She looked at the dress in amazement. "You mean these natives don't know any more about dressing than this?"
I masked any glee I might feel. I pointed at a change booth. "Quickly, quickly. People are waiting. Heller is half a day's flight from here and we've got to get you on your way."
Reluctantly, she went into the booth and shed her greatcoat.
I found a dingy-looking woman's hooded cloak. It was a sort of spotty brown. I found a veil. I couldn't find any shoes or stockings. She was wearing spaceboots. So let her wear spaceboots.
She came out wearing the dress. She was about five foot, nine and a half inches tall and the dress was for a smaller woman. Her opinion of it was plain in her expression.
I shoved the cloak at her. "This will cover it," I said.
She found a couple small holes in it. She looked at me with a rather calculating eye. It made me nervous.
"The sooner you put this on, the sooner you're away," I said.
She put it on. I handed her the veil. She didn't know what to do with it so I showed her on my own face. "All women go veiled," I told her. "It's a religious custom."
"Are you sure we're on the right planet?" she said. But she put it on.
I got into my own bearskin coat and karakul hat, picked up the box of bugs, the things she had taken off and her grip, and with some persuasion, got her outside and into the taxi.
Now came the tricky part. I closed the partition so the driver couldn't hear. "You have to be very careful on this world," I said. "They are absolutely crazy on the subject of identification. And if you have any scars or marks of any kind on your body, they grab you at once. So all such things have to be removed."
The taxi was rolling through a very dark night but I could feel her eyes on me.
"Oh, Soltan," she said, disbelieving.
I turned on the overhead light. "No, look. See that scar on the back of your hand? A dead giveaway."
"That's just a little claw mark from a lepertige. You can hardly see it."
"And look at that wrist! Electric cuffs, weren't they?"
"Oh, Soltan. You'd need a vivid imagination just to make them out."
"All right," I said. "But how about that hideous scar over your right eyebrow?"
"You mean that tiny little scratch?" She fingered it. "But the eyebrow covers it."
"Well," I said, "you're just used to seeing it." And then I got very cunning. "You think Heller wants to have to look at that huge blemish the rest of his life?"
She was thoughtful. Then she said, "I see what you mean. But you're not putting me under gas, Soltan."
"Listen, Countess," I said. "It is my duty to protect you. Heller would have my head if I let you wander out only to get picked up because of identifying marks."
I must have sounded convincing—possibly because it was true that Heller would kill me with slow torture if I let anything happen to her. She grew more thoughtful.
It was time to dive straight into Strategy Plan A. "I don't blame you for being wary," I said. "The world, any world, is full of wolves. But I am a slave of duty. I will tell you what I will do. I happen to have hypnohelmets here. I'll let you put both me and the cellologist under one first and I'll give you a wrist recorder to wear during the operation. How's that?"
Just as I suspected, it caught her fancy. Above the veil, a gleam was very visible in those gray-blue eyes. "All right," she said.
I almost hugged myself with glee. It had worked! It had worked! I had to turn my face away so she would not see me suppressing triumph. I was tricking the formidable Countess Krak. And getting away with it!
Chapter 9
It was nearing 9:00 P.M. and there were very few around at the hospital.
I steered the Countess Krak through the lobby and got her into an interview room.
Dr. Prahd Bittlestiffender had been on the lookout and followed.
She sat down in a chair. She obviously didn't like the veil and took it off. She threw back the hood.
Young Doctor Prahd gangled into the room.
He stopped.
He stared.
In Voltarian, I said to her, "This is your doctor. He is one of the most competent cellologists Voltar ever produced. Doctor, this is Miss X. She just came in on the Blixo and, as usual, has to have her identifying scars removed."
Prahd, the silly ape, didn't take the cue at all. He was just standing there, staring at her with his mouth open!
I was operating smoothly now, myself. I said to her, "We'll go out now to the warehouse and get a hypnohelmet. So please excuse us."
