by Keith Laumer
“That completes my preparations, pop,” I said. “It’ll be dark in another half hour. Thanks for everything.”
He got to his feet, a worried look on his lined face, like a father the first time Junior asks for the car.
“The Baron’s men are everywhere.”
“If you want to help, come along and back me up with that shotgun of yours.” I picked it up. “Have you got any shells for this thing?”
He smiled, pleased now. “There are shells—but the magic is gone from many.”
“That’s the way magic is, pop. It goes out of things before you notice.”
“Will you destroy the Great Troll now?”
“My motto is let sleeping trolls lie. I’m just paying a social call on the Baron.”
The joy ran out of his face like booze from a dropped jug.
“Don’t take it so hard, old timer. I’m not the fairy prince you were expecting. But I’ll take care of you—if I make it.”
I waited while he pulled on a moth-eaten mackinaw. He took the shotgun and checked the breech, then looked at me.
“I’m ready,” he said.
“Yeah,” I said. “Let’s go …”
The Baronial palace was a forty-story slab of concrete and glass that had been known in my days as the Hilton Garden East. We made it in three hours of groping across country in the dark, at the end of which I was puffing but still on my feet. We moved out from the cover of the trees and looked across a dip in the ground at the lights, incongruously cheerful in the ravaged valley.
“The gates are there—” the old man pointed—“guarded by the Great Troll.”
“Wait a minute. I thought the Troll was the Bolo back at the Site.”
“That’s the Lesser Troll. This is the Great One.”
I selected a few choice words and muttered them to myself. “It would have saved us some effort if you’d mentioned this troll a little sooner, old timer. I’m afraid I don’t have any spells that will knock out a Mark II, once it’s got its dander up.”
He shook his head. “It lies under enchantment. I remember the day when it came, throwing thunderbolts. Many men were killed. Then the Baron commanded it to stand at his gates to guard him.”
“How long ago was this, old timer?”
He worked his lips over the question. “Long ago,” he said finally. “Many winters.”
“Let’s go take a look.”
We picked our way down the slope, came up along a rutted dirt road to the dark line of trees that rimmed the palace grounds. The old man touched my arm.
“Softly here. Maybe the Troll sleeps lightly …”
I went the last few yards, eased around a brick column with a dead lantern on top, stared across fifty yards of waist-high brush at a dark silhouette outlined against the palace lights.
Cables, stretched from trees outside the circle of weeds, supported a weathered tarp which drooped over the Bolo. The wreckage of a helicopter lay like a crumpled dragonfly at the far side of the ring. Nearer, fragments of a heavy car chassis lay scattered. The old man hovered at my shoulder.
“It looks as though the gate is off limits,” I hissed. “Let’s try farther along.”
He nodded. “No one passes here. There is a second gate, there.” He pointed. “But there are guards.”
“Let’s climb the wall between gates.”
“There are sharp spikes on top of the wall. But I know a place, farther on, where the spikes have been blunted.”
“Lead on, pop.”
Half an hour of creeping through wet brush brought us to the spot we were looking for. It looked to me like any other stretch of eight-foot masonry wall overhung with wet poplar trees.
“I’ll go first,” the old man said, “to draw the attention of the guard.”
“Then who’s going to boost me up? I’ll go first.”
He nodded, cupped his hands and lifted me as easily as a sailor lifting a beer glass. Pop was old—but he was nobody’s softie.
I looked around, then crawled up, worked my way over the corroded spikes, dropped down on the lawn.
Immediately I heard a crackle of brush. A man stood up not ten feet away. I lay flat in the dark trying to look like something that had been there a long time …
I heard another sound, a thump and a crashing of brush. The man before me turned, disappeared in the darkness. I heard him beating his way through shrubbery; then he called out, got an answering shout from the distance.
I didn’t loiter. I got to my feet and made a sprint for the cover of the trees along the drive.
4
Flat on the wet ground, under the wind-whipped branches of an ornamental cedar, I blinked the fine misty rain from my eyes, waiting for the halfhearted alarm behind me to die down.
