Дэймон Найт: Orbit 4

He stood up, put the dorfox on his shoulder, and petted him. The animal began radiating immediately. His first target was a middle-aged merchant—one of the few people who were not yet at the waterfront. As the man passed Svir and Ancho, his eyes widened and he performed the nodding bow reserved for members of the Bureaucracy. Svir smiled and walked onto the open area before the Keep. In some peculiar way, when Ancho used the effect on others, it made Svir feel confident, competent. And this feeling of authority actually seemed to feed back to the animal, making him perform even more effectively. Hedrigs strolled briskly across the grassy plain.

The two Guardsmen came rigidly to attention as he approached. One of them saluted. Svir offhandedly returned the salute. He passed his credentials to the Guardsman. At the same time he spoke the ritual words. “The Crown’s agent to inventory the Prizes.”

The senior Guardsman looked up from the papers. “Very good, sir.” Both men wore ridiculously ornamented dress uniforms, but there was nothing ornamental about their weapons. In a single glance, the Guardsman gave Svir a thorough once-over. His alert and active mind checked for the minor details that would give an impostor away. Unfortunately for the Guardsman, his own mind made him sec the details he was looking for. If questioned later, both Guards would swear they saw the Crown’s Inspector General entering the 'building, and not Svir Hedrigs.

The fellow returned Svir his papers, and turned to an inconspicuous speaking tube that emerged from the black stone of the castle wall. Except for the words “Inspector General,” Svir couldn’t hear what was said. But that was enough. He had passed the second hurdle. At each checkpoint, the word would be passed back as to who he was supposed to be. With a greased sliding sound, a thirty-ton cube of stone lifted into the ceiling of the entrance. Beyond was darkness.

Svir walked in, striving not to look up at the mass of stone above him, or back at the colorful city which would soon be blocked from his view. The/ stone cube slid smoothly down. Svir stood in the dark for almost five seconds. Ancho chirped nervously, and the device on his back continued to clock-cUck-clock. Hedrigs rubbed the little animal’s neck, and the dorfox began radiating again, none too soon. A second block of stone was lifting. Al-gac-generatcd light flooded the chamber. He stepped into the hallway and handed his papers to the Guardsmen standing there. Two of them were right by the entrance, while a third stood on a crenelated balcony near the ceiling. All three were dressed in loose, comfortable suits of Bureaucratic black. They weren’t nearly as formal as the Fellows outside, but they showed obvious respect—and they were just as alert and competent as the dudes outside. Hedrigs’ identity was passed by speaking tube to the next checkpoint.

Svir walked on confidently. The hall was well lighted and ventilated, even though it was within a mass of stone almost six hundred feet high. In some places the cold black stone was covered by wood paneling and cabinets filled with the Arms of Early Kings. He passed through three more checkpoints, each with its own door system. Whenever he had a choice of routes he took the middle one—he was following a radius straight to the center of the Keep, to the Crown Room vault. Some of the outer passages were almost crowded. Bureaucrats were making final arrangements for the evening’s events. Svir walked aloof from these groups, and hoped that none of them compared notes on exactly who they thought he was. As he approached the center, however, there were fewer and fewer people. Besides the Guards, he encountered only an occasional, very high-ranking Bureaucrat.

Here the identification procedures became more complex. The walls were uniformly panelled and the floors heavily carpeted. Svir wondered at this strange luxuriousness in the most secret part of the Keep. Besides the usual paintings and displays, there were small glass windows at regular intervals. Beyond that glass, Svir could see only darkness. Probably there was someone back there watching what went on—guarding the guards. Svir was suddenly very glad that Tatja had had Ancho practice at deluding hidden observers. Now he knew the reason for the luxurious trappings. Besides hiding the observation posts, they probably concealed a variety of weapons and deadfalls.

Finally he reached the last checkpoint—the doorway to the Crown Room itself. It was conceivable that at this moment, only the Inspector General and Tar Benesh himself had authority to enter that storeroom of the nation’s greatest treasures and most secret documents. Here the clearance process was especially difficult. For a few uncomfortable moments, Svir thought they were going to take his fingerprints and run a comparison right there. Would the illusion extend to fingerprints? But apparently that procedure was used in special cases only, and Svir was not subjected to it

As they opened the outer vault door, Hedrigs casually turned to the officer in charge. “Captain, I have instructions to move some of the Prizes out to Sacrifice Island right away. I’d like to have a couple of squads ready when I finish the general inventory.”

“Very good, sir,” she answered. “We have about twenty people with the proper clearance for just that job. I can have them here in fifteen minutes.” She handed Svir an algae lamp. “Don’t forget this, sir.”

“Why, thanks.” Hedrigs accepted the lamp uncertainly. “If everything’s in order, my inventory should take about forty minutes—if not, it could be longer.” A lot longer, thought Svir to himself.

Hedrigs turned and walked quickly into the lock area between the double doors. The outer door slid shut, the inner door lifted open, and he stepped into the Crown Room.

The vault was a disappointment. The room was large and without ornamentation. Svir’s lamp provided the only illumination. Over all hung a musty smell, which the tiny vault ventilator shafts could not dissipate. The treasures were not heaped in a spectacular pile, but were neatly catalogued on racks that filled most of the room. Each object had its own classification tag. A row of cabinets along one wall housed the personal records of the Royal Family. Svir walked along the racks. (He almost didn’t notice the Crown Jewels and the nine-hundred-thirty-carat Shamerest cut diamond. In the dim light everything looked dull.) Finally he reached the red-tag area—the prime sacrifices for the Festival.

And there it was—the Fantasie collection. Its sheer bulk was impressive. The ten thousand volumes were stacked on seven close-set racks. The entire mass rested on a dolly for easy handling. Obviously Benesh thought of Fantasie as an article of portable wealth rather than a source of philosophical and romantic pleasure. But—as Tatja so cynically pointed out—that massive collection was also the vehicle of Cor’s salvation. Even in this dim light, he could read some of the binding titles. Why, there was the last obra of Ti Liso’s Time Travel Series! For the last three centuries, the Chainpearl experts had been trying to find that issue. The series had been illustrated by Inmar Ellis—probably the greatest artist of all time. Svir noticed all this in passing. No matter how valuable this collection, its physical dimensions were much more important to him now. There was indeed enough room between the third and fourth racks to hide a human body.

Now he had to find the correct passage to the prison tier. If Tatja had lied about that—

The vault doors were so well constructed that Hedrigs did not know he had been discovered until the inner door lifted and he heard the raging voice of—

Tar Benesh.

The Regent advanced into the room. A look of astounded shock came to his face as he saw Hedrigs. Svir wondered briefly what authority figure the dictator saw in Ancho’s illusion. Benesh was less than five feet tall. He weighed more than two hundred pounds. Once that weight had been slablike muscle, but now he was as soft as the velvet and flutter-feather costume he wore.