Double Star (12 page)

           
"I knew you would."

           
I gave a mock sword salute with my wand and said, "Just call me Kkkahjjjerrr"-spraying the front rows with the second syllable.

           
"Be careful with that thing!" she said nervously.

           
I slid in beside her on the front seat and asked, "Do you know how to use one of these things?" The reaction was setting in and I felt exhausted but gay; I wanted three quick drinks and a thick steak, then to wait up for the critics' reviews.

           
"No. But do be careful."

           
"I think all you have to do is to press it here," which I did, and there was a neat two-inch hole in the windshield and the car wasn't pressurized any longer.

           
Penny gasped. I said, "Gee, I'm sorry. I'll put it away until Dak can coach me."

           
She gulped. "It's all right. Just be careful where you point it." She started wheeling the car and I found that Dak was not the only one with a heavy hand on the damper.

           
Wind was whistling in through the hole I had made. I said, "What's the rush? I need some time to study my lines for the press conference. Did you bring them? And where are the others?" I had forgotten completely the driver we had grabbed; I had not thought about him from the time the gates of the nest opened.

           
"No. They couldn't come."

           
"Penny, what's the matter? What's happened?" I was wondering if I could possibly take a press conference without coaching. Perhaps I could tell them a little about the adoption; I wouldn't have to fake that.

"It's Mr. Bonforte-they've found him."

Chapter 6

           
I had not noticed until then that she had not once called me "Mr. Bonforte." She could not, of course, for I was no longer he; I was again Lorrie Smythe, that actor chap they had hired to stand in for him.

           
I sat back and sighed, and let myself relax. "So it's over at last-and we got away with it." I felt a great burden lift off me; I had not known how heavy it was until I put it down. Even my "lame" leg stopped aching. I reached over and patted Penny's hand on the wheel and said in my own voice, "I'm glad it's over. But I'm going to miss having you around, pal. You're a trouper. But even the best run ends and the company breaks up. I hope I'll see you again sometime."

           
"I hope so too."

           
"I suppose Dak has arranged some shenanigan to keep me under cover and sneak me back into the Tom Paine?"

           
"I don't know." Her voice sounded odd and I gave her a quick glance and saw that she was crying. My heart gave a skip. Penny crying? Over us separating? I could not believe it and yet I wanted to. One might think that, between my handsome features and cultivated manners, women would find me irresistible, but it is a deplorable fact that all too many of them have found me easy to resist. Penny had seemed to find it no effort at all.

           
"Penny," I said hastily, "why all the tears, hon? You'll wreck this car."

           
"I can't help it."

           
"Well-put me in it. What's wrong? You told me they had got him back; you didn't tell me anything else." I had a sudden horrid but logical suspicion. "He was alive-wasn't he?"

           
"Yes-he's alive-but, oh, they've hurt him!" She started to sob and I had to grab the wheel.

           
She straightened up quickly. "Sorry."

           
"Want me to drive?"

           
"I'll be all right. Besides, you don't know how-I mean you aren't supposed to know how to drive."

           
"Huh? Don't be silly. I do know how and it no longer matters that-" I broke off, suddenly realizing that it might still matter. If they had roughed up Bonforte so that it showed, then he could not appear in public in that shape-at least not only fifteen minutes after being adopted into the Kkkah nest. Maybe I would have to take that press conference and depart publicly, while Bonforte would be the one they would sneak aboard. Well, all right-hardly more than a curtain call. "Penny, do Dak and Rog want me to stay in character for a bit? Do I play to the reporters? Or don't I?"

           
"I don't know. There wasn't time."

           
We were already approaching the stretch of godowns by the field, and the giant bubble domes of Goddard City were in sight. "Penny, slow this car down and talk sense. I've got to have my cues."

           
The driver had talked-I neglected to ask whether or not the bobby-pin treatment had been used. He had then been turned loose to walk back but had not been deprived of his mask; the others had barreled back to Goddard City, with Dak at the wheel. I felt lucky to have been left behind; voyageurs should not be allowed to drive anything but spaceships.

           
They went to the address the driver had given them, in Old Town under the original bubble. I gathered that it was the sort of jungle every port has had since the Phoenicians sailed through the shoulder of Africa, a place of released transportees, prostitutes, monkey-pushers, rangees, and other dregs-a neighborhood where policemen travel only in pairs.

           
The information they had squeezed out of the driver had been correct but a few minutes out of date. The room had housed the prisoner, certainly, for there was a bed in it which seemed to have been occupied continuously for at least a week, a pot of coffee was still hot-and wrapped in a towel on a shelf was an old- fashioned removable denture which Clifton identified as belonging to Bonforte. But Bonforte himself was missing and so were his captors.

           
They had left there with the intention of carrying out the original plan, that of claiming that the kidnapping had taken place immediately after the adoption and putting pressure on Boothroyd by threatening to appeal to the Nest of Kkkah. But they had found Bonforte, had simply run across him in the street before they left Old Town-a poor old stumblebum with a week's beard, dirty and dazed. The men had not recognized him, but Penny had known him and made them stop.

