He felt a chill sweep over the back of his scalp. If Red Orc could anticipate him this well, then he would also know Kickaha's next step.
He shrugged. There was only one way to find out if Red Orc was that clever.
The voice was deep and resonant. Its pronunciation of English was that of a native, and its use of vocabulary seemed to be "right." The speaker did not introduce himself. His tone indicated that he did not need to do so, that just hearing him should convince anyone immediately of his identity. And of his power.
Kickaha felt that this was truly Red Orc, and the longer he heard him the more he identified certain characteristics that reminded him of Anana's voice. There was a resemblance there, which was not surprising, since the family of Urizen was very inbred.
"Finnegan! I have your friends Wolff and Chryseis and your lover, my niece, Anana. They are well. Nothing has happened to them, nothing harmful, that is. As yet! I drugged the truth from them; they have told me everything they know about this."
Then it is good, Kickaha thought, that Anana does not know where the Horn of Shambarimen really is.
There was a pause. Kickaha said, "I'm listening."
"I should kill them, after some suitable attentions, of course. But they don't really represent any threat to me; they were as easily caught as just-born rabbits."
A Lord always had to do some bragging. Kickaha said nothing, knowing that the Lord would get to the point when he became short-winded. But Red Orc surprised him.
"I could wait until I caught you, and I would not have to wait very long. But just now time is of the essence, and so I am willing to make a trade."
He paused again. Kickaha said, "I'm all ears."
"I will let the prisoners go and will allow them to return to Jadawin's world. And you may go with them. But on several conditions. First, you will hand over the Horn of Shambarimen to me!"
Kickaha had expected this. The Horn was not only unique in all the universes, it was the most prized item of the Lords. It had been made by the fabled ancestor of all the Lords now living, though it had been in the possession of his equally fabled son so long that it was sometimes referred to as the Horn of Ilmarwolkin. It had a unique utility among gates. It could be used alone. All other gates had to exist in pairs. There had to be one in the universe to be left and a sister, a resonant gate, in the universe to be entered. The majority of these were fixed, though the crescent type was mobile. But the Horn had only to be blown upon, with the keys of the Horn played in the proper coded sequence, and a momentary way between the universes would open. That is, it would do so if the Horn were played near a "resonant" point in the "walls" between the two worlds.
A resonant point was the path between two universes, but these universes never varied. Thus, if a Lord used the Horn without knowing where the resonant point would lead him, he would find himself in whichever universe was on the other side, like it or not.
Kickaha knew of four places where he could blow the Horn and be guaranteed to open the way to. One was at the gate in the cave near Lake Arrowhead. One was in Kentucky, but he would need Wolff to guide him to it. Another would be in his former apartment in Bloomington, Indiana. And the fourth would be in the closet in the basement of a house in Tempe, Arizona. Wolff knew that, too, but he had described to Kickaha how to get to it from Earth's side, and Kickaha had not forgotten.
Red Orc's voice was impatient. "Come, come! Don't play games with me, Earthling! Say yes or say no, but be quick about it!"
"Yes! Provisionally, that is! It depends upon your other conditions!"
"I have only one." Red Orc coughed several times and then said, "And that is, that you and the others first help me catch the Beller!"
Kickaha was shocked, but a thousand experiences in being surprised enabled him to conceal it. Smoothly, he said, "Agreed! In fact, that's something I had wished you would agree to do, but at that time I didn't see working with you. Of course, you had no whip hand then."
So the Beller had either been caught by Orc's men and had then escaped or somebody else had captured him. That somebody else could only be another Lord.
Or perhaps it was another Beller.
At that thought, he became cold.
"What do we do now?" he said, unwilling to state the truth, which was, "What do you wish now?"
Orc's voice became crisp and restrainedly triumphant.
"You will present yourself at Mrs. Cambring's house as soon as possible, and my men will conduct you here. How long will it take you to get to Cambring's?"
"About half an hour," Kickaha said. If he could get a taxi at once, he could be there in ten minutes, but he wanted a little more time to plan.
"Very well!" the Lord said. "You must surrender all arms, and you will be thoroughly examined by my men. Understood?"
"Oh, sure."
While he was talking, he had been as vigilant as a bird. He looked out the glass of the booth for anything suspicious, but had seen nothing except cars passing. Now a car stopped by the curb. It was a big dark Cadillac with a single occupant. The man sat for a minute, looked at his wristwatch, and then opened the door and got out. He sauntered toward the booth, looking again at his watch. He was a very well-built youth about six-foot-three and dressed modishly and expensively. The long yellow hair glinted in the sun as if it were flecked with gold. His face was handsome but rugged.
He stopped near the booth and pulled a cigarette case from his jacket. Kickaha continued to listen to the instructions from the phone but he kept his eye on the newcomer. The fellow looked at the world through half-lidded arrogant eyes. He was evidently impatient because the booth was occupied. He glanced at his watch again and then lit his cigarette with a pass of the flame over the tip and a flicking away of the match in one smooth movement.
Kickaha spoke the code which prepared the ring on his finger to be activated for a short piercing beam. He would have to cut through the glass if the fellow were after him.
The voice on the phone kept on and on. It seemed as if he were dictating the terms of surrender to a great nation instead of to a single man. Kickaha must approach the front of the Cambring house and advance only halfway up the front walk and then stand until three men came out of the house and three men in a car parked across the street approached him from behind at the same time. And then...
The man outside the booth made a disgusted face as he looked at his watch again and swung away. Evidently he had given up on Kickaha.
But he only took two steps and spun, holding a snubnosed handgun.
Kickaha dropped the phone and ducked, at the same time speaking the word which activated the ring.
The gun barked, the glass of the booth shattered, and Kickaha was enveloped in a white mist. It was so unexpected that he gasped once, knew immediately that he should hold his breath, and did so. He also lunged out of the booth, cutting down the door with the ring. The door fell outward from his weight, but he never heard it strike the ground.
When he recovered consciousness, he was in the dark and hard confines of a moving object. The odor of gas and the cramped space made him believe that he was in the trunk of a car. His hands were tied behind him, his legs were tied at the ankles, and his mouth was taped.
He was sweating from the heat, but there was enough air in the trunk. The car went up an incline and stopped. The motor stopped, doors squeaked, the car rifted as bodies left it, and then the lids of the trunk swung open. Four men were looking down at him, one of whom was the big youth who had fired the gas gun.