Sam was starry-eyed.
Dar glanced at her, glanced again, and scowled. What was she looking moonstruck about? He glanced around quickly, but didn't see any gorgeous hunks of manhood nearby. As a last resort, he glanced back at Sam, and followed the direction of her gaze; it arrowed straight toward Horatio. Dar felt a sudden, biting jealousy, which surprised him.
“Now, then!” Horatio stopped in the middle of a wide, open field, chewed into mud at its center. “The lists are the most private place we'll find, at least until the next joust. Let's have your list. Who's chasing you first?”
“The Solar Patrol, at the moment,” Whitey answered with a grin, “cheered on by a weasel named Canis Destinus.”
“Canis what?” Horatio frowned. “Why is he on your trail?”
“Because I'm helping a friend.” Whitey nodded toward Dar. “And this Canis guy is chasing him because he's on a secret mission of some sort. It involves getting to the Executive Secretary for a few minutes.”
“I think he does have an opening on his calendar, next Thursday. . . .” Horatio pursed his lips. “Still, it's a difficult appointment to make.”
“Especially with Canis trying to cancel it,” Whitey agreed. “We can't be sure, mind you, but we think he's the one who's been rousing the local police against us on every planet we've been to. There must be at least three warrants out for me, along my backtrail.”
“Well, that's nothing new.” Horatio's scowl deepened. “Still, I expect the honor's being bestowed for the wrong reasons. What charge has he drummed up?”
“Now, we're not sure, mind you,” Whitey said, frowning, “but we think he's managed to convince the LORDS that we're a bunch of telepaths, and that we've been aided and abetted by telepaths all along our route in from the marches.”
Horatio stared. “You're the Interstellar Telepathic Conspiracy?”
“Well, that is kinda what we think they've got in their heads, yeah,” Whitey muttered.
Horatio glared down at him, his face slowly turning purple. Dar stood frozen, with his heart in his throat. If Whitey were just a little bit mistaken about his old buddy, they could all wind up in prison at the snap of a finger. He could fairly feel that restraining field pressing in on him from all sides already. . . .
Then Horatio blew. “Foul!” he bellowed, fingers clawing into fists. “How foul, how fell! That the High Gleeman of scores of worlds should be hounded and harassed like a common felon! And all for the brain-sick nightmare of a diseased and petty mind! Nay, nay! I have stood and smiled, I have gnashed my teeth whiles I watched them play their petty games of plot and counterplot; I have schooled myself to patience while the reek of their corruption stank in my nostrils—but this I cannot bear! Nay, how can there be any gram of goodness biding in a sovereignty that's so riddled with malice that it dreams up excuses to harry its bravest and best? Terra is become a stench-filled sty, a globe no longer fit for glee, a domain no longer fit for dwelling—nor can any planet be that falls within its sphere of influence!”
Whitey dug in his toes and braced himself against the gale. “Peace, now, peace, good fellow! Hope lives on yet! Even corruption has its day, and ceases, and the seeds of goodness sprout up from it, to flower again in virtue!”
“Aye, but in how many years?” Horatio glowered down at him. “Nay, centuries! I am not minded to hold my peace and bear myself in silence whiles I wait!”
Dar felt a surge of panic. Was this madman going to try a one-man rebellion, or something?
But Whitey suddenly became very casual. “Well then, if you truly feel so, flee! There be no dearth of G-type suns, nor of worlds like Terra. If you find all known worlds so swinishly unfit, go seek the unknown! Go sail into uncharted skies and find a world to make anew, after the fashion of your dreaming!”
Dar held his breath. What Whitey was saying was, in effect, put up or shut up.
But Horatio was staring at him as though he'd spoken an idea never thought of before. “Aye,” he breathed. “Aye, surely!”
He whirled away toward the house, crying, “Where are these hearts? Where are my comrades?”
The whole group stared at his retreating back.
“I, ah, think we might want to go along with him,” Whitey suggested. “He sometimes needs restraining when he gets into these moods.” He set off after Horatio.
The troupe followed, and caught up with him.
