Helen looked up demurely. “I had to do wee wee,” she said. She continued on, not looking back, hauling Zorro by the hand. He thanked whatever gods might be around that he had rewrapped the whip about his waist.
They could hear the Florentines continuing on their way. Zorro breathed deeply.
He said, finally, “What’d you mean, you found a guard? What’d he do to you? How’d you get away?”
“Oh, I didn’t get away. But he tried to,” she said with an air of deprecation. She cleared her throat slightly. “I had to, uh, coax him a little, but he told me where the Section G office was.”
Zorro Juarez rolled his eyes upward in agony. They’ll be on us like a ton of beef! Verona’s security cops will…”
“Don’t be silly,” she said. “You think that bully-boy, when he regains consciousness…”
“Consciousness,” he repeated weakly.
“… is going to repeat a story like that to his superior officer? That a child came up and tortured him into giving some answers?”
“I give up,” he said. “Don’t tell me any more. No wait. What did you find in Bulchand’s files, in the Section G office?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing!”
“Nothing at all. The files had been ransacked.”
Chapter Six
“Ransacked?” Dorn Horsten said. “You mean, Maggiore Verona’s anti-subversive men had already been there?”
They were back in the penthouse suite of the Albergo Palazzo, the three men standing around Helen, an enormous highball glass in her right hand.
“Ransacked,” she repeated. “And by the looks of the place, not necessarily by the authorities. It had a look of too much confusion. Whoever went through that office was in a hurry.”
“You found nothing at all?” Jerry Rhodes said. “Golly, that’s awful luck.”
“Yeah,” she snarled. “It’s too bad you weren’t there.”
“Um,” he said absently.
“You would have found the minutes of the last meeting of the executive committee of the Engelists, or something.”
“Possibly not that,” he admitted, the sarcasm passing him by.
“I oughta slug you,” she snarled.
“Easy, easy,” Horsten muttered. “That leaves us absolutely nowhere, and with nowhere to go. Obviously…”
“Obviously, somebody else got to the Section G files first, and now we’re completely on our own,” Zorro growled. “Well, I’m off to bed. Can any of you imagine what’s involved in climbing up this hotel wall? All the way to the penthouse, floor by floor, half the time hooking onto something above with my whip, half the time heaving this little brat up ahead to attach the whip. I’ll tell you…”
“Knock it,” Helen said. “It was fun.”
He rolled his eyes upward and left for his room.
“That reminds me,” Horsten said. He went over to the window the two had used for exit and reentry and bent the heavy iron bars back into their original position.
Jerry shook his head. “I wish I could do that,” he marveled.
Helen said, “Why don’t you just bet somebody a stick of gum that you could? Then this fabulous luck of yours would come to the rescue, and you’d do it.”
He looked at her. “You’re beginning to get the idea.”
Helen snorted.
Zorro stuck his head back through the door of his bedroom and called to Horsten, “By the way, how did you manage to squash that duel thing?”
“We didn’t.”
“What!”
“You’re scheduled for the day after tomorrow—we couldn’t postpone it any longer—in the Parco Duello, at dawn.”
“Oh, fine. A great couple of seconds, you two are. Why didn’t you apologize?”
“How could we apologize?” Jerry said reasonably. “You hadn’t done anything.”
Horsten said, “We’ve got two days to figure something out. We’ll check with Maggiore Verona. There’s undoubtedly some manner in which to duck out of a duel.”
“Do you mind telling me what kind of weapon you decided to let me get killed with?”
Horsten said, “Well, we should have checked with you on that. We didn’t know what you were handy with—besides a bullwhip.”
“So…?
“So we chose swords.”
“Wonderful! I’ve never had a sword in my hand in my life.” Zorro slammed the door behind him.
They had a glum breakfast together.
Zorro, in a foul humor, complained, “Why’d they send us off from the Octagon with no more to work on than this? We should have been given some sort of lead, some sort of takeoff point.”
Helen said, “For one thing, Ross Metaxa doesn’t want us to succeed.”
Dorn Horsten looked at her, between bites of toast, his eyebrows high.