           
She broke into sobs again as she told me this part and we almost ran down a truck train snaking up to one of the loading

           
A reasonable reconstruction seemed to be that the laddies in the second car-the one that was to crash us-had reported back, whereupon the faceless leaders of our opponents had decided that the kidnaping no longer served their purposes. Despite the arguments I had heard about it, I was surprised that they had not simply killed him; it was not until later that I understood that what they had done was subtler, more suited to their purposes, and much crueler than mere killing.

           
"Where is he now?" I asked.

           
"Dak took him to the voyageurs' hostel in Dome 3."

           
"Is that where we are headed?"

           
"I don't know. Rog just said to go pick you up, then they disappeared in the service door of the hostel. Uh, no, I don't think we dare go there. I don't know what to do."

           
"Penny, stop the car."

           
"Huh?"

           
"Surely this car has a phone. We won't stir another inch until we find out-or figure out-what we should do. But I am certain of one thing: I should stay in character until Dak or Rog decides that I should fade out. Somebody has to talk to the newsmen. Somebody has to make a public departure for the Tom Paine. You're sure that Mr. Bonforte can't be spruced up so that he can do it?"

           
"What? Oh, he couldn't possibly. You didn't see him."

           
"So I didn't. I'll take your word for it. All right, Penny, I'm 'Mr. Bonforte' again and you're my secretary. We'd better get with

           
"Yes-Mr. Bonforte."

           
"Now try to get Captain Broadbent on the phone, will you, please?"

We couldn't find a phone list in the car and she had to go through "Information," but at last she was tuned with the clubhouse of the voyageurs. I could hear both sides. "Pilots' Club, Mrs. Kelly speaking."

           
Penny covered the microphone. "Do I give my name?"

           
"Play it straight. We've nothing to hide."

           
"This is Mr. Bonforte's secretary," she said gravely. "Is his pilot there? Captain Broadbent."

           
"I know him, dear." There was a shout: "Hey! Any of you smokers see where Dak went?" After a pause she went on, "He's gone to his room. I'm buzzing him."

           
Shortly Penny said, "Skipper? The Chief wants to talk to you," and handed me the phone.

           
"This is the Chief, Dak."

           
"Oh. Where are you-sir?"

           
"Still in the car. Penny picked me up. Dak, press conference, I believe. Where is it?"

           
He hesitated. "I'm glad you called in, sir. There's been a-slight change in the situation."

           
"So Penny told me. I'm just as well pleased; I'm rather tired. Dak, I've decided not to stay dirtside tonight; my gimp leg has been bothering me and I'm looking forward to a real rest in free fall." I hated free fall but Bonforte did not. "Will you or Rog make my apologies to the Commissioner, and so forth?"

           
"We'll take care of everything, sir."

           
"Good. How soon can you arrange a shuttle for me?"

           
"The Pixie is still standing by for you, sir. If you will go to Gate 3, I'll phone and have a field car pick you up."

           
"Very good. Out."

           
"Out, sir."

           
I handed the phone to Penny to put back in its clamp. "Curly Top, I don't know whether that phone frequency is monitored or not-or whether possibly the whole car is bugged. If either is the case, they may have learned two things-where Dak is and through that where he is, and second, what I am about to do next. Does that suggest anything to your mind?"

           
She looked thoughtful, then took out her secretary's notebook, wrote in it: Let's get rid of the car.

           
I nodded, then took the book from her and wrote in it: How far away is Gate 3?

She answered: Walking distance.

           
Silently we climbed out and left. She had pulled into some executive's parking space outside one of the warehouses when she had parked the car; no doubt in time it would be returned where it belonged-and such minutiae no longer mattered.

           
We had gone about fifty yards, when I stopped. Something was the matter. Not the day, certainly. It was almost balmy, with the sun burning brightly in clear, purple Martian sky. The traffic, wheel and foot, seemed to pay no attention to us, or at least such attention was for the pretty young woman with me rather than directed at me. Yet I felt uneasy.

           
"What is it, Chief?"

           
"Eh? That is what it is!"

           
"Sir?"

           
"I'm not being the 'Chief.' It isn't in character to go dodging off like this. Back we go, Penny."

           
She did not argue, but followed me back to the car. This time I climbed into the back seat, sat there looking dignified, and let her chauffeur me to Gate 3.

           
It was not the gate we had come in. I think Dak had chosen it because it ran less to passengers and more to freight. Penny paid no attention to signs and ran the big Rolls right up to the gate. A terminal policeman tried to stop her; she simply said coldly, "Mr. Bonforte's ear. And will you please send word to the Commissioner's office to call for it here?"

           
He looked baffled, glanced into the rear compartment, seemed to recognize me, saluted, and let us stay. I answered with a friendly wave and he opened the door for me. "The lieutenant is very particular about keeping the space back of the fence clear, Mr. Bonforte," he apologized, "but I guess it's all right."

           
"You can have the car moved at once," I said. "My secretary and I are leaving. Is my field car here?"

           
"I'll find out at the gate, sir." He left. It was just the amount of audience I wanted, enough to tie it down solid that "Mr. Bonforte" had arrived by official car and had left for his space yacht. I tucked my life wand under my arm like Napoleon's baton and limped after him, with Penny tagging along. The cop spoke to the gatemaster, then hurried back to us, smiling. "Field car is waiting, sir."