There were a few shouts, some sounds of searching among the shrubbery. It was a bad night to be chasing imaginary intruders in the Baronial grounds. In five minutes all was quiet again.
I studied the view before me. The tree under which I lay was one of a row lining a drive. It swung in a graceful curve, across a smooth half-mile of dark lawn, to the tower of light that was the palace of the Baron of Filly. The silhouetted figures of guards and late-arriving guests moved against the gleam from the colonnaded entrance. On a terrace high above, dancers twirled under colored lights. The faint glow of the repellor field kept the cold rain at a distance. In a lull in the wind, I heard music, faintly. The Baron’s weekly grand ball was in full swing.
I saw shadows move across the wet gravel before me, then heard the purr of an engine. I hugged the ground and watched a long svelte Mercedes—about an ’88 model, I estimated—barrel past.
The mob in the city ran in packs like dogs, but the Baron’s friends did a little better for themselves.
I got to my feet and moved off toward the palace, keeping well in the shadows. When the drive swung to the right to curve across in front of the building, I left it, went to hands and knees, and followed a trimmed privet hedge past dark rectangles of formal garden to the edge of a secondary pond of light from the garages. I let myself down on my belly and watched the shadows that moved on the graveled drive.
There seemed to be two men on duty—no more. Waiting around wouldn’t improve my chances. I got to my feet, stepped out into the drive, and walked openly around the corner of the gray fieldstone building into the light.
A short, thickset man in greasy Baronial green looked at me incuriously. My weather suit looked enough like ordinary coveralls to get me by—at least for a few minutes. A second man, tilted back against the wall in a wooden chair, didn’t even turn his head.
“Hey!” I called. “You birds got a three-ton jack I can borrow?”
Shorty looked me over sourly. “Who you drive for, Mac?”
“The High Duke of Jersey. Flat. Left rear. On a night like this. Some luck.”
“The Jersey can’t afford a jack?”
I stepped over to the short man, prodded him with a forefinger. “He could buy you and gut you on the altar any Saturday night of the week, low-pockets. And he’d get a kick out of doing it. He’s like that.”
“Can’t a guy crack a harmless joke without somebody talks about altar-bait? You wanna jack, take a jack.”
The man in the chair opened one eye and looked me over. “How long you on the Jersey payroll?” he growled.
“Long enough to know who handles the rank between Jersey and Filly.” I yawned, looked around the wide, cement-floored garage, glanced over the four heavy cars with the Filly crest on their sides.
“Where’s the kitchen? I’m putting a couple of hot coffees under my belt before I go back out into that.”
“Over there. A flight up and to your left. Tell the cook Pintsy invited you.”
“I tell him Jersey sent me, low-pockets.” I moved off in a dead silence, opened the door and stepped up into spicy-scented warmth.
A deep carpet—even here—muffled my footsteps. I could hear the clash of pots and crockery from the kitchen a
hundred feet distant along the hallway. I went along to a deep-set doorway ten feet from the kitchen, tried the knob, and looked into a dark room. I pushed the door shut and leaned against it, watching the kitchen. Through the woodwork I could feel the thump of the bass notes from the orchestra blasting away three flights up. The odors of food—roast fowl, baked ham, grilled horsemeat—curled under the kitchen door and wafted under my nose. I pulled my belt up a notch and tried to swallow the dryness in my throat. The old man had fed me a half a gallon of stew before we left home, but I was already working up a fresh appetite.
Five slow minutes passed. Then the kitchen door swung open and a tall round-shouldered fellow with a shiny bald scalp stepped into view, a tray balanced on the spread fingers of one hand. He turned, the black tails of his cutaway swirling, called something behind him, and started past me. I stepped out, clearing my throat. He shied, whirled to face me. He was good at his job: the two dozen tiny glasses on the tray stood fast. He blinked, got an indignant remark ready—
I showed him the knife the old man had lent me—a bonehandled job with a six-inch switchblade. “Make a sound and I’ll cut your throat,” I said softly. “Put the tray on the floor.”
