first trip here,” he explained. “Very few people have private cars; nearly everybody uses
the jits because they allow for more flexibility in the traffic patterns. But there’s a certain
outlaw element that takes advantage of that. They’d think nothing of picking up
newcomers like you, beating you up and robbing you. Hardly a week goes by without
some story in the newsrolls about some tourist getting mugged on a pirate jit.
“Oh, dear,” said Karen.
“I have heard about them,” Nils said slowly. “That’s why I carry a small stunner in my
pocket at all times.” “A wise precaution,” Lessin nodded. “However, sometimes a little
prudence in one’s choice of transportation can eliminate the need for that. Ah, there’s a
more likely candidate.” He waved at another jit that was coming down the street.
This one proved to be much more acceptable to all of them. Not only was it new and
clean, but the six passengers already aboard were far more respectable types who paid
no notice to the new arrivals. Lessin insisted on paying the fares for all three of them as
he gave the driver an address. “It’ll only be a few minutes’ drive,” he told the Bjendens.
“Just relax.
The couple from Lindstrom did so. There was little scenery to watch in these tunnels, but
the shuttle’s novelty intrigued them. Since it did not go faster than thirty kilometers an
hour-and since the climate was perfectly controlled within these corridors-the jit was an
open-air conveyance with no roof. The slight breeze was deliciously cool as they drove
along.
Two minutes later, the jit entered a solitary tunnel slightly darker than the main
passageways. Lessin looked up and suddenly an expression of horror crossed his face.
“Oh no!” he exclaimed.
“What’s the problem?” Nils demanded.
“The ceiling’s going to cave in! There’s a crack in the roof right up there. See?” Both Nils
and Karen craned their necks to see where the stranger was pointing.
At that precise moment, the other six men on the jit exploded into action. Two of them
grabbed the Bjendens’ feet, holding them tightly together so that they could not run. Two
more grabbed their arms, pinning them to the sides to prevent struggling. The remaining
two whipped yellow scarves off from around their necks and, in one lightning-fast
gesture, twisted them around the throats of the married couple. The upward-tilted necks
were well exposed-an easy target.
The two tourists were taken so much by surprise that they had no opportunity to
struggle, even if the men holding their bodies had allowed such a thing. Their eyes
bugged out of their sockets as the scarves tightened around their throats, squeezing shut
the windpipes and cutting off their air supply. The only sound was the faintest guggling as
Nils and Karen fought vainly to breathe.
The last sight either of them ever saw was Lessin’s imperturbable face staring at them
with neither pity nor regret in his eyes.
When both were quite dead, Lessin-as leader of the stranglers-had the duty of combing
their bodies for loot. He did this efficiently and, within a minute, both bodies had yielded
all that they had of value-wallets, jewelry and keys to a hotel room where more of their
goods would be stored.
The shuttle driver’s timing was impeccable-just as the leader finished his search, the jit
pulled up to a large white building. Driving into a private accessway, the driver tooted his
horn sharply twice, and a side door opened. Four men dressed in white coveralls
emerged from the building and boarded the jit. They looked down at the two dead bodies
and, without comment, lifted them up and carried them back outside. Lessin gave them a
curt nod as they disappeared inside the building with their burdens and the door slid shut
once more.
As the jit backed out into the main thoroughfare again, the leader of the strangler band
sat down in a seat behind the driver. The Bjendens’ hotel keys jingled idly in his hand.
Tomorrow, after their rooms had been thoroughly picked over, the Bjendens would be
“checked out” of their hotel and would simply vanish from the face of the Universe, as
many thousands had done before them. Very simple, very routine.
Lessin gave an involuntary yawn. The banker and his wife brought his daily total to six.
He decided to see whether he could bring that number up to eight before calling it quits.
Stifling a second yawn, he told the driver to head back to the Golden Crater; the pickings
there seemed exceptionally good today.
The man known as Garst was fuming silently as he strode down the marble-floored
hallway. He made no effort to quiet the clacking sound of his boots made with each
impatient step he took; he was angry, and he wanted his anger to show.
Her tinning is lousy, he griped silently. Just when I finally had a chance to talk with the
emissary of the Countess von Sternberg. It would have been my big opportunity to break
out of my dependence on one little moon, a chance to reach for bigger things.
But maybe that was precisely why she had called him. Maybe she didn’t want him
branching out beyond her grasp. Marchioness Gindri was a very possessive person, and
the thought that her own personal lackey might have ambitions to something higher than
her would be a very deep sting. But I’d tried so hard to keep this meeting secret.
He stopped as he came to the giant doors that marked the entrance to her boudoir.
These doors stood nearly three meters high, and were elaborately carved out of solid
whitewood and gilded in ornate designs. The knobs were solid gold, sculpted in the
shape of miniature birds flying with wings outstretched. The doors were meant to
impress the visitor, but Garst had been here too many times before and they seemed
just like doors to him.
He paused outside the portals to catch his breath and curb his temper. Maybe her
summoning him now was just a coincidence. She’d called for him before at odd times,
this could be just another one. She was, after all, none too bright; it would do him no
good to allow his guilty conscience-or what passed for a conscience in him-to ascribe to
her a cunning she did not possess. Probably the biddy was just suffering from another of
her incessant loneliness jags and needed his services.
Garst shuddered. That was perhaps the most distasteful aspect of his entire
operation-making love to her gross, overindulged body. Someday, he was afraid, his
sensibilities would overcome his logical mind and leave him incapable of even performing
the act.
He sighed. The truth of the matter was that he needed her to make his strangling
operation work. The Marcbioness controlled the entire moon, at least nominally. It was
she who gave orders to the police force, the hotel employees and the casinos. True, he
was the one telling her what orders to give, but without her authority and her title to back
up those orders, he was lost.
Once again, the delightful thought of killing her flashed through his mind. Many were the
times he had fantasized the simple act of reaching his hands out to surround her fat,
multi-chinned neck and squeeze the life out of her. But, though the personal satisfaction
that act would give him would be enormous, the consequences would be disastrous.
Gindri had no direct heirs to inherit her tide, and at her death Vesa would revert back to
the Throne, allowing the Emperor to choose whomever he wished as the new Marquis.
Knowing Stanley Ten’s reputation for incorruptibility, the appointee would be someone
Garst would never get a hold over.
He sighed again. His success lay in keeping Gindri alive and happy, so that she would not
interfere with the profitable setup he had established. Garst was, if nothing else, a
realist.
With his temper now well under restraint, Garst pulled down on the handles and opened
the huge twin doors. Instantly the sickening stench of the Marchioness’s perfume
assailed his nostrils, and he had to fight down the impulse to gag. Instead, with his most
obsequious smile plastered tightly onto his lips, he entered the room and snaked his way
over to the side of the bed.
Marchioness Gindri Lohlatt of Vesa looked like nothing so much as a beached whale in a
white satin nightgown. She easily massed a hundred and fifty kilograms; Garst had never
asked exactly how much, more out of fear of being revolted by the actual number than
out of politeness. Her fat face was always red and jowly, her many chins overlapping and
virtually hiding her neck in layers of blubber. Her body was as soft and pallid as a slug’s.
She would hardly even be able to move on any world with a normal gravity, Garst
thought. Only the fact that the gravity on Vesa was a mere one-quarter Earth standard