“There,” he said. “Is mended.”
Villiers picked it up and studied it while McBe continued to stare. Villiers touched his mustache for comparison. He was young enough that six years had changed him substantially, but the alien’s adscription did much to harmonize man and likeness.
“You’re right,” he said, nodding. “I do believe you’ve caught my very spirit.”
“He held the picture for McBe’s inspection. “Don’t you agree that the addition of a mustache gives me a gravity that formerly I lacked? I don’t know why I didn’t grow one years ago when my need was greater.” McBe was confirmed in his dislike of the man.
The alien made the throbbing noise again: “Thurb.” He had the contented look of a toad in summer.
Villiers said, “Perhaps I should grow a beard as well.” He considered the picture again, and then looked about for the pen. “Do you mind?”
His intention caused McBe to snatch the pen up. “No!” he said, which Villiers rightly took to mean that he did mind.
McBe said to the alien, “It is a serious matter to deface official papers.”
McBe said to Villiers, “A very serious matter. There are penalties. It is a very good thing for you that you didn’t compound the offense.”
McBe said to the alien, “Do you realize. . .”
McBe said to Villiers, “Your papers, if you please.” He thumbed to the front. He moved his finger as he read.
McBe said to the alien, “Do you realize that you might be fined a full five royals, and subjected to penalties under four statutes?” He held up the book and pointed to the statute numbers.
McBe said to Villiers, whom he didn’t like, “And you should know better, sir.”
“Your pardon,” said Villiers. “I’m sure he intended no harm. If the picture needs replacement, as you suggest, then no harm has been done. Let us replace the picture, and all will be as it should.”
McBe leaned back and looked at him through narrowed eyes. The effect—for McBe was not totally without presence—was redolent of authority.
“Are you trying to teach me my business?” he asked, the age-old question of authority challenged. “Defacement is defacement. It may be enough to change the picture, and it may not. I think I shall have to have a closer look at your papers in any case.”
If Villiers had deferred properly, McBe would have been ready to let him go his own way, but instead the young man looked down his cool nose and said, “Really? A matter of routine, I suppose?”
“Yes,” said McBe. “A matter of routine. I’m sure you understand.”
He checked the time, and the thought of cost to his schedule made him more peevish. If his schedule suffered appreciably, he expected to show Mr. Villiers a thing or two about bureaucracy.
He pointed to the alien. “Next, there. Let me see your papers. Pa-pers.”
“To be sure,” the alien said, and presented his book.
McBe flipped through it. “Well,” he said. “At least you haven’t marked your own book.”
He stamped it, bam, and handed it back. “Listen—it was very wrong of you to mark the book. Never do anything like that again. Now follow the yellow line and it will take you out.”
Don’t think it strange that McBe challenged Villiers rather than the alien. McBe knew to a fine degree exactly what he was capable of coping with.
The alien looked at him and the black pits in his blue blue eyes pulsed questioningly. For a panicked moment, McBe thought be might make that noise again.
He drew breath and said, “Shoo. Go along. I’m done with you.”
The alien said, “I am done with you, too. Is agreed. Goodbye.”
Villiers said, “Goodbye.”
McBe said nothing. He sat unmoving until the alien had padded off to find where the yellow line had it in mind to go. Then he swished his nasal passages, rose, and said, “Come along.”
But he left Villiers’ papers on the desk. Villiers rescued them and handed them over when McBe suddenly turned halfway to the exit. Villiers raised his eyebrows. He had parallel wrinkles over each brow that rose into prominence as the brows rose, and seconded every comment they made.
It was excellent natural equipment and Villiers made good use of it. McBe was sure then that he disliked Villiers. It took little to confirm a suspicion like that. He nodded coldly for Villiers to proceed.