I kicked him out of his trance, got him into the hall and closed the door. Carrying her bag and the bug box, I herded him back to the privacy of his office.
I snarled, "What the Hells are you so (bleeped) stunned about?"
"That lady," he said, eyes wide.
"That 'lady'," I told him acidly, "is a very wanted criminal!"
"WHAT? That beautiful woman? I can't believe it. She must be one of the greatest beauties of Voltar! I've only seen one other that could compare with her. And that was Hightee Heller, the Homeview star!"
I pushed him into his chair so I could tower over him. "Listen," I snarled. "That woman you are going into orbit about was once condemned to death and is today a nonperson. She has killed four men to my personal knowledge. Three of them for just making an innocent pass at her. So don't get any romantic ideas about that 'lady'! She is being sent in to do another job. A murder."
He was staring at me round-eyed, his straw hair standing up in all directions. I pressed my advantage. "We have to con her to protect ourselves," I continued. "You're going to remove her scars all right. But you're also going to put these audio and visual bugs in her skull just like you did with Heller. There's a scar just above her right eye that will do just fine. So you're going to put her under gas right now and do the job. She's not to know about the bugs."
"But she'll kill us if she finds out!" he said.
"Precisely!" I snapped. "But I've got that figured out. She has an inflated idea of herself as a hypnotist. I am going to propose to her that she put a hypnohelmet on each of us——"
"WHAT?"
"Be calm, be calm," I soothed him. "I've fixed a helmet so it doesn't work. You simply pretend you are under hypnosis. So will I. And we'll put a wrist recorder on her. Then she'll go tamely through with it. I'm just protecting you, that's all. So run over to the warehouse and get a couple of those hypnohelmets I sent over and I'll see you back in the interview room."
He took the box with the two bug devices and put it in his pocket. He left.
Rapidly, I opened her grip. I went through it very thoroughly. Only a few toilet articles and a little makeup. The bulk of the space was taken up with the language machine and some Earth texts. I carefully investigated the lining. Nothing.
The space greatcoat and the coveralls she had been wearing and which I had brought along produced no better result. Originally, when I gave them to her, she had strapped the "proclamations" against her body. And that's exactly where they must be now. I couldn't imagine even an Apparatus guard adventuring a skin search on her: she would kill him! And had they found them, they would have checked them against the Palace City log, found they were forgeries and she now would be a very executed Countess Krak, instead of a live one here on Earth.
My own neck was still out. Even with Bawtch and the forgers dead, the Countess Krak could implicate me. Ah, well. Very shortly, I would have them back for she would be lying there under gas. I might even fold a packet of paper to put in their place. Yes, that was the ploy. I made a paper packet up.
A door slammed somewhere and I realized Prahd must be back. I hurried down to the interview room and arrived just as he was entering. The Countess Krak's eyes lit up.
He was carrying two cartons and when he put them down she instantly rose and brushed him away. I had carefully replaced the original carton seals, of course —we are experts at that in the Apparatus—and those two carton
s looked like they had never been touched since the day they left the manufacturer.
She chose one. She opened it. She looked like somebody about to cut a birthday cake. "Oho!" she said. "All shiny new and the very latest type! See, look! It has a plug-in microphone as well as the recording strip player! Oh, lovely. Such nice colors, too."
She expertly inserted a power pack and checked the meter. She plugged in the microphone. "Who is first?"
I wasn't really sure that she wouldn't also shove a knife into somebody. I gave Prahd a push toward a chair. He nervously perched his lanky body on its edge.
"Do you own this hospital?" she asked him conversationally.
"No, no," said Prahd, pointing at me. "He does. That is to say, he's the boss. If you have any complaints ..."
"Not any yet," said the Countess Krak, smiling at him sweetly.
She put the helmet on his wheat shock of hair. She turned to me. "If you'll just wait in the hall, Soltan." She was juggling the microphone in one hand, the other poised over the switch to turn the helmet on.
