Retief-Ambassador to Space (11 page)

"But ... my two-pronged panzer thrust," the
general faltered. "The crowning achievement of my military career
...!"

"My magnificently coordinated one-two
counter-strike!" Lib Glip wailed. "It cost me two months' golf to
work out those logistics!"

"I might even go so far as to hazard a guess,"
Retief pressed on, "that in the excitement of the announcement of the
armistice, I might even forget to publish my historical findings."

"Hrnmm," Barf eyed his colleague. "It might
be a trifle tricky, at that, to flog up the correct degree of anti-Blort
enthusiasm on such short notice."

"Yes; I can foresee a certain amount of residual
sympathy for Gloian institutions lingering on for quite some time," Lib
Glip nodded.

"I'd still have the use of my car, of course,"
the general mused. "As well as my personal submarine, my plushed-up
transport, and my various copters, hoppers, unicycles, and sedan chairs for use
on rough terrain."

"I suppose it would be my duty to keep the armed
forces at the peak of condition with annual War. Games," Lib Glip
commented. He glanced at the general. "In fact, we might even work out
some sort of scheme for joint maneuvers, just to keep the recruits sharpened
up."

"Not a bad idea, Glip. I might try for the
single-engine pursuit trophy myself."

"Ha! Nothing you've got can touch my little beauty
when it comes to close-in combat work."

"I'm sure we can work out the details later,
gentlemen," Retief said. "I must be getting back to the Embassy now.
I hope your formal joint announcement will be along well before
presstime."

"Well ..." Barf looked at Lib Glip. "Under
the circumstances ..."

"I suppose we can work out something," the
latter assented glumly.

"I'll give you a lift back in my car, Retief,"
General Barf offered. "Just wait till you see how she handles on flat
ground, my boy ..."

In the pink light of dawn, Ambassador Biteworse and his
staff waited on the breeze-swept ramp to greet the party of portly officials
descending from the Corps lighter.

"Well, Hector," the senior member of the inspection
team commented, looking around the immaculate environs of the port. "It
looks as though perhaps some of those rumors we heard as to a snag in the
disarmament talks were a trifle exaggerated."

Biteworse smiled blandly. "A purely routine affair.
It was merely necessary for me to drop a few words in certain auditory organs,
and the rest followed naturally. There aren't many of these local chieftains
who can stand up to the veiled hint of a Biteworse."

"Actually, I think it's about time we began
considering you for a more substantive post, Hector. I've had my eye on you for
quite some time ..." The great men moved away, fencing cautiously. Beside
Retief, a tiny, elderly local in striped robes shook his head sadly.

"That was a dirty trick, Retief, getting a pardon
directly from young Lib Glip. I don't get much excitement over there in the
stacks, you know."

"Things will be better from now on," Retief
assured the oldster. "I think you can expect to see the library opened to
the public in the near future."

"Oh, boy," the curator exclaimed. "Just
what I've been wishing for, for years now! Plenty of snazzy young co-eds coming
in, eager to butter an old fellow up in return for a guaranteed crib sheet!
Thanks, lad! I can see brighter days a-coming!" He hurried away.

"Retief," Magnan plucked at his sleeve.
"I've heard a number of fragmentary rumors regarding events leading up to
the truce; I trust your absence from the Chancery for an hour or two early in
the evening was in no way connected with the various kidnappings, thefts,
trespasses, assaults, blackmailings, breakings and enterings, and other
breaches of diplomatic usage said to have occurred."

"Mr. Magnan, what a suggestion." Retief took out
a fan-folded paper, began tearing it into strips.

"Sorry, Retief. I should have known better. By the
way, isn't that an Old Plushniki manuscript you're destroying?"

"This? Why, no. It's an old Chinese menu I came
across tucked in the classified despatch binder." He dropped the scraps in
a refuse bin.

"Oh. Well, why don't you join me in a quick bite
before this morning's briefing for the inspectors? The Ambassador plans to give
them his standard five-hour introductory chat, followed by a quick run-through
of the voucher files ..."

"No thanks. I have an appointment with Lib Glip to
check out in one of his new model pursuit ships. It's the red one over there,
fresh from the factory."

