitrant.
Now, thought Miles. "I know a place you can buy good blades, in Vorbarr Sultana," he said with nicely calculated diffidence. "Better than standard-issue stuff.