“What's the matter with her?” Whitey muttered to Dar.
“Huh?” Dar glanced at Sam, who was moving a little more quickly than the rest of them, gaze fixed on Horatio, eyes shining. He turned back to Whitey. “Just spellbound. Money has that effect, sometimes.”
But Whitey shook his head. “Not so, or she'd have gone after me. Would you say Sam's the impulsive sort?”
“Well . . . in a way.” Dar frowned at Sam, seeing her anew. “Controls it well, though.”
“And Horatio doesn't have to.” Whitey nodded. “That explains a lot.”
Dar was glad it did, because he didn't understand a bit of it. On the other hand, he hadn't had much exposure to women who spoke his own language.
Horatio stormed up a flight of limestone steps and wheeled through French doors into his palace. By the time the crew caught up with him, he was leaning across a Louis XIV desk, glaring into a phone screen at an image of a bulky, black-haired man with a flowing beard. “Ship?” he was saying. “Of course you can buy a ship, Horatio! The Navy has surplus dreadnoughts it would love to be rid of—but why?”
“To issue from a sty of stenches!” Horatio snapped. “What do you mean, they have ships they'd love to be rid of?”
“Always more on hand than they have buyers for. After all, who'd want a retired battleship—without its cannon?”
“We would! To bear a crew of colonists to a brave new world, where we may purify ourselves of this crass materialism, and rise above the suspiciousness and greed of this technological monster of a world!”
“Horatio.” Blackbeard eyed him warily. “Do you speak of founding a society based on the Society?”
“Indeed I do, Markone!”
“I was afraid that this might come,” Markone sighed. “You must not confuse the pleasant fantasy of our Society tournaments and moots with the reality of the real world, Horatio. That way lies madness.”
“I do not confuse them—I wish to make the fantasy become real! Think of it, Markone—your barony become a reality, your vassals and serfs forever at your call!”
Markone's eyes lost focus. “A pleasant dream, Horatio—yet nothing but a dream.”
“It need not be!” Horatio insisted. “Think, man! What need would we have for all our fortunes? Each could lay the half of them away for his heirs here, and take the other half to pool, to buy a ship and equip an expedition! What could it cost? Certainly no more than a hundred billion—and we must have a dozen barons in the Society who are worth more than half of that apiece!”
Markone gazed off into space. “It might be possible, at that . . . as though we were holding an extended festival abroad. . . . And 'twould be possible to return. . . .”
“Meditate upon it,” Horatio urged. “Yet if 'twere done, 'twere well 'twere done quickly, Markone. You know the uncertainty of the political situation.”
You could almost hear Markone's eyes click back into focus. “Uncertainty? What's doubtful about it, Bocello? Nothing but time—and that might be as short as a few days, before these petit-bourgeois politicians in the Assembly elect the Executive Secretary to the noble post of Dictator!”
“Oh, come now,” Horatio purred. “I scarcely think they'd be so blatant as to give him the title.”
“No, but they'll give him the power! They're primed and ready; all they need is a trigger, some threat to all of them, and they'll cheerfully sell all their freedoms for security—and ours with theirs!”
“True, true—and we know how sensitive these lowborns are to anything that threatens their positions. When all's said and done, money is seconda
ry to them. But give them one sign that there may be someone more powerful than they, who might usurp their powers, and they panic!”
“They do indeed—which brings to mind the latest news, Horatio.” Markone glowered up at him out of the screen. “What think you of this Interstellar Telepathic Conspiracy?”
“Who could better recognize a fantasy than we? But there is a man of almost supernatural gifts there, as the grain of truth that rumor's wrapped around, Markone.”
“Indeed?” Markone's scowl deepened. “What manner of man is that?”
“One you've met—the greatest bard of the Terran Sphere, Tod Tambourin. Government officials have been chasing him in here from the marches—secretly at first, but now openly, claiming that he and his band are telepaths.”
“Chased Tod Tambourin?” Markone bawled. “This is too much, Bocello! They exceed excess in this!”
