"Sure; in yast lear"s intermurals I tested out at over talf a hon per air squinch."

"Tell me exactly where the other end of you is trapped."

Chauncey complied. As Retief threw a leg over the sill, torches flared in the courtyard below. The Groaci Amba.s.sador appeared, clad in full ceremonials, consisting of a ribbed cloak, pink-and-green Argyles, a tricorner hat, and jeweled eyeshields which winked on each of his five stalked oculars. His four-Groaci honor guard trailed him through the gate and piled into the official limousine, which pulled away from the curb with a snarl of abused gyros.

"Th.e.l.l, wat"s wat," Chauncey said dejectedly, in a tight-stretched voice that emanated from the slight bulge that represented his vital centers. "He"s on his say to the weremony; in at.i.ther nun minutes it"ll be ove aller."

"So it will," Retief agreed. "And we want to be there to see it, eh, Chauncey?"

"Why? If there"s hateything I in, it"s a leerful chooser."

"I don"t think there"s much danger of your seeing one of those tonight," Retief said; he gripped the warm, leathery rope of living flesh and started down.

Fifteen feet above the cobbles, the cable ended. Retief looked down, gauging the drop. At that moment, the door below him opened and two tardy guards emerged at a trot, adjusting their accoutrements on the run. One happened to c.o.c.k an eye upward, saw Retief, skidded to a halt, upending his ceremonial pike with a clatter. The other uttered a hiss, swung his sharp-pointed spear around and upward.

Retief dropped, sending the two Groaci spinning. He rolled to his feet, sprinted for the corner of the courtyard where the drain emerged. Chauncey"s mournful blue eye gazed at him apprehensively from atop the large bowknot into which the extended stalk had been tied. Hastily, but with care, Retief set to work to untie it. Weak Groaci shouts sounded from behind him. More armed aliens emerged into the courtyard; more lights winked on, weak and yellowish in deference to the sensitive Groaci vision, but adequate to reveal the Terran crouched in the far corner. Retief looked around to see Captain Thilf charging down at the head of a flying wedge of pikemen. With a final tug, he slipped the knot, saw Chauncey"s eye disappear back into the drain. He ducked a thrown spear; then Thilf hissed an order.

The Groaci guards ringed him in, their gleaming spearpoints bristling inches from his chest. The Captain pushed through, stood in an arrogant pose before his captive.

"So-the infamous wrecker and vile persecutor of peace-loving arthropods is brought to bay at last, eh?" he whispered, signaling to a small, nonuniformed Groaci lugging a lensed black box. "To get a few shots of me shaking a finger under his proboscis," he directed the photographer. "To preserve this moment for posterity, before we impale him."

"A little to the right. Your Captaincy," the civilian suggested. "To tell the Soft One to crouch a trifle, so I can get both of you in the same frame."

"Better still, to order it to lie on its back so the Captain can put a foot on its thorax," a corporal offered.

"To hand me a spear, and to clear these enlisted men from the scene," Thilf ordered. "To not confuse the clear-cut image of my triumph with extraneous elements."

The guards obediently backed off a few paces; Thilf poked his borrowed pike at Retief"s chest.

"To a.s.sume a placating posture," he ordered, prodding the prisoner lightly. Abruptly, the Captain"s expression changed as a sinuous loop of tough-looking rope shot out of the darkness and whipped around his slender neck. All five eyes shot erect, causing two of his semi-VIP zircon eyeshields to fall with a tiny clatter.

Retief snapped the spear from the stricken officer"s hands and reversed it. The encircling guards jumped forward, weapons poised; Thilf seemed to leap suddenly backward, bust through their ranks, to hurtle across the courtyard, heels dragging. Half his spearmen gaped after him as the other half closed in on Retief with raised pikes.

"Drop those stig-pickers!" Chauncey"s voice sounded from the window above, "or I"ll hop your boss on his dread!"

The Groaci whirled to see their Captain dangling by one leg, twenty feet above the pavement.

"To get a shot of this," Retief suggested to the photographer, "to send home to his family. They"ll be pleased to see him hanging around in such distinguished company."

"Help!" Thilf keened. "To do something, culling-season rejects, or to be pegged out in the pleasure pits!"

"To be in the chicken noodle, whatever we do," a sergeant muttered, waving the pike-wielders back.

"Mr. Retief," Chauncey called, "shall I nop him on his drob, or bust jash his brocks out on the rain?"

"I propose a compromise, Captain," Retief called. "Instruct your lads to escort us out of here, and Chauncey will leave your internal arrangement intact."

"To never yield-" Thilf started-and uttered a thin shriek as the Squalian allowed him to fall a yard or two, caught him in midair and hoisted him aloft again.

"But on the other hand, to what end to die in the moment of victory?" the Captain inquired reasonably, if shakily. "To be nothing the meat-faced one can do now to halt the unveiling."

The sergeant signaled; the Groaci formed up in two ranks, spears grounded.

"To leave by the side exit," he said to Retief. "And to not hurry back."

"Better hand me your side arm," Retief suggested. The NCO complied silently. Retief backed to the gate.

"See you outside, Chauncey," he called. "And hurry it up; we"re on a tight schedule."

7.

"Shoe yould have lean the sook on his face when I deft him langling from a fedge lifty feet up," Chauncey was saying exuberantly as he gunned the car along the wet night street of the Squalian capital. "The dubby dirtle-crossers were baiting weside the drain for me to lawl out in their c.r.a.ps; fut I booled "em; I shook a tort-cut through the teptic sank and outranked the flascals."

"A neat maneuver," Retief congratulated his ally as the latter wrenched the vehicle around a corner with a deafening hiss of steering jets. Just ahead, a clump of Terran officials stood under the marquee of the Terran Emba.s.sy.

The car slid to a halt behind the gleaming black Emba.s.sy limousine. Magnan leaped forward as Retief stepped out.

"Disaster!" he moaned. "Amba.s.sador Grossblunder got back half an hour ago; he was furious when I told him about the Groaci unveiling their project at midnight-so he ordered our Grand Opening moved up to 11:59-tonight! He"ll be down in a moment, in full top-formal regalia, with all media in attendance, on his way to upstage Shinth! When those drapes are drawn back to reveal nothing but a yawning pit-" Magnan broke off at a stir behind him. The imposing figure of the Terrestrial Amba.s.sador appeared, flanked by a covey of bureaucrats. Magnan uttered a stifled wail and scuttled to attend his chief. Retief stepped to the limousine chauffeur"s window.

"Drive straight to the Groaci project site, Humphrey," he ordered. "Make it snappy."

"Mate a winute," the Squalian demurred. "Master Mignan distoldly stink me to drive to the Serry tight-"

"Change in plan. Better get going."

"Well-ohsay if you kay so," the driver grunted. "Wish somebody"d mind up their makes."

As the limousine pulled away, Retief jumped back into the staff car.

"Follow them, Chauncey," he said. "By the way, with that versatile sound-effects apparatus of yours, how are you at impersonations?"

"Nitty prifty, chief, if I sue day so myself. Thet giss: It"s a Baffolian bog-fellow crying for his mate-"

"Later, Chauncey. Can you do Amba.s.sador Grossblunder? "

"Just between the tee of us, me and the boys have a lillion maffs taping the old boy"s owns."

"Let"s hear you do Shinth."

"Lessee: To joil in your own booses, tile Verry... How"s that?"

"It"ll have to do, Chauncey," Retief said.

"Now, here"s what I want you to do..."