And then, “Look. We’re going around and around, getting nowhere. By the looks of it, we’re being kept in this suite until the slaughter. Jerry’s going to have his work cut out avoiding that appointment in the Parco Duello. And…”
“Not in the park,” Cesare Marconi said, shaking his head. “Too big an event. It’ll be in the auditorium of the College of the Code Duello, where the Tri-Di coverage will be perfect.”
Jerry said, “You mean this whole thing goes on the air?”
“Like I said, Signore Rhodes, it will be the making of the First Signore in this pseudo-election. It will be played up to the point where every man, woman and child on Firenze will be glued to the Tri-Di set.”
“Hm,” Helen said.
The Great Marconi reached out for the bottle of Chartreuse, but little Helen was before him. She snatched the rare liqueur. There was only an inch or so left.
The Florentine’s eyebrows went up. She didn’t look particularly the worse for wear, in spite of the hefty number of drinks she had poured down since the First Signore and his party had left.
Helen said, ” I think I’ve got a use for this.”
Dorn Horsten grunted. “You’ve had a use for all three bottles the bar originally was equipped with,” he said. “I’ll never get over it. You put away alcohol like it was strained fruit juice.”
“Shut up, you big lummox, I’m thinking.”
Horsten grunted again and turned back to the Florentine duelist. “To get back to Jerry and his rendezvous with your cousin. What will be the procedure?”
“I suppose you two, you and Zorro, will have to be Signore Rhodes’ seconds. However, I’ll act as your adviser. The manufacturing of the Sten guns shouldn’t take more than twenty-four hours. Undoubtedly, Antonio’s seconds will then turn up and a time will be set for the meeting. You have, perhaps, a day and a half, at most, two.”
Helen said, “No way of escaping? Getting off the planet?”
He looked at her glumly. “With the security forces on this world? And only one spaceport? And with no United Planets Embassy, even? Why do you bother to ask?”
The auditorium of the College of the Code Duello was done up in such wise that it might have been recognized by a showman of yesteryear as a movie set portraying the Florence of the days of the Medici. Perhaps a cinema producer of the past might have so recognized it, though the doubt is there that Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, or Donatello would have. Alas, long millennia had expired between the golden Renaissance city and the interior decorators employed by the Machiavellian Party.
Nevertheless, the setting was impressive in its rich grandeur. On the face of it, the First Signore was going to milk every drop of propaganda value from his revenge on the subversives from overspace who had come to undermine the institutions of the Free Democratic Commonwealth of Firenze. Or, so at least had the mass media of the planet announced.
Uniforms were impressive; even those of the enlisted men of the guard were a blaze of color. Officers and high rankers of the immediate staffs of the First Signore and his Council on Signori were quite breathtaking in their grandeur.
Even Cesare Marconi, for once, had risen above his usual seedy attire and had blossomed forth in the garb of a Florentine of the highest position.
He stood, most unhappily, with the group of Section G operatives in the corner of the auditorium where the protocol officers had assigned them. There were two or three Tri-Di cameras trained on them, otherwise they were free to their own devices.
The self-styled Great Marconi grunted deprecation. “I am beginning to wonder why I am here,” he said. “Foot-dragging opposition to my cousin’s government is one thing. In the past, nobody took me very seriously. This is another thing.”
Zorro said sourly, “What happens now?”
“We’re waiting for the First Signore. His public relations people undoubtedly have it all figured out. Just the point where suspense has built up to the ultimate, but not quite to where the patriotic citizenry is beginning to weary of the delay. Only the blind, on Firenze, are not watching this, and they’re listening.”
Helen, now that their cover was irretrievably blown, had improvised from her wardrobe the nearest thing she could achieve to adult wear and a touch of cosmetics. She had rearranged her hair, managed a bit here, a bit there, so that she now appeared to be an adult, albeit a tiny one by the standards of any member of the United Planets save her own world.
Jerry said, not nearly so glum as the occasion might have warranted, “I’ve always been kind of lucky.”
They ignored that.
Dorn Horsten, pushing his glasses back on his nose in irritation, said, “I’m beginning to build up a disregard for your cousin, my friend.”
Cesare looked at him. “Don’t let your hopes get too high. Antonio will never meet you with Macedonian pikes, nor anything else where your strength might be a factor. Believe me, some way will be found in which his own chances are minimal.”
Horsten said, “You mean he’ll stack the deck? He doesn’t seem to have done so in Jerry’s case. Except for his alleged fast reflexes, the duel seems to be fifty-fifty.”
“Seems is correct,” Cesare said. “I don’t trust him.”
“But we all inspected and tried out the two weapons before they were sealed in that carrying case, last night.” The scientist looked at Jerry in compassion. “You certainly picked the most deadly short-range weapon come down through history.”
Zorro said abruptly to their Florentine companion, “Look, isn’t there any way for the rest of us to get out of this? It’s bad enough that Jerry, here, has obviously had it, but…”
Shut up, lover,” Helen snorted.
