Getaway world, p.1
Getaway World, page 1
Getaway World
Volume four of The classic Family d'Alembert series
By E.E. 'Doc' Smith
With Stephen Goldin
Chapter 1
A Chat with Lady A
The young woman looked vastly out of place standing in the line of people waiting to file through the debarkation gate and receive billeting assignments. Tall and lithe, beautiful and dignified, she looked like a tulip growing in a cactus garden. The rest of her queue mates were the scum of a dozen worlds; virtually all of them, male and female alike, were graduates of the roughest schools in the Galaxy--the imperial prison system. They were tough and, for the most part, ill educated; one could tell their planets of origin by the brand of slang they spoke and the choice of obscenities with which they peppered their conversation.
In contrast, the young woman was striking in her cleanliness. Her clothing fitted her with fidelity, and had been fashioned by one of Earth's finest designers. Her eyes had a deep look of intelligence to them, and her long black hair was neatly trimmed. Her stance, the way she tilted her head, the expression of cool self-assurance-all testified to the fact that this woman was something special, born to wealth if not to the nobility itself.
She stood patiently in the corridor that had once been painted white, but was now scratched and faded to a dismal shade of gray. Her eyes stared straight ahead at the tables where the computer programmers were feeding the information on people's cards into their quietly humming machines. She seemed totally unaware of the lecherous glances from the men around her, or of the envious stares from the women. When the person at the front of the line was finished, she moved forward with the rest; but as for any other interaction with her queue mates, she might as well have been a statue.
Finally her turn came. She handed over her cards to the woman at the front table, who took them routinely without looking up and began typing them into the computer. "Name?" the clerk asked in a bored tone.
"Hazel Whiting," the young lady replied. "It's on the card, if you'd bother to look."
The cultured timbre of that voice made the clerk look up. She was obviously startled; she wasn't used to seeing people of such obvious quality in this place. "What's someone like you doing here?" she asked involuntarily.
"The same as everyone else-looking for sanctuary." The clerk was doubtful. This young lady looked too clean, too innocent and too intelligent to be needing this planet's specialized services. Her left foot reached out and pushed the hidden button that would notify the boss that something was not quite right here; the trivision cameras in the corners would beam the scene to his office, where he could make a decision without the applicant's being aware of it. In the meantime, the clerk would carry on with her work.
"What did you ever do to need sanctuary?"
"Again., it's on the card," said the woman who called herself Hazel Whiting. "Jewel robberies, mostly, with a few swindles along the way." She paused, then added as a sarcastic afterthought, "It helps to look sophisticated; it gets you into the swanker circles where the real loot is."
The clerk shrugged and continued typing silently for several seconds. Then she produced a retinascope, and Hazel Whiting leaned forward to have her identity checked. When the clerk was satisfied, she handed Gospozha Whiting a plastic key card, a pamphlet and a bookreel. "You'll live solely on your past earnings as long as you're on Sanctuary," she said routinely. It was clearly a speech she'd made many times before. "We don't steal from each other here. Report to Room J-5 down the hall for temporary quarters until you decide where in the city you want to live."
Hazel Whiting took the proffered materials from the clerk and started away. As she moved past the line, one. of the men grabbed her arm. "Hey, Hazel Whiting," he said in a raspy voice. "How'd you like to move in with me when you get the chance?"
The girl looked him up and down skeptically. The man was a burly sort with more muscle than brains; he smelled as though he'd missed his bath three months in a row, and his beard looked to have been trimmed with pinking shears. "I think," she replied coolly, "I'd prefer to drink vacuum through a short straw."
The man gave a coarse laugh and pulled her closer to him. "I'll teach you not to be so damned snooty."
Hazel Whiting let herself be pulled until she stood right next to the man. Then, in a series of rapid movements, she acted. Her left foot came down hard on her assailant's right instep, causing him to howl with pain and let go of her right arm. Her right hand lashed out, fingers stiff and extended, and jabbed the man just under his ribs. It could have been a killing blow if she had chosen, but that was not her intention. The man doubled over far enough for her to lift her right knee and hit him on the chin with it. He went out like a candle in a gale.
To an accompaniment of whistles and cheers from other men in the line, Hazel Whiting walked off to Room J-5 to obtain her temporary billeting assignment.
Garst was understandably nervous. Seated across from him was the woman he knew only as Lady A, the person most responsible for his being in this position right now. She was easily the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen; the lines of her face had the classic arrangement of eternal beauty. Her creamy complexion was flawless and her calm green eyes took in everything worth seeing in the room. Her body was sensuality incarnate, and her delicate perfume exuded femininity. There was an eternal quality about her. She could have been any age between thirty and sixty; it was impossible to tell, and Garst did not dare ask.
She was dressed in a wide-sleeved panne velvet jumpsuit with flared pant legs. The suit was green, diagonally slashed with black-the left leg and sleeve were black, with thin lines of emeralds along the edges. A tight green hood-attached to the jumpsuit by a gold metal collar-covered most of her jet black hair. A pearl dangled over her forehead from the center of the hood and around her neck she wore an integrated circuit chip on a golden chain.
