Mission: Earth "The Enemy Within" (21 page)

She reluctantly let me pass. In his office, I said, "What the Hells is that?"

"Her name means 'quail.' I thought it kind of pretty," said Prahd.

"More payroll?" I demanded.

"Why, yes. She's the daughter of the town's leading practitioner. His son is coming in from Istanbul in the morning to finish his internship here. But only five more nurses are coming down from the Istanbul training school."

"Who's this 'resident intern'?" I demanded.

"Oh, that's me when they don't have money." I noticed he had a big tray on a side table, a finished dinner that must have been enormous. "Are you running up bills at the restaurants, too?" I demanded.

"Oh, no," he said. "You told me to be economical. So I only hired two cooks, three dishwashers, a laundress and a chef. They don't want much money. Just plenty of food to carry home."

"Look," I said, "that girl out there will steal your patients for her father. That son when he comes..."

"Oh, I mean to train him in cellology!" His eyes suddenly glowed. "Officer Gris, I think I can clean up all the TB and trachoma in this district! And then go on to all of Turkey! And then the whole Middle..."

"Doctor Bittlestiffender!" I said sharply. "They obviously omitted from your training a course in finance. Doctor Gyrant Slahb often said, 'Where the Hells would cellology be without money'! So there!"

"She did try to collect a fee off you," he said weakly. I sat down. "Prahd, I think you need basic orientation in the facts of life. It isn't money from me you're after. It's money for me, young Doctor Prahd." I saw he looked shocked.

I am quick at these things. "So that I can finance cleaning up diseases," I added.

His eyes instantly glowed worshipfully. "Then it was all right that I ordered two new ambulances and have drivers coming in." Gods!

There was no use talking to him about some things. He was too stupid. I whipped out Jimmy "The Gutter's" list. "Here are two hundred names. You will find phone numbers on this list. They are in Paris and New York and Las Vegas and Rio and Gods know where else. Schedule them to come in here a couple dozen at a time and get busy!"

He took the list. He looked confused. "Now what's the matter?" "I don't know how to use one of these phones!" I snatched the list back. I knew a balk when I saw it. "I'll do it myself!" I started out the door.

"There's no need to walk back to your villa," he called after me. "My car and driver will take you!"

And, (bleep) him, there was a new Omni waiting on the front drive and a uniformed chauffeur opened the door for me. "To where did you wish to go, Sultan Bey?" he said.

I told him he could go to any Hell Moslems went to and walked back to my villa. That would show them! The walk cooled me off. Prahd was pouring out money in rivers. (Bleep)-all was coming in.

I sat down with the list. What to do with it. I got to thinking. The National Security Agency monitored all long-distance calls. Perhaps it wasn't wise to phone from here. It might even bring in hit men on their trail or even CIA hit men, which is worse, and I had had a bellyful of hit men for the night.

Ah. I wrote explicit instructions to use messengers and not to use the phone at all. I wrote exactly what to do. I coded these and the lists up. I ran down the long tunnel to Faht's office.

"Send this to our New York organization," I said. "Right away!"

He took it. "I hope you know what you're doing, Sultan Bey. We're having about all the commotion we can stand. There was a shooting in town a little while ago. I just got a call. Where were you?"

"In a bar, having a Coke, and I can prove it," I said.

"I bet you can," he said.

But he took the list over to his machine and sent it.

But fate was not through dribbling on me yet.

As I turned to go, Faht Bey said, "You have another prisoner in the detention cells. Captain Bolz phoned from an Istanbul whorehouse this afternoon and told me he had orders to take the person back with him when he left and he wanted to make sure we had an extra set of irons for him."

Too-Too! Oh Gods, would duty never cease to nag! "All right," I said impatiently. "I'll go interview him now."

I went out. I had no car so I walked through the chilly night to the archaeological workers' barracks. I got the duty officer and we entered the hangar.

At the cell, the guard officer said, "You want me to stay? They brought him in, in chains. He must be pretty violent."