He glared at her darkly. “We don’t win any prizes by going down in noble defeat. If there’s anything we can do to help Jerry, very well. But if we can’t, our job is to survive and carry on the work. Maybe Marconi has some place we could hide.”
But Cesare Marconi was shaking his head. “Forget about it, Juarez. I’m possibly the most observed man on Firenze. They haven’t cracked down on me in the past, because of my family connections, but, as Antonio said the last time we saw him, they aren’t amused by my professions of being an Engelist. They know that I know the whole tiling is a fraud, that there are no Engelists. I couldn’t hide you. I couldn’t even hide myself.”
“There must be some way we can get out from under,” Zorro said.
There was a blare of anachronistic clarions.
There was a great animation at the opposite end of the hall, a great stirring. All, save the Section G operatives and their single Florentine adherent, came to formal attention.
Down the center of the auditorium, stiff-legged, the stride of the cavalryman long used to high military boots, came Antonio Cesare Bartolemo d’Arrezzo, First Signore of the Free Democratic Commonwealth of Firenze. He looked to neither left nor right at the perfectly aligned men at arms who flanked his march. In that multitude of the uniformed, his was the simplest garb of all, a simple black duelist’s costume, the shirt open at the neck, rubber-soled sport shoes on his feet.
Immediately behind him were his seconds, Alberto Scialanga, the Third Signore, and another high ranking officer, unknown to the otherworldlings until the formalities of the meeting had been gone through.
Cesare Marconi cleared his throat, an element of apology there. “All right,” he said. “Here we go. We advance to within five paces, the stipulated distance. Jerry, you stop at that point. Dorn and Zorro, you advance to make last preparations with his seconds, and to receive Jerry’s weapon. We went over the details last night. I’ll be immediately behind you, as adviser, in case you have questions.”
Helen said, “I don’t know what the rules are, but I’m coming along.”
Cesare Marconi scowled down at her, began to say something, shook his head, and closed his mouth.
They marched out to meet the First Signore and his people.
Jerry Rhodes’ opponent stood ther
e, five correct paces away, his black-clad legs slightly parted, his hands behind his back. His two seconds approached. Dorn Horsten and Zorro Juarez met them halfway, Marconi immediately to their rear. The Third Signore carried an elaborately decorated flat box, the other second a golden key with which he ceremoniously unlocked the container.
Inside were two Sten guns. On the handle of one, in gold inlay, was lettered SIGNORE RHODES, on the other, SIGNORE D’ARREZZO.
The box was extended to Dorn Horsten, who took forth Jerry’s weapon and returned with it to his principle.
“Are there any questions, Signori?” Alberto Scialanga said to Horsten and Zorro.
“None,” the scientist said unhappily.
The First Signore’s men returned to him and proffered the box. He took forth his own weapon, balanced it in his hands as though he had handled such a gun all his life.
A highly decorated officer, the judge, stepped forward. As he did, guards and witnesses shifted out of the line of fire.
He said, his voice loud and clear for the sake of the Tri-Di technicians who were zeroed-in on the scene: “The Signori are familiar with the agreed procedure. Both Signori will turn their backs to each other. I shall count three. On the last, the Signori shall turn and fire at will. Is all understood?”
The First Signore bit out, “Yes.”
Jerry said, “I guess so.” He looked down at the Sten gun, as though he had never seen a firearm before and had never truly expected to.
All except the two duelists cleared away.
“This is murder,” Zorro muttered.
Dom Horsten looked at him. “We’ll have a chance, later,” he growled in frustration.
The judge began: “One… Two…”
All in that great auditorium took deep breath.
“Three!
The First Signore blurred into a spinning crouch, the Sten gun up at waist level, the finger on the trigger already exerting pressure.
A strange expression washed over his face. His eyes had been on the more slowly turning Jerry Rhodes, but now they shot down to his weapon, unbelievingly. His finger tensed again, in a jerky movement this time.
Jerry had brought his own weapon up, his eyes blinking rapidly. His own finger tensed.
The liquid that jetted from the barrel of Jerry’s vicious looking gun hit the ultimate head of Firenze full in the face. It was a yellowish, thickish liquid and inclined to drip and ooze, rather than splatter.
A delicious aroma began to permeate the vicinity.
The visage of Antonio d’Arrezzo fell in complete bewilderment. He shook his head. He stared down at his gun. His eyes, in bewildered shock, registered utter disbelief. His tongue inadvertently came out and licked around his slack, twitching mouth. One hand came up, two fingers touched his moisture bespattered face; he brought them away, stared at them, brought the fingers to his mouth.
It was the judge who giggled first.
But it was the Third Signore who first began to guffaw.
Aftermath
“Luck!” Helen snarled at Jerry Rhodes.
“Why, sure,” Jerry said. “Who ever heard of such luck?”
“Luck!” she all but screamed. “It took me half the night to get into that damned room where they had those guns stashed in that supposedly locked box. It must have taken me an hour to pick that lock. And what did I find? They’d got there first and extracted the firing pin from your Sten gun. It took me another hour to figure out how to field strip those confounded primitive shooters, and switch matters around so it was his firing pin that was missing, and the necessary parts of my toy water pistol installed in yours, loaded with Chartreuse. And you call it luck!”