“They do indeed.” Horatio nodded slowly, eyes gleaming.
“If they will harry such a man out of pettiness and spite, what might they not attempt? By all the stars, Bocello—do you realize that they might come a-hunting us?”
“We are logical targets for envious men,” Horatio purred, “the more so since we have wealth to confiscate.”
“Does it begin again, then? Must we watch the bloody flag arise, and ride on tumbrels to the guillotine?”
That, Dar thought, was overdoing it a bit—though he had to agree that there did seem to be some danger in staying on Terra just now, for anyone with large amounts of money or a taste for eccentric hobbies.
“I, for one, do not intend to learn the answer,” Horatio informed his phone-screen, “at least, not from personal experience. I'll buy a ship alone, if I have to, and recruit my party guests. What say you, Markone? Will you join me?”
“That I will, and see the Baronetcy of Ruddigore established in reality! Go buy your ship, Bocello—and don't lift off without me!”
The screen blanked. Horatio turned to his guests with a wolfish grin. “So it begins, and they'll fall into line quickly, I assure you; the twelve great barons of the Central Kingdom. Oh, we'll have that ship bought and outfitted within a day, and be loading passengers in two!”
Whitey spread his hands. “It was just an idea.”
“You can't find enough people that fast,” Dar stated flatly. “Oh, maybe you twelve rich men might be ready to jump at a moment—you know you can come back any time you choose. But it's different for the ordinary people. They'll need a long time to decide.”
“They will, eh?” Horatio seized a stylus and tablet from his desk and strode to the French doors. He came out onto the terrace, hands high, bellowing, “Now I cry HOLD!”
The shouting chaos of laughing and singing ceased in an instant.
“They're loyal,” Horatio explained over his shoulder. Then, to the multitude: “The Baronet of Ruddigore and I have decided to take ship, and ride out to the stars, to discover a world never before seen by Terrans, there to found the Central Kingdom in reality, and live as men ought, by faith and sweat and steel. We shall need villeins and yeomen, gentlemen and knights! We shall leave in two days time; any who are not with us then, will never be! Who wishes to ride? Sign here!”
He threw the tablet down into the multitude. With a roar, they pounced on it, and the whole crowd instantly re-formed into a line, each one fairly panting in his eagerness to emigrate. Food-sellers and jugglers began to work up and down the queue.
Horatio turned back to Dar with a grin. “That is the mettle of my people!”
“They'll change their minds by the time they get to the front of the line,” Dar predicted.
Horatio nodded. “Some of them, no doubt—but most will sign. They've wished for nothing half so much as to live in a world where folk are true, and the rulers worthy of trust. How say you, brave ones? Will you join us?”
“Instantly.” Sam beamed up at him.
Horatio looked down at her, surprised. Then, slowly, he began to smile, almost shyly.
“I admit I'm tempted,” Father Marco mused. “For a priest, the Middle Ages had definite advantages.”
“For gleemen, too.” Whitey grinned from ear to ear. “I think it's a great idea, Horatio, and I'll cheer you on every A.U. of the way—but I never was much of a joiner.”
“Nor I.” Lona shook her head firmly. “Stuck in a society that's never even heard of electrons? Horrible!”
Dar opened his mouth to answer, and a burring sound came out. He swallowed and blinked, then realized that the sound had come from the phone. A footman in tights and tabard stepped out to announce, “There is a Mr. Stroganoff calling, sir, for Mr. Tambourin.”
Whitey looked up in surprise. “Already? There shouldn't have been any progress yet.” He went back inside, with Dar trailing after.
Stroganoff was on the screen, dazed. “What's the matter, David?” Whitey asked as he came into range.
“Oh, nothing, nothing at all! Everything's just fine—in fact, too fine. That's what's the matter!”
“Glad to hear it—I hope. Want to tell me why it's gotten so hot that it's turned cold?”
“The Executive Secretary.” Stroganoff swallowed. “I sent a fax to his office, right after you left. I figured the way the government bureaucracy works, I'd better start right away if we were going to have any chance of shooting him within the year.”
