Chapter 3

The gaily-dressed crowd formed a semicircle facing the landing-stage escalators; everybody was staring in embarrassed curiosity, those behind craning over the shoulders of those in front. The ladies had drawn up their shawls in frigid formality; many had even covered their heads. There were four news-service cars hovering above; whatever was going on was getting a planetwide screen showing. The Karvall guardsmen were trying to get through; their sergeant was saying, over and over, “Please, ladies and gentlemen; your pardon, noble sir,” and getting nowhere.

Otto Harkaman swore disgustedly and shoved the sergeant aside. “Make way, here!” he bellowed. “Let these guards pass.” With that, he almost hurled a gaily-dressed gentleman aside on either hand; they both turned to glare angrily, then got hastily out of his way. Meditating briefly on the uses of bad manners in an emergency, Trask followed, with the others; the big Space Viking plowed to the front, where Sesar Karvall and Rovard Grauffis and several others were standing.

Facing them, four men in black cloaks stood with their backs to the escalators. Two were commonfolk retainers; hired gunmen, to be precise. They were at pains to keep their hands plainly in sight, and seemed to be wishing themselves elsewhere. The man in front wore a diamond sunburst jewel on his beret, and his cloak was lined with pale blue silk. His thin, pointed face was deeply lined about the mouth and penciled with a thin black mustache. His eyes showed white all around the irises, and now and then his mouth would twitch in an involuntary grimace. Andray Dunnan; Trask wondered briefly how soon he would have to look at him from twenty-five meters over the sights of a pistol. The face of the slightly taller man who stood at his shoulder was paper-white, expressionless, with a black beard. His name was Nevil Ormm, nobody was quite sure whence he had come, and he was Dunnan’s henchman and constant companion.

“You lie!” Dunnan was shouting. “You lie damnably, in your stinking teeth, all of you! You’ve intercepted every message she’s tried to send me.”

“My daughter has sent you no messages, Lord Dunnan,” Sesar Karvall said, with forced patience. “None but the one I just gave you, that she wants nothing whatever to do with you.”

“You think I believe that? You’re holding her a prisoner; Satan only knows how you’ve been torturing her to force her into this abominable marriage--”

There was a stir among the bystanders; that was more than well-mannered restraint could stand. Out of the murmur of incredulous voices, one woman’s was quite audible:

“Well, really! He actually is crazy!”

Dunnan, like everybody else, heard it. “Crazy, am I?” he blazed. “Because I can see through this hypocritical sham? Here’s Lucas Trask, he wants an interest in Karvall mills, and here’s Sesar Karvall, he wants access to iron deposits on Traskon land. And my loving uncle, he wants the help of both of them in stealing Omfray of Glaspyth’s duchy. And here’s this loan-shark of a Ffayle, trying to claw my lands away from me, and Rovard Grauffis, the fetchdog of my uncle who won’t lift a finger to save his kinsman from ruin, and this foreigner Harkaman who’s swindled me out of command of the Enterprise. You’re all plotting against me--”

“Sir Nevil,” Grauffis said, “you can see that Lord Dunnan’s not himself. If you’re a good friend to him, you’ll get him out of here before Duke Angus arrives.”

Ormm leaned forward and spoke urgently in Dunnan’s ear. Dunnan pushed him angrily away.

“Great Satan, are you against me, too?” he demanded.

Ormm caught his arm. “You fool, do you want to ruin everything, now--” He lowered his voice; the rest was inaudible.

“No, curse you, I won’t go till I’ve spoken to her, face to face--”

There was another stir among the spectators; the crowd was parting, and Elaine was coming through, followed by her mother and Lady Sandrasan and five or six other matrons. They all had their shawls over their heads, right ends over left shoulders; they all stopped except Elaine, who took a few steps forward and confronted Andray Dunnan. He had never seen her look more beautiful, but it was the icy beauty of a honed dagger.