"This is all rather horrible," Jessie admitted. "But why have you gone to such pains to keep it secret?"
"If word had gotten out that we were having trouble with a murderous supernatural, after all we've told your people about how flesh-and-blooders can learn to live in harmony with supernaturals, your Pure Earthers would have had a field day. Maseni-human relations would have been set back nearly a decade by the hubbub."
Jessie nodded. "True enough. But Slavek and his crowd went to extremes to keep us from—"
"Oh, sir, you must not suppose that they were a part of the official plan to put a security blanket over this affair. They were acting on their own, all without the consent or even the knowledge of elected flesh-and-blood authority."
Jessie finished his drink, twisted the glass in a tight circle on the wet tabletop. "But what have the supernaturals got to lose, from this, that would force them to such extreme measures?"
"That's a question we've been asking ourselves, Mr. Blake," the alien said, rising from his chair, still holding his glass as he paced back and forth across the room, his head dangerously close to the low ceiling. "Every effort we've made, on the home world, to discover the nature and origins of this new beast has been opposed by our own supernaturals. And, here on Earth, both maseni and human-born supernaturals conspired to keep the secret from you. Obviously, they know more of this than we do, but they will not speak of it."
"You've got yourself a dandy little mystery there," Helena said. She had finished her drink and was sucking on the orange slice that had been on the side of the glass.
"That's it exactly," Tesserax said. "A mystery. That's why we decided to tell you the sutuation — and invite the three of you to come to the home world and investigate it."
Jessie raised his eyebrows. "Hunt down this murderous beast that tramples villages?"
"It will be dangerous," Tesserax conceded. "But we will pay well."
Brutus said, "How well?"
"Five hundred credits a day."
"That's a flat fee, for all of us?"
Tesserax clearly did not enjoy talking with the hell hound. He raised a hand to his mouth and cleared his throat — cats screaming — and said, "We thought that would be a fair—"
"Make it five hundred a day, including travel days, for each of us," Brutus growled. "Then maybe we'll consider it."
The alien looked at Jessie and said, "Does this… hound speak for you, Mr. Blake?"
"He makes good sense, yes."
Tesserax considered this and finally said, "Very well, then. Five hundred a day, for each of you — fifteen hundred a day in all." He returned to his chair and folded up in it. "I assume the prison computer has recorded all of this."
"Yes, Mr. Tesserax, I have," the computer said, sweetly.
Tesserax rolled his amber eyes toward Jessie and said, "Will a print-out be sufficient contract for you?"
"It'll do," Jessie said.
"Did you hear that?" Tesserax asked the ceiling.
The computer said, "I'll send an adjunct around with two print-outs in a minute, Mr. Tesserax."
"Thank you."
"It's nothing, sir," the computer said.
Jessie looked at the speaker behind the ceiling light and said, "Do you mind telling me whose voice was used to make your tapes?"
The prison computer said, "My tapes, which were provided as part of the overall computer package by Big Brother Building Systems Company, contain two hundred tapes with every sound that the human voice can produce, in addition to nearly two hundred thousand words in three Earth languages. My tapes were recorded by Miss Tessie Alice Armbruster, a retired school teacher from Holidaysburg, Pennsylvania, on July 9, 1987. The same woman made supplementary tapes for my system — in addition to supplementary tapes on the maseni languages which were fed to me earlier — on August 3, 1994 and again on November 1, 1999. Miss Armbruster's voice was employed because psychologists working with the Big Brother Building Systems Company felt that it had a range and modulation pattern that combined a lovable motherliness with an undeniable disciplinarian tone."
Jessie said, "Is Holidaysburg near Altoona?"
"Yes, sir, it is a suburb of the larger city," the prison computer replied,
"You're amazing!" Tesserax said. "Simply amazing."
The door opened. One of the computer's adjuncts tripped on the door sill as it entered the room, crashed flat on its face like a comedian taking a pratfall in some abominable old movie. Somthing shattered, and it made a gruesome, internal grinding sound.
"If they slash my budget any further, I won't be responsible for what happens to the prison," Tessie Alice Armbruster said.
The robot clambered to its feet and staggered forward a couple of steps until it got its balance. It said, "Me please gentlemen excuse."
"Never mind that," Tesserax said, impatiently, snapping all six of his right-hand tentacles rapidly, making a noise like popcorn popping. "Just bring me those papers, will you?"
"Sir, yes," the adjunct said. But it just stood there.
"Well?" Tesserax asked.
"Knee joint my bent is some, sir," the robot said, mournfully. It made an obvious effort and broke the temporary paralysis, tottered hesitantly forward toward the alien. "Are you here, sir," it said, handing him the crumpled pile of print-outs. "Thought drop them would I."
"But you didn't."
The robot was very self-satisfied. "No, sir. Held them did tight I and fool no make myself of."
"Very good," Tesserax said, sorting the print-outs into two groups.
The robot suddenly coughed and fell into the table, knocked the bottles of liquor over and frightened Helena. It slid slowly to the floor, like a drunkard passing out, landed on its backside and fell backwards, its metal skull thunking the blue tiles.
"When appropriations time comes around," Tessie Alice Armbruster said, "I'm going to call all of you as witnesses."
Tesserax slid a complete set of print-outs across the table to Jessie. "There you are. Five hundred a day, apiece."
"It looks in order," Jessie said.
They got out of their shape-changing chairs, and Jessie came around the table to shake hands with the maseni official. "I think you'll see that your money was well spent with us, Mr. Galiotor."
"I sincerely hope you're right," Galiotor Tesserax said. "Not only for the sake of the maseni treasury, but for the sake of all the beast's potential victims and for the sake of future maseni-Earth relations." He let go of Jessie's hand as if he found contact with bone-jointed fingers less than pleasant. "You'll leave on the starship Poogai tomorrow morning."
"And good sir to you, luck!" the robot said, staring up at them from the floor, waving one five-fingered metal hand.
PART TWO: THE BEAST AT MIDNIGHT
Chapter Seventeen
Riding the escalator down the Poogai's long debarking tube into the largest terminal on the maseni home world, Tesserax said, "Oh, dear! I forgot to warn you about the Protector."
Jessie said, "Who?"
Tesserax slapped the top of his hairless, bulbous head and said, "Oh, damnation and thunderpunt! I really should have remembered it. It's all quite traumatic if you aren't expecting it — and even if you are." He looked anxiously ahead at the rapidly approaching terminal entrance, and he said, "Now don't be alarmed, sir, when it charges at you with all those sharpened teeth and claws."
"Teeth and claws?" Helena said.
"Teeth and claws?" Jessie said, clutching Helena's arm and.wondering if they should turn around and fight the traffic the whole way to the top of the moving stairs.