“Wise.” Whitey was poised like a hawk about to stoop. “And?”
“And his office just called. He's—he's willing to do the piece. But only if we can do it tomorrow!”
Whitey and Dar both stared.
“The primary citizen never says ‘yes' that quickly!” Stroganoff bawled. “And even after you've talked him into it, you have to make an appointment months away!”
“And have it canceled at the last minute, at least twice.” Whitey nodded, with a faraway look in his eyes. “On the other hand, I do have a certain reputation. . . .”
“Well, you're at least as famous as he is, if that's what you mean. But . . .”
“But my fame is apt to last a bit longer,” Whitey mused, “and from the current political news, I'd guess the Exec isn't too sure he's going to still be Exec in a few months—or even next month, for that matter.”
“Next week,” Stroganoff growled.
Whitey nodded. “So he's making his bid for immortality. Do the piece for us, and he's guaranteed a featured place in Tod Tambourin's one and only 3DT masterpiece. Even if history forgets him, literature won't.”
Stroganoff nodded slowly. “Y'know, that almost makes sense, Tod.”
“Yeah, but the schedule doesn't.” Whitey grimaced. “Oh, the crew can make it easily enough—all we have to do is hop into a cab, and charge it to your company.”
Stroganoff shuddered. “How about first class on a public shuttle?”
Whitey shrugged. “Whatever you like. But how about equipment?”
“May have it, or may not. There's no point in dropping it down from Luna, of course; what we do is to rent it out from a dirt side company. I know a few. I'll have to make some calls, and get back to you.”
Whitey grinned. “I always wanted to use a 3DT camera.”
“Uh, hold on, now. Whoa!” Stroganoff held up his palm. “No can do. Tod. Cameras come with a union crew, or they don't come at all!”
“Why?” Whitey frowned. “I've got two electronics techs right here!”
“I know, but if the union finds out you've shot a sequence without them, they won't give you any tech crew for the studio segments up here. Like it or not, we've got to use them.”
“Okay, I'll try to like it,” Whitey sighed. “When do we meet them?”
“I'll let you know, if I manage to get them. Where'll you be?”
“Where should I be?”
Stroganoff grinned. “Thank you, Meistersinger. Be on your way to the Gamelon, will you? Call me back when you're over Lake Champlain.”
11
“You're sure this's the Gamelon?” Dar muttered. “For
all I can see, it could be the inside of Moby Dick.”
“Moby Dick was a whale, not a snake,” Whitey muttered back, “or haven't you noticed how many turns we've made?”
“Didn't look this big from outside,” Dar grumped.
Father Marco had become enmeshed in a long theological discussion with two young clerks who were devout atheists masquerading as medieval monks. Lona had become enmeshed in partying, and Sam was trying to become enmeshed with Horatio. So they had come alone to the long, striplike building that had replaced New York's eastside docks, and were following a lighted bar that slid along the hallway floor in front of them, making some very unpredictable turns as it led them farther and farther into the building that housed the Central Executive Staff of the Interstellar Dominion Electorates.
Finally, it stopped next to an open doorway. Dar looked up, and met the gaze of a wide, very muscular individual dressed in a laborer's coverall. “Help you?” he rumbled.
“Somebody's got to,” Dar answered. Then Whitey arrived at his elbow. “Tod Tambourin,” he said, pointing to the ID tag the door-guards had hung around his neck.
“Oh yeah, the writer.” The muscular one looked bored. “This your P.A.?”
“No, he's my assistant.”
“Right. Well, come on in. Not much for you to do, though; we're just about ready, here.”
They were, indeed. As Dar came in, he saw a huge desk sitting in front of a photomural of a starfield, with the I.D.E. spiderweb superimposed over it in lines of light. On either side of the desk, between it and the backdrop, were two slender pillars. In front were two cameras. All around were at least a dozen technicians.
Dar turned back to Muscles. “Mind if I show my ignorance?”
“That's what I'm here for,” the beefy one sighed.
“What do you need so many people for?”
Escape Velocity Page 24