"All right," said Charley. He led the way back out into the hall. Chu came last and turned to click the lock on the door into place, drawing his handgun.
"What's this?" somebody shouted at my elbow, pushing toward Chu. "That's an emergency room. You can't do that-"
Chu was using his handgun on low aperture to slag the lock of the door. A crude but effective way to make sure that the room would not be opened by anyone with anything short of an industrial, heavy-duty torch. The man who was talking was middle-aged, with a grey mustache and the short green jacket of a senior surgeon. I intercepted him and held him back from Chu.
"Yes, he can," I said, as he turned to stare furiously in my direction. "Do you recognize me? I'm Tomas Velt, the Superintendent of Police."
He hesitated, and then calmed slightly - but only slightly.
"I still say - " he began.
"By the authority of my office," I said, "I do now deputize you as a temporary Police Assistant. - That puts you under my orders. You'll see that no one in this hospital tries to open that door or get into that room until Police authorization is given. I make you responsible. Do you understand?"
He blinked at me. But before he could say anything, there was a new outburst of sound and action; and Pel broke into our group, literally dragging along another man in a senior surgeon's jacket.
"Here!" Pel was shouting. "Right in here. Bring the life support - "
He broke off, catching sight of Chu.
"What?" he said. "What's going on? Is Kensie in there? We don't want the door sealed - "
"Pel," I said. I put my hand on his shoulder. "Pel!"
He finally felt and heard me. He turned a furious face in my direction.
"Pel," I said quietly, but slowly and clearly to him. "He's dead. Kensie. Kensie is dead."
Pel stared at me.
"No," he said irritably, trying to pull away from me. I held him. "No!"
"Dead," I said, looking him squarely in the eyes. "Dead, Pel."
His eyes stared back at me, then seemed to loose their focus and stare off at something else. After a little they focused back, on mine again and I let go of him.
"Dead?" he repeated. It was hardly more than a whisper.
He walked over and leaned against one of the white-painted corridor walls. A nurse moved toward him and I signalled her to stop.
"Just leave him alone for a moment," I said. I turned back to the two Dorsai officers who were now-testing the door to see if it was truly sealed.
"If you'll come to Police Headquarters," I said, "we can get the hunt going for whoever did it."
Charley looked at me briefly. There was no more friendly humor in his face now; but neither did it show any kind of shock, or fury. The expression it showed was only a businesslike one.
"No," he said briefly. "We have to report."
He went out, followed by Chu, moving so rapidly that I had to run to keep up with their long strides. Outside the door, they climbed back into the police car, Charley taking the controls. I scrambled in behind them and felt someone behind me. It was Pel.
"Pel," I said. "You'd better stay-"
"No. Too late," he said.
And it was too late. Charley already had the police car in motion. He drove no less swiftly than Pel had driven, but without madness. For all that, though, I made most of the trip with my fingers tight on the edge of my seat; for with the faster speed of Dorsai reflexes he went through available spaces and openings in traffic where I would have sworn we could not get through.
We pulled up before the office building attached to the Exotic Embassy as space for Expeditionary Base Headquarters. Charley led the way in past a guard, whose routine challenge broke off in mid-sentence as he recognized the two of them.
"We have to talk to the Base Commander," Charley said to him. "Where's Commander Graeme?"
"With the Blauvain Mayor, and the Outbond." The guard, who was no Dorsai, stammered a little.
Charley turned on his heel. "Wait - sir, I mean the Outbond's with him, here in the Commander's office."
Charley turned again.
"We'll go on in. Call ahead," Charley said.
He led the way, without waiting to watch the guard obey, down a corridor and up an escalator ramp to an outer office where a young Force-Leader stood up behind his desk at the sight of us.
"Sir - " The Force-Leader said to Charley, "the Outbond and the Mayor will only be with the Commander another few minutes - "
Charley brushed past him, and the Force-leader spun around to punch at his desk phone. Heels clicking on the polished stone floor, Charley led us toward a further door and opened it, stepping into the office beyond. We followed him there - into a large, square room with windows overlooking the city and our own broad-shouldered Mayor, Moro Spence, standing there with a white-haired, calm-faced, hazel-eyed man in a blue robe both facing a desk at which sat the mirror image of Kensie that was his twin brother, Ian Graeme.
Ian spoke to his desk as we came in.
"It's all right," he said. He punched a button and looked up at Charley, who went forward with Chu beside him, to the very edge of the desk, and then both saluted.
"What is it?" asked Ian.
"Kensie," said Charley. His voice became formal. "Field Commander Kensie Graeme has just been killed, sir, as we were on our way into the city."
For perhaps a second - no longer - Ian sat without speaking. But his face - so like Kensie's and yet so different - did not change expression.
"How?" he asked, then.
"By assassins we couldn't see," Charley answered. "Civilians we think They got away."
Moro Spence swore.
"The Blue Front!" he said. "Ian… Ian, listen…"
No one paid any attention to him. Charley was briefly recounting what had happened from the time the message about the invitation had reached the encampment -
"But there wasn't any celebration like that planned!" protested Moro Spence, to the deaf ears around him. Ian sat quietly, his harsh, powerful face half in shadow from the sunlight coming in the high window behind him, listening as he might have listened to a thousand other reports. There was still no change visible in him; except perhaps that he, who had always been remote from everyone else, seemed even more remote now. His heavy forearms lay on the desktop, and the massive hands that were trained to be deadly weapons in their own right lay open and still on the papers beneath them. Almost, he seemed to be more legendary character than ordinary man; and that impression was not mine alone, because behind me I heard Pel hiss on a breath of sick fury indrawn between his teeth; and I remembered how he had talked of Ian being only ice and water, Kensie only blood.
The white-haired man in the blue robe, who was the Exotic, Padma, Outbond to St. Marie for the period of the Expedition, was also watching Ian steadily. When Charley was through with his account, Padma spoke.
"Ian," he said; and his calm, light baritone seemed to linger and reecho strangely on the ear, "I think this is something best handled by the local authorities."
Ian glanced at him.
"No," he answered. He looked at Charley. "Who's Duty Officer?"
"NgTsok," said Charley.
Ian punched the phone button on his desk
"Get me Colonel Waru Ng'kok, Encampment HQ," he said to the desk
" 'No ?' " echoed Moro. "I don't understand Commander. We can handle it. It's the Blue Front, you see. They're an outlawed political - "
I came up behind him and put my hand on his shoulder. He broke off, turning around.
"Oh, Tom!" he said, on a note of relief "I didn't see you before. I'm glad you're here - "
I put my finger to my lips. He was politician enough to recognize that there are times to shut up. He shut up now, and we both looked back at Ian.