Yet despite her physical perfection, there was a coldness emanating from her that made her seem terribly inhuman. Her manner was brisk, her speech sarcastic and stem. Garst could not recall ever having seen her laugh in the several months of their acquaintance. It was as though, being possessed of an ideal body, she had relinquished the option on her soul.
Lady A sat in the comfortable chair across from his desk, her right leg crossed over her left and her hands folded neatly into her lap. She stared with piercing intensity at Garst as she spoke.
"I'm very happy with the operation as you've redefined it," she said. "In only slightly over three months you've taken a marginally working system and turned it into a full-fledged organization. Our 'colony' is growing by leaps and bounds; we should soon have enough talent here to launch our recruiting drive effectively."
Garst nodded his head in acknowledgment of the praise. Though Lady A's words were laudatory, her tone of voice had not altered perceptibly; she was still as passionless as an asteroid. "Thank you. As I told you at our first meeting, organization is my forte. The system I had built on Vesa worked perfectly for two decades before bad luck destroyed it last year-and that was working almost entirely on my own. With your backing, there should be no limit to the things I can accomplish."
He leaned back in his chair, daring to relax a little. "In fact," he continued, half joking, "with my talents and your connections, I wouldn't be surprised if the two of us were ruling the Empire within a couple of years."
The woman snorted. "I doubt it. That particular plum has been within my reach before, but it's a harder fruit to pick than it appears. We'll need a little more time and a lot more background work completed before that goal is attained."
Garst did his best not to overreact to Lady A's statement. His own remark had been intended in jest; her answer was dead serious. She did have her eyes set on the Throne; but what did she mean that it had been within her reach before? A light began flashing on his desk, startling him out of this reverie. Lady A noticed it, too.
"What's that about?" she asked.
Garst reached across the desktop and punched some computer key buttons. "It's a signal from Admissions," he announced after a moment.
"Trouble?"
"Probably nothing. We're just having a new shipload coming in today, and I usually get at least one checkup per ship. I've left standing orders that anything in the least bit suspicious is to be referred to me, so that I can make a decision personally. I like to keep on top of my entire organization-it's what makes me so successful." He neglected to add that, since the breakup of his robbery and murder ring on Vesa, he was extremely paranoid about detection. He wanted to stop problems before they had a chance to start.
Flipping a couple more switches, Garst turned on the monitors so that he could view the scene at the admitting gate. Out of courtesy to his visitor, he swivelled the set around so that she could see, too.
Both of them watched and listened in silence as Hazel Whiting had her interview with the clerk. They noted the brief but vicious fight in the line with the overzealous male, and Garst gave a low whistle of appreciation at the woman's talent for self-defense. "That Hazel Whiting can certainly handle herself well," he said as the subject moved down the corridor and out of the camera's view.
"That she can," acknowledged Lady A icily. "Except her name is not Hazel Whiting-it's Helena von Wilmenhorst."
There was a pause as she let Garst digest that morsel. "Any relation to the Grand Duke?" he asked at last. "Only his daughter," replied Lady A from the heights of cold sarcasm. "And his heir."
Garst was both impressed and puzzled. The von Wilmenhorst family own
"As to the first," Lady A drawled, "I imagine it must be some flaw in this vaunted organization you've been telling me about. She is hardly the sort of character we should be catering to, and I suspect someone along the way was bribed to let her come. As to the second..." She paused to consider something, and finally decided to trust Garst enough to say it.
"As to the second, you will have to know one additional fact about her father: Zander von Wilmenhorst is the Head of the Service of the Empire."
Garst stared at her in disbelief. The Service of the Empire, or SOTE, was virtually the right arm of the Emperor himself. It was the most elite intelligence gathering network ever assembled by mankind, dedicated to enforcing Imperial policies and staffed only by the most loyal, most talented agents in the Galaxy.
Lady A saw his confusion and, for the first time since he'd known her, she smiled. It was a smile that offered no warmth or comfort. "That fact is not generally known," she added, "and it would not be wise to spread it beyond these walls."
"SOTE." Garst's mind raced as he considered the possibilities. "That means she's here to investigate us." "The lightning swiftness of your mind never fails to astonish me."
He ignored Lady A's irony as he hurriedly punched out an order on his desk computer.
Within seconds, a printout of the Hazel Whiting file issued from the tiny slot at the side of his desk. He gave it a careful perusal while his companion eyed him with patient curiosity.
"According to our records, 'Hazel Whiting' first applied to us on the planet Kiesel in Sector Five. She approached one of our agents, claiming to be a jewel thief and swindler. Her reason for asking to come to Sanctuary was that her partner was killed during their last job, and that there were enough clues pointing to her involvement in some seventy capers that she was sure SOTE would be on her trail as well as the regular police. She claims to have attended some of Sector Five's better schools, and she's obviously several levels above the usual rank of people we get here." Garst scrutinized the record a little more carefully. "I don't see much corroboration of her story here-my man seems to have taken a great deal of it on faith. Or perhaps he took a great deal of it on credit. In any event, I shall have him replaced immediately."