Helen said, “The Special Talents group is a pet of Lee Chang’s but Metaxa doesn’t like it. It louses up the atmosphere of dignity he’d like to associate with his beloved Section G.”
Jerry Rhodes said, “He’s the boss. Why not just eliminate us special talents agents?”
“Because Lee Chang’s one of his favorite supervisors and one of his best. He can’t just slap her down. Besides, Sid Jakes more or less backs her project.”
Horsten said, “Then you think if we flunk this assignment, Lee Chang’s whole idea will go by the board?”
Helen sipped her pseudo-coffee. “Of course. That was the arrangement.”
Zorro growled, “You wonder what side Ross Metaxa is on. But what gets me is we’re evidently expendable. It’s all fine for him, sitting there in the Octagon waiting for us to blow this job and get ourselves killed off in duels so he can prove a point to Lee Chang and Jakes. So to accomplish it, we get insufficient material with which to work.”
Horsten said uncomfortably, “We don’t know that’s true. The situation is unique. Bulchand was the sole Section G agent, and he was killed and his files taken. Ross Metaxa had nothing to do with all that. Don’t be bitter, Zorro.”
Helen smeared jam on her toast to a thickness that made her supposed father wince. “I hate a bitter man,” she said.
Jerry Rhodes said, “I bitter woman, once.”
Zorro, his mouth tightly shut, came to his feet and threw his napkin to the table. He glared around at them, then turned and left the room abruptly.
Jerry said to his remaining two companions, “Sorry. I guess I’m not as funny as I think I am.”
The scientist pushed his pince-nez back to a more comfortable spot on his nose and said, “He’s got that confounded duel on his mind. He doesn’t want to kill that inspector—he has no reason to—and, on the other hand, doesn’t want to get killed himself.”
Helen shrugged tiny shoulders. “Maybe. However, I’m beginning to get the impression that friend Zorro figures everybody is expendable but Zorro.”
Horsten looked at her. “You two have a run-in?”
“Not particularly. He’s just a bit on the cold-blooded side for little Helen.”
Dorn Horsten said, “Remember, he’s part of the team. His being around might mean the difference between your neck and its wringing, someday.” He looked at his watch and switched subjects. “We’re going to have to get some lead on this underground outfit. The desk phoned a little while ago and I have an appointment to meet Academician Udine from the university. He’s not a complete stranger; we met during my past brief visit here. It comes to mind that he will undoubtedly feel more at ease with me, than with a fellow citizen of Firenze. Perhaps I can draw him out.”
“On the Engelists, eh?” Helen said.
“Uh huh. If there’s this much underground activity on Firenze, then the universities should be hotbeds of subversion. It’s when man is young and idealistic that he rebels against the status quo.”
Jerry said, “If rebellion is called for or not?”
Helen finished off her pseudo-coffee. “Jerry, my lad, rebellion against the status quo is almost always call
ed for. A culture shouldn’t be allowed to become static. Wasn’t it that old-timer Thomas Jefferson who thought they ought to have a new revolution about every twenty years?”
Jerry grunted. “Then why’re we here on Firenze trying to foul up these Engelists?”
Dom Horsten came to his feet. “Because they’re a little too previous. It’s not as though the present government is in decadence. It’s never been allowed to get underway. They want to be progressive, but this confounded underground won’t let them get started.”
He looked at his wrist chronometer again. “At any rate, I’ll see if I can get a line on the Engelists through my colleague Udine.”
“How about me?” Helen said.
He scowled at her. “I can’t take you along. He wouldn’t open up in front of a child. He’d think you couldn’t be trusted not to repeat something.”
Jerry said, “Helen and I can go out on the town and find what we can find. Possibly, we’ll be lucky and stumble on something. Suppose we meet back here for lunch.”
“What’s happened to Zorro?”
“Who knows?” Helen said. “I heard the door open and close a few minutes ago.”
“For lunch it is, then,” the massive scientist said, leaving them.
When he was gone, Jerry and Helen sat alone. Helen looked at him unblinkingly for a long moment.