“Well,” Jerry said placatingly. “That’s what I mean. It sure was lucky for me you did all that.”
“Oh, shut up!” she snarled. She turned back to where Dorn Horsten had his massive body hunched over the Section G communicator. The faces of both Sid Jakes and Lee Chang Chu were in the screen, both of them a little on the wide-eyed side.
Horsten was summing it up.
“… and obviously a farce is what the First Signore and his gang could stand the least, especially on the eve of this pseudo-election of theirs. Nothing will come of it this time, perhaps, but by the next election, if not sooner, Cesare Marconi and his people will have their chance.”
“What people?” Sid Jakes demanded. “I thought you said he was the only Engelist on the whole planet.”
“Well,” Dorn Horsten explained plausibly, that’s why we’re going to have to stay on for awhile. We were sent to end the Engelist movement on this planet. But, actually, we’re going to have to get it underway. A real underground movement, that is.”
Lee Chang Chu murmured, “Talk about Special Talent!”
They sat around, still later, in the living room of the penthouse suite of the First Signore and worked out their situation, over drinks.
They were, it was decided, safe for the immediate future. Antonio d’Arrezzo and his group wouldn’t dare molest them, right at present. The full shockwaves of the disaster to the dignity of the First Signore would have to subside before he could so much as show his face. The ludicrous qualities of a regime, a political system, so dependent upon the antique code of the duelist were obviously too prominent in the minds of every thinking person on the planet, right now.
They batted it back and forth and made tentative plans for their activities in support of Cesare Marconi and his organization in embryo.
After a half hour of this, Helen said abruptly, “And now I think it’s time for a little game of Truth and Consequences.”
“What’re you talking about?” Jerry said. “Besides, that game’s called Truth or Consequences.”
“That’s what you think, lover,” Helen said. “You see these drinks I served you? I put the last of my supply of Scop in them.”
Zorro began to come to his feet, his face dark.
But it was then they all noticed that Helen had a very small gun in her chubby right hand and that her eyes were dangerous.
They were—Zorro Juarez, Jerry Rhodes, Dorn Horsten—familiar enough with the character of the diminutive Helen, so that when she snapped, “Subside, lovers,” they subsided and awaited developments.
It was to the big scientist that she turned.
“All right,” she said. “Listen, you lummox. In this Section G masquerade we play, do you picture yourself as sort of a romantic, dashing D’Artagnan, Three Musketeers type?”
He tried to hold his teeth firmly clamped. An absolute flare of red started up from his collar, but the word came out.
“Yes.”
She laughed sneeringly at him. “You overgrown romantic elephant.”
Her eyes went to Jerry. “All right, that was just a test to see if the Scop was working. Now then, this luck of yours. How does it happen? How do you account for it?”
His expression was blank, beyond the effects of the drug. Before he could answer, however, she had snapped, “Keep your hand away from that tranca of yours, Zorro.” She looked back at Jerry. “Why?” Why—why, it’s just luck.”
She nodded satisfaction. “I’m glad you didn’t know that you’ve been a parasite on your fellow man by utilizing something more than luck. At least, you’re basically honest.”
The effects of the drug weren’t such as to attack lucidity. Horsten growled, “What does that mean?”
Helen snorted. “You’re supposed to be the double-dome of the team. Haven’t you figured it out? Our boy, here, evidently as all the psi abilities in the book working for him subconsciously. Everything from telekinesis, when he’s flipping that coin of his, or lousing-up even rigged roulette wheels, to telepathy and clairvoyance. For all I know, he even exercises a bit of precognition.” She snorted again. “All subconscious, evidently. But from what little I know about it, that’s the way psi has often manifested itself down through the ages. Go back far enough and you’ll find psi adepts thinking themselves witches, or mediums, or s
ome such.”
But now the gun was full on the chest of Zorro Juarez.
“And now we get to the real point. Keep your hands away from that tranca, lover. It’s your turn. Why did you join Section G?”
His hands, both on the table top, clinched until fingernails dug into palms. A trickle of sweat found its way down the side of his cheek from the sideburn of his hair.
The gun remained steady and Helen said, her voice empty and cold, “Answer.”
To… to… learn… more… about… the Dawnworlds.”
“Why did you want to learn more about the Dawn-worlds?”
His breath was short, desperate. “I… I belong… to a syndicate… that plans to… locate… the Dawnworlds… and secure some… of their… advanced devices.” The shoulders of the man had slumped in defeat.
“Then all of this gobbledygoolc you’ve been giving us about local interest in the subject was simply an effort to pry more information from us, and from Sid Jakes?”
“Yes.”
The diminutive agent looked at him in disgust “Lover, you’re first going to give us all the dope you possess on this syndicate of yours. Undoubtedly, they’re the ones that stole Ronny Bronston’s starchart, after you tipped them off to its existence. Sid and Lee Chang can deal with them. And then you’re going to get a dose of memory-wash so strong you’ll not only forget everything you know about Section G, you’ll have to go back to grammar school.”
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