The robot glided away on its treads toward a lift-ramp. Kesley
followed, suppressing his impatience.
He wondered if the Duke of Antarctica would be surrounded by long rows
of halberdiers. Somehow he doubted it.
A pulse tickled annoyingly in the side of his throat as the elevator
rose. The trip was brief; the door-panel was sliding open almost before
it had closed.
The robot rolled out first and started off down a long, bright
corridor. Kesley followed.
The corridor seemed to be endless. Finally, the robot paused before a
richly-panelled door and touched a stud. "Yes?" a deep voice said.
Inclining its speaking-grid toward a pickup embedded in the ornament of
the door, the robot said: "Dale Kesley to see you?"
"_Kesley?_"
"Dale Kesley to see you," the robot repeated impassively.
Kesley heard stirring within. He tensed; this was suspicious. Was it
this easy to gain audience with a Duke?
He waited nervously for the door to open. He had been hired to kill
Winslow; Miguel had begged him once to drive a knife into _his_ breast.
And now he was about to see a third Duke--the first he had any real
motive for killing.
The door swung back. Another robot waited within.
"Don't tell me _you're_ the Duke?" Kesley said, aghast. He had long
since learned that anything was likely.
"Hardly," the new robot replied, with as much of an ironic inflection
as a robot voice could muster. "The Duke waits for you within. Come."
Fingering the keen knife at his side, Kesley entered the Ducal chambers.