importance.”
“But he must be!” Alcon protested. “It was a human being who tried and executed
our agent; Cartiff was a human being—to name only two.”
“Of course,” Kandron admitted, half contemptuously. “But we have no proof
whatever that any of those human beings actually did, of their own volition, any of the
things for which they have been given credit. Thus, it is now almost certain that that
widely advertised ‘mind-ray machine’ was simply a battery of spot-lights—the man
operating them may very well have done nothing else. Similarly, Cartiff may have been
an ordinary gangster controlled by the Lensman— we may as well call him Star A Star
as anything else—or a Lensman or some other member of the Patrol acting as a
dummy to distract our attention from Star A Star, who himself did the real work, all
unperceived.”
“Proof?” the Tyrant snapped.
“No proof—merely a probability,” the Onlonian stated flatly. “We know, however,
definitely and for a fact—visiplates and long-range communicators cannot be
hypnotized— that Blakeslee was one of Helmuth’s own men. Also that he-was the same
man, both as a loyal Boskonian of very ordinary mental talents and as an enemy having
a mental power which he as Blakeslee never did and never could possess.”
“I see.” Alcon thought deeply. “Very cogently put. Instead of there being two
Lensmen, working sometimes together and sometimes separately, you think that there
is only one really important mind and that this mind at times works with or through some
Tellurian?”
“But not necessarily the same Tellurian—exactly. And there is nothing to give us
any indication whatever as to Star A Star’s real nature or race. We cannot even deduce
whether or not he is an oxygen-breather . . . and that is bad.”
“Very bad,” the Tyrant assented. “Star A Star, or Car-tiff, or both working
together, found Lonabar. They learned of the Overlords, or at least of Lyrane II. . .”
“By sheer accident, if they learned it there at all, I am certain of that,” Kandron
insisted. “They did not get any information from Menjo Bleeko’s mind; there was none
there to get.”
“Accident or not, what boots it?” Alcon impatiently brushed aside the
psychologist’s protests. “They found Bleeko and killed him. A raid upon the cavern of
the Overlords of Lyrane II followed immediately. From the reports sent by the Overlords
to the Eich of Lyrane VIII we know that there were two Patrol ships involved. One, not
definitely identified as Caitiffs, took no part in the real assault The other, the super-
dreadnought Dauntless, did that alone. She was manned by Tellurians, Valerians, and
at least one Velantian. Since they went to the trouble of taking the Overlords alive, we
may take it for granted that they obtained from them all the information they possessed
before they destroyed them and their cavern?”
“It is at” least highly probable that they did so,” Kandron admitted.
“We have, then, many questions and few answers,” and the Tyrant strode up and
down the dimly blue-lit room. “It would be idle indeed, in view of the facts, to postulate
that Lyrane II was left, as were some others, a dead end. Has Star A Star attempted
Lyrane VIII? If not, why has he delayed? If so, did he succeed or fail in penetrating the
defenses of the Eich? They swear that he did not, that he could not. . .”
“Of course,” Kandron sneered. “But while asking questions why not ask why the
Patrol chose this particular time to invade our galaxy in such force as to wipe out our
Grand Fleet? To establish themselves so strongly as to make it necessary for us of the
High Command to devote our entire attention to the problem of dislodging them?”
“What!” Alcon exclaimed, then sobered quickly and thought for minutes. “You
think, then, that. . .” His thoughts died away.
“1 do so think,” Kandron thought, glumly. “It is very decidedly possible—perhaps
even probable—that the Eich of Lyrane VIII were able to offer no more resistance to the
penetration of Star A Star than was Jalte the Kalonian. That this massive thrust was
timed to cover the insidious tracing of our lines of communication or whatever other
leads the Lensman had been able to discover.”
“But the traps—the alarms—the screens and zones!” Alcon exclaimed,
manifestly jarred by this new and disquietingly keen thought.
“No alarm was tripped, as you know; no trap was sprung,” Kandron replied,
quietly. “The fact that we have not as yet been attacked here may or may not be
significant. Not only is Onlo very strongly held, not only is it located in such a central
position that their lines of communication would be untenable, but also . . .”
“Do you mean to admit that you may have been invaded and
searched—tracelessly?” Alcon fairly shrieked the thought.
“Certainly,” the psychologist replied, coldly. “While I do not believe that it has
been done, the possibility must be conceded. What we could do, we have done; but
what science can do, science can circumvent. To finish my thought, it is a virtual
certainty that it is not Onlo and I who are their prime objectives, But Thrale and you.
Especially you.”
“You may be right. You probably are right; but with no data whatever upon who
or what Star A Star really is, with no tenable theory as to how he could have done what
actually has been done, speculation is idle.”
Upon this highly unsatisfactory note the interview closed. Alcon the Tyrant went
back to Thrale; and as he entered his palace grounds he passed within forty inches of
his Nemesis. For Star-A-Star-Kinnison-Traska-Gannel was, as Alcon himself so clearly
said, rendered invisible and imperceptible by his own obviousness.
Although obvious, Kinnison was very busy indeed. As a lieutenant of
Guardsmen, the officer in charge of a platoon whose duties were primarily upon the
ground, he had very little choice of action. His immediate superior, the first lieutenant of
the same company, was not much better off. The captain had more authority and scope,
since he commanded aerial as well as ground forces. Then, disregarding side-lines of
comparative seniority, came the major, the colonel, and finally the general, who was in
charge of all the regular armed forces of Thrale’s capital city. Alcon’s personal troops
were of course a separate organization, but Kinnison was not interested in them—yet.
The major would be high enough, Kinnison decided. Big enough to have
considerable authority and freedom of motion, and yet not important enough to attract
undesirable attention.
The first lieutenant, a stodgy, strictly rule-of-thumb individual, did not count. He
could step right over his head into the captaincy. The real Gannel had always, in true
zwilnik fashion, hated his captain and had sought in devious ways to undermine him.
The pseudo-Gannel despised the captain as well as hating him, and to the task of
sapping he brought an ability enormously greater than any which the real Gannel had
ever possessed.
Good Boskonian technique was to work upward by stealth and treachery, aided
by a carefully-built-up personal following of spies and agents. Gannel had already
formed such a staff; had already selected the man who, in the natural course of events,
would assassinate the first lieutenant. Kinnison retained Gannel’s following, but
changed subtly its methods of operation. He worked almost boldly. He himself criticized
the captain severely, within the hearing of two men whom he knew to belong, body and
soul, to his superior.
This brought quick results. He was summoned brusquely to the captain’s office;
and, knowing that the company commander would not dare to have him assassinated
there, he went. In that office there were a dozen people: it was evident that the captain
intended this rebuke to be a warning to all upstarts.
“Lieutenant Traska Gannel, I have had my eye on you and your subversive
activities for some time,” the captain orated. “Now, purely as a matter of form, and in
accordance with paragraph 5, section 724 of General Regulations, you may offer
whatever you have of explanation before I reduce you to the ranks for insubordination.”
“I have a lot to say,” Kinnison replied, coolly. “I don’t know what your spies have
reported, but to whatever it was I would like to add that having this meeting here as you
are having it proves that you are as fat in the head as you are in the belly . . .”
“Silence! Seize him, men!” the captain commanded, fiercely. He was not really
fat. He had only a scant inch of equatorial bulge; but that small surplusage was a sore
point indeed. “Disarm him!”
“The first man to move dies in his tracks,” Kinnison countered; his coldly
venemous tone holding the troopers motionless. He wore two hand weapons more or
less similar to DeLameters, and now his hands rested lightly upon their butts. “I cannot
be disarmed until after I have been disrated, as you know very well; and that will never