Drake looked sad. "I brought it to give to my good friend, the Noble
Belgezad. Of course it would be a gross insult to wear them at the
Shan's Coronation, but he could wear them at other functions.
"And how does my good friend repay me? By having me arrested. My Lord
Prosecutor, I am a wronged man."
The Prosecutor swallowed heavily and stood up. "The necklace has,
naturally, been impounded by the police. I shall have the stones
tested."
"You'll find they're phonies," Drake said. "And that means one of two
things. Either they are not the ones stolen from Belgezad or else
Belgezad has mortally insulted his Shan by wearing false jewels to the
Coronation."
"Well! We shall see about this!" said the Lord Prosecutor.
* * * * *
Anson Drake, free as a lark, was packing his clothes in his hotel room
when the announcer chimed. He punched the TV pickup and grinned. It was
the girl.
When the door slid aside, she came in, smiling. "You got away with it,
Drake! Wonderful! I don't know how you did it, but--"
"Did what?" Drake looked innocent.
"Get away with the necklace, of course! I don't know how it happened
that Dobigel was there, but--"
"But, but, but," Drake said, smiling. "You don't seem to know very much
at all, do you?"
"Wha--what do you mean?"
Drake put his last article of clothing in his suitcase and snapped it
shut. "I'll probably be searched pretty thoroughly when I get to the
spaceport," he said coolly, "but they won't find anything on an innocent
man."
"Where is the necklace?" she asked in a throaty voice.
Drake pretended not to hear her. "It's a funny thing," he said. "Old
Belgezad would never let the necklace out of his hands except to get
me. He thought he'd get it back by making sure I was followed. But he
made two mistakes."
The girl put her arms around his neck. "His mistakes don't matter as
long as we have the necklace, do they?"
Anson Drake was never a man to turn down an invitation like that. He
held her in his arms and kissed her--long and lingeringly.
When he broke away, he went on as though nothing had happened.
"Two mistakes. The first one was thinking up such an obviously silly
plot. If it were as easy to steal jewels from the palace as all that,
nothing would be safe on Thizar.
"The second mistake was sending his daughter to trap me."
* * * * *
The girl gasped and stepped back.
"It was very foolish of you, Miss Belgezad," he went on calmly. "You
see, I happened to know that the real Norma Knight was sentenced to
seven years in Seladon Prison over a week ago. Unfortunately, the news
hadn't reached Thizar yet. I knew from the first that the whole thing
was to be a frame-up. It's too bad that your father had to use the real
necklace--it's a shame he lost it."
The girl's eyes blazed. "You--you _thief_! You--" She used words which
no self-respecting lady is supposed to use.
Drake waited until she had finished, and then said: "Oh, no, Miss
Belgezad; I'm no thief. Your father can consider the loss of that
necklace as a fine for running narcotics. And you can tell him that if I
catch him again, it will be worse.
"I don't like his kind of slime, and I'll do my best to get rid of them.
That's all, Miss B.; it was nice knowing you."
He walked out of the room, leaving her to stand there in helpless fury.
His phony necklace had come in handy after all; the police had thought
they had the real one, so they had never bothered to check the Galactic
Mail Service for a small package mailed to Seladon II. All he'd had to
do was drop it into the mail chute from his room and then cool his heels
in jail while the Galactic Mails got rid of the loot for him.
The Necklace of Algol would be waiting for him when he got to Seladon
II.