As we have seen, when Nicholas van Rijn appears to be at leisure, eating, drinking and yarning with Thea Beldaniel, his mind is working at top speed all the time. And Nick gets involved in the combat when necessary, never ceasing to look for a profit. Grabbing a gun from a Shenn, he says:
"'I take that thing home and see if you got new ideas in it I can patent.'" (David Falkayn: Star Trader, p. 582)
Although van Rijn is old and fat, he remains fast. The bigger and stronger Shenn yells at a karate kick and is felled by a blow from the statuette of St Dismas. That statuette has been with van Rijn from the beginning of the series and suddenly has a very practical application.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I certainly agree in saying Old Nick was very mentally agile! The bit about studying the Shen gun for any useful innovations was amusing!
The comment about the Martian sandroot statuette of St. Dismas reminds me of how I keep a small satuette of the Christ Child of Prague on my desk.
Sean
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