* * *
Slyne was an Orthodoxou. Orthodoxous are unmistakable, clothed by nature in black velvet, bodies bulbous, heads enclosed but for the wet tip of the nose in the metal lattice of their sensory amplifiers. Slyne was an unmistakable Orthodoxou, the only one in the entire Imperial Service. He was the first. He had the feeling of being watched, justified to some extent by his promotion to his present position on Delbalso after his success in a bit of amateur detection that keyed in significantly to the Diced Strawberry Affair on Able II. (That was a code name—the reality was more sinister.) His ambition was to be an Inspector General some day, an example for the Empire and for other Orthodoxous of what an Orthodoxou might be.
Orthodoxous have no talent for the construction of elaborate artificial systems, but they admire rigmarole immensely and find great satisfaction in making the most of it. Naturally, Imperial Service would have great appeal for them, so if Slyne had the feeling of being watched, it might have been because other distant eyes were peering brightly, observing his good works.
Slyne was earnest and diligent, and unable to understand why he was not loved. He was not loved because he was not lovable.
He was McBe’s superior, looking for McBe, as he so often was. He liked McBe too well for McBe’s comfort. He was always asking what McBe was doing. He was always hanging about trying to entertain McBe with a recital of Empire regulations, or some boring story of a minor exploit that had boosted him into his present position of niggling authority.
Slyne found McBe in his “office”—his cubicle. He had a young man with him. Slyne sniffed at them, his wet nose wriggling through the grillwork.
McBe shied, and then said defensively, “I have defaced and outdated papers here. I was going to run a Random Depth Inspection on them.”
The young man said nothing. Slyne wriggled his nose.
Then Slyne said, “Well, continue, then.”
McBe looked at the time. “I’m behind schedule,” he said. He shoved the papers at Slyne. “Here. Why don’t you take over? Could you, please?”
He plunged out of the room and then kitty-corner into the sanctuary of the toilet. It was on his schedule for the end of the day, but he was more abrupt about it than he usually was. The door slid shut behind him and locked and a discreet green light went on above.
The Orthodoxou looked at the young man. More properly, he looked in the direction of the young man. It was hard to tell exactly what he was looking at behind the amplifier.
“You defaced your papers?” he said.
“No,” said the young man.
“How are the papers defaced?”
“A mustache,” said the young man. He showed the picture.
Slyne took the papers and peered at them, then at their bearer. “A mustache? Ornamental lip hair?”
“True. I wear a mustache.”
“I see that you do.”
“My picture showed no mustache.”
“It should have. It is best to keep these things regular, Mr. Villiers.”
“So Mr. McBe said.”
“Is that when you defaced your papers?” Slyne eyed the door to the toilet, but the green light was still on. He turned back to Villiers. “It’s against regulations to deface official papers, you know.” He named the regulations. He knew his regulations.
“I’m sure that it is,” said Villiers, “and quite properly, too. But as it happens, it was not I who defaced the picture, but another passenger, apparently with insufficient grasp of the basic importance of official papers. We traveled here in the same ship. A most remarkable character, and not predictable.”
“You claim that it was another that defaced the papers?”
“Yes.”
“Where is this other passenger?”
“Gone. Mr. McBe stamped his papers and sent him on his way.”
“That seems unusual,” said Slyne. “McBe should have kept him in hand until the matter has had its due. I think we had best ask McBe for an explanation. McBe!”
And there you have the value of a sensory amplifier. The toilet door had just opened and McBe had emerged. Slyne spoke without turning. It was almost a good enough trick for a party.
McBe came slowly to the door. “Yes, sir.”
Slyne said, “How was the picture defaced?”
Villiers looked on with calm interest. His manner throughout was unconcerned. Whether it was innocent interest or arrogant assurance that he displayed was a matter for question. It might have been either.
McBe said, “The alien marked it.”
“The alien?”
“There was an alien in my line, just off the charterboat. He marked the picture. But the papers are still outdated.”
“You let him go?”
“His papers looked all right.”
“What kind of alien was it?”
McBe said, “I don’t know. Excuse me, sir. I’m supposed to be off duty now.”