He started to back. I brought the knife up. He took a good look, licked his lips, crouched quickly, and put the tray down.
“Turn around.”
I stepped in and chopped him at the base of the neck with the edge of my hand. He folded like a two-dollar umbrella.
I wrestled the door open and dumped him inside, paused a moment to listen. All quiet. I worked his black coat and trousers off, unhooked the stiff white dickey and tie. He snored softly. I pulled the clothes on over the weather suit. They were a fair fit. By the light of my pencil flash I cut down a heavy braided cord hanging by a high window, used it to truss the waiter’s hands and feet together behind him. There was a small closet opening off the room. I put him in it, closed the door, and stepped back into the hall. Still quiet. I tried one of the drinks. It wasn’t bad.
I took another, then picked up the tray and followed the sounds of music.
The grand ballroom was a hundred yards long, fifty wide, with walls of rose, gold and white, banks of high windows hung with crimson velvet, a vaulted ceiling decorated with cherubs, and a polished acre of floor on which gaudily gowned and uniformed couples moved in time to the heavy beat of the traditional foxtrot. I moved slowly along the edge of the crowd, looking for the Baron.
A hand caught my arm and hauled me around. A glass fell off my tray, smashed on the floor.
A dapper little man in black and white headwaiter’s uniform glared up at me.
“What do you think you’re doing, cretin?” he hissed. “That’s the genuine ancient stock you’re slopping on the floor.” I looked around quickly; no one else seemed to be paying any attention.
“Where are you from?” he snapped. I opened my mouth—
“Never mind, you’re all the same.” He waggled his hands disgustedly. “The field hands they send me—a disgrace to the Black. Now, you! Stand up! Hold your tray proudly, gracefully! Step along daintily, not like a knight taking the field! and pause occasionally—just on the chance that some noble guest might wish to drink.”
“You bet, pal,” I said. I moved on, paying a little more attention to my waiting. I saw plenty of green uniforms; pea green, forest green, emerald green—but they were all hung with braid and medals. According to pop, the Baron affected a spartan simplicity. The diffidence of absolute power.
There were high white and gold doors every few yards along the side of the ballroom. I spotted one standing open and sidled toward it. It wouldn’t hurt to reconnoiter the area.
Just beyond the door, a very large sentry in a bottle-green uniform almost buried under gold braid moved in front of me. He was dressed like a toy soldier, but there was nothing playful about the way he snapped his power gun to the ready. I winked at him.
“Thought you boys might want a drink,” I hissed. “Good stuff.”
He looked at the tray, licked his lips. “Get back in there, you fool,” he growled. “You’ll get us both hanged.”
“Suit yourself, pal.” I backed out. Just before the door closed between us, he lifted a glass off the tray.
I turned, almost collided with a long lean cookie in a powder-blue outfit complete with dress sabre, gold frogs, leopard-skin facings, a pair of knee-length white gloves looped under an epaulette, a pistol in a fancy holster, and an eighteen-inch swagger stick. He gave me the kind of look old maids give sin.
“Look where you’re going, swine,” he said in a voice like a pine board splitting.
“Have a drink, admiral,” I suggested.
He lifted his upper lip to show me a row of teeth that hadn’t had their annual trip to the dentist lately. The ridges along each side of his mouth turned greenish white. He snatched for the gloves on his shoulder, fumbled them; they slapped the floor beside me.
“I’d pick those up for you, boss,” I said, “but I’ve got my tray …”
He drew a breath between his teeth, chewed it into strips, and snorted it back at me, then snapped his fingers and pointed with his stick toward the door behind me.
“Through there, instantly!” It didn’t seem like the time to argue; I pulled it open and stepped through.
The guard in green ducked his glass and snapped to attention when he saw the baby-blue outfit. My new friend ignored him, made a curt gesture to me. I got the idea, trailed along the wide, high, gloomy corridor to a small door, pushed through it into a well-lit tile-walled latrine. A big-eyed slave in white ducks stared.
