Ren was about to make a reply when Di Rode got up from the bench and made as though to call a servant. The agent’s gaze did not follow the hedonistic lord, but remained fixed in fascination on the bench from which Di Rode had risen. He saw now for the first time that the entire surface was covered with upward-pointing metal spines, like a bed of nails. In an agony of realization his eyes traveled involuntarily to Di Rode’s back.
Krist Di Rode was watching his perplexity with some amusement. With a swift movement he dropped the single drape that covered his back and allowed Ren to examine his flesh. There were slight indentations from the pressure of the barbs, but otherwise the skin was undamaged. In contrast, however, the open weave of the drape had been severely cut. Ren looked again to the sharp spines of the couch and again back to Di Rode. By any normal reasoning, Di Rode’s back should have been lacerated to an extremely serious extent. Instead the young lord was laughing and the main discomfort was Ren’s.
‘Well, Agent Ren—do you still think you can do better than Dion-daizan?’
Ren shook his head, not trusting himself to speak. He suspected, not for the first time, that he was fighting a battle quite impossible for him to win. With Dion’s influence removed, Delph Di Guaard would go berserk and Krist Di Rode would destroy himself. With such powerful nobility removed, the social structure of the three hills, undermined as it was, would slowly begin to disintegrate as surely as if the
Imaiz
were still pushing it. Dion-daizan had raised a social conscience and all the old forces of tradition would be hard-pressed to put that, evolving creature back to bed.
As Ren came to the square of the fruit market he could see Catuul Gras waiting for him on the steps of his office chambers. He hastened over and the scribe followed him to safety behind closed doors before he would reveal the nature of his his concern.
‘Something’s gone wrong.’ Catuul’s face was grave. ‘The list of slaves you gave us—it was incorrect.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘We took the slaves whose names were on the list. It didn’t seem right, because most of them were well trusted and known to us. But even under pressure they gave us absolutely nothing. Most of them claimed never to have been with the
Imaiz
.’
‘Surely that’s no more than you’d have expected them to say?’
‘True. But on further examination we found their statements to be correct. Dr. Hardun has given us a list of our own sympathizers—and none of Dion’s men at all.’
‘Ridiculous!’
‘It’s all here.’ Catuul Gras laid a sheaf of papers on the table. ‘Check for yourself. No man on that list has ever spent more than thirty-six hours on Magda and most of them haven’t been there at all.’
Scowling, Ren reached for the microwave communicator and called the spaceport. Alek Hardun was a long time answering.
‘Tito? What’s eating you?’
‘What in hell are you trying to do, Alek? That list of slaves you sent was the diametric opposite of what it was supposed to represent.’
‘Now don’t run off the spool, Tito! You asked me to reconstruct histories for a selected group of slaves and to notify you of those who’d served bond with the
Imaiz
for a year or longer. That’s exactly what I’ve done.’
‘Correction. That’s exactly what you’ve not done.’ Catuul tells me no slave on that list has spent longer than two days in Magda.’
‘Hold it! That wasn’t an automatic computer printout you received. We verified that list before it went on transmission. There’s no possibility of an error in the data we sent you.’
‘Yet I’m assured the list is one hundred per cent wrong. What the hell’s going on?’
‘Let’s check first that you have the right list. Watch your computer terminal and I’ll give it to you again.’
Ren watched as the computer printout began to spit forth names. When it had finished, he compared it with the paper Catuul had given to him. ‘How’s that?’ asked Hardun.
‘It agrees with the first set exactly. There’s not an error in the pack.’
‘Yet you insist they’re
not
the names you want?’
‘The names you’ve given me are also on the select list of Pointed Tails least probable suspects.’
‘I see!’ Hardun was serious. ‘How many names appear on your list, Tito?’
‘Seventeen. You should know—you’ve transmitted it.’
‘Not on your life. My list contained seventeen names, but I transmitted only sixteen of them.’
‘What?’
‘I said sixteen, Tito. All of whom I can guarantee have been at Magda for at least three years and most much longer. If you’ve just received a list of seventeen names, there’s only one conclusion—the list you’re receiving is not the one I’m transmitting. Somebody else has access to your terminal line. They’re intercepting what I’m sending and substituting a list of their own.’