He really did have a schedule. He needed one, since the Imperial Service did not see fit to direct his life with the fineness that he required. His schedule held his life together.
Slyne said, “Mr. McBe, you will not be done until I tell you that you are done.”
“I warned the alien,” McBe said defensively.
“That’s very commendable. Describe the alien, please.”
“Well, furry. Bigger than you. Big blue eyes.”
“A Trog,” said Villiers quietly.
“A Trog!” exclaimed Slyne.
And well he might exclaim. Trogs are Restricted, confined since the end of the War of Orion’s Ear to their two home solar systems. Trogs are strange and uncertain creatures and only some fifty are allowed to travel with even relative ease. You would be fortunate to see one in a lifetime.
“Did you examine his Permit to Travel? Did you check his Red Card?”
“No,” said McBe. “I guess I didn’t.”
Slyne looked at him reproachfully. He wasn’t quite sure why he allowed McBe to continue in service, except that he liked the way McBe smelled. It is an article of faith with some Orthodoxous that each of them shall search for that elusive and ultimate odor that once found rules life. Slyne had always thought this romantic foolishness, but that was before he had come to Delbalso and met McBe. He was less smugly certain now that the tradition was without foundation. He felt giddy around McBe, and was ashamed because he knew it bad for his ambition.
McBe said, “He must have been too clever for me.”
”That would explain things,” said Slyne. “What color was the Trog?”
It is a fact that Trogs, unlike humans, are significantly color-coded. Peasants are a basic gray metamorphosing to olive. Soldiers are white striped with black. And scholars are always brown, solid brown, nothing but brown, never anything but brown, and that is that. If you were a Trog and you weren’t brown, you wouldn’t even be interested.
McBe thought about the color of the beast. Since he thought in black and white, it was difficult for him to remember things like that. “Brown,” he said at last.
That was true, but insufficient. Villiers knew better: the Trog had had a white belly and faint black stripes on his back. But Villiers did not correct McBe, perhaps out of politeness.
“A scholar,” concluded Slyne, demonstrating the deleterious effects of imperfect data on conclusion. “Perhaps we should begin to look for him in libraries and educational institutions.”
“We?” said McBe.
“Of course, we,” said Slyne, wriggling his nose through the wire cage. “This is a Restricted Sentient. The Empire doesn’t set restrictions idly. We’ll have to find him, and start now.”
McBe looked at the time and whimpered. Slyne looked at Villiers, who withdrew his attention. Slyne drew McBe aside. This involved a paw placed against McBe’s chest, a bird cage next to his ear, and the sound of an occasional whuffle of deeply breathed air. McBe hardly flinched. Give him credit.
Slyne said quietly, “A new Administrator is due to assume authority here at any moment. Think of your job, McBe.”
“A new Administrator?” said McBe. It had been the main topic of conversation within the Rock for a month but McBe hadn’t been listening. That is, he knew, he had heard, but the information had not penetrated his defenses.
“Yes,” said Slyne. His wet nose touched McBe’s earlobe and he whuffled. McBe’s shoulder shuddered slightly, but you couldn’t call that a flinch.
“If this Trog is a scholar, it may not be so dangerous, but, even so, it must be found. It is up to you and me. I don’t think that you have been doing your job as your job should be done. McBe, I shall be watching you. You shall show me a new McBe. And together we will find this Trog. If it has a proper set of papers, it may go its way. If it does not, you and I shall take it into custody. If you perform well, you will be excused. But if you do not perform well—or if trouble should come of this—I shall sacrifice you to the new Administrator. I have my career to bear in mind. If you care to continue to wear Empire livery, it had best be a new McBe. Starting this minute. Now straighten up.”
This sounded impressively threatening, and in fact McBe did feel threatened. Though he did his work badly, and took no pleasure in it, the thought of searching for a different employ in which greater demands might be made of him was genuinely frightening.
