The SF Hall of Fame Volume Two B (52 page)

"What
you
want?" grunted the fat man,
pointing the stick with some dignity at the captain.

"Lay off the kid!" rumbled the captain, edging
into the courtyard.

"Mind your own business!" shouted the fat man,
waving his stick like a club. "I'll take care of her! She-"

"I never did!" squealed the girl. She burst into
tears.

"Try it, Fat and Ugly!" the captain warned.
"I'll ram the stick down your throat!"

He was very close now. With a sound of grunting
exasperation, the fat man pulled his foot free of the box, wheeled suddenly and
brought the end of the stick down on the top of the captain's cap. The captain
hit him furiously in the middle of the stomach.

There was a short flurry of activity, somewhat hampered by
shattering boxes everywhere. Then the captain stood up, scowling and breathing
hard. The fat man remained sitting on the ground, gasping about ". . . the
law!"

Somewhat to his surprise, the captain discovered the girl
standing just behind him. She caught his eye and smiled.

"My name's Maleen," she offered. She pointed at
the fat man. "Is he hurt bad?"

"Huh—no!" panted the captain. "But maybe we'd
better—"

It was too late! A loud, self-assured voice became audible
now at the opening to the alley:

"Here, here, here, here, here!" it said in the
reproachful, situation-under-control tone that always seemed the same to the
captain, on whatever world and in whichever language he heard it.

"What's all this about!" it inquired rhetorically.

"You'll have to come along!" it replied.

Police Court on Porlumma appeared to be a business conducted
on a very efficient, around-the-clock basis. They were the next case up.

Nikkeldepain was an odd name, wasn't it, the judge smiled.
He then listened attentively to the various charges, countercharges, and
denials.

Bruth the Baker was charged with having struck a citizen of
a foreign government on the head with a potentially lethal instrument —produced
in evidence. Said citizen had admittedly attempted to interfere as Bruth was
attempting to punish his slave Maleen—also produced in evidence—whom he
suspected of having added something to a batch of cakes she was working on that
afternoon, resulting in illness and complaints from fifty-two of Bruth's
customers.

Said foreign citizen had also used insulting language—the
captain admitted under pressure to "Fat and Ugly."

Some provocation could be conceded for the action taken by
Bruth, but not enough. Bruth paled.

Captain Pausert, of the Republic of Nikkeldepain—everybody
but the prisoners smiled this time—was charged (a) with said attempted
interference, (b) with said insult, (c) with having frequently and severely
struck Bruth the Baker in the course of the subsequent dispute.

The blow on the head was conceded to have provided a
provocation for charge (c)—but not enough.

Nobody seemed to be charging the slave Maleen with anything.
The judge only looked at her curiously, and shook his head.

"As the Court considers this regrettable
incident," he remarked, "it looks like two years for you, Bruth; and
about three for you, captain. Too bad!"

The captain had an awful sinking feeling. He had seen
something and heard a lot of Imperial court methods in the fringe systems. He
could probably get out of this three-year rap; but it would be expensive.

He realized that the judge was studying him reflectively.

"The Court wishes to acknowledge," the judge
continued, "that the captain's chargeable actions were due largely to a
natural feeling of human sympathy for the predicament of the slave Maleen. The
Court, therefore, would suggest a settlement as follows—subsequent to which all
charges could be dropped:

"That Bruth the Baker resell Maleen of Karres—with
whose services he appears to be dissatisfied—for a reasonable sum to Captain
Pausert of the Republic of Nikkeldepain."

Bruth the Baker heaved a gusty sigh of relief. But the
captain hesitated. The buying of human slaves by private citizens was a very
serious offense in Nikkeldepain! Still, he didn't have to make a record of it.
If they weren't going to soak him too much—

At just the right moment, Maleen of Karres introduced a
barely audible, forlorn, sniffling sound.

"How much are you asking for the kid?" the captain
inquired, looking without friendliness at his recent antagonist. A day was
coming when he would think less severely of Bruth; but it hadn't come yet.

Bruth scowled back but replied with a certain eagerness:
"A hundred and fifty m—" A policeman standing behind him poked him
sharply in the side. Bruth shut up.

