Mack Reynolds - Code Duello

Zorro said, “Shouldn’t we get in touch with Sid Jakes and let him know about this development?”

The big man shook his head. “They’re too confoundedly conscious of all the paraphernalia involving communications, bugs, eavesdropping and such, here on Firenze. The police probably have every device known in U.P. to tap any signals we might send to Earth.”

“Even a Section G communicator?” Jerry said. “I thought they were beyond tapping.”

“There is no such thing as being beyond tapping,” Horsten told him. “Our laboratories come up with something today, supposedly perfect, but in a year or so, or even a week or so, and some stute, somewhere, figures out a method of listening in. Whether or not the security people on Firenze have a way of cracking our communications with Earth, we don’t know, but I don’t think we ought to take any chances, particularly with nothing more important than this. Let’s wait until we have something big, and well mention it, too, at the same time.”

“It seems to me this is pretty big,” Zorro said. “What’s more important ultimately than the presence of the Dawnworlds?”

“Ultimately, yes. But right now your assignment is to find out about these Firenze subversives and thwart them.”

“So where do we start?” Helen said. She grunted disgust. “Thus far we know damn little more about them than we did when Metaxa briefed us back in the Octagon.”

Jerry walked over to the vicinity of Dorn Horsten and sat down on the couch, his face in unwonted concentration. “You know,” he said. “I still wonder if what we shouldn’t do is go right to Roberto Verona and lay our cards on the table. If anybody knows anything about these Engelists, it’s his Department of Anti-Subversion.”

Helen grunted disgust again.

Zorro said, “I think we ought to get in touch with Sid Jakes and let him know about this Dawnworld development.”

But Horsten was staring at Jerry. “You know,” he said. “You’re right.”

“I am?”

Helen said, “Have you slipped around the corner? We open our traps to Verona about being interested in the Engelists and bingo, we’re all in Zorro’s concentration camp.”

“Um,” Horsten said, coming to his feet and looking at the chronometer on his wrist. “But we won’t open our traps to Verona. What time is it getting to be? Late enough to burglarize a government office?”

“Oh, no,” Helen protested.

“Oh, yes,” Horsten said, beaming at her. “As Jerry says, if anybody knows anything about these Engelists, it’s the Department of Anti-Subversion.”

“Right,” Jerry said, standing too. “With my luck, we’ll stumble right on the guy who…”

“With your luck,” Helen snorted, “we’ll all break our legs, walking down stairs. Have you forgotten? That coin of yours isn’t flipping heads any more.”

“How do you mean?”

“Remember betting the waiter five to one?”

Jerry grinned. “That was lucky, wasn’t it?”

“Lucky!” She glared at him.

“Sure. I was all set to pick up that Great Marconi fellow, the agent provocateur , and bring him back to the hotel. If I’d been able to get away with not paying that check, we’d all have been in the soup. As it was, they stuck me in jail, and the Great Marconi disappeared.”

Helen deflated. “I never thought of that.”

“Which reminds me,” Jerry said to her. “You owe me a hundred interplanetary credits. Remember, you bet me that Zorro’d get killed in that duel.”

“What!” Zorro yelped.

“Come on, let’s get out of here,” Helen said to Horsten. “I’d never be able to explain that.”

It was getting dark when Helen and Horsten left the Albergo Palazzo , her hand in his as she tripped along, Gertrude and a little tin box Dolly’s Nurse Kit in the other.

She said from the side of her mouth, her voice low enough that the casual passerby couldn’t have heard, “Why didn’t you want Jerry and Zorro? I hate to admit it, but Jerry’s right. He’s got the damnedest luck.”

“That he has,” Horsten said. “But sometimes it’s a little too left-handed for my satisfaction. I’m continually waiting for the roof to fall in and kill a fly that’s been bothering friend Jerry.”

“Well… Zorro, then.”

“For this job,” the big scientist said, “we need all the inconspicuous qualities we can muster. Zorro, cracking that overgrown whip of his, doesn’t quite fit in.”

“All right,” Helen agreed. “So where is this Ministry of Anti-Subversion?”

“I wouldn’t know,” her companion said. “We’ll have to ask.”

“Ask?” Helen said bitterly. “And you talk about Zorro being conspicuous.”

Dorn Horsten smiled fondly at her and chose that very moment to stop at the curbside where a uniformed Florentine was staring in despair at a small armored hovercar, embellished with the red letters, NATIONAL POLICE. The hood had been slid back to reveal the mechanism, but, on the face of it, the driver was stymied.

“What’m I ever going to tell the sergente,” he muttered in suppressed rage. The scout car looked like nothing so much as a three-legged turtle, its tripod stilts supporting it some two feet off the surface of the street, in lieu of its now inoperative air cushion.

For the moment, the street was clear of other passersby. The scientist came to a halt, Helen still held by his hand, and said pleasantly, “Ah, my good fellow, could you give me a bit of direction?”

From the side of his mouth the police officer growled, “Dust off, Buster.”

Horsten’s eyebrows went up. “I merely wished to ask…”

The other turned and glowered at him. “Can’t you see I’m busy? This damned tin can flicked out on me. Go on, dust.” He turned back to contemplating his vehicle, muttering, “The sergente’ll have my neck.”

Horsten puffed out his cheeks.

Take it easy, you big ox,” Helen said lowly. “He’s a cop.”

Her companion ignored her. “I said I wished to ask some directions.”

The furious minion of Firenze law spun on him, his teeth tight. “And I said to dust off. Can’t you see I’m busy? I’ve got to cook up some explanation for my superior. He told me not to take this crate out. Anyway, dust. I haven’t any time…”

Horsten had started off the conversation with a benign beam, that good-natured air attainable best by truly king-sized specimens of humanity. The beam was rapidly changing to a glare. “I shall give you exactly one more chance to tell me the location of the Ministry of Anti-Subversion,” he said.

“Oh, you will, eh?”

“Yes.”

“Come on, come on, Daddy!” Helen began to pull on her colleague’s arm. Between her teeth she added, in a hiss, “Let’s get out of here.”

“Or you’ll do just what?” the driver said.

Dorn Horsten looked at the armored police scout car. It’s upper surface resembled the corrugated exterior of a hand grenade, or, perhaps, the shell of a turtle. The vehicle squatted there on its three sturdy metal stilts. It was a nasty looking little car.

Very deliberately, Horsten reached his hand out and banged the top of it with his closed fist. The three legs buckled, the end one to the point of allowing the rear of the armored scout to touch the street.

The driver looked at his vehicle for a long empty moment. Then he turned his eyes on the big scientist and looked at him. Finally, he looked down at Helen.

Helen wrinkled her nose at him nastily.

“You shoulda told my daddy,” she said.

The policeman looked back at his car.

Finally he said to Horsten, “What was it you wanted to know?”

“Where is the Ministry of Anti-Subversion?”