It was an opportunity to show how tough I was. "I can handle him," I said. "I'm heavily armed."

The officer unlocked the cell door for me and left.

I turned on the cell glowplates.

Too-Too woke up, saw me and started crying.

He was pretty rumpled. "Six horrible weeks in a horrible spaceship with a horrible crew trying to get at me," he said. "And now you!" The tears streamed down his pretty face.

I slapped him. I hate homos. They make me sick at my stomach. The very thought of a man making love to a man makes me turn green!

"I've got two postcards," I said. "One for you and one for Oh Dear. If you don't mail them on return, your mothers will automatically be killed."

The tears turned into rivers.

"So if you want those cards to continue to hold the magic mail," I said, "you will stop blubbering and tell all—clearly and distinctly."

He begged permission to go to the toilet.

There is not much privacy in a detention cell. He made me turn my back.

Finally, he composed himself on the stone ledge– which is to say, he sat there drawing long, shuddering sobs.

Now that he was relaxed, I said, "I want to know everything Lord Endow has been saying or doing since I left. Start talking!"

"I was only there ten days after you left!" he wailed.

"No equivocations. Begin!"

"The minute he saw me, he said, 'Oh, how darling!' Then he said, 'Your trousers seem a little tight. Come into my bathroom so I can...'"

"No, no, no!" I stormed at him. I hate homos! Men making love to each other curdles my blood! "I want you to tell me the essentials! The important information!"

"Oh. The important things. He said I was much more beautiful than his orderly so he transferred the fellow back to the Fleet at once. And I am lovely! Endow said one night..."

"Too-Too," I said in my most deadly voice. "Political. I want political, not homosexual, data!"

He started crying again and I had to slap him.

Finally, with my knee on his chest and him lying back on the stone ledge and a stungun held to his throat, I began to get data.

It seemed that Lombar, through Endow, had begun to get several of the Grand Council on uppers and downers—methedrine and morphine—to "help their rheumatism." The physicians in Palace City were all pushing drugs and success was looked for.

With a few more slaps and jabs, I got more data. Lombar had heard of the U.S. Congress's Harrison Act of 1914, Earth date, which regulated narcotics, and was pushing it to get it passed by the Grand Council so that anybody else pushing drugs that hurt Lombar's monopoly would be instantly jailed. The growing of poppies on any planet in the Voltar Confederacy would be punishable by total confiscation of the land, the poppies, heavy fines and imprisonment for life. Synthesizing speed or any other such drug would carry the death penalty. There would be one license for all types of drugs and that would be Lombar's.

Very smart. Just like I. G. Barben and Rockecenter had done. Lombar had studied the primitives very well.

Aside from some odds and ends, that was really all Too-Too knew about the Grand Council.

I let him up. I was almost reaching for the postcards when a sudden suspicion took me. He looked smug, the way homos will. I hate homos. You can't trust them.

I took out the cards all right. And then I put my hands on them in a position that indicated I was about to tear them up.

"No!" he screamed at me.

"You know more," I said.

He thought wildly. Then he said, "All I can think of doesn't concern the Grand Council or Endow. It's only Bawtch."

Aha! He was holding back. I made my hands look tense.

"No, no," he screamed. "I'll tell you! Just the day after you left, I saw Bawtch sitting in his office. He was laughing to himself. And he said something."

Good Gods! Bawtch laughing? That silly old chief clerk never laughed in his life. This must be something terrible! "What did he say?"

"It didn't make any sense to me. But it concerned you. Bawtch said, talking to himself, 'Forgery. Oh my. Oh my. It's wonderful. Forgery! They'll execute Gris for it!'"

I went cold. What did Bawtch have on me?

The only forgery you could instantly be executed for was forging the Emperor's name on a document!

And then it came to me. Those two (bleeped) forgers in Section 451 had talked!

They had told Bawtch about those two documents I had used to con the Countess Krak into persuading Heller to leave!

Yes! They could execute me!

