“Useful thing, misdirection,” Macduff murmured. “Only way to get aboard, however. What was that fool saying about the Captain’s being injured? Nothing serious, I hope. I must hit him for a loan. Now where’s your cabin, my dear? Ah, yes. Stateroom R and here it is. We’d better hide till we’re in space.
Hear that siren? That means take-off, which is useful since it delays the passenger check. Space nets, Ao!”
He yanked open the door to Stateroom R and urged Ao toward a spider-web filament of mesh that dangled like a hammock.
“Get in there and stay till I come back,” he ordered. “I’ve got to find another shock hammock.”
The gossamer net attracted Ao as surf attracts a mermaid. She was instantly ensconced in it, her angelic face looking dreamily out of the softly tinted cloud. She gazed beyond Macduff, thinking of nothing.
“Very good,” Macduff told himself, going out, shutting the door and crossing to Stateroom X, which luckily was unlocked and vacant, with a web dangling ready. “Now—”
“You!” said an all-too-familiar voice.
Macduff turned quickly on the threshold. Across the passage, looking at him from the door adjoining Ao’s, was the ill-tempered crustacean.
“What a surprise,” Macduff said cordially. “My old friend Ess Pu. Just the-ah, Algolian I wanted to—”
He was not permitted to finish. With a bellow in which the words “Lethean dust” could be indistinctly understood, Ess Pu charged forward, eyes waving. Macduff hastily closed the door and locked it. There was a crash and then someone began to claw viciously at the panel.
“Outrageous assault on a man’s privacy,” Macduff muttered.
The hammering on the door grew louder. It was drowned out by the ultrasonic, sonic and resonating warning of an immediate take-off.
The hammering stopped. The sound of clicking claws receded into the distance. Macduff dived for the shock net. Burrowing into its soft meshes he focused his mind on the hope that the awkward Algolian would be unable to make his hammock in time and that the acceleration would break every bone around his body.
Then the jets blazed, the Sutter rose from the troubled soil of Aldebaran Tau and Macduff really began to get into trouble.
It is perhaps time to deal, in some detail, with a matter which had already involved Macduff, though he didn’t know it. Cryptic reference has been made to such apparently unrelated matters as sphyghi seeds and Xerians.
In the most expensive perfumeries of all, on the most luxurious worlds of all, there can be seen in tiny vials drams of a straw-colored fluid which carries the famous label of Sphyghi No. 60. This perfume of perfumes, which bears the same price whether sold in a plain glass phial or in a jewel-studded platinum flagon, is so costly that by comparison Cassandra, Patou’s Joy or Martian Melee seem cheap.
Sphyghi is indigenous to Aldebaran Tau. Its seeds have been safeguarded so strictly that not even Aldebaran’s great trade rival, Xeria, has ever managed, by hook, crook or even honest means, to get hold of a single seed.
For a long time it had commonly been known that Xerians would have bartered their souls, or soul, for some of the seed. In view of the Xerians’ resemblance to termites there has always been some doubt as to whether an individual Xerian has a mind of his own and operates by free will or whether they are all ruled by a central common brain and determinism.
The trouble with sphyghi is that the growth cycle must be almost continuous. After the fruit is detached from the parent plant, its seeds become sterile in thirty hours.
Not a bad take-off, Macduff mused, crawling out of the shock hammock. It would be too much to hope that Ess Pu suffered at least a simple fracture of the carapace, he supposed.
He opened the door, waited until the opposite door leaped open to reveal the Algolian’s watchful bulk and snapped back into Stateroom X with the agility of a frightened gazelle.
“Trapped like a rat,” he muttered, beginning with a quick tour of the cabin. “Where is that intercom?
Outrageous! Ab, here it is. Connect me with the Captain at once, please. Macduff is the name, Terence Lao-T’se Macduff. Captain Masterson? Let me congratulate you on your take-off. A magnificent job. I gathered you have had an accident, which I trust is not serious.”
The intercom croaked hoarsely, caught its breath and said, “Macduff.”
“A throat injury?” Macduff hazarded. “But to come to the point, Captain. You are harboring a homicidal maniac on the Sutter. That Algolian lobster has gone perfectly insane and is lurking outside my door -Stateroom X-ready to kill me if I come out. Kindly send down some aimed guards.”
The intercom made ambiguous sounds which Macduff took for assent.
“Thank you, Captain,” he said cheerily. “There is only one other small matter. It became necessary for me to board the Sutter at the last moment and I found it inexpedient to obtain a ticket. Time pressed.
Moreover, I have taken a Lesser Vegan girl under my protection, in order to save her from the dastardly machinations of Ess Pu and it would perhaps be wise to keep any knowledge of her presence in Stateroom R from that lobster.”
He took a deep breath and leaned familiarly against the intercom. “Frightful things have been happening, Captain Masterson-I have been subjected to persecution by a bloodthirsty mob, an attempt to swindle me at dice on Ess Pu’s part, threats of violence from Angus Ramsay—”
“Ramsay?”
“You may have heard of him under that name, though it’s probably an alias. The man was discharged in disgrace from the Space Service for smuggling opium, I believe—”
A knock came at the door. Macduff broke off to listen. “Quick work, Captain,” he said. “I assume these are your guards?” There was an affirmative grunt and a click. “Au revQir,” Macduff said cheerfully, and opened the door. Two uniformed members of the crew were standing outside, waiting.
Across the corridor Ess Pu’s door was ajar and the Algolian stood there, breathing hard.
“You’re armed?” Macduff asked. “Prepare yourselves for a possible treacherous attack from that murderous crustacean behind you.”
“Stateroom X,” one of the men said. “Name, Macduff? Captain wants to see you.”
“Naturally,” Macduff said, pulling out a cigar and stepping dauntlessly into the corridor, making certain, however, that one of the crewmen was between him and Ess Pu. Nonchalantly clipping the cigar, he paused abruptly, his nostrils quivering.
“Let’s go,” one of the men said.
Macduff did not stir. From beyond the Algolian a breath of dim fragrance drifted like a murmur from paradise.
Macduff rapidly finished lighting his cigar. He puffed out great clouds of smoke as he hurriedly led the way down the corridor. “Come, come, my men,” he admonished. “To the Captain. Important matters are afoot.”
“We wouldn’t know,” a crewman said, slipping in front while the other one fell in behind. Macduff allowed himself to be escorted into the officers’ quarters, where he caught sight of himself in a reflecting bulkhead and blew out an approving smoke-cloud.
“Imposing,” he murmured. “No giant, of course, but unquestionably imposing in my fashion. The slight rotundity around my middle merely indicates that I live well. Ah, Captain Masterson! Very good, my men, you may leave us now. That’s right. Close the door as you go. Now, Captain—”
The man behind the desk lifted his gaze slowly. As all but the stupidest reader will have guessed, he was Angus Ramsay.
“Smuggling opium-aye!” said Angus Ramsay, exhibiting his teeth to the terrified Macduff.
“Discharrrged in disgrace-och! Ye nosty libelling scum, what am I going to do with ye?”
“Mutiny!” Macduff said wildly. “What have you done? Led the crew to mutiny and taken over the Sutter? I warn you, this crime will not go unpunished. Where’s Captain Masterson?”