Mission: Earth "Villainy Victorious" (45 page)

The volunteer walked out.

The chief clerk muttered, "I told you he wasn't here."

The volunteer got into the hall.

Meanwhile Snelz was experiencing shock and heart failure. The volunteer had no more than gotten on the zipbus when the feeling of being smart and clever turned, in Snelz, to horror.

THE MODEL 99 LANDED!

In a state of acute paralysis he watched Madison get out, walk through the dust to the barricade before the zip-bus. Snelz didn't dare breathe. Would the officer on duty notice he was logging Madison in TWICE?

Action was the answer to everything with Snelz. He drew a hand blastgun, fired at the top of a pole and shattered the light. He ducked.

As glass showered down, the guards raced for cover. Madison put into action his own method of escape. He swung aboard a zipbus quickly and looked back as it sped away into the tunnel.

Not daring to think what would happen when Madison ran into "Madison" in the elevator or hall, he did something he almost never did: he prayed.

The volunteer, meanwhile, was waiting in the hall for an elevator shaft to signal it was clear. Somebody was coming up!

Not wanting anything like a confrontation, possibly even with Lombar, the volunteer looked hastily around. There was a big box of fresh computer paper in the hall. It was only four feet high but he quickly dived behind it. Peering out, he was horrified to see the real Madison step out of the shaft!

The instant the hall was clear, the volunteer dived headfirst into the shaft to get out of there.

The real Madison walked into the clerk's office.

"What'd you do?" the chief clerk said, after an indifferent glance. "Forget something?"

Madison walked on into Lombar's office, saying, "I'll wait."

He had the newest clippings from the press. They gave a lot of juicy speeches about Hisst wanting law and order and raging about anyone trying to defame the honor of Apparatus officers, and he knew these shots of his angry face would delight Lombar no end. He wanted to make a nice display of them on the desk.

A stinger was propping up a big envelope and he accidentally knocked it down. He set it up once more. But it was in the way of his clipping spread. He decided it should be put further back. He took hold of it once more and moved the stinger and, then, with a double take, suddenly registered what was in his hand.

He stared, stunned.

How had that gotten there?

It was still sealed.

Lombar hadn't seen it yet.

Not knowing anything about Heller's admonition to Snelz that Lombar would have the messenger killed, particularly if the seals were broken, Madison quivered with greed to know.

What was this? Some secret communication line?

And as it was from the only reason he was doing all he was doing, he could hardly resist.

He broke the seals.

It was all quiet in the outer office.

Madison swiftly read:

Madison read it again. Suddenly everything began to click together. Time after time he had told Hisst that all he had to do was get a Royal proclamation about this thing or that: Hisst every time had looked extremely cagey!

Madison abruptly understood.

There was no Emperor back of that Palace City door Hisst guarded and saw guarded so carefully!

Jettero Heller had kidnapped the Emperor!

So THAT was what this was all about!

Madison glanced around. He did not think that he was in any way observed.

This was not a communication line. It was a first time.

Risks were the very thing his profession was made of. Madison put the envelope and despatch in his own briefcase. He left no trace of it on the desk.

He arranged his PR display of clippings. He went into the clerk's office. He said, "Have there been any urgent messages for Hisst?"

The old clerk shook his head.

A surge of elation coursed through Madison. What an outlaw! Heller had somehow, unbeknownst to anyone, slipped into this office, maybe from the roof, and had left Hisst this envelope.

Looking very calm, Madison sat down at the console of the computer and, as though to pass the time, began to extract bits of information he might find handy, such as the strength of forces on the planet Calabar. Then he began to tally up the enormous numbers available in the Army and the Fleet.

Obviously, from the message, Heller didn't want these people after him. Madison was trying to work out how he could accomplish just that.

Oh, what headlines all this would eventually make!

Not right now, of course, but later when he had his campaign all worked out and perfect.

If he had had any slightest doubt before, that he would make his goal, he had none now. He would, for sure, return to Earth in glory-if, of course, there was anything left of it.

Hisst came in an hour later. Madison walked with the man into his office. Hisst was very pleased with the press.

"Things are going well," said Hisst.

"Yes, we'll have you Emperor in no time," said Madison.

HE DID NOT SAY ONE SINGLE WORD ABOUT THE HELLER DESPATCH!

Snelz, when the volunteer, sneaking past the barricade, had returned, sighed with relief.

He saw Hisst arrive and go up to the tower.

Neither the chief nor the real Madison came out.

He could only assume that the message had been delivered.

For a second time, a message which would have forestalled an invasion of Earth had been stopped en route.

And not only that, this one had fallen into the hands of a man to whom it gave total power: J. Walter Madison, who could use it in any villainous way he chose and at a moment when he considered it would be the most advantageous in a headline.

KNOWLEDGE WAS POWER! And Madison now knew that he was the only one on Voltar with the vital, pivotal information that the Emperor was on Calabar and Heller was holding him a captive!

WHAT A STORY!

But not for now. No, no, not for now. This one had to be built up to with the biggest BANG this universe had ever heard!

As he returned to Joy City, the glee in Madison threatened to bubble out and explode!

The fate of two empires was truly up for grabs! And J. Warbler Madman was the one who would do the tossing!

The first toss by Madison came the moment Soltan Gris took the stand in the crowded courtroom.