Finally he began to get apprehensive. “You’re going to come up with something,” he accused.
She said, “I’ll bet you a hundred interplanetary credits.”
“On what?”
“What do you care? You said you always win a bet?”
“All right, all right. I always win a bet, but one of the reasons I do is that I don’t push it beyond reason. I wouldn’t bet, for instance, that I could be in two places at once.”
“Trying to crab out, eh?”
“What’s the bet?”
Helen said slowly, “I’ll bet you one hundred credits that Zorro gets killed in that duel.”
He said finally, “All right. I’ll bet you a hundred he doesn’t.”
At the desk, in the lobby of the Albergo Palazzo, Jerry Rhodes, the look of a martyr on his face, stopped long enough to say to the concierge, “Look, for this morning I’m saddled with a babysitting routine, understand? But I’d appreciate it if you’d make arrangements for me tonight. A limousine, some suggestions for nightspots. You know, where the action…”
“Nightspots?” the concierge said.
Jerry, who had Helen firmly by the hand as he talked, said, aggrieved, “Nightspots, nightspots, whatever you call them on Firenze. Cabaret, cafe dansant, music hall, nightclub.” As the other’s face remained blank, his voice went pleading. “… saloon, gin mill, pub, bistro, beer hall…” The other’s face was still blank. “… speakeasy! blind tiger!”
The clerk held up a hand to stem the tide. “I know what you mean. But the curfew.”
It was Jerry’s turn to be blank. “Curfew?”
“Let’s go, Uncle Jerry,” Helen whined, pulling at his hand. She had her doll under her left arm.
The concierge said, “At ten o’clock, all public establishments must be closed. At eleven o’clock, all citizens must be off the streets.”
Jerry said, ” Why?”
The clerk’s face and voice turned cool. “Signore, are you criticizing the measures taken by the First Signore and his Council of Signori?”
“No. Why?”
The concierge looked left and right, as though in subconscious check. He leaned a bit over the desk, and his tone was lower. “It seems that the Fifth Signore recommended to the First Signore, that the nightspots, as you call them, be temporarily closed. Evidently, they were being used as drops by the underground.”
Jerry groaned. “How long ago did that happen?” he said.
Helen whined, “Uncle Jerry, let’s go. You promised me and Gertrude a ice cream.”
The concierge said, “Why, actually, before my time. The curfew has been in effect for years.”
“Swell!” Jerry muttered. He gave Helen’s arm a tug as he started for the door, still muttering.
Out on the street, he said, in disgust, “No nightclubs, and me with an unlimited expense account and with the job of projecting myself as a playboy.”
Helen said sweetly, “You seem to have terrible luck, Uncle Jerry, old boy, old lad. Maybe that coin is beginning to flip tails.”
He snorted contempt of that opinion.
“Where’re we going?” he said.
“How would I know? To case this town.” They were walking down the avenue, obviously one of the city’s best, and heading toward the main shopping district. Helen stared at a window devoted to fashions.
Jerry jerked her arm. “Watch yourself,” he said from the side of his mouth. “You’re supposed to be interested in toy shops, ice cream parlors and such, not haute couture.”
Helen grunted sourly, but, to project her character, began to skip.
Her supposed guardian for the morning was taking in their fellow pedestrians and the passing traffic. He said softly, for her ears alone, “I thought Metaxa said this was potentially one of the more advanced worlds. It looks a few centuries behind the times to me. And nine people out of ten look on the raggedy side.”
She said, “I get the same impression. However, that’s the point. The underground’s got things so fouled up that the progressive elements can’t get underway.”
Jerry Rhodes spotted a sidewalk café.
He said, “What’d you say we sit down and let the town come to us? Have a mead, or something.”
She smiled up at him with the trustfulness of an eight-year-old in the hands of a mature adult, but her voice held a low snarl. “Mead, you rat. You know damn well I won’t be able to order anything stronger than lime squash.”
“Oh, that’s right.” He grinned down at her. “Sorry. You feel the need to kill the hangover? You were really knocking them back last night.”
