"Marras figures," the Duke's flat voice explained, "that if the thing
comes into the room and he squeaks at it a few times, he won't get
hurt."
"That's possible," Cooms said, unruffled. "At any rate, I intend to
hang on to it."
"Well, I wouldn't play around with those buttons too much," Quillan
observed.
"Why not?"
"You might get lucky and tap out some pattern that spells 'Come to
chow' in the Hlat's vocabulary."
* * * * *
There were considerably more men in evidence on Level Two than on the
fourth, and fewer signs of nervousness. The Star men had been told of
the Hlat's escape from its cubicle, but weren't taking it too
seriously. Quillan was conducted to the commodore and favored with an
alarmingly toothy grin. Ryter, the security chief, joined them a few
seconds later. Apparently, Velladon had summoned him.
Velladon said, "Ryter here's made a few transmitter calls. We hear
Pappy Boltan pulled his outfit out of the Orado area about a month
ago. Present whereabouts unknown. Hagready went off on some hush-hush
job at around the same time."