"Seven hundred maels," the judge said smoothly.
"There'll be Court charges, and a fee for recording the
transaction—"He appeared to make a swift calculation. "Fifteen
hundred and forty-two maels—" He turned to a clerk: "You've looked
him up?"

The clerk nodded. "He's right!"

"And we'll take your check," the judge concluded.
He gave the captain a friendly smile. "Next case."

The captain felt a little bewildered.

There was something peculiar about this! He was getting out
of it much too cheaply. Since the Empire had quit its wars of expansion, young
slaves in good health were a high-priced article. Furthermore, he was
practically positive that Bruth the Baker had been willing to sell for a tenth
of what the captain actually had to pay!

Well, he wouldn't complain. Rapidly, he signed, sealed and
thumb-printed various papers shoved at him by a helpful clerk; and made out a
check.

"I guess," he told Maleen of Karres, "we'd
better get along to the ship."

And now what was he going to do with the kid, he pondered,
padding along the unlighted streets with his slave trotting quietly behind him.
If he showed up with a pretty girl-slave in Nikkeldepain, even a small one,
various good friends there would toss him into ten years or so of penal
servitude—immediately after Illyla had personally collected his scalp. They
were a moral lot.

Karres-?

"How far off is Karres, Maleen?" he asked into the
dark.

"It takes about two weeks," Maleen said tearfully.

Two weeks! The captain's heart sank again.

"What are you blubbering about?" he inquired
uncomfortably.

Maleen choked, sniffed, and began sobbing openly.

"I have two little sisters!" she cried.

"Well, well," the captain said encouragingly.
"That's nice—you'll be seeing them again soon. I'm taking you home, you
know!"

Great Patham—now he'd said it! But after ail-But this piece
of good news seemed to be having the wrong effect on his slave! Her sobbing
grew much more violent.

"No, I won't," she wailed. "They're
here!"

"Huh?" said the captain. He stopped short.
"Where?"

"And the people they're with are mean to them,
too!" wept Maleen.

The captain's heart dropped clean through his boots.
Standing there in the dark, he helplessly watched it coming:

"You could buy them awfully cheap!" she said.

In times of stress, the young life of Karres appeared to
take to the heights. It might be a mountainous place.

The Leewit sat on the top shelf of the back wall of the
crockery and antiques store, strategically flanked by two expensive-looking vases.
She was a doll-sized edition of Maleen; but her eyes were cold and gray instead
of blue and tearful. About five or six, the captain vaguely estimated. He
wasn't very good at estimating them around that age.

"Good evening," he said, as he came in through the
door. The Crockery and Antiques Shop had been easy to find. Like Bruth the
Baker's, it was the one spot in the neighborhood that was all lit up.

"Good evening, sir!" said what was presumably the
store owner, without looking around. He sat with his back to the door, in a
chair approximately at the center of the store and facing the Leewit at a
distance of about twenty feet.

". . . and there you can stay without food or drink
till the Holy Man comes in the morning!" he continued immediately, in the
taut voice of a man who has gone through hysteria and is sane again. The
captain realized he was addressing the Leewit.

"Your other Holy Man didn't stay very long!" the
diminutive creature piped, also ignoring the captain. Apparently, she had not
yet discovered Maleen behind him.

"This is a stronger denomination—much stronger!"
the store owner replied, in a shaking voice but with a sort of relish.
"He'll
exorcise you, all right, little demon—you'll whistle no buttons off him!
Your time is up! Go on and whistle all you want! Bust every vase in the
place—"

The Leewit blinked her gray eyes thoughtfully at him.

"Might!" she said.

"But if you try to climb down from there," the
store owner went on, on a rising note, "I'll chop you into bits—into
little, little bits!"

He raised his arm as he spoke and weakly brandished what the
captain recognized with a start of horror as a highly ornamented but probably
still useful antique battle-ax.

"Ha!" said the Leewit.

"Beg your pardon, sir!" the captain said, clearing
his throat.

"Good evening, sir!" the store owner repeated,
without looking around. "What can I do for you?"

