Revolt of the Galaxy
E. E. ‘DOC’ SMITH With STEPHEN GOLDIN
Volume 10 in The Family d’Alembert Series
CHAPTER 1 A Stranger to DesPlaines
The heavy-gravity world of DesPlaines ranked reasonably high in galactic commerce. Sometimes called the “slagheap of the Universe,” the planet was rich in heavy metals and precious stones, and did a creditable export business in those resources. The Circus of the Galaxy, owned and operated by the noble d’Alembert family, toured throughout the Empire and brought a sizeable amount of income into DesPlaines’ coffers. Even the citizens themselves were a valuable commodity. With their lightning reflexes and above-normal strength, DesPlainians were always in demand as Marines, bodyguards, or criminals. By taking advantage of its geological and human resources, DesPlaines had turned a hellish environment into a prosperous and comfortable place for its natives to live.
One industry that was not big on DesPlaines, how ever, was tourism. People from worlds with more standard gravities – which included all but a tiny percentage of the settled galaxy – dared not visit DesPlaines with out being surrounded by specialized equipment. The constant three-gee pull could easily provoke heart attacks and breathing difficulties even in people in superb physical condition if that weren’t bad enough, a simple fall – at three times the speed it would happen elsewhere – could prove fatal.
People from offworld usually dealt with DesPlainians via subetheric communications. If more personal contact was required, the DesPlainian often would visit the offworlder; sometimes a compromise would be reached and the offworlder would rendezvous with his DesPlainian contact on one of DesPlaines’s three moons, where gravity was only one-fifth gee and everyone could relax. Only the most desperate circumstances could compel someone from a normal-grav world to visit the surface of DesPlaines itself.
There were other high-grav worlds, of course, the most well-known being Purity and Newforest, but their citizens seldom traveled. The Puritans shunned the spiritual contamination they felt would be inevitable if they had much intercourse with people less wholesome than themselves. The Newforesters were a clannish group who preferred their own sometimes backward ways, and who had until recently kept apart from the mainstream of galactic society.
Thus the major spaceports on DesPlaines were designed primarily with cargo in mind. There were some passengers, of course; with DesPlainians in such demand throughout the Empire there were always some departing for or returning from other worlds. But DesPlainian spaceports tended to be large, open, barn-like buildings with plain walls and few of the amenities to be found in more well-traveled ports. The walls were not hung with colorful displays of DesPlainian night spots or scenic wonders; the few chairs scattered about the floor were institutional and uncomfortable. The faded tile on the floors was clean but badly scuffed; there was little point in improving it when so few people ever saw it in the first place. The harsh lighting cast sharp shadows on the walls and floors, and the air perpetually smelled of perfumed disinfectants.
Today, though, the freighter Anatolia brought with it a paying passenger whose destination was indeed DesPlaines. She was a young woman, perhaps twenty years old, with long black hair and a deep olive complexion. She had enormous brown eyes and thick, sensuous lips that highlighted her attractive face, and she wore a bright-colored blouse and a skirt with a wild, multi-colored pattern.
Even under normal circumstances she’d have attracted every masculine eye in the spaceport, but her bearing showed nervousness and not a little apprehension. Something was not quite right with her, and that made her stand out even more.
Her nervousness brought her to the attention of the SOTE clerk checking identification. One of the many duties of the Service of the Empire was to keep records of the comings and goings of the Empire’s citizens, and to serve as customs agents to prevent the transport of contraband materials. Spaceport clerks were trained to spot suspicious behavior – and this traveler was definitely exhibiting some.
Courtesy was ever the watchword of the Service of the Empire – when more drastic measures were not called for. “Good afternoon, gospozha,” the clerk said politely. “May I see your ID card, please?”
The woman fumbled awkwardly – in the compartmented leather belt she wore and eventually produced the card. The officer took it and inserted it in the scanner, which immediately read the encoded information and informed him that the card was issued to “Beti Bavol,” that she held the title “lady,” and that her physical description matched that of the woman standing before him. She was from the planet Newforest and consequently could be expected to have the typical high grav physique: short, well-balanced body with thick bones and toughened muscles. That much, at least, checked out.
“May I ask Your Ladyship to look in the retinascope for a positive ID scan?” the clerk continued. The fact that Gospozha Bavol was of the nobility meant that even more courtesy was called for, but he was still suspicious.
Beti Bavol peered into the scope, and a quick comparison with the patterns on her ID card confirmed that she was indeed who she claimed to be. At the same time, the clerk surreptitiously had the desk’s built-in scanner go over her luggage and clothing to see whether she was carrying anything illegal. The scanner showed she had a small knife tucked under her clothing next to her hip, but nothing more serious than that. There was nothing illegal about carrying a hidden knife – many women did it for protection – but it was one more factor to be considered.
“Thank you,” the officer said as Beti Bavol pulled her eyes away from the scope. “Are you visiting Des Plaines for business or pleasure?”
“I … I’m not sure. That is, I’m looking for some one, my brother. I think he may be here. I guess you’d call that pleasure.”
The clerk did not respond; he was busy trying to make a decision. He had the full authority to arrest this newcomer just on the basis of his feeling that something was wrong, but authority that powerful could not be wielded casually – especially not against a member of the nobility – and he had no hard evidence to back up his suspicions. At the same time, he didn’t feel completely right about letting her go off unsupervised.
In the end, he made a compromise decision. He entered her card number into his computer with the order to keep a check on her activities and look for anything further out of order. Whenever her ladyship took a hotel room, rented transportation, ordered a meal, or made any major purchase, the fact would be reported to SOTE. The Service could then decide on the basis of more information what action should be taken.
Ejecting the ID card from the machine, the officer handed it back to the young woman from Newforest. “Thank you for your cooperation, Your Ladyship,” he said politely. “Enjoy your stay on DesPlaines. Good luck in finding your brother.”
—
Because there were so few tourists, there were no hotels near the spaceport; Beti Bavol had to take a cab into the center of Nouveau Calais to find one. The price was reasonable, and she quickly settled into her comfortable but compact room. She unpacked her one small suitcase and then faced the challenge of what to do next.
It was imperative that she find her brother Pias as quickly as possible – but where could she begin? She didn’t have enough money with her to hire a detective, and she’d never done any tracing on her own, so she hadn’t the faintest idea how to go about it. She had very few facts to go on. Her brother had been exiled from Newforest four years ago in disgrace and she wasn’t even sure he’d come to DesPlaines. All she knew was that he’d become engaged to a DesPlainian woman named Yvette Dupres. They could just as easily have married and settled on some other planet – or perhaps they’d broken their engagement and each gone their separate ways. It was a very slender thread that brought Beti Bavol to DesPlaines – and if it broke, she wasn’t sure where she’d go from here.
She tried calling the police first, but they were less than helpful. Unless her brother was officially listed as a missing person or was wanted in connection with some crime, they couldn’t spare the manpower to help her. Since Pias’s case didn’t fall within the “missing persons” category, the police refused even to listen to her.
She next tried calling the SOTE office, figuring that they would have records of everyone who came to DesPlaines. The clerk she spoke to told her that they might indeed have such records, but they were all confidential; regulations regarding personal privacy for bade SOTE to release such information to the public without a court order. Beti Bavol had hit another stone wall.