Flandry; Familiar Faces

(Mayday Orbit is "A Message in Secret.")

The second paragraph of "A Message in Secret" informs us that this story is about:

"Captain Sir Dominic Flandry, field agent, Naval Intelligence Corps of the Terrestrial Empire..."
-Poul Anderson, "A Message in Secret" IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, 2010), pp. 341-397 AT p. 341.

On p. 306 of Captain Flandry..., he was described as:

"Captain Sir Dominic Flandry, Intelligence Corps, Imperial Terrestrial Navy..."

- and, on p. 307, he introduced himself as:

"Captain Sir Dominic Flandry, Imperial Navy Intelligence..."

These slightly different phrasings are translations from Anglic. Flandry is by now an established series character. In "A Message in Secret," he is a passenger in a Betelgeusean merchant spaceship. See also here. Flandry was in the Betelgeusean System in "Honorable Enemies." Thus, it is no surprise to the regular reader that the captain of the ship is blue-faced. The ship approaches yet another red sun, Krasna ("Red"), and its human-colonized planet, Altai ("Golden"). Regular readers remember that Altai was the home planet of Emil Dalmady and that both Dalmady and one of his daughters made their marks in The Earth Book Of Stormgate.

Like most planets, Altai is beautiful from space. More than half of the northern hemisphere and almost as much in the south is polar cap tinged red by Krasna although naked ice is blue or green. The tropical steppes and tundra shade from bronze to gold with large quicksilver lakes. There are two moons and rainbow rings.