"I came to inquire," the captain said hesitantly,
"about that child."

The store owner shifted about in his chair and squinted at
the captain with red-rimmed eyes.

"You're not a Holy Man!" he said.

"Hello, Maleen!" the Leewit said suddenly.
"That him?"

"We've come to buy you," Maleen said. "Shut
up!"

"Good!" said the Leewit.

"Buy it? Are you mocking me, sir?" the store owner
inquired.

"Shut up, Moonell!" A thin, dark,
determined-looking woman had appeared in the doorway that led through the back
wall of the store. She moved out a step under the shelves; and the Leewit
leaned down from the top shelf and hissed. The woman moved hurriedly back into
the doorway.

"Maybe he means it," she said in a more subdued
voice.

"I can't sell to a citizen of the Empire," the
store owner said de-featedly.

"I'm not a citizen," the captain said shortly.
This time, he wasn't going to name it.

"No, he's from Nikkei—" Maleen began.

"Shut up, Maleen!" the captain said helplessly in
turn.

"I never heard of Nikkei," the store owner
muttered doubtfully.

"Maleen!" the woman called shrilly. "That's
the name of one of the others—Bruth the Baker got her. He means it, all right!
He's buying them—"

"A hundred and fifty maels!" the captain said
craftily, remembering Bruth the Baker. "In cash!"

The store owner looked dazed.

"Not enough, Moonell!" the woman called.
"Look at all it's broken! Five hundred maels!"

There was a sound then, so thin the captain could hardly
hear it. It pierced at his eardrums like two jabs of a delicate needle. To
right and left of him, two highly glazed little jugs went
"Clink-clink!",
showed a sudden veining of cracks, and collapsed.

A brief silence settled on the store. And now that he looked
around more closely, the captain could spot here and there other little piles
of shattered crockery—and places where similar ruins apparently had been swept
up, leaving only traces of colored dust.

The store owner laid the ax down carefully beside his chair,
stood up, swaying a little, and came towards the captain.

"You offered me a hundred and fifty maels!" he said
rapidly as he approached. "I accept it here, now, see—before
witnesses!" He grabbed the captain's right hand in both of his and pumped
it up and down vigorously. "Sold!" he yelled.

Then he wheeled around in a leap and pointed a shaking hand
at the Leewit.

"And NOW," he howled, "break something! Break
anything! You're his! I'll sue him for every mael he ever made and ever
will!"

"Oh, do come help me down, Maleen!" the Leewit
pleaded prettily.

For a change, the store of Wansing, the jeweler, was dimly
lit and very quiet. It was a sleek, fashionable place in a fashionable shopping
block near the spaceport. The front door was unlocked, and Wansing was in.

The three of them entered quietly, and the door sighed
quietly shut behind them. Beyond a great crystal display-counter, Wansing was
moving about among a number of opened shelves, talking softly to himself. Under
the crystal of the counter, and in close-packed rows on the satin-covered
shelves, reposed a many-colored gleaming and glittering and shining. Wansing
was no piker.

"Good evening, sir!" the captain said across the
counter.

"It's morning!" the Leewit remarked from the other
side of Maleen.

"Maleen!" said the captain.

"We're keeping out of this," Maleen said to the
Leewit.

"All right," said the Leewit.

Wansing had come around jerkily at the captain's greeting,
but had made no other move. Like all the slave owners the captain had met on
Porlumma so far, Wansing seemed unhappy. Otherwise, he was a large, dark,
sleek-looking man with jewels in his ears and a smell of expensive oils and
perfumes about him.

"This place is under constant visual guard, of
course!" he told the captain gently. "Nothing could possibly happen
to me here. Why am I so frightened?"

"Not of me, I'm sure!" the captain said with an
uncomfortable attempt at geniality. "I'm glad your store's still
open," he went on briskly. "I'm here on business—"

"Oh, yes, it's still open, of course," Wansing
said. He gave the captain a slow smile and turned back to his shelves.
"I'm making inventory, that's why! I've been making inventory since early
yesterday morning. I've counted them all seven times—"

"You're very thorough," the captain said.