“I don’t have an amie at the moment, Colonel, petite or otherwise,” Retief said. “And, as it happens, I don’t know any young ladies named Fifi. Still, it’s never too late to rectify the omission. I’ll be happy to talk to her.”
“I’m gratified to hear that,” Underknuckle said coldly. “And if that vessel lands on this planet, young man, I’ll hold you solely responsible!”
* * *
Back in the corridor, Magnan trotted at Retief’s side, offering advice. “Now, just tell this young person, kindly but firmly, that your time is fully occupied by your duties and that if she’ll just flit along to Adobe, say—there’s a fascinating museum there with a lovely display of mummified giant spiders—”
“I won’t presume to plan any itineraries,” Retief interrupted gently. “I think it might be better to find out what the girls are up to, first.”
“Yes, it does seem odd they’d plan a vacation on Quopp; after all, there’s nothing here but jungle, with a few thousand tribal villages and three or four dozen market towns.”
They turned in at the Message Center, showed badges; electro-locks clicked and the inner door slid back, revealing a bright-lit room crammed with lock-files and coding machines.
“Oh boy, am I glad to see you, Mr. Retief,” a freckled youth with thick contact lenses and a struggling mustache blurted, coming forward. “That babe aboard the yacht’s a dish, all right, but she’s got a way of flashing her eyes at a fellow when she doesn’t get her way—”
“If you don’t mind, Willis, Mr. Retief and I are in something of a hurry,” Magnan cut him off. “Which screen are they on?”
“The yacht’s over the horizon at the moment,” the boy said. “She’ll make reentry on the next pass; a couple more minutes, I guess.”
“What’s a yacht doing out here, Willy?” Retief asked. “Quopp’s a long way off the regular tourist runs.”
“Beats me, Mr. Retief. She’s a nice job—ten thousand tons, loaded with all the latest comm gear. Too bad all we have is this obsolete line-of-sight stuff.” He gestured at the banked equipment panels. “Tough about those girls losing their celestial tracking circuit, too. Even if they could get in here, they’d be stuck for months waiting for a replacement. That Mark XXXIV stuff is hard to come by.”
“Emergency letdown, eh? What kind of help are we giving them?”
The youth shrugged. “None—Longspoon’s orders. Says they’ve got no business coming in on Quopp.”
“Did you tell him about the tracker?”
“He said they could go on to the next system on manual tracking—”
“Two months of staring into a tracker scope could get tiring,” Retief said. “And a good chance of fatigue error and no planet-fall at the end of it. Let’s get ’em down.”
“Yeah, but the ambassador’s orders—”
“I’ll take the responsibility of countermanding them. Get the yacht on the SDR and start feeding her data as soon as she makes contact again.”
“Look here, Retief,” Magnan held up an admonitory hand. “I can’t stand idly by while you exceed your authority! I confess it seems a trifle surprising the ambassador hasn’t authorized aid to a distressed Terran vessel, but—”
“We don’t need authorization in a Deep Space emergency. Check Title Nine, Article Twelve, Section three-B of the Uniform Code.”
“Hey, that’s right,” Willis blinked. “The code overrides any planetary authority, it says so right in—”
“See here, Retief,” Magnan moved to Retief’s side, speaking low. “Quoting technicalities is all very well, but afterward one still has the problem of an overridden ambassador to deal with. Hardly a shrewd move, career-wise . . .”
“We’ll get the ladies down first, and carry out career salvage afterward,” Retief said soothingly. “Maybe it would be better if you went down to spot-check the commissary while I attend to this.”
Magnan frowned, settled his dickey in place. “Never mind,” he said shortly. “I’ll stand by.”
A blare of static burst from the center screen on the console across the room, followed by rapidly flickering bars of light; then the image steadied into focus. A girl’s face appeared, framed in red-blond hair, a headset clamped in place. Other feminine faces were visible behind her, all young, all worried.
“Hello, Quopp Control,” she said calmly. “It looks as though the rock that hulled us did more than take out the tracker. I have no horizontal gyros, and damned little control in my left corrector banks. I’m going to have to do this by the seat-of-the-pants method. I’d appreciate it if you’d loosen up and feed me some trajectory data.”