Lord Turn had bowed to the pleas of his own guard captains, the newssheets and the Domestic Police, who all promised they could not prevent riots unless the people were kept informed, minute to minute, on the progress of the proceedings. They pointed out there were no laws or regulations which forbade it: it was simply a new idea. Lord Turn, against his better judgment, had agreed to a public trial.

Madison, who was behind it, could not have asked for more.

The biggest courtroom of the old castle was jammed from the dais to the entrance doors. Even the buttresses had stages clinging to them. The gray stone looked down upon six thousand people crammed in where only four thousand should have been. The high windows let in shafts of dusty sunlight.

The Homeview crews were in ecstasy. They had never been permitted in a courtroom before and they kept racing about jamming cameras into people's faces, hitting mouths with microphones, telling people to look this way and that, colliding all the while with press photographers and stumbling over reporters.

Lord Turn, in vain, was banging his mace of office on the dais gong. He was nearly in despair: this whole thing was being seen all over Voltar and, on delay, throughout the entire Confederacy. He was certain people were bound to get the impression that he ran a very disorderly court. He wished to blazes those refreshment vendors would stop hawking their wares at the tops of their voices.

Only when his chief clerk brought him an electronic megaphone did hope revive in him that he would be heard. He pointed it at the gong and struck a tremendous blow with his mace. The result was ear-shattering.

"The court is in session!" Lord Turn roared. "If the prisoner Soltan Gris will take the stand, I can read him the charges!"

Instant hush.

Soltan Gris, manacled, was sitting on a bench surrounded by the three attorneys that the Widow Tayl (Mrs. Gris) had provided him. Gris had thought he would be dressed in a General Services officer's gray.

Instead, he was appearing in the black uniform of an Apparatus Death Battalion colonel. He had protested but his attorneys had said he had no choice. He even had to put on the scarlet gloves.

Soltan Gris was scared: in addition to everything else, he had stage fright.

The three attorneys were trying to look reassuring. They were old men; two of them had been Domestic Police judges and the third a Lord's executioner. Gris did not trust them. But it had been explained to him that this was the closest anyone could get to a criminal defense attorney on Voltar, and although he had to accept them, he still did not believe they were on his side: the explanation had been done by Madison.

His evident refusal to walk toward the railed stand began to elicit a storm of animal sounds from the assembled, and his attorneys gave him a forward shove and two sergeants grabbed him. With a clank and clatter of manacles, Gris was propelled to the raised rail chair: its door was opened and he was slammed into it, the instant center of all eyes. Yells of hate bombarded him like missiles; a shaft of dirty sunlight from a high, round window blinded him. Gris was confused.

Lord Turn, again using the loudspeaker held to the gong, banged for silence. He hitched his scarlet robe around him and leaned from his massive chair toward Gris.

"You are Soltan Gris," said Lord Turn, "officer of the Coordinated Information Apparatus. Verify if correct."

Gris swallowed hard and nodded.

Turn had every hope of getting this over fast. "You are accused," said Turn, "of false and felonious bigamy committed in this prison. You may make any statement you care to before you are sentenced."

Gris drew a long, shuddering breath. The crime carried the death penalty. He couldn't possibly see how he could get out of it. He had not seen Teenie in the court but he suspected she would have papers showing earlier marriages and would have given them to the judge. It looked like he was a goner for sure.

When he didn't answer at once, the animal sounds started up again. The spectators had had all their weapons removed by guards but that didn't include spent chank-pops and sweetsticks. A few missiles came his way. He gathered the idea that he was not popular. His mind was confused.

Lord Turn hit the gong again to bring order. It was like a shock to Gris. Suddenly, INSPIRATION! He would say what Madison had told him to say.

Gris shouted, "I accuse Jettero Heller! He is the cause of any crimes!"

Whatever the vast audience had expected to hear, it had not been that. Abruptly, one could have heard a dust mote fall.

Lord Turn sat up straight and blinked. Then he said, "Just a minute. Jettero Heller is a Royal officer. You were HIS prisoner in this jail. But this is NOT the trial we're trying. You are being charged with false and felonious marriage committed within these very walls."

Gris took heart. He hadn't been sentenced yet. His attorneys were all nodding at him. He shouted, "I still accuse Heller!"

A buzz of confusion went through the room.

Lord Turn said, in an incredulous voice, "You accuse him of causing you to commit bigamy?"

Gris glanced toward his attorneys. They were all nodding at him. Madison, on the bench behind them, was grinning. Gris said, "Absolutely. He refused to follow orders. He went absolutely wild. Jettero Heller put me in a position where all I could do to defend myself was to get married again."

The buzz in the room rose in volume: it was becoming a roar of confusion.

Lord Turn hit the gong again. "Clerk," he said to his scribe at a lower desk, "this prisoner is being willfully digressive. Strike those remarks from the record."

But Madison's grin widened. They might get struck on the record but they had been carried by Homeview all over Voltar and would be all over the Confederacy.

The eldest Gris attorney, one of the two ex-Domestic Police judges, rose and demanded attention. "Your

Lordship," he said to Turn, "we accept the charge of bigamy in your prison but will seek to prove it was totally justified."

"WHAT?" cried Turn.

The old attorney said, "To clarify the point, we will have to produce a great many witnesses. They will attest to various crimes and situations that give the background nature of this charge and when we come to the end of this trial, I am sure you will agree that the extenuating circumstances are so great that you will be bound to find our client innocent."