As well as being the chief city of Argentina Province, Buenos Aires was
a Ducal capital--the first such city Kesley remembered having entered.
He knew the names of the others: Chicago, Tunis, Johannesburg,
Stockholm, Canberra, Strasbourg, Kiev, Hankow, Calcutta, Manila,
Leopoldville. They were strange and alien names; to him, abstract
symbols of Ducal power rather than concrete geographical localities.
It was easy to see that this was Miguel's abode. The walls of the city
bristled with dark-skinned riflemen in blue shorts and gold brocade,
zealously guarding their Immortal's city against armed attack. Standing
outside the city walls, Kesley could see, looming above the blocks of
low, grubby buildings, the arching sweep of Don Miguel's palace. A
gleaming spire almost a hundred feet high topped the vaulted building,
which looked down upon the nest of small houses clustered around it as
a giant would upon worms.
There seemed to be a jam-up at the gates. Traffic was heavy at a Ducal
capital. All around him, swarthy men on burros or horses or stubby
piebald mutant beasts waited patiently to be admitted. Most of them
were clad in broad-brimmed _sombreros_ and colorful _serapes_; Kesley
grinned wryly at that. South America was an unchanging microcosm.
Beneath the friendly sky, life, frozen always in a stasis of todays,
moved on slowly, with _manana_ never quite arriving.
Kesley wondered about van Alen. The Antarctican had run away, and
presumably had been shot by a bandit. Was he dead, his corpse lying
rotting on the plain? It didn't matter, now. Kesley was in the hands of
Duke Miguel. His destiny was no longer bound to that of Dryle van Alen.
"Get along, now," a voice drawled. The line moved up. Slowly, the long
queue was passing through the great double doors and into the city.
Kesley's six captors surrounded him, three before and three aft. Their
conversation during the long trip north to the capital had been limited
to occasional rapid-fire bursts of incomprehensible Spanish, and Kesley
still had no idea of the fate that awaited him.
"We go to the Duke," the taciturn bandit leader said as they reached
the gatekeeper. He gestured at Kesley. "We bring him a prize."
"_Norteamericano?_"
"_Sí_."