chapter THIRTY-ONE
The door leaves rang heavily against their stops. Then the crossbar slotted home with a sharper note, and the tension in the courtyard was released. The Council might think it was separating itself from external distractions. Those outside knew that they were temporarily preserved from the screwy whims of their employers.
All but a handful of the men in the courtyard wore crimson.
One of the exceptions was a kitchen assistant. He trotted from the House carrying on a yoke a pair of large insulated canisters. It was food and drink for the musicians. Their leader, Codell, had shown the foresight to lay on the refreshments ahead of time. There was no question of the musicians relaxing in the vans outside the walls which acted as barracks for most of Dyson’s men. They were still on duty. They had put up their instruments and were openly belting on the sidearms which were to be part of their regalia henceforward.
Ahwas took off his gold-billed cap and wiped his forehead with his sleeve. The sound the gunman made reminded Subiyaga of the gurgle of recovery following a near drowning.
The guard leader looked around him. His own men were already uncasing their submachine guns. Ahwas nodded approval. He motioned Subiyaga nearer to him and whispered, “You keep an eye on things here, huh? You saw Baucom give the word to me? Right from the top, that was. I got to go talk to some people.”
The specialist grimaced. “Via,” he said, “your goons aren’t any business of mine. Do what you please, but leave me out of it.”
Four of the men who had formally observed the checkpoint were now clustered a little apart. They were talking while their eyes roved nervously. None of them seemed disposed to notice the guns appearing all around them.
When the Hall closed behind Councilor Dyson, Coon Blegan stalked lumpily away from the detection cabinet. He stood now by the shaded south wall of the yard, not far from the outside gate. His arms were crossed and the sole of his right boot was planted against the wall at knee level. The old man was a brooding threat which drew Ahwas’ eyes even though whispers could not carry that far.
“Well,” the guard leader said.
Subiyaga had begun disassembling and packing his rig. The specialist had served on a dozen planets with as many different varieties of security forces. That gave him a professional familiarity with weapons. The ignorance of many of the liverymen around him was appalling. The sooner he had his equipment packed and had carried it out of this courtyard, the happier he would be. Incompetence could make the enclosure a killing ground, even without the orders Ahwas seemed so proud to be passing on.
“Blood! Look at that!” the guard leader said. In case his tone were not demanding enough, he snatched at Subiyaga’s sleeve to turn him toward the House.
The specialist bit back a curse as one of the sideplates rattled out of the groove in which he had just inserted it. Nervous fools with guns were dangerous enough without having their emotional temperature raised still further. “Well, I see him,” Subiyaga said. “The mercenary, Pritchard. And if he’s got a gun, it isn’t anything as big as the one he backed you boys down with the other night.”
“Don’t matter,” muttered Ahwas, “don’t matter cop. We got him this time.”
The guard set his cap in place firmly. He began trotting toward Dyson’s van. There the liverymen who had blocked the Hall doorway were being issued their own automatic weapons.
Subiyaga paused for a further moment to watch Pritchard. The ex-mercenary had climbed onto the deck of one of the drones. He was relaxed, his arm resting loosely on the gun tube. Hard to tell his expression at the distance, but it did not seem to be too concerned. Too bad. Subiyaga liked to work with other professionals, but this time the few such around were all on the other side.
The detection loop was held rigid and a finger’s breadth above the ground by its own internal charge. Subiyaga reversed the polarity with a pop. The loop collapsed. He began to reel it in. One thing Subiyaga had seen for sure: Pritchard still wore his remote unit, the one Subiyaga had thought he must have left behind in the Hall.
Or another one, of course; but why would the mercenary have carried two identical commo units to Tethys?
Ballenger was in charge of the van. He also acted as Councilor Dyson’s steward when the Councilor was traveling. The pudgy man considered himself a cut above Ahwas and the other gunmen, though Dyson had never formalized lines of authority. Everyone in crimson livery was Dyson’s subordinate. The Councilor believed that lack of certainty beyond that fact kept his retainers nervous and alert. It also made it unlikely that Dyson’s men would make any major decision without personally clearing it with their master, which suited his style very well.
The ten-meter van looked larger from the outside than it was within, what with the drive units, the equipment that made it the Councilor’s command station—and especially because of the squad of armed liverymen now babbling in the main room.
“You have no business here!” cried Ballenger in a powerful voice. It was a surprise coming from a small man who looked soft from any angle. “Take your—” he made shooing motions with the backs of both hands, trying to dismiss the submachine guns he had just been required to issue— “things and get back where you belong. I don’t know what the Councilor is going to say when he sees the filth you’ve tracked into his compartment.”
“Via, that’s easy for you to say, piggy,” said Ahwas, still puffed with the orders he had delivered to the chief of the other squad. “We’ve got to blast that merc and the other just as soon as they come out of the meeting.”
“Right when the doors open, Rag?” the other leader asked. He was toying with the safety of his own weapon in a way which would have terrified anyone in the van with better sense.
“Well, I . . .” Ahwas began.
“Of course not, you buffoons!” snapped Ballenger. “Is this Slade going to be the first person out the door?” Several guards frowned in an attempt to answer the question. “Of course not!” the steward repeated in fury. “So if you shoot this one when the doors open, you’ll warn the other, won’t you? Won’t you? So wait till the other one comes out of the Hall, then kill them both.”
Ballenger paused, breathing hard.
“Right, that’s just what the master told me to have done,” Ahwas lied. He took off his cap and wiped his face again, darkening the bright scarlet with his sweat.
“Sir,” called the driver who monitored the instruments from the cab. “There’s a couple supply trucks coming in.
“That’s correct,” the steward said primly. “There’s to be a celebration banquet in Slade House this evening. They’ll be bringing additional specialties.”
The armed liverymen were beginning to file out of the van. Ahwas watched them with a glum expression. “Won’t help us a bit, though, will it?” he said. “Now that we aren’t allowed in the House anymore.”
Ballenger opened his mouth in an amazement that was only partially feigned. “That isn’t a problem anymore, don’t you see?” he said to the guard. “After the meeting, we own Slade House. We own Tetkys. In just a few hours.”
He continued to shake his head in wonder as the last of the gunmen trooped out of the van.