“Come, come, my man, get to the point,” an unidentified voice put in from the audience. Captain Ramsay was observed to glance sharply toward the Plutonian.
“Eh-quite,” said Mr. French. “Does anyone have a suggestion?”
“Guessing the date on a coin,” a voice said eagerly, but it was drowned out by a chorus of cries mentioning the word sphyghi.
“Sphyghi?” Captain Ramsay asked with hypocritical blankness. “The perfume stuff, ye mean?”
There was laughter. A mousy Callistan got the floor.
“Captain Ramsay,” he said. “How about running a sphyghi-seed lottery here, the way they do on Aldebaran Tau? The way it’s done, I think, is by betting on how many seeds there are in the first sphyghi fruit of the crop. The number always varies. Sometimes there are a few hundred, sometimes a few thousand and there’s no way of counting them until the fruit’s cut open. If Ess Pu could be induced to agree, perhaps—”
“Allow me,” Captain Ramsay said. “I’ll consult Ess Pu.”
He did so, while the crustacean looked blackly around. At first he was obdurate. But finally, in return for a half-share in the pool, he was prevailed upon to cooperate. Only the glamor of sphyghi and the unparalleled chance to boast about this lottery for the rest of their lives led the passengers to put up with his inordinate greed. But presently all was arranged.
“Stewards wull pass among ye,” Captain Ramsay said. “Write yer guess and yer name on these slips of paper and drop them in a box which wull be provided for the purpose. Aye, aye, Ess Pu. Ye wull be given a chance too if ye insist.”
The Algolian insisted. He wasn’t missing a bet. After long hesitation he put down a number, angrily scrawled the phonetic ideograph of his name and had turned to stalk away when something subtler than sphyghi fragrance began to breathe through the salon. Heads turned. Voices died away. Ess Pu, glancing around in surprise, found himself facing the door. His infuriated bellow reverberated from the ceiling for several seconds.
Ao, standing on the threshold, paid no attention. Her lovely eyes gazed into the far distances.
Concentric circles of magic drifted dreamily out from her. Already she was increasing the affective tone of all living organisms within the lounge, and Ess Pu was not excluded. However, as has already been disclosed, when an Algolian feels good his rage knows no bounds. Ao didn’t care.
“Mine!” Ess Pu mouthed, swinging toward the Captain. “The girl -mine!”
“Get ye claws awa’ from my face, mon,” Captain Ramsay said with dignity. “If ye wull join me in this quiet corner perhaps ye can state yer case in a more courteous fashion. Noo, what is it?”
Ess Pu demanded Ao. He took out a certificate which, appeared to state that he had travelled to Aldebaran Tau with Ao as her guardian. Ramsay fingered his jaw undecidedly. Meanwhile there was a scuffle among the thronging passengers who were pressing folded slips of paper upon the stewards.
The breathless, rotund figure of Macduff burst out of the crowd just in time to snatch Ao from Ess Pu’s possessively descending claws.
“Back, lobster!” he ordered threateningly. “Lay a claw on that girl at your peril.” Towing her, he dodged behind the Captain as Ess Pu lunged.
“I thought so,” Ramsay said, lifting a cautioning finger at Ess Pu. “Were ye no specifically forbidden to mingle with the passengers, Macduff?”
“This is a matter of law enforcement,” Macduff said. “Ao is my ward, not that criminal lobster’s.”
“Can ye prove it?” Ramsay inquired. “That certificate of his—”
Macduff tore the certificate from Ess Pu’s grip, scanned it hastily, crumpled it into a ball and threw it on the floor.
“Nonsense!” he said scornfully, taking out a cablegram in an accusing manner. “Read this, Captain.
As you will observe it is a cable from the Lesser Vegan Control Administration. It points out that Ao was illegally deported from Lesser Vega and that an Algolian is suspected of the crime.”
“Eh?” Ramsay said. “One moment, Ess Pu.” But the Algolian was already hastily clashing his way out of the salon. Ramsay scowled at the cablegram, looked up and beckoned to a Cephan double-brained attorney among the passengers. There was a brief colloquy, from which Ramsay came back shaking his head.
“Can’t do much about this, Macduff,” he said. “It isn’t a GBI offence, unfortunately. I find I’m empowered only to turn Ao over to her richtful guardian and since she has none—”
“Your error, Captain,” Macduff broke in. “You want her richt-I mean, her rightful guardian? You’re looking at him. Here’s the rest of that cablegram.”
“What?” Captain Ramsay demanded.
“Exactly. Terence Lao-T’se Macduff. That’s what it says. The Lesser Vegan Control Administration has accepted my offer to stand in loco parentis to Ao, pro tern.”
“Vurra weel,” Ramsay said reluctantly. “Ao’s yer ward. Ye wull have to take that up with the Xerian authorities when ye arrive, for as sure as my name is Angus Ramsay ye’ll gae head over basket doon the gangplank the minute we land on Xeria. Ye and Ess Pu can fight it oot there. In the meantime I dinna allow a crewman to mingle with my passengers. Go for-rard!”
“I demand the rights of a passenger,” Macduff said excitedly, backing up a step or two. “The price of the ticket includes the pool and I demand—”
“Ye are no passenger. Ye’re a dom insubordinate member of—”
“Ao’s a passenger!” Macduff contended shrilly. “She’s entitled to take part in the pool, isn’t she?
Well, then, a slip, please, Captain.”
Ramsay growled under his breath. But finally he beckoned to the steward with the slotted box.
“Let Ao write her own guess,” he insisted stubbornly.
“Nonsense,” Macduff said. “Ao’s my ward. I’ll write it for her. Moreover, if by any miraculous chance she should happen to win the pool, it will be my duty to administer the dough in the best interests of her welfare, which obviously means buying us both tickets to Lesser Vega.”
“Och, why quibble?” Ramsay said suddenly. “If ye’re lucky enough to have a miracle happen, fair enough.”
Macduff, concealing what he wrote, scribbled busily, folded the paper and pushed it through the slot.
Ramsay took a permaseal from the steward and ran it across the box-top.
“Personally,” Macduff said, watching him, “I feel slightly degraded by the atmosphere of the Sutter.
What with condoning smuggling, shyster tactics and pure vicious gambling, I’m forced to the unsavory conclusion, Captain, that you’re running a crime ship. Come, Ao, let us seek purer air.”
Ao licked her thumb and thought of something very nice, perhaps the taste of her thumb. No one would ever know.
Time passed, both Bergsonian and Newtonian. On either scale it seemed probable that Macduff’s time was running rapidly out.
“Who sups wi’ Auld Clootie should hae a long spoon,” Captain Barn-say said to the acting first, on the day of the Sutter’s scheduled arrival at Xeria. “The wonder is that Macduff has evaded Ess Pu’s claws this long, the way he’s been trying to get at those sphyghi plants. “What baffles me is what he hopes to accomplish by sneaking around the Algahan’s cabin with sodium iodide counters and microwave spectroscopes. Whatever he wrote doon in the lottery box canna be changed. The box is in my safe.”
“Suppose he finds a way to open the safe?” the acting first suggested. “In addition to the time lock it is keyed to the alpha radiations of my own brain,” Captain Ramsay pointed out. “He canna possibly-ah, talk of the devil, Mr. French, look who’s coming.”
The rotund yet agile form of Macduff came scuttling rapidly along the corridor, one jump ahead of the Algolian. Macduff was breathing hard. At sight of the two officers he dived behind them like a quail going to cover. Ess Pu, blind with fury, snapped his claws in the Captain’s very face.