She turned a switch and the scene came to life — naked crags and cliffs reaching up toward the red moons, and a stir of activity in the shadows. Armored forms were moving about, setting up atomic guns, warming the engines of spaceships — and they were Merseians.
The Sartaz snarled. Someone asked, “How do we know this is not a falsified transmission?”
“You will be able to see their remains for yourself,” said Aline. “Our plan was very simple. We planted atomic land mines in the ground. They are radio controlled.” She held up a small switch-box wired to the televisor, and her smile was grim. “This is the control. Perhaps your Majesty would like to press the button?”
“Give it to me,” said the Sartaz thickly. He thumbed the switch.
A blue-white glare of hell-flame lit the screen. They had a vision of the ground fountaining upward, the cliffs toppling down, a cloud of radioactive dust boiling up toward the moons, and then the screen went dark.
“The cameras have been destroyed,” said Aline quietly. “Now, your Majesty, I suggest that you send scouts there immediately. They will find enough remains to verify what the televisor has shown. I would further suggest that a power which maintains armed forces within your own territory is not a friendly one!”
Korvash and Aycharaych were to be deported with whatever other Merseians were left in the system — once Betelgeuse had broken diplomatic relations with their state and begun negotiating an alliance with Terra. The evening before they left, Flandry gave a small party for them in his apartment. Only he and Aline were there to meet them when they entered.
“Congratulations,” said Aycharaych wryly. “The Sartaz was so furious he wouldn’t even listen to our protestations. I can’t blame him — you certainly put us in a bad light.”
“No worse than your own,” grunted Korvash angrily. “Hell take you for a lying hypocrite, Flandry. You know that Terra has her own forces and agents in the Betelgeusean System, hidden on wild moons and asteroids. It’s part of the game.”
“Of course I know it,” smiled the Terran. “But does the Sartaz? However, it’s as you say — the game. You don’t hate the one who beats you in chess. Why then hate us for winning this round?”
“Oh, I don’t,” said Aycharaych. “There will be other rounds.”
“You’ve lost much less than we would have,” said Flandry. “This alliance has strengthened Terra enough for her to halt your designs, at least temporarily. But we aren’t going to use that strength to launch a war against you, though I admit that we should. The Empire wants only to keep the peace.”
“Because it doesn’t dare fight a war,” snapped Korvash.
They didn’t answer. Perhaps they were thinking of the cities that would not be bombed and the young men that would not go out to be killed. Perhaps they were simply enjoying a victory.
Flandry poured wine. “To our future amiable enmity,” he toasted.
“I still don’t see how you did it,” said Korvash.
“Aline did it,” said Flandry. “Tell them, Aline.”
She shook her head. She had withdrawn into a quietness which was foreign to her. “Go ahead, Dominic,” she murmured. “It was really your show.”
“Well,” said Flandry, not loath to expound, “when we realized that Aycharaych could read our minds, it looked pretty hopeless. How can you possibly lie to a telepath? Aline found the answer — by getting information which just isn’t true.
“There’s a drug in this system called sorgan which has the property of making its user believe anything he’s told. Aline fed me some without my knowledge and then told me that fantastic lie about Terra coming in to occupy Alfzar. And, of course, I accepted it as absolute truth. Which you, Aycharaych, read in my mind.”
“I was puzzled,” admitted the Chereionite. “It just didn’t look reasonable to me; but as you said, there didn’t seem to be any way to lie to a telepath.”
“Aline’s main worry was then to keep out of mind-reading range,” said Flandry. “You helped us there by going off to prepare a warm reception for the Terrans. You gathered all your forces in the valley, ready to blast our ships out of the sky.”
“Why didn’t you go to the Sartaz with what you knew — or thought you knew?” asked Korvash accusingly.
Aycharaych shrugged. “I realized Captain Flandry would be doing his best to prevent me from doing that and to discredit any information I could get that high,” he said. “You yourself agreed that our best opportunity lay in repulsing the initial attack ourselves. That would gain us far more favor with the Sartaz; moreover, since there would have been overt acts on both sides, war between Betelgeuse. and Terra would then have been inevitable — whereas if the Sartaz had learned in time of the impending assault, he might have tried to negotiate.”
“I suppose so,” said Korvash glumly.
“Aline, of course, prevailed on Bronson to mine the valley,” said Flandry. “The rest you know. When you yourselves showed up—”
“To tell the Sartaz, now that it was too late,” said Aycharaych.
“ — we were afraid that the ensuing argument would damage our own show. So we used violence to shut you up until it had been played out.” Flandry spread his hands in a gesture of finality. “And that, gentlemen, is that.”
“There will be other tomorrows,” said Aycharaych gently. “But I am glad we can meet in peace tonight.”
The party lasted well on toward dawn. When the aliens left, with many slightly tipsy expressions of good will and respect, Aycharaych took Aline’s hand in his own bony fingers. His strange golden eyes searched hers, even as she knew his mind was looking into the depths of her own.
“Goodbye, my dear,” he said, too softly for the others to hear. “As long as there are women like you, I think Terra will endure.”
She watched his tall form go down the corridor and her vision blurred a little. It was strange to think that her enemy knew what the man beside her did not.
Hunters of the SkyCave
I
It pleased Ruethen of the Long Hand to give a feast and ball at the Crystal Moon for his enemies. He knew they must come. Pride of race had slipped from Terra, while the need to appear well-bred and sophisticated had waxed correspondingly. The fact that spaceships prowled and fought, fifty light-years beyond Antares, made it all the more impossible a gaucherie to refuse an invitation from the Merseian representative. Besides, one could feel delightfully wicked and ever so delicately in danger.
Captain Sir Dominic Flandry, Imperial Naval Intelligence Corps, allowed himself a small complaint. “It’s not that I refuse any being’s liquor,” he said, “and Ruethen has a chef for his human-type meals who’d be worth a war to get. But I thought I was on furlough.”
“So you are,” said Diana Vinogradoff, Right Noble Lady Guardian of the Mare Crisium. “Only I saw you first.”
Flandry grinned and slid an arm about her shoulders. He felt pretty sure he was going to win his bet with Ivar del Bruno. They relaxed in the lounger and he switched off the lights.
This borrowed yacht was ridiculously frail and ornate; but a saloon which was one bubble of clear plastic, ah! Now in the sudden darkness, space leaped forth, crystal black and a wintry blaze of stars. The banded shield of Jupiter swelled even as they watched, spilling soft amber radiance into the ship. Lady Diana became a figure out of myth, altogether beautiful; her jewels glittered like raindrops on long gown and heaped tresses. Flandry stroked his neat mustache. I don’t suppose I look too hideous myself, he thought smugly, and advanced to the attack.