Retief at Large (59 page)

            "Ambassador
Grossblunder might have a few objections to the scheme," Retief pointed
out.

            "Let
him object," Shinth whispered carelessly. "The operation was carried
off under cover of night, unseen and unheard. The lift units left the planet
today via our supply shuttle. What matter substanceless accusations?
Grossblunder was thoughtful enough to carry on erection under heavy security
wraps; it will be his word against mine. And a ballet theater on the site is
worth two in the Project Proposal folder, eh?"

            "You
won't wet agay with it," Chauncey blurted. "I'll bill the
speans."

            "Bill
whatever you like, fellow," Shinth said loftily.
"Ex post facto
rumor-mongering
will have no effect on a
fait accompli.
And now, I really must be robing
myself for the festivities." He snapped an eyelid at the guard captain.
"Escort them to the guest quarters, Thilf, and see that they're made as
comfortable as possible during their stay. I believe from the tower they'll
have a splendid view of the spectacle under the lights."

            "To
defenestrate the rogues at once," Thilf suggested in a stage whisper.
"To eliminate the blabbermouths completely—"

            "To
be silent, litter-mate of drones," the Ambassador hissed. "To propose
no unfortunate precedents which could rise to haunt a less ingenious
functionary then myself." He waggled three of his five oculars at Retief
in a placating fashion. "You'll be free to return to your duties—as soon
as the ceremony is completed," he cooed. "In the meantime—happy
meditations."

            "Ithalways
ought that stiguring out who loll the foote was the pard hart," Chauncey
mourned as the door to the tower apartment slammed on them. "We know shoo
hiped it, and hair they wid it—and a lat got of food it does us."

            "Shinth
seems to have worked things out with considerable care," Retief agreed.

            "Luff
tuck," Chauncey commiserated. "I sate to hee those feepy little
crive-eyes tut one over on you Perries."

            "Well,
Chauncey, I'm glad to know you feel kindly disposed toward us."

            "It'sthot
nat, exactly," the Squalian said. "It's bust I had a jet bown with my
dookie," He sighed. "Well, you can't wick a pinner every time."

            "Maybe
our side hasn't lost yet," Retief said. "Chauncey, how are you at
poking around in dark places?"

            "Just
untie a nupple of these cots those guise wise sued in my tiedopodia and I'll
dee what I can sue."

            Retief
set to work; ten minutes later, with a groan of relief, the Squalian withdrew
the last yard of himself from the final knot.

            "Peether,
what an exbrothience," he sighed. "Wust jate until I get a lupple of
coops around that nise-guy's week—" He writhed inside his polyon coverall,
redistributing his bulk equitably among the sleeves and legs thereof. "And
I've shost my looze," he lamented. "Nazzy snumbers, they were, bright
with wown ting-wips," he added.

            Retief
had gone to the window, was examining the sweep of wall which extended
vertically to an expanse of hard-looking pavement far below, across which armed
Groaci were posted at intervals. Chauncey came over to peer out past him.

            "Forget
it," he said. "You clan't cimb down there. And if you could, the
nards would gab you. But jet's lust see if there's a lonn in here—" He
prowled across to a connecting door, poked his head inside the bathroom.

            "Daypirt,"
he exclaimed. "The gums boofed when they esterundimated a Squalian. Thawch
wiss." He extruded a stalked eye, plunged it into the bowl; yard after
yard of pencil-thick filament followed, paying out smoothly down the drain.

            "Oh,
boy," Chauncey said happily. "Will those toobs be bartled when I tit
in gutch with an out on the palside. All I dot to goo is reach the plewage
sant, gook around for a lie I know and—" Chauncey went rigid.
"Oh-oh," he said. He planted his feet—rather loosely organized in the
absence of shoes—and pulled backward. The extended cable of protoplasm
stretched, but failed to yield.

            "Why,
the dirty, skousy lunks!" he squalled. "Way were thaiting! Gray
thabbed me and nide me in another tot! I can't foe any garther and I can't bet
gack!"

            "Tough
break," Retief said. "But can't you just slide the rest of you down
the line?"

            "Bat,
and awondan a sellow-fufferer?" Chauncey replied indignantly.
"Besides, my integnal intendments gon't woe through the pipe."

            "Looks
like they've outthought us again, Chauncey."

-

            "Indeed,
so it appears," an unctuous whisper issued from a grill above the door,
followed by Shinth's breathy chuckle. "Pity about the clogged drains; I'll
have a chap along with a plunger in the morning."

            "Hey—that
posy narker can weir every herd we say," the Squalian exclaimed. "A
dreavesopper, yet!"

            Retief
went to the door and shot the heavy bolt, securing it from the inside. He
caught the chauffeur's remaining eye and winked.

            "Looks
like Ambassador Shinth wins," he said. "He was just too smart for us,
Chauncey. I suppose he knows all about the bomb we planted in his Embassy,
too—"

            "What's
that? A bomb? In my Embassy?" Shinth's voice rasped in sudden alarm.
"Where? I insist you tell me at once!"

            "Don't
tell him, Chauncey," Retief said quickly. "It's set to go off in
eight minutes; he'll never find it in time."

            There
was a sibilant gasp from the intercom, followed by feeble Groaci shouts.
Moments later, feet clattered in the passage beyond the door. The latch
rattled. Fists pounded.

            "What
do you mean, locked from the inside?" Shinth's voice was audible through
the panel.

            "Seven
minutes," Retief called. "Chins up, Chauncey. It will all be over
soon."