"Well, I suppose you have to humor him, inasmuch as
he's premier." Magnan cocked an eye at Retief. "I confess I don't
understand how it is you get on such familiar terms with these bigwigs,
restricted as your official duties are to preparation of reports in
quintuplicate."

"I think it's merely a sort of informal manner I
adopt in meeting them," Retief said. He waved and headed across the runway
to where the little ship waited, sparkling in the morning sun.

-

A large green-yolked egg splattered
across the flexglas panel as it slammed behind Retief. Across the long, narrow
lobby, under a glare-sign reading HOSTELRY RITZKRUDLU, the Gaspierre room clerk
looked up, then came quickly around the counter. He was a long-bodied,
short-legged creature, wearing an expression as of one detecting a bad odor on
his flattened, leathery-looking face. He spread six of the eight arms attached
to his narrow shoulders like a set of measuring spoons, twitching the other two
in a cramped shrug.

"The hotel, he is fill!" he
wheezed. "To some other house you convey your custom, yes?"

"Stand fast," Retief said to
the four Terrans who had preceded him through the door. "Hello,
Strupp," he nodded to the agitated clerk. "These are friends of mine.
See if you can't find them a room."

"As I comment but now, the rooms,
she is occupy!" Strupp pointed to the door. "Kindly facilities
provide by management to place selves back outside use!"

A narrow panel behind the registration
desk popped open; a second Gaspierre slid through, took in the situation,
emitted a sharp hiss. Strupp whirled, his arms semaphoring an unreadable
message.

"Never mind that, Strupp,"
the newcomer snapped in accentless Terran. He took out a strip of patterned
cloth, mopped under the breathing orifices set in the sides of his neck, looked
at the group of Terrans, then back at Retief. "Ah, something I can do for
you, Mr. Retief?"

"Evening, Hrooze," Retief
said. "Permit me to introduce Mr. Julius Mulvihill, Miss Suzette la
Flamme, Wee Willie, and Professor Fate, just in from out-system. There seems to
be a room shortage in town. I thought perhaps you could accommodate them."

Hrooze eyed the door through which the
Terrans had entered, twitched his nictating eyelids in a nervous gesture.

"You know the situation here,
Retief!" he said. "I have nothing against Terries personally, of
course, but if I rent to these people—"

"I was thinking you might fix
them up with free rooms, just as a sort of good-will gesture."

"If we these Terries to the
Ritz-Krudlu admit, the repercussions political out of business us will
put!" Strupp expostulated.

"The next ship out is two days
from now," Retief said. "They need a place to stay until then."

Hrooze looked at Retief, mopped his
neck again. "I owe you a favor, Retief," he said. "Two days,
though, that's all!"

"But—" Strupp began.

"Silence!" Hrooze sneezed.
"Put them in twelve-oh-three and -four!"

He drew Retief aside as a small
bellhop in a brass-studded harness began loading baggage on his back.

"How does it look?" he
inquired. "Any hope of getting that squadron of Peace Enforcers to stand
by out-system?"

"I'm afraid not; Sector HQ seems
to feel that might be interpreted by the Krultch as a warlike gesture."

"Certainly it would! That's
exactly what the Krultch can understand—"

"Ambassador Sheepshorn has great
faith in the power of words," Retief said soothingly. "He has a
reputation as a great verbal karate expert; the Genghis Khan of the conference
table."

"But what if you lose? The
cabinet votes on the Krultch treaty tomorrow! If it's signed, Gaspierre will be
nothing but a fueling station for the Krultch battle fleet! And you Terries
will end up as mess-slaves!"

"A sad end for a great oral
athlete," Retief said, "Let's hope he's in good form tomorrow."

In the shabby room on the twelfth
level, Retief tossed a thick plastic coin to the baggage slave, who departed
emitting the thin squeaking that substituted in his species for a jaunty
whistle. Mulvihill, a huge man with a handlebar mustache, looked around,
plumped his vast, bulging suitcase to the thin carpet, mopped at the
purple-fruit stain across his red plasti-weve jacket.