Blue-boy jerked his head. “Get out!” The slave scuttled away. Blue-boy turned to me.
“Strip off your jacket, slave! Your owner has neglected to teach you discipline.”
I looked around quickly, saw that we were alone.
“Wait a minute while I put the tray down, corporal,” I said. “We don’t want to waste any of the good stuff.” I turned to put the tray on a soiled linen bin, caught a glimpse of motion in the mirror.
I ducked, and the nasty-looking little leather quirt whistled past my ear, slammed against the edge of a marble-topped lavatory with a crack like a pistol shot. I dropped the tray, stepped in fast and threw a left to Blue-boy’s jaw that bounced his head against the tiled wall. I followed up with a right to the belt buckle, then held him up as he bent over, gagging, and hit him hard under the ear.
I hauled him into a booth, propped him up and started shedding the waiter’s blacks.
5
I left him on the floor wearing my old suit, and stepped out into the hall.
I liked the feel of his pistol at my hip. It was an old-fashioned .38, the same model I favored. The blue uniform was a good fit, what with the weight I’d lost. Blue-boy and I had something in common after all.
The latrine attendant goggled at me. I grimaced like a quadruple amputee trying to scratch his nose and jerked my head toward the door I had come out of. I hoped the gesture would look familiar.
“Truss that mad dog and throw him outside the gates,” I snarled. I stamped off down the corridor, trying to look mad enough to discourage curiosity.
Apparently it worked. Nobody yelled for the cops.
I reentered the ballroom by another door, snagged a drink off a passing tray, checked over the crowd. I saw two more powder-blue getups, so I wasn’t unique enough to draw special attention. I made a mental note to stay well away from my comrades in blue. I blended with the landscape, chatting and nodding and not neglecting my drinking, working my way toward a big arched doorway on the other side of the room that looked like the kind of entrance the head man might use. I didn’t want to meet him. Not yet. I just wanted to get him located before I went any further.
A passing wine slave poured a full inch of genuine ancient stock into my glass, ducked his head, and moved on. I gulped it like sour bar whiskey. My attention was elsewhere.
A flurry of activity near the big door indicat
ed that maybe my guess had been accurate. Potbellied officials were forming up in a sort of reception line near the big double door. I started to drift back into the rear rank, bumped against a fat man in medals and a sash who glared, fingered a monocle with a plump ring-studded hand, and said, “Suggest you take your place, colonel,” in a suety voice.
I must have looked doubtful, because he bumped me with his paunch, and growled, “Foot of the line! Next to the Equerry, you idiot.” He elbowed me aside and waddled past.
I took a step after him, reached out with my left foot, and hooked his shiny black boot. He leaped forward, off balance, medals jangling. I did a fast fade while he was still groping for his monocle, eased into a spot at the end of the line.
The conversation died away to a nervous murmur. The doors swung back and a pair of guards with more trimmings than a phony stock certificate stamped into view, wheeled to face each other, and presented arms—chrome-plated automatic rifles, in this case. A dark-faced man with thinning gray hair, a pug nose, and a trimmed gray Vandyke came into view, limping slightly from a stiffish knee.
His unornamented gray outfit made him as conspicuous in this gathering as a crane among peacocks. He nodded perfunctorily to left and right, coming along between the waiting rows of flunkeys, who snapped-to as he came abreast, wilted and let out sighs behind him. I studied him closely. He was fifty, give or take the age of a bottle of second-rate bourbon, with the weather-beaten complexion of a former outdoor man and the same look of alertness grown bored that a rattlesnake farmer develops—just before the fatal bite.
He looked up and caught my eye on him, and for a moment I thought he was about to speak. Then he went on past.
At the end of the line he turned abruptly and spoke to a man who hurried away. Then he engaged in conversation with a cluster of head-bobbing guests.
I spent the next fifteen minutes casually getting closer to the door nearest the one the Baron had entered by. I looked around; nobody was paying any attention to me. I stepped past a guard who presented arms. The door closed softly, cutting off the buzz of talk and the worst of the music.