‘Damn!’ Ren considered the enormity of the prospect. Most of the Company’s business transactions were reported via his terminal to the spaceport computers for processing and onward transmission via the FTL radio links. The director’s reports on the state of the feud with Dion-daizan went out over the same channel, The thought of unauthorized access to the terminal linkage made his blood run cold. With a chill creeping up his spine,he turned the instrument off.
‘Can you spare me some linemen, Alek? My terminal is on a wired circuit with the spaceport. I can only assume it’s been tapped.’
‘Not only tapped,’ said Hardun. ‘I’d suspect that it’s being consistently monitored by an online computing complex compatible with that at the spaceport. The insertion of a substitute list at that juncture is no mean feat of technology. What the hell have they got up there at Magda?’
‘I wish I knew. All the signs now are that they’ve a modern technological workshop that can match anything we can produce. This has to put a new face on how we approach the attack on the
Imaiz
—but I’ll take the matter up with you personally. I don’t even trust this microwave voice link now.’
‘That’s wise,’ said Hardun. ‘But before I sign off I’ll read you the list of names you should have received.’
He did so. Ren copied them faithfully and handed the results to Catuul Gras. The scribe compared them with another list and shook his head concernedly.
‘The names you’ve given me match the list of slaves who’ve escaped in the last two days. We presume they’ve gone to Magda, though the evidence Isn’t clear. It would seem the devil has recalled his own.’
Finding the actual position of the line tap was difficult. Because Anharitte had no telephone and no electric services, the customary array of available poles was absent from the landscape. When Ren had decided to bring his office into the fruit market in Anharitte proper, he had found it necessary to arrange for his wire link with the spaceport to be laid across private land wherever he could purchase the goodwill. The line now took a circuitous route across roofs, under eaves, around gables and dormer windows, and generally progressed in a most unorthodox manner until it ran free of the town and came to the western slopes of Firsthill. From there it ran across the country on Company-owned poles parallel to the Provincial Route that skirted the spaceport.
Despite the apparent opportunity for interference with the line in the town itself it was, curiously enough, on one of the poles on the open stretch of road that the tap was eventually found. The line had been split and both ends coupled into a neat black cable that ran unobtrusively down the pole and disappeared deep into the sandy soil of the provincial plain. Attempts to trace the path of the unauthorized cable proved tiresome and expensive and they were finally abandoned. Its general direction was, as Ren had known it would be, toward Magda. The depth and security of its lodgment showed it to have been buried at about the same time as Ren’s own cable had been installed.
This latter fact alone made the agent squirm. A great volume of confidential Company business had been fed into the line over the past few years. Had the
Imaiz
been operating for a trade competitor, the Company could have suffered extreme losses as the result of this unanticipated leakage of information. There was no evidence that the knowledge the
Imaiz
must have gained had been used to the Company’s disadvantage—but it was a late time to realize that one’s commercial future lay in the hands of a sworn enemy.
Nor was Ren’s temper improved by a further consideration.
From his terminal, by means of signature codes, he had access not only to Company computer data banks at the spaceport, but also to the spaceport’s common computer banks. With the right sort of intercept equipment the
Imaiz
, too, would have had similar access to the same data banks and, by extrapolation there would scarcely seem to have been a commercial transaction on Roget of which the master of Magda need have remained unaware.
As a commercial blunder the situation was without parallel. The only mitigating factor for those involved was that no one could reasonably have suspected that on a relatively undeveloped planet like Roget there existed either the equipment or the technology to make this sophisticated form of espionage a fact. The strength of Dion-daizan lay as much in what he concealed as in what he revealed. Wryly Ren wondered how many other surprises the
Imaiz
still had up his sleeve.
Despite his growing antipathy for Alek Hardun, Ren was now forced to visit the spaceport in order to continue the Company’s business transactions. This was because he suspected he could trust the security of neither the wire circuit nor the microwave link. Although he tried to stay out of Hardun’s .way, it was inevitable that the latter would learn of his coming and seek him out.