Slyne snuffled and his nose nuzzled McBe’s ear. McBe had more latitude than he knew. But since he had no appreciation of the fact, he straightened up and tried to look as though he cared about the alien, as though he cared about doing a proper job, as though he didn’t mind abandoning his imperative need to put on his night light and crawl under the covers. Outside? At night? He almost broke, but he was too frightened, so he bent.
“Yes, sir,” he said. It was just as well that he had already observed the previous part of his agenda.
Slyne turned and said, “And now, Mr. Villiers. We must talk about your defective papers.”
McBe made a quick swipe of ear against shoulder, and then became aware that Villiers had observed him, which caused a rush of cold followed by radiant resentment.
Villiers turned his attention to Slyne. He said, “Perhaps the matter can be settled with some ease.”
He reached within his coat and produced a large flat wallet, which he opened.
McBe said, “Bribery?” He didn’t say it too loudly. He got halfway into the word, and then finished it as a question.
Villiers said, “Sir, while it might be possible to bribe you, nothing in our short acquaintance leads me to the belief that there could be any conceivable benefit in doing so. Accordingly, I shall forego the opportunity you have just proffered. I trust you will not take it amiss, and will forgive me if I have misjudged you.”
To Slyne, he said, “I thought to supplement my papers with various items of identification. If you find them satisfactory, perhaps you will allow me to travel on the planet and will monish my papers as you please in the meantime. Here, to begin, is my Patent.”
“You have a title?” Slyne asked, to and by appearances impressed.
“Viscount Charteris,” said Villiers. He said it with the straightest of faces.
* * *
First, out of the Rock came the Trog, following the yellow line.
Brown, basically. Friendly in appearance.
The sun had set by then, and the Rock was black with night. The air was cool. The Trog tested the evening and then followed the will of the road down into the town.
After some search, he found Joralemon House of the Delbalso Monist Association. The Monist Association had a house in each of the quarters of Delbalso. Joralemon Hous
e was a rambling pile, its palisade enclosing armfuls of gardens and buildings. It had once been smaller, but after the way of Monist Associations, it was still growing. Joralemon House had fourteen gates and doors.
The Trog padded around the perimeter. He paused at one gate and then passed on. Eventually he stopped outside a door and in the fullness of time the door opened.
“Hello,” he said to the Warder. “I am Torve. I wish to see Badrian Beaufils.”
“What is your business?” asked the Warder.
“We are pen pals,” said Torve the Trog.
“Oh, well, come in, then,” said the man, and welcomed him within. “Now that I think of it, I believe I’ve heard him make mention of you.”
He closed the great wooden door behind them.
* * *
Second, out of the Rock came Villiers. He was out of difficulty and into the cool clear air five minutes after he announced himself. It is clear—a title can be an advantage. Imagine the coils if he had not declared the game over by revealing himself.
In fact, however, it hardly seems proper behavior. It is certainly fair for a noble to go incognito, just as it is for a common man to occasionally assume a weekend title. But if nobles are going to go incognito, they should have the grace to stay incognito come the last muffin on the plate. But they never do. No, they stand, announce themselves, and in the stunned silence they gobble the muffin. Clearly they are taught the wrong things in childhood.
Villiers failed to look properly ashamed of himself. He threw his cloak back and looked around for directions to a city car. He was smiling. And then he laughed out of sheer exuberant good spirits.
Taught all the wrong things in childhood.
* * *
Last, out of the Castle came Slyne and McBe. Slyne had buttressed memory with research and now knew Trogs for exactly the uncertain creatures they were. Empire Regulations were the guide.
Empire Regulations are quite specific. Trogs are not to be allowed to travel. Their principles of behavior not yielding to ready analysis, they must be considered dangerous. Even scholars. If you like, especially scholars.
The doors opened at the foot of the Rock. They stood for a moment looking out at the night. There was light from the spray of stars and a glow from the town, but mainly it was dark. McBe felt dismay.
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