“I’ll kill you, if you don’t knock that condescending tone in your silly voice.” She grunted satisfaction as they got nearer to the sidewalk cafe. The place was packed. Obviously, in view of the night curfew, the citizens of Firenze were forced to do their imbibing early in the day.
“No tables,” she said. “So you’ll do without, too.”
“Oh, we ought to be lucky enough to find something,” Jerry murmured, heading for the more preferable locations.
“With all these people standing around waiting for a table?” she said nastily.
However, at that split second, three Florentines came to their feet, one looking at his wrist chronometer apprehensively. They hurried off.
“Here we are,” Jerry beamed, pulling back a chair and then taking her up from behind by the elbows and sitting her down.
“Talk about luck …” she began, and then shut her mouth to glare at him.
He turned to take a chair of his own, only to find it occupied.
The stranger looked up. “I got here first,” he said.
Jerry took him in for a long moment, finally saying bitterly, “You want us to leave?”
The other waved a nonchalant hand. “Not at all, not at all. Strangers to Firenze?” He indicated the table’s third chair. “Be my guest.”
Jerry Rhodes sat down. “You have to be speedy in this town, don’t you?”
“Well, Signore, I’ll tell you…” But then the other, as though suddenly remembering the amenities, came to his feet, brought his heels together and bowed stiffly. “May I introduce myself? The Great Marconi.”
Helen had leaned her elbows on the tabletop, her chin in her cupped hands. She stared at him unblinkingly. “You don’t look so great,” she told him. “You oughta see my daddy.”
The Great Marconi put his right hand to his heart and bowed again, more sweepingly. “Signorina, you convince me. I am most certain your parent is even greater than the Great Marconi.”
“Betcha boots,” Helen informed him ungraciously.
&nbs
p; Jerry Rhodes came to his feet in turn, clicked his heels and bowed. “The pleasure is ours,” he said. “And I am the Great Rhodes, and this is the Great Helen.”
The other sank back into his chair and looked at Jerry speculatively. “You condescend with me?” he said. “You jest?”
“Who me?” Jerry said in disgust. “Be condescending?
I wouldn’t dare. Although all sorts of puns and such come to mind. I could’ve introduced myself as Cross Rhodes, the guy who becomes slightly sore when somebody slips into his chair, right under him. And I could have pointed out Miss Horsten here”—he indicated Helen—“and said, ‘She looks like Helen Brown, but her real name is Horsten, and she looks cute in blue.’ ”
Helen’s face was pained. “I betcha I could think of a funnier one than that.”
The Great Marconi evidently couldn’t decide whether to laugh or mount higher into the saddle of dignity. He said evenly, “You are undoubtedly unacquainted with Firenze usage, Signore.”
“Undoubtedly,” Jerry said, looking about for a waiter, half a dozen of whom were scooting around amidst the tables.
Their unwelcome Florentine companion evidently couldn’t help putting in a dig. He said, “To get a waiter’s attention here at the Florida Cafe, you’d have to have, the luck of…”
He broke it off.
A waiter had magically materialized at the elbow of Jerry Rhodes.
“Hal” Helen said under her breath.
Jerry said, “One ice cream and—you do have ice cream on this planet? Nobody’s decided it’s subversive, or something?”
The waiter looked at him. “Are you criticizing the…”
But Jerry had held up a hand in horror. “Certainly not!” He looked at the self-named Great Marconi. “What’s a good morning pick-me-up on this planet?”
“Try a Grappa Sour,” the other said, and then to the waiter, “Two Grappa Sours.”
“Three,” Helen said.
Jerry and the Great Marconi looked at her. Jerry shook his head. “Ice cream,” he said.
The waiter left.
Helen and Jerry turned their eyes to their uninvited companion. He was possibly in his early thirties, lithe of build, quick of movement. His eyes were, if anything, overly bright in a face that fell into a drawn seriousness when relaxed, which was seldom. The Great Marconi was great for moues, smiles, animated grimaces; it was as though he wore a mask over a mask. His clothing, while not as seedy as that of many of his fellow Florentines, could have used a bit of spotting up. He hadn’t exactly slept in them, but…
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