Garst stood up and began to pace around slowly behind his desk. He was quite conscious now of Lady A's eyes focused on him. She was observing him like a specimen under a microscope, and he had the feeling that his future employment would hinge largely on how he chose to cope with this latest development.
"Putting aside for the moment the question of how she got here," he said carefully, "we still face the problem of what to do with her now that she's here."
"Indeed." Lady A's brusque comment implied that she wanted to see how he would react to the threat. Garst suddenly found himself perspiring heavily, even though his office was comfortably cool.
He decided to enumerate the possibilities. "We could kill her, we could take her in and give her a shot of nitrobarb to see what she knows, or we could let her wander around, keeping her under close observation to see what she does and whom she contacts.
"I'm opposed to the first alternative for aesthetic reasons. Killing is a last resort, because all the information she has would be lost. It's a move of panic and desperation; so far, the threat she poses is not that serious. Killing her is the safest thing we could do, but not necessarily the smartest.
"The second alternative is very attractive. There's no way anyone can lie under nitrobarb; she would tell us everything we needed to know about how she discovered us, how she managed to get here, what her plans are and how SOTE plans to deal with us. Even if she died under questioning, we would still benefit."
"Yet I seem to detect a note of hesitation in your voice," Lady A observed. "If giving her nitrobarb has all those advantages, why not do it and get it over with?"
"Several reasons. Suppose she's here to contact someone else, someone whom she doesn't know, but who will get in touch with her using a code phrase of some sort. It wouldn't do us any good to pick her up in that case, since it would only scare off her contact. By letting her play on our leash, we may make a bigger haul of infiltrators. Then too, by keeping her alive, we may be able to use her as a bargaining point later, should any trouble arise. The longer we're able to string her out, the more we may learn."
"This method is the least secure of your three alternatives," Lady A pointed out.
"Yes, but potentially the most rewarding. And the threat she poses is still minimal.
There's no way she can broadcast a message off this planet using our equipment without our knowledge, and I'll have her belongings screened thoroughly-and discreetly-to make sure she has no transmitters on her. The only way to get off planet is aboard our ships, and I'll quadruple the guard on the spaceport to make sure she doesn't sneak by us that way."
"What's to stop any of her offworld friends from landing one of their own ships secretly and meeting her?"
Garst smiled. "This planet is well off the main trade lanes, and as you know is listed in the Empire's files as having been explored and passed over for settlement. The only ships that should be coming anywhere near here are our own, and we know the schedule. Anything else that comes within the boundaries of this solar system is blasted instantly out of the skies. We control all access in and out--of that much, I'm sure."
Lady A was silent for a moment. Garst scanned her impassive face, trying to read approval or disapproval in her eyes. Had he passed the test and retained her confidence, or had he made some error in logic that would brand him as incompetent? At last the woman spoke. "Very well, Garst, I agree with your reasoning. Putting Helena von Wilmenhorst under nitrobarb would gain us very little, in the long run. We already have our own access to most of the information she could tell us about SOTE's operations in general; and in regard to the specific mission she's on now, you can do just as well by keeping her under tight surveillance. But you'd better make sure that surveil- lance is tight-no holes, no leaks, no way for her to escape." The or else implied in her tone of voice was entirely too obvious.
"No need to worry about that. Every room in her apartment will be thoroughly searched and monitored around the clock by my best security people. Beepers will be placed in all her clothing. Wherever she goes, there will be two people on her tail. We'll keep lists of everyone she contacts, under what circumstances the contacts were made, and we'll have tails put on all those contacts who look even the faintest bit suspicious. I'll personally review the progress of the investigation at least once a day, to make sure there are no slip-ups. Gospozha von Wilmenhorst will be given more surveillance than the entire Imperial family. Nothing will slip by us, I'll stake my life on that."
"Yes," said Lady A, "you very well may."
After his visitor had gone and he had ordered the implementation of his surveillance tactics, Garst sat alone in his office, deep in thought. What have I gotten myself into? he wondered. Exactly whom have I allied myself with? He reached across his desk and fiddled with the controls of his recorder. As a matter of routine he taped every meeting held in this office, so that they could be played back to refresh his memory. Now, as he sat behind the desk with the lights dimmed, be watched the ghostly images come to life and repeat the performance of earlier that afternoon.
Certain phrases haunted him. "That particular plum has been within my reach before,"
referring to the Throne. And again, "we already have our own access to most of the information she could tell us about SOTE's operations in general."
After his faked death and hasty departure from the gambling moon Vesa, Garst had desperately utilized all the contacts he knew in the Galaxy's underworld until, through the friend of a friend of a friend, he had gotten in touch with this Lady A and asked for a job.
He had expected to be integrated into a criminal organization and allowed to use his talents there; but Lady A's conversation left him little doubt that he was actually con- nected to an Empire-wide conspiracy of infinitely vaster proportions. The thought of what this could mean filled him with both terror and eager anticipation.
