Thoughts raced through Ramsey's mind. As an administrator, as an
Irwadian public servant in a touchy job, Garr Symm, a drunkard, was
obviously grossly incompetent. What other qualifications did he have
which gave him the top Irwadian Security job? Ramsey didn't know. He
sighed. The Vegan girl's mouth formed a rictus of pain. Ramsey had a
hunch he was going to find out.
He said curtly: "Let go of her, Symm. She told me nothing that would
interest you."
* * * * *
Garr Symm ignored him. The blue-skinned girl cried.
Ramsey grimaced and hit Garr Symm in the belly as hard as he could.
Symm thudded back against the table. It overturned with a crash and the
Security Chief crashed down on top of it. There wasn't a sound in the
gambling hall except Ramsey's sudden hard breathing, the Vegan girl's
sniffling, and Garr Symm's noisy attempts to get air into his lungs.
Then Garr Symm gagged and was sick. He writhed in pain, still unable to
breathe. His hands fluttered near his weapons belt.
"Come on," Ramsey told the Vegan girl. "We'd better get out of here." He
took her arm. Dumbly she went with him. None of the outworlders there
tried to stop them. Ramsey looked back at Garr Symm. The Irwadian was
shaking his fist. He had finally managed to draw his m.g. gun, but the
crowd of outworlders closed between them and there was no chance he
could hit Ramsey or the girl. Retching, he had dirtied the glossy green
scales of his chest.
"I'll get you," he vowed. "I'll get you."
Ramsey took the girl outside. It was very cold. "I'm so afraid," she
said. "What will I do? What can I do?" She shook with fear.
"You got a place to sleep?"
"Y-yes, but I'm the only Vegan girl in Irwadi City. He'll find me. He'll
find me when he's ready."
"O.K. Then come home with me."
"I--"
"For crying out loud, I don't look that lecherous, do I? We can't just
stand here."
"I--I'm sorry. I'll go with you of course."
Ramsey took her hand again and they ran. The cold black Irwadian night
swallowed them.
"So you live in the Old Quarter too," the Vegan girl said.
"Heck yeah. Did you expect a palace?"
* * * * *
Ramsey had a room, rent one Irwadi month in arrears, in a cold-water
tenement near the river which demarked the Old and the New Quarters. The
facade of the old building was dark now. His landlady was probably
asleep, although you never could tell with that old witch. Ramsey knew
it wouldn't be the first time she stayed up through half the night to
await a delinquent tenant.
"I--I never went to a man's room before," the blue-skinned Vegan girl
said. She was rather pretty in a slender, muscleless, big-eyed,
female-helpless mode.
"You're a dance-hall girl, aren't you?"
"Still, I never spent the night in a man's--"
"What's the matter with you? You think we're going to spend the night
here? Somebody over at those gaming tables will be able to identify me.
Garr Symm'll be on his way before long."
"Then what are we going to do?" The girl was shivering with cold.
"Hide," Jason Ramsey said. "Somewhere. I just came back to get my
things. There isn't much, but there's an old m.g. gun which we might
need."
"But they'll find us, and--"
"You coming upstairs or will you wait out here and freeze to death in
the cold?"
"I'm coming."
They went upstairs together, on tip-toe. Ramsey's room was on the third
floor, with a besooted view of the industrial complex on the river by
day. The narrow hall was dark and silent. Behind one of the closed doors
an outworlder cried out in his sleep. Ramsey had to cup a hand over the
Vegan girl's mouth so she wouldn't scream in empathic fear. He opened
the door of his room, surprised that it was not locked. He thought he
had left it locked.
At once he was wary. It was dark in the hall, just as dark in the room.
He could see nothing. The door hinges squeaked.
"Come in, Captain Ramsey," a voice said. "I thought you would never get
here."
He stood on the threshold, uncertain. The voice had spoken not
Interstellar _Coine_, but English. It had spoken English, without a
foreign accent.
And it was a girl's voice.
* * * * *
Still, it could have been an elaborate trick. It was unlikely, but not
impossible, that Garr Symm had learned Ramsey's identity already and had
sent an operative here to await him. Ramsey and the Vegan girl had come
on foot. It was a long walk.
"I'm armed," Ramsey lied. "Come over here. Slowly. Don't put any lights
on." He could feel the Vegan girl trembling next to him. Not able to
understand English, she didn't know what was going on.
"You're armed," the unseen girl's voice said in crisp, amused English,
"like I'm a six-legged Antarean spider-man. You have an m.g. gun,
Ramsey. It's in this room. I have it. That's all you have. No, don't try
to lie to me. I'm a telepath. I can read you. Come in and put the light
on and shut the door. You may bring the girl with you if you want.
