Priscilla threw back her head and laughed. "Joel, are you in
communication with the Ganelons?"
"Ganelons?" he said, "What are they?"
The machine said: "_How did she know that? Ye gods, she'll pull
everything out of me. Make my mind a blank. Don't think about Tamis.
Don't...._
"Who's Tamis?" Priscilla asked.
"_She's forgotten_," the machine said in surprise. "_No. She didn't
know the girl's name; just that she was a Ganelon. Wow, what a
horrible, uncontrollable thing a person's mind is. Multiplication
tables. Two times two is four.... Damn! I can't remember the
multiplication tables!_"
"Joel," said Priscilla, "I'm going to make you my bodyguard."
"Bodyguard!" echoed Joel and the machine together. "Hell fire...."
He shut his mouth. The machine went, "_Glug--glug--bubble--glug. Out
damned spot! Out, I say! One: Two: Why, then 'tis time to do't...._"
"What's that?" Priscilla demanded suspiciously.
"Macbeth," Joel replied with a grin. And for ten minutes she had to
listen to the machine spouting quotations from Shakespeare. After that
it started on nursery rhymes, began a dissertation on cattle breeding.
"All right!" said Priscilla savagely. "You win. I can stand anything
but hearing about the love life of a cow!" She shut the machine off.
Joel slumped weakly in the seat. Sweat was rolling down his face.
* * * * *
Priscilla was pensive as she removed the suckers, rolled the machine
away. When she returned she was carrying a small paralyzer.
"Did you mean it," Joel asked, "when you said I'm to be your bodyguard?"
"Yes."
"But that's absurd!"
"Would you stand by and watch me murdered?"
"No," he admitted.
"Fair enough," she said. "That's all I ask."
She threw a switch on the back of the chair. The bands loosened. Joel
stood up, rubbing his throat.
Priscilla shot him an oblique glance, said dryly, "Don't misunderstand
me. I need protection. Nothing else."
Turning abruptly she entered the apartment, beckoned for him to follow.
She touched a hidden plate in the floor with her toe. Joel saw a
section of the mirror paneled wall slide aside revealing a shallow
passage beyond.
"This is where you're to stay. So that you can watch the apartment at
all times."
Joel entered the passage, gave a low whistle of surprise. It ran all
around the salon behind the mirrors. He could see the room through them
as if they were the clearest plate glass.
Security glass, he realized. It had been bombarded with chromium so
that from one side it acted as a mirror. But from the other it was
transparent.
"Who built this?"
"The last governor. He was terrified of assassination. The palace is a
rat-run of secret passages and lifts, concealed televisors, electronic
eyes and alarms."