Retief flipped the SEND key.
“Quopp Control here, young lady. Listen closely; there won’t be time for a repeat. You have two choices on impact areas; one is the commercial port here at Ixix. If you’ve got a fix on me, you know the general location. I’m throwing the R and D fixer beam on the line now; lock into it if you can—”
The girl frowned. “Sorry, Quopp Control. No response from my R and D. I have a fix on your transmission, though, and—”
“Your other possibility is an unimproved patch of rocky desert about fifty miles north-north-west. Try to align on my signal here; if you miss, you’ll have the other as a backup.”
“Roger, Quopp Tower. I’ve got some speed to kill if I want to make you on this pass—”
“This pass is it,” Retief rapped out. “I’m clocking you on a descending spiral with an intersect this orbit. Damp that velocity fast!”
The image on the screen jittered and jumped; Retief waited while the girl worked the controls, watching the glowing red blip moving rapidly across the R and D screen, dropping steadily closer to the line representing the horizon.
“More grief,” the girl said briskly. “I’ve got about half power on the forward main tubes. I’m afraid I’m going to have to give your beacon a miss and try for the desert.”
“Throw everything you’ve got to your retros, let ’em blast and keep blasting! You’re going to overshoot by a hundred miles on your present course, and there’s nothing out there but nineteen thousand miles of unexplored jungle!”
There was a long moment of tense silence as the girl’s hands moved out of sight. Then she shook her head, gave a quick, flashing smile. “That’s it, Quopp Control. A fizzle. Did you say nineteen thousand miles?”
“As the Phip flies. How many are there aboard?”
“Ten of us.”
“I’ve got a tracker on you; try to nurse her in as easy as you can. Got any flares aboard?”
“If not, there are a few cases of hundred and sixty proof Imperial Lily gin; I’m sure the intended recipient won’t mind if I light them off.” Already, her voice was growing fuzzy as the hurtling ship neared the horizon.
“Hold her steady on your present course. Looks like you’ll intersect ground zero about eighty miles out.”
“I’m not reading you, Quopp. I hope you get here before all the gin’s—” Her voice broke off. Then it came again, faint and far away: “Quopp . . . er, a . . . ing in . . . make it . . .” The voice was gone in a rising hiss of random noise.
“Good Lord, I hope the poor girls land safely,” Magnan gasped; he dabbed at his forehead with a large floral-patterned tissue. “Imagine being down in that horrible wilderness, swarming with unpacified Quoppina—”
“I’ll get an Embassy heli on the way to make the pickup,” Retief said; he glanced at the wall clock. “No time to waste if we’re going to collect them by dark.”
“Retief—are you sure you don’t know this Fifi person?” Magnan queried as they turned to the door.
“Regrettably, no. But I hope to correct the omission soon—”
The interoffice communicator screen burped; an angular female face with stiff-looking hair and a porridgy complexion blinked into focus.
“There you are,” she snapped at Retief. “The ambassador wants to see you in his office—right away!”
“Tsk,” Magnan said. “I warned you about stretching those coffee breaks . . .”
“Hi, Fester,” Retief greeted the woman. “Is it business, or should I bring my tennis racket?”
“You can save the wisecracks,” she sniffed. “There are two Planetary Police officers with him.”
“Goodness, I’d be glad to give His Excellency a character reference,” Magnan burbled. “What did they catch—that is, what’s the charge?”
“It’s not Ambassador Longspoon who’s in trouble,” Fester said coldly. “It’s Mr. Retief they want to see.”
* * *
Ambassador Longspoon was a small man with bright, close-set eyes in a parchment-yellow face, a mouth which would have been inconspicuous on a carp, and a shiny skull over which a few strands of damp-looking hair were combed for maximum coverage. He sat behind a nine-foot ambassadorial desk of polished platinum, flanked by two Voion, one ornately crested and jeweled, whose oculars followed Retief unwaveringly as he entered the room.
“Commissioner Ziz, Mr. Retief,” Longspoon said in a voice like a dry bearing. There was silence as he looked expectantly from one of the Voion to the other.