Bawtch was getting his jealous revenge!

What could I do?

Those two documents, the only copies, were on the body of the Countess Krak!

The deadly Countess Krak, that would let nobody touch her! That killed, if anyone but Heller reached toward her.

My head was in a whirl.

I needed time to think!

I put the two postcards back in my pocket.

Too-Too screamed in anguish.

I left the cell. The guard officer was waiting. He said, "Devils! I've heard some brawls in my time but that one in there... No wonder they brought him in chains!"

I said, "Lock him up again but hold him ready." I went up the tunnel to my room. This was a real emergency. Fate had just been playing with me until it hit me with an axe! What could I do?

My old Apparatus school professor in Wits Utilization used to say, "When the natives have you lowered in boiling oil and are sticking spears into you, it's time to accumulate data." I heeded his advice.

The night was getting on. I sat there trying to think. My eye was attracted to the viewscreen.

The interference was off in the suite. I usually kept the sound off when I was away. I turned it on.

Vantagio, Izzy, Bang-Bang and, of course, Heller were lolling around in Heller's suite. It must be just before dinner there.

Vantagio had a huge atlas on his lap. He had it open to a map of the world. At first I just thought he was riding his hobbyhorse—political science.

"... so that's what the 'democratic process' is: the politicians give the people things the politicians don't own in order to get elected. Got that, kid?"

Heller nodded. Bang-Bang said he wished they had some Scotch.

"Now, communism," continued Vantagio, "is where the people are forbidden to own anything so the commissars can grab it all for themselves. These are the essential differences between democracy and communism. You got that, kid?"

Heller said, "Yes. Political science is a wonderful subject."

"Yes," agreed Vantagio. "Politics is mostly grabbing and political science gives you a good chance to grab first."

Izzy looked around at them apologetically. "Could we please get back to the Master Plan?"

I became alert. Spinning though I was, the "Master Plan" was something I knew I had better know about. I had missed it before.

Izzy continued. "How many of these countries have to depend on voter appeal?"

Vantagio picked up the atlas and turned it toward them. He pointed. "Let's take England first...."

On went the interference. Some (bleeped) diplomat was reliving his youth in hot, synthetic sunlight on artificial grass! I hoped he got sand in his hair!

I turned off the sound and was about to throw a blanket over the viewer when the import of what I had heard struck me.

You understand that I was in a very nervous state. I was in the hands of Bawtch, which was bad enough, but I conceived that I was also in danger of being executed by the Emperor. One might have thought these were sufficient threats for one night. But here, I realized abruptly, was another one!

Heller could get at me!

They were actually conspiring, there in that suite. Heller was studying political science and there could only be one reason. If they were taking over every country in the world—and Vantagio had clearly stated they were about to take England—Heller could then control the combined military forces of the planet, and now that he knew I had tried to kill him, he would use them for only one purpose—to capture me!

It tipped the scales utterly.

I made up my mind.

I woke up Karagoz. He told me the Ford station wagon was able to run.

I was too shaky to drive. I made him get in, ignoring his plea that he had no pants or shoes on, and forced him to drive me to the hospital.

On those inventories I had seen a hypnohelmet. When I had asked Zanco for all the other new bits they had, that appeared to have been one of them.

At the hospital I pushed my way right by the old woman asleep at the desk. I made my way noisily to Prahd's bedroom.

I was not noisy enough. He was in bed with Nurse Bildirjin. Their heads popped up.

"My father!" said Nurse Bildirjin.

"It's not your father," said Prahd. "Sultan Bey, I think you have met Nurse Bildirjin? Please don't blow up the hospital."

Nurse Bildirjin professionally started to get into her uniform. "You should register at the outer desk. The first examination is three hundred lira."

I kicked her out. "Where are the inventories?"

Prahd got some pants over his skinny legs. He got on a doctor's coat, and barefoot, led the way to his office. He had the inventories in a safe.

I looked at them. There were two lots. It took me a while.