Brother, is she ever radiating fear! It's practically drowning your own
mind out."
The unseen girl wasn't kidding, Ramsey knew. She could read minds. She
had proved it to him. Which left him this choice: he could grab the
Vegan girl's arm again and get the heck out of there, or do what the
unseen Earth girl told him to do. He wanted that m.g. gun. He took the
Vegan girl's hand and advanced over the threshold and closed the door
and switched on the light.
The girl was sitting on the bed. She was an Earthgirl, all right. She
had come in a toggle-cloak of green Irwadian fur, which was folded
neatly at her side on the bed. Under it she wore a daring net halter of
the type then fashionable on Earth but which had not yet taken over the
outworlds. It left her shoulders bare and exposed a great deal of
smooth, tawny skin through the net. Her firm breasts were cupped in two
solid cones of black growing out of the net. Her midriff was bare to an
inch or two below the navel. Her loins were covered by an abrevitog
which formed a triangle in front and, Ramsey knew, would form one in
back. Her long, well-formed legs were bare down to the mid-calf boots
she wore. She had a beautiful body and had dressed so Ramsey couldn't
miss it. Her face was so provocatively beautiful that Ramsey just stood
there staring at it--after he had taken in the rest of her. She wore her
hair quite long. She seemed perfectly composed. In her right hand she
held Ramsey's m.g. gun, but she wasn't pointing it at them.
She looked at the timid Vegan girl and smiled. "Oh, I am sorry, Captain
Ramsey," she said. "I couldn't know, of course, you'd be coming home
with--company."
"It isn't what you think it is," Ramsey said, surprised to find himself
on the defensive. "The girl's in trouble. So'm I."
The Earthgirl laughed. "Already? You looked the type, but I thought it
would take a little time."
"What do you want?" Ramsey said. They were speaking in English. The
Vegan girl tugged at Ramsey's arm. She wanted to get out of there and
hoped Ramsey would go with her. Abruptly the Earthgirl burst out
laughing.
"What's so funny?" Ramsey demanded.
"Your little Vegan friend. I read her mind, Ramsey. She thinks I'm your
wife. She thinks I'm mad at you for bringing her home."
"Then why don't you talk in _Coine_," Ramsey said in the interstellar
language, "and make her feel better? She might as well know I never saw
you before in my life." He was annoyed.
* * * * *
The Vegan girl smiled timidly, taking hope.
"But you did," the beautiful Earthgirl said. "I was on the _Polaris_
today, Captain. You were to be the pilot, until Interstellar Transfer
here on Irwadi was planetarized."
"I didn't see you. Dressed like that I wouldn't have forgotten you."
"I wasn't dressed like this." The girl smiled, very sure of herself. "I
read your mind when you came in. The costume's had the desired effect, I
see. But you needn't broadcast your animal desires so blatantly."
"Nobody asked you to read my mind. Besides, you needn't broadcast your
physical assets so blatantly."
"Touche," said the Earthgirl.
"Listen," Ramsey began. "We're in a jam. We're in a hurry."
"So you told me. I couldn't have wished for more. It looks like I didn't
need this costume and its obvious inducements at all, if you're really
in a jam."
"What the devil is that supposed to mean?"
"My name is Margot Dennison, Captain Ramsey. I have managed to buy an
old starship, small and held together by spit and string and whatever
the Irwadians use for prayer--"
"They're atheists," Ramsey said a little pointlessly. It was the girl.
Darn her hide, she was beautiful! What did she expect? Looking at her,
how could a man concentrate.... "Hey!" Ramsey blurted suddenly. "Did you
say Margot Dennison? The tri-di star?"
* * * * *
Margot Dennison smiled. "That's right," she said. "Stranded five hundred
light years from nowhere, Captain Ramsey. With a ship. With money. In
need of a hyper-space pilot. That's why I'm here, or didn't you guess?"
"I'm listening."
"Isn't it clear? I'll pay you to take me away from here."
"Where to?"
"Through hyper-space to Earth. Well?"
"I've been grounded. If I take you through hyper-space, I lose my
license."
"You really don't believe that, do you? After the Irwadians grounded all
of you without warning, and grounded all ships until they can train a
few more pilots. You don't really think I.T.S. would take your license
away if you took a ship up and through hyper, do you? Under the
circumstances? Especially since you're in a jam with a totalitarian
government gone wild? Do you?"