I went. But I kept my ear pressed close to the closed door.
"Sleep, sleep, pretty sleep," she said. "Can you hear me?"
A muffled "Yes."
"You are about to do an operation. You will do it very expertly. You will not bring about any physical-body distortions or alterations. In other words, you will not monkey with my limbs or glands. Is that clear?"
A muffled "Yes."
"You will limit your operations to repairing a few scars and blemishes and make it all heal rapidly with no further scars or blemishes and no fancy ideas. Right?" "Yes."
"Now," she continued, "if you or Soltan or any other man approaches me carnally or makes any sexual contact with me while I am under gas, you are to use an electric knife on yourself or them. Understood?" "Right."
"And you are not to say anything around me or to me while I am under gas. Understood?" "Yes."
"Now, if you violate any of this you will feel like atom bombs are exploding in your head. Right?" "Right."
"You will now forget what I have said to you and when you wake up you will only remember and believe that I have been asking about your professional qualifications. Agreed?" "Right."
A click. She had turned the helmet off. In a minute Prahd came stumbling out the door. I was watching him very closely. I had wanted to be sure that the helmet was made inoperative when the unit I carried came within two miles of it.
He was mopping his face. "Gods," he whispered. "Atom bombs! I see what you mean!" He tottered down the hall to his operating room.
It was all right. If he'd been hypnotized, he would not have remembered! It was safe. "Soltan," a soft voice was calling. I went in like a meek little schoolboy. I was hiding my grins. She plopped the helmet down on my head. She threw on the switch. Through the visor shield I could see her check the meter and the lights.
She stepped back and held the microphone to her mouth. "Sleep, sleep, pretty sleep. Can you hear me, Soltan?"
"Yes," I said, making my voice sound groggy.
"Some time ago I told you that if you had any idea of hurting Jettero Heller, you would get sick at your stomach and so forth. Now tell me, Soltan, is that still true?"
"Oh, yes," I lied.
"And you have not gotten any notion of hurting him or doing him any nasty tricks?"
"Oh, no," I lied.
"Good. That is still true. Only, added to it is the fact that if you try to do anything bad to me, you will now feel the same way. Understood?"
"Yes," I said. Oh Gods, it sure was a good thing this helmet was null on me!
"Now listen carefully. You will help me in every way you can to reach Jettero. You will let me go wherever I want around this hospital and nearby buildings or base. You will let me pick up anything I want. Understood?"
"Yes," I said.
"Now also," she said, "you'll let me have whatever I take, no matter what it is. You will let me leave with it. And you will find a reasonable reason in yourself for letting me do so. Is that clear?"
"Yes," I said.
"Good. You will now forget what I have said. When you awake you will think I have been asking you about the operation. All right?"
"Yes," I said.
She reached over and clicked the helmet switch and then took it off my head. "Wake up, Soltan."
Hiding my grin, I said, "Now that you know all about the operation, shall we go to the operating room?"
Oh, smart brains, indeed! What if I had not had that breaker-switch pair installed in the helmets and my skull? All that agony had just paid off! It didn't compare to the stomachaches I'd had!
Chapter 10
Prahd sent her into a cubicle beside the operating theater. It was a sort of bathroom-dressing room. He gave her a package—a Zanco disposable, sterile operating gown and cap. He gestured toward a slot in the door. "Please drop your clothes through that, including those boots. Then take a shower and get into this. Then enter the operating room through that side door."
She nodded. She seemed oddly cheerful. But of course she was happy to have a bath after six weeks on a freighter. And she was going to see Heller soon, wasn't she? Still, I was very suspicious of a happy Countess Krak.
Prahd and I entered the operating room itself. He had lights flashing and beakers bubbling and it all looked very businesslike.
"Just as soon as you have her under," I said, "I'm going to have to do a skin search."
"WHAT?"
"I have to make sure she is carrying no secret weapons," I lied. "I will take off my boots. I will be very quiet."