            "To
flee at once!" Captain Thilf's thin tones squalled. "To leave the
dastards here to die!"

            "Retief—tell
me where the bomb is and I'll put in a word for you with your chief!"
Shinth called through the door. "I'll explain you shouldn't be judged too
harshly for bungling your assignment; after all, a mere Terran, pitted against
a mind like mine—"

            "That's
good of you, Mr.
Ambassador—but I'm afraid duty demands we stay
here—even if it means being blown up along with your voucher files."

            "My
final offer, Retief. Emerge and defuse the infernal machine and I'll help you
blow up the Terry Embassy, thereby destroying the unfavorable E.R. your shabby
role in the present contretemps will doubtless earn for you."

            "That's
a most undiplomatic suggestion, Mr. Ambassador."

            "Very
well then, self-doomed one. To learn the meaning of Groaci wrath. To watch as I
evacuate the premises, leaving you and your toady to your fates."

            Retief
and Chauncey listened to the sound of retreating footsteps. They watched from
the window as Shinth darted forth, crossed the courtyard at a brisk run,
followed by his entire staff, the last of whom paused to lock the door behind
him.

            "I
adfun that was a lot of mit." The Squalian broke the profound silence that
fell after the last of the Groaci had departed. "But in mix senutes
they'll dealize they been ruped. So put's the woint?"

            "The
point is that I'll have six undisturbed minutes inside the Groaci
Chancery," Retief said, unlocking the door. "Fold the hort until I
get back."

-

            It
was ten minutes before Retief reentered the room, locking the door behind him.
Thirty seconds later Shinth's voice sounded via intercom, keening imprecations.

            "Thilf!
To batter the door down, to take vengeance on the Soft One for making a jackass
out of me in full view of my underlings—"

            "Instead,
to hasten to the scene of the up-coming ceremony, Exalted One," the guard
captain caviled. "Otherwise, to miss the big moment."

            "To
myself attend the unveiling, whilst you deal with the evildoers."

            "To
grasp the implication that I am to take whatever action seems appropriate to
deal with the interlopers?" Thilf inquired in his unctuous whisper.

            "To
ask no foolish questions," Shinth snapped. "The impossibility of
permitting the lesser beings to survive to spread abroad reports prejudicial to
the dignity of the Groacian state!"

            "To
see eyeball to eyeball with your Excellency," Thilf murmured.

            "That's
a bot of eyelalls," Chauncey commented. "Well, Mr. Retief, it was a
farrel of bun lyle it wasted but I kess it's gurtains now." He twitched
violently as an axe
thunked
into the door, causing it to jump in its
frame. Retief was at the window, stripping off his powder-blue early-evening
informal blazer.

            "Chauncey,
how much stretch do you have left?" he asked over the battering at the
door.

            "Hmmm,
I gee what you've sot in mind. I'll dee what I can sue—" Chauncey
unlimbered a length of tough cable from his left sleeve, sent it over the sill;
his coverall hung more and more loosely as he paid out coil after coil of himself.

            "There's
thuch a sing as oving getter-extended," he panted; by this time his
garment hung limply on a single thumb-sized strand that extended from the water
closet around the door jamp, across the room and down into the darkness below.

            "Can
you handle my weight all right?"

            "Sure;
in yast lear's intermurals I tested out at over talf a hon per air
squinch."

            "Tell
me exactly where the other end of you is trapped."

            Chauncey
complied. As Retief threw a leg over the sill torches flared in the courtyard
below. The Groaci Ambassador appeared, clad in full ceremonials, consisting of
a ribbed cloak, pink and green argyles and tricorner hat. Jeweled eye shields
winked on each of his five stalked oculars. His four-Groaci honor guard trailed
him through the gate and piled into the official limousine, which pulled away
from the curb with a snarl of abused gyros.

            "Thell,
wat's wat," Chauncey said dejectedly, in a tight-stretched voice that
emanated from the slight bulge that represented his vital centers. "He's
on his say to the weremoney; in atither nun minutes it'll be ove aller."

            "So
it will," Retief agreed. "And we want to be there to see it, eh,
Chauncey?"

            "Why?
If there's hateything I an, it's a leerful chooser."

            "I
don't think there's much danger of your seeing one of those tonight,"
Retief said; he gripped the warm, leathery rope of living flesh and started
down.

            Fifteen
feet above the cobbles the cable ended. Retief looked down, gauging the drop.
At that moment the door below him opened and two tardy guards emerged at a
trot, adjusting their accouterments on the run. One happened to cock an eye
upward, saw Retief, skidded to a halt, dropping his ceremonial pike with a
clatter. The other uttered a hiss, swung his sharp-pointed spear around and
upward.

            Retief
dropped, sending the Groaci spinning. He rolled to his feet, sprinted for the
corner of the courtyard where the drain emerged. Chauncey's mournful blue eye
gazed at him apprehensively from atop the large bowknot into which the extended
stalk had been tied. Hastily, but with care, Retief set to work to untie it.
Weak Groaci shouts sounded from behind him. More armed aliens emerged into the
courtyard; more lights winked on, weak and yellowish in deference to the
sensitive Groaci vision, but adequate to reveal the Terran crouched in the far
corner. Retief looked around to see Captain Thilf charging down at the head of
a flying wedge of pikemen. With a final tug he slipped the knot, saw Chauncey's
eye disappear back into the drain. He ducked a thrown spear, heard Thilf hiss
an order. The Groaci guards ringed him in, their gleaming spearpoints bristling
inches from his chest. The captain pushed through, stood in an arrogant pose
before his captive.