‘You wouldn’t be trying to avoid me, would you, Tito?’
‘Why should I?’ Ren’s answer was couched in a frame of aggrieved innocence. ‘I’ve been very busy, that’s all.’
‘I just wondered.’ Hardun was probing. ‘I mean, we’ve not yet completed our little chat on ways of removing the
Imaiz
. And they tell me Director Vestevaal has made a hurried trip back to Free Trade Central. I naturally wondered what was brewing.’
‘I wouldn’t know. The director mentioned something to me about visiting Terra, but I’m not exactly in his confidence.’
This was so patent a lie that Hardun did not even pretend to believe it.
‘Very well, Tito! If you want to play it close to the chest that’s your affair. Rance Intelligence will give me all the answers I need, so don’t let the director think he’s acting too cleverly.’
‘I don’t see how you’d know,’ Ren said critically. ‘You’re scarcely in his class.’
For a moment a spear of anger burned in Hardun’s eyes. Then, with amazing composure, he turned the expression of malice aside and overlaid it with a veneer of genial charm.
‘Look, Tito—I know we have our differences on the way the job’s to be done, but we’re still here for a common purpose. We mustn’t forget the
Imaiz
is a very clever enemy. Nothing could suit him better than to have us divided. Let’s not play into his hands. How’s your campaign going?’
‘Slowly, but I think we’ve got it made. The Pointed Tails have produced a scheme for disrupting Dion’s holdings right through Magda Province. I’ve been into it in detail and I don’t see how they can fail. Given nine months we’ll have the
Imaiz
begging for alms in the streets.’
‘Nine months!’ The veneer of geniality was stretched taut. ‘And Vestevaal settled for that? It shouldn’t take nine days to settle a little issue like this. Somebody’s going soft.’
‘That’s your view. Alek. But you haven’t studied the local conditions as I have. Believe me, we have to play this one very softly.’
‘I accept that it’s your fight, Tito, but I’d like to make one strike just to prove to you that I can do as I say.’
‘Then make it, Alek. I don’t seem to be able to stop you,’ said Ren unexpectedly. ‘But I’m not supporting you and I don’t wish to be implicated in any way. Furthermore, if you make a hash of it and the whole thing blows up into an interplanetary row, I’ll set up such a howl for your skin that even Rance’ll have to throw you to the wolves. As far as I’m concerned you’re a Rance combat unit and nothing to do with legitimate Free Trade at all.’
‘I can see you’ve been doing your homework.’ Hardun’s acknowledgment was a grudging acceptance of the terms. ‘I’ll make the strike tonight and guarantee you undisputed access to Castle Magda in the morning. I’ll even have a squad of Rance commandos standing by to do any mopping up that may be required. It’s about time you tradesmen learned that jobs like this were better left to professionals.’
Under cover of the early darkness Hardun moved his murder contingent out to the plain. Because the whole episode was highly illegal in terms of Roget law, absolute secrecy was essential. For this reason the most opportune site, that between the Via Arena and the Space Canal, could not he used, for fear of chance observation. The alternative site was the rising banks of the wilder country almost centrally between the Provincial Route and the Old Coast Road. Here there was almost no chance of observation during the hours of darkness, though by day it would have lain under the scrutiny of the watchtowers and the great keep of Castle Di Guaard. The rocket’s trajectory thus lay slightly over the northwest corner of Firsthill, but such was the precision of the apparatus that the chance of a premature fallout on the town was negligible.
All day had been spent by Hardun’s technicians in calculating the course coordinates and carefully calibrating the equipment to guarantee the, pinpoint accuracy necessary to ensure that the deadly black canister was delivered precisely inside the confines of the castle and not dispersed across Thirdhill and its township. The position of the central point of the castle had been determined with micrometers by laser triangulation. A radar lock from the battle cruiser and a second one from the manpack station on the northern slopes of Secondhill gave the necessary references for faultless radio guidance of the missile from its mobile launcher to the castle. All this preparation had been leisurely and time-consuming. Speed was not important, but it was absolutely vital that the payload of sinister cargo fell cleanly inside the castle walls.