"I'd like to get my hands on the
Gasper that threw that," he growled in a bullfrog voice.

"That's a mean crowd out
there," said Miss La Flamme, a shapely redhead with a tattoo on her left
biceps. "It was sure a break for us the Ambassador changed his mind about
helping us out. From the look the old sourpuss gave me when I kind of bumped
against him, I figured he had ground glass where his red corpuscles ought to
be."

"I got a sneaking hunch Mr.
Retief swung this deal on his own, Suzy," the big man said. "The
Ambassador's got bigger things on his mind than out-of-work variety acts."

"This is the first time the
Marvelous Merivales ever been flat out of luck on tour," commented a
whiskery little man no more than three feet tall, dressed in an old-fashioned
frock coat and a checkered vest. His voice was like the yap of a Pekinese.
"How come we got to get mixed up in politics?"

"Shut up, Willie!" the big
man said. "It's not Mr. Retiefs fault we came here."

"Yeah," the midget conceded.
"I guess you fellows in the CDT got it kind of rough, too, trying to pry
the Gaspers outa the Krultch's hip pocket. Boy, I wish I could see the show
tomorrow when the Terry Ambassador and the Krultch brass slug it out to see
whose side the Gaspers'll be neutral on."

"Neutral, ha!" the tall,
cadaverous individual looming behind Wee Willie snorted. "I caught a
glimpse of that ferocious war vessel at the port, openly flying the Krultch
battle flag! It's an open breach of interworld custom—"

"Hey, Professor, leave the
speeches to the CDT," the girl said.

"Without free use of Gaspierre ports,
the Krultch plans for expansion through the Gloob cluster would come to naught.
A firm stand—"

"Might get 'em blasted right off
the planet," the big man growled. "The Krultch play for keeps."

"And the Gaspers aim to be on the
winning side," the midget piped. "And all the smart money is on the
Krultch battlewagon to put up the best argument."

"Terries are fair game around
here, it looks like, Mr. Retief," Mulvihill said. "You better watch
yourself going back."

Retief nodded. "Stay close to
your rooms; if the vote goes against us tomorrow, we may all be looking for a
quick way home."

Outside, on the narrow elevated
walkway that linked the gray slablike structures of the city, thin-featured
Gaspierre natives shot wary looks at Retief, some skirting him widely, others
jostling him as they crowded past. It was a short walk to the building where
the Terrestrial delegation occupied a suite. As Retief neared it, a pair of
Krultch sailors emerged from a grogshop, turned in his direction. They were
short-coupled centauroid quadrupeds, with deep, narrow chests, snouted faces
with business-like jaws and fringe beards, dressed in the redstriped livery of
the Krultch Navy, complete with sidearms and short swagger sticks. Retief
altered course to the right to give them passing room; they saw him, nudged
each other, spaced themselves to block the walk. Retief came on without
slowing, started between them. The Krultch closed ranks. Retief stepped back,
started around the sailor on the left. The creature sidled, still blocking his
path.

"Oh-hoh, Terry loose in
street," he said in a voice like sand in a gear box. "You lost,
Terry?"

The other Krultch crowded Retief
against the rail. "Where you from, Terry? What you do—?"

Without warning, Retief slammed a
solid kick to the shin of the Krultch before him, simultaneously wrenched the
stick from the alien's grip, cracked it down sharply across the wrist of the
other sailor as he went for his gun. The weapon clattered, skidded off the walk
and was gone. The one whom Retief had kicked was hopping on three legs, making
muffled sounds of agony. Retief stepped quickly to him, jerked his gun from its
holster, aimed it negligently at the other Krultch.

"Better get your buddy back to
the ship and have that leg looked at," he said.

A ring of gaping Gaspierre had
gathered, choking the walk. Retief thrust the pistol into his pocket, turned
his back on the Krultch, pushed through the locals. A large coarse-hided
Gaspierre policeman made as if to block his way; Retief rammed an elbow in his
side and kept going. A mutter was rising from the crowd behind him. The Embassy
was just ahead now. Retief turned off toward the entry; two yellow-uniformed
Gaspierre moved into sight under the marquee, eyed him as he came up.