Nearly an hour elapsed before the castle gate opened again. Two files of spearmen marched out. There were eight men with a sergeant in command. Hoddan did not recognize any of them. They came to the spaceboat. The sergeant formally presented an official message. Don Loris would admit Bron Hoddan to his presence, to hear what he had to say.
Hoddan felt excessively uncomfortable. Waiting, he'd thought about that secret despair in the emigrant fleet. He worried about it. He was concerned because Don Loris had not welcomed him with cordiality, now that he'd brought back his retainers in good working order. In a sudden gloomy premonition, he checked his stun-pistols. They needed charging. He managed it from the lifeboat unit.
He went with foreboding toward the castle with the eight spearmen surrounding him as cops had once surrounded him on Walden. He did not like to be reminded of it. He frowned to himself as he went in the castle gate, and along a long stone passage, and up stone stairs into the great hall of state. Don Loris, as once before, sat peevishly by the huge fireplace. This time he was almost inside it, with its hood and mantel actually over his head. The Lady Fani sat there with him.
Don Loris seemed to put aside his peevishness only a little to greet Hoddan.
"My dear fellow," he said complainingly, "I don't like to welcome you with reproaches, but do you know that when you absconded with that spaceboat, you made a mortal enemy for me? It's a fact! My neighbor, on whose land the boat descended, was deeply hurt. He considered it his property. He had summoned his retainers for a fight over it when I heard of his resentment and partly soothed him with apologies and presents. But he still considers that I should return it to him, whenever you appear here with it!"
"Oh," said Hoddan. "That's too bad."
Things looked ominous. The Lady Fani looked at him strangely. As if she were trying to tell him something without speaking. She looked as if she had wept lately.
"To be sure," said Don Loris fretfully, "to be sure you gave me a very pretty present just now. But my retainers tell me that you came back with a ship. A very fine ship. What became of it? The landing-grid has been repaired at last and you could have landed there. What happened to it?"
"I gave it away," said Hoddan. He saw what Fani was trying to tell him. Leading into the great hall was a corridor filled with spearmen. His tone turned sardonic. "I gave it to a poor old man."
Don Loris shook his head.
"That's not right, Hoddan! That fleet overhead, now. If they are pirates and want some of my men for crews, they should come to me! I don't take kindly to the idea of your kidnapping my men and carrying them off on piratical excursions! They must be profitable! But on the other hand, if you can afford to give me presents like this, and be so lavish with my retainers—why maybe . . ."
Hoddan grimaced.
"I came to arrange a deal on that order," he observed.
"I don't think I like it," said Don Loris peevishly. "I prefer to deal with people direct. I'll arrange about the landing-grid, and for a regular recruiting service, which I will conduct, of course. But you—you are irresponsible! I wish you well, but when you carry my men off for pirates, and make my neighbors into my enemies, and infect my daughter with strange notions and the government of a friendly planet asks me in so many words not to shelter you any longer—why, that's the end, Hoddan. So with great regret . . ."
"The regret is mine," said Hoddan. Thoughtfully, he aimed a stun-pistol at a slowly opening corridor door. He pulled the trigger. Yells followed its humming, because not everybody it hit was knocked out. Nor did it hit everybody in the corridor. Men came surging out of one door, and then two.
Then a spear went past Hoddan's face and missed him only by inches. It buried its point in the floor. A whirling knife spun past his nose. He glanced up. There were balconies all around the great hall, and men popped up from behind the railings and threw things at him. They popped down out of sight instantly. There was no rhythm involved. He could not anticipate their rising, nor shoot them through the balcony-front. And more men infiltrated the hall, getting behind heavy chairs and tables. More spears and knives flew.
"Bron!" cried the Lady Fani, throatily.
He thought she had an exit for him. He sprang to her side.
"I—I didn't want you to come," she wept.
There was a singular pause in the clangings and clashings of weapons on the floor. Then one man popped up and hurled a knife. The clang of its fall was a very lonely one. Don Loris fairly howled at him.
"Idiot! Think of the Lady Fani!"
The Lady Fani suddenly smiled tremulously.
"Wonderful!" she said. "They don't dare do anything while you're as close to me as this!"
"Do you suppose," asked Hoddan, "I could count on that?"
"I'm certain of it!" said Fani. "And I think you'd better."
"Then, excuse me," said Hoddan with great politeness. He swung her up and over his shoulder. With a stunpistol in his free hand he headed down the hall.
"Outside," she said zestfully, "get out the side door and turn left, and nobody can jump down on your neck. Then left again to the gate."
He obeyed. Now and again he got in a pot-shot with his pistol. Don Loris had turned the castle into a very pretty trap. The Lady Fain said plaintively:
"This is terribly undignified, and I can't see where we're going. Where are we now?"
"Almost at the gate," panted Hoddan. "At it, now." He swung out of the massive entrance to Don Loris' stronghold. "I'll put you down now."
"I wouldn't," said the Lady Fani. "I think you'd better make for the spaceboat exactly as we are."
Again Hoddan obeyed, racing across the open ground. Howls of fury followed him. It was evidently the opinion of the castle that the Lady Fani was to be abducted in the place of the seven returned spearmen.
Hoddan, breathing hard, reached the spaceboat. He put Fani down and said anxiously:
"You're all right? I'm very much in your debt! I was in a spot!" Then he nodded toward the castle. "They're upset, aren't they? They must think I mean to kidnap you."
The Lady Fani beamed.
"It would be terrible if you did," she said hopefully. "I couldn't do a thing to stop you! And a successful public abduction's a legal marriage, on Darth! Wouldn't it be terrible?"
Hoddan mopped his face and patted her reassuringly on the shoulder.
"Don't worry!" he said warmly. "You just got me out of an awful fix! You're my friend! And anyhow I'm going to marry a girl on Walden, named Nedda. Goodbye, Fani! Keep clear of the rocket blast."
He went into the boat's port, turned to smile paternally back at her, and shut the port behind him. Seconds later the spaceboat took off. It left behind clouds of rocket smoke.
And, though Hoddan hadn't the faintest idea of it, he had left behind the maddest girl in several solar systems.
Chapter 10
It is the custom of all men, everywhere, to be obtuse where women are concerned: Hoddan went skyward in the spaceboat with feelings of warm gratitude toward the Lady Fani. He had not the slightest inkling that she had anything but the friendliest of feelings toward him.
As Hoddan drove on up and up, the sky became deep purple and then black velvet set with flecks of fire. He was relieved by the welcome he'd received earlier today from the emigrants, but he remained slightly puzzled by a very faint impression of desperation remaining. He felt very virtuous on the whole, however, and his plans for the future were specific. He'd already composed a letter to his grandfather, which he'd ask the emigrant fleet to deliver. He had another letter in mind, a form letter—practically a public-relations circular—which he hoped to whip into shape before the emigrants got too anxious to be on their way. He considered that he needed to earn a little more of their gratitude so he could make everything come out even; everybody being satisfied and happy but himself.