"You don't have to come in," he said. "There's a viewport, one way, right over in that wall. It looks like a small mirror."
"Won't do," I said. "I can be very quiet. I have to be sure."
"All right, but do it before I begin work. I don't want all the germs you carry in here. And I can disinfect afterwards."
I ignored his insult. I took a wrist recorder out of my pocket. "Tell her she can put this on and start it."
"I think she would kill us if we took any liberties, Officer Gris. So just be warned that I'll have my electric knife ready."
"Hey, you weren't really hypnotized, were you?"
"No. But if she wakes up and finds she's been fooled with and your dead body isn't lying on the floor, she'll get suspicious that the helmet didn't work."
Yes, there was that. But I didn't exactly like the way he put it.
She came in, in the open-backed operating gown. "That's the awfullest-smelling soap I think I ever smelled. What a frightful stink!"
"Overstrength germicidal," said Prahd. "As to the stink, Officer Gris is just leaving. As to the soap, I'll put a nice smelling bar in the recovery room and you can shower and wash your hair when you wake up. All right? Good. Now, if you will just sit down on the operating table..."
I left. I went around to the one-way window. I couldn't hear what they were saying. She was on the table but she was having to master how to operate the wrist recorder and I realized she was unfamiliar with the clumsiness of Earth devices. She finally got it tested and running and hung on her forearm.
She swung her shapely legs up and stretched out. Prahd lowered the gas anesthetic dome. He watched a heart counter and respiration meter. She was out.
He pulled the gown off her and beckoned toward the window.
I went around to the door. I slipped off my boots. More silent than a cat, I entered and stole toward the table.
Gods, she was a beautiful woman! No Greek sculptor had ever had a model like this!
Prahd was standing there with an electric knife. I got busy.
There was nothing strapped to the front of her body. There was nothing around her waist so far as I could observe it. They must be strapped to her back! I moved forward to turn her over. I stopped. Prahd notwithstanding, I was afraid to touch her. I suddenly discovered that terror could be a much heavier emotion than sexual desire. I backed up.
Finding it ha
rd to swallow and shaking a bit, I gestured to Prahd to lift her.
He did, very quietly. I looked under her back from the right side. I went around while he moved her the other way. Nothing. She didn't have a thing on her!
I tiptoed out of there, feeling somehow that I had escaped with my life.
I went into the change room and searched. Nothing. I examined the clothes she had taken off. Nothing. I looked for false soles in the boots. Just plain, black space-boots.
(BLEEP)!
She was a very clever woman. She not only trained people for the stage, she could also do all kinds of sleight of hand. I would have to watch her very carefully. It would be my neck if I didn't recover those forgeries. The horrible thought hit me that maybe Bawtch had talked before he died. Or left a note or something! Yes, I had no choice but to recover them. Constant watchfulness was the watchword.
Chapter 11
Back at the one-way window, I watched the progress of the operation.
She lay in naked repose, oblivious of what was going on.
Prahd was working with rapid expertise. For some reason, he took a lot of measurements with a lot of different scopes and devices, cataloguing them all on a chart. Then he opened a big volume and consulted it. From where I was I could see the page he had: it was headed "Manco." Well, he was right about that. She was from Manco.
Then he made a signal toward the window, indicating the hall. I met him there. He showed me the book. "This lady is from the aristocracy of Atalanta."
I noted sourly that it was "lady" again. "Yes," I said.
"That accounts for it," he said.
"For what?" I said, irritated.
"The perfection. She's the product of tens of thousands of years of selective breeding. The aristocracy married nothing but the most beautiful and bright. Do you realize that her thyroid..."
Oh, Gods, deliver me from a specialist riding his hobby! "Are you going to get on with this operation or aren't you?"
"I just wanted you to be aware that you were tampering with the aristocracy," he said. "It carries the death penalty, you know."
"I told you!" I grated. "She's a nonperson! A criminal! There isn't even any penalty if you killed her."
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