The news broke early the following morning. It broke with a crash that was channelled to every planet of
civilization. Carlos and Carmen Velasquez knew nothing of it until half past ten, when the eager waiter hurried in
with the breakfast they had ordered a few minutes before. He was accompanied this time by his captain, who
carried both morning papers in his hand.
“Good morning, sir and madam,” that worthy said. “You have perhaps not heard the extraordinary news on your
receiver?”
“Uh-us.” Jules covered a yawn with his hand and shook his head. “We’re hardly awake yet.” He was wearing only
purple-and-gold pajamas; Yvette wore her fabulous headpiece and a purple-and-gold robe that, while opaque in a
few places here and there” was practically transparent everywhere else. “Something happen?”
“Most assuredly! The most tremendous, the most sensational of happenings, be assured!” He put the papers down
on a side table and helped the waiter arrange the breakfast table most meticulously. “But you will read of it later.
You will eat your breakfast now, please, while it is hot.” And the two hotel men accepted gratuities and went back
downstairs.
After eating” Jules and Yvette went through the story with interest-if with an occasional snort or giggle. The
official version was of course new to them. SOTE, under the masterly direction and leadership of Planetary Chief
Borton, had been keeping this band of traitors under close and continuous surveillance for over a year. They had
waited until they were sure that they had found every member and connection of the band, then they had struck
everywhere at once. They had made a clean sweep. Faced with absolute proof of guilt, each traitor had confessed
and each had been promptly executed, including the Baron of Osberg, who had been the leader. Al! had been
cremated and their ashes had been dumped. The reporter was very glad to say that, since the Baron was the only
member of his family involved in the crime, the Barony of Osberg would not revert to the crown. The Baroness
Carlotta, who was very well known as a philanthropic clubwoman would succeed-and so on.
Planetary Chief Borton had had no help, not even from Earth. And there was no hint anywhere that nitrobarbthe
mere possession of which was by law a capital offensehad been used.
“Nice,” Yvette said. “That story is so tight I almost believe it myself. But you said we’d have to stick around. Why?
The fact that we were here on the planet-coupled with the fact that those two Delfians had to be DesPlainians
-would be plenty for people not half as smart as they are. Whether we stay here a month or leave today makes no
difference-except perhaps as an exercise in the old guessing game.”
“That’s probably right” at that … Okay, we’ll shoot in a call for the ship as soon as we’re dressed.”
Since the ship had to come from DesPlaines, it was eight days later that Carlos and Carmen Velasquez left the
Hotel Splendide for the spaceport, scattering largesse from the penthouse to the limousine as they went.
It was good to feel real gravity again; it was vastly more than good, when, safely inside a private lounge of the big
subspacer, they were met by three particular peopletwo of whom were very special people indeed.
“Jules!” a brown-haired girl shrieked, and took off at him in a flying leap from a distance of twelve feet. “Vonnie!
Sweetheart!” He caught her expertly, although her momentum swung him around in a full circle; and for a long,
ecstatic minute they stood almost motionless, locked fiercely in each other’s arms.
Yvonne pulled back a little” looked at him closely and shook her head. “I’ve got to have a picture of you. Both of
you. They told me, but this is a thing that has got to be seen to be believed. You always were a handsome dog, Julie,
but now you’re simply beautiful!” She kissed him a few more times. “But I don’t like that moustache-it tickles! You
know something? I asked the Council to let me be Carmen Velasquez-begged them, practically on my knees-but the
old stinkers wouldn’t. They made me take the thousand-point test, just like everybody else, and Gabby here beat me
out.”
Jules grinned. “Did you think they wouldn’t?”
“Well, they certainly ought to’ve given me the job, since I’m engaged to the only thousand-pointer alive. Anyway, I
speared second place. I got nine eighty-nine.”
“That’s mighty good going, sweet.” There was a brief interlude” then Jules, with his arm still around his Yvonne’s
waist, turned to the two others, whom he hadn’t even looked at before. The man was of his own age, size and shape,
his hair, moustache, and eyebrows matched Jules’ exactly. The girl, too” except for costume, was a very reasonable
facsimile of Yvette, purple hair and all. The man had been embracing Yvette ardently; the girl, having taken the
towering ornament from Yvette’s head and put it on her own, was unblushingly admiring herself in a mirror.
“Hi” Gabby; hi, Jacques,” Jules said, extending his free band.
“‘Gabby,’ indeed!” the girl said, tossing her head in fine scorn. “‘Grand Lady Gabrielle’ to you, lout. I don’t think I’ll
even speak to any of the common herd any more unless they come crawling, bumping their foreheads on the floor”
“Here, herel” “That’s telling him, Gabbyl” Yvette and Jacques said at once, and Yvette added:
“I liked wearing these jewels and that crown and stuff” darn it,” she moumed. “They did something for me,” and the
conversation became general.
Jules and Yvette took off their spectacular finery and turned it over to the new Carlos and Carmen. They had their
hair un-dyed and rebarbered long and plain; and Jules unwaxed and un-curled his moustache. They donned shapeless
brown trousers and jackets of homespun and became in appearance somewhat unorthodox Puritans. The switch
completed, at the next transfer-point a new Carlos and Carmen Velasquez, still tossing five-dollar Earth bills
around like confetti, hoarded the biggest and plushiest liner in port for a planet halfway across all explored space.
There wasn’t room enough in Jules’ cabin for him to pace the floor, so he stoocl still, with clenched fists jammed
into his pockets. Yvette sat on his narrow bunk, frowning in concentration.
“It’s like fighting a fog,” Jules said,scowling. “And yet everything we find is just too damned pat.”
“You just lost me. Fog, yes. But I haven’t noticed any patness.”
“Look. In sixty-seven years SOTE hasn’t found any evidence that Duke Henry of Durward wasn’t I” T” IT.” “Which
goes to show that he was.”
“Does it? He milked Durward of a staggering fortune” yes. Billions of bucks. But could he possibly have got away
with enough to finance a project that big this long? And the others . . .”
“I see what you mean. Never mind the others, let’s pursue this one. Either he had help from the start or he hooked
up with some. He’d have to, to do what he did.”
“That’s sure. Yet nobody ever got a solid trace, ever. And the leads they did get didn’t point to anything solid; just to
nit-picking stuff. My thought is that every one of those leads was a trap-a trap that worked.”
“And we weren’t trapped because we made them come to us.”
“I’m not even sure of that.”
“My God! Surely you don’t think this is a trap!”
“Not exactly. I just think it may be. We have to follow it” of course, but we’ll follow it with our eyes wide open and
everything we’ve got on the trips. And if what we dig up points to Durward-we’ll go anywhere else in all space but
there.”
“So you think everybody’s been barking up the wrong trees and all they’ve got is forty-seven reels of junk and . . .”
“I said maybe!” Jules snapped. “I don’t know anything!” “Which puts you one up on SOTE,” Yvette said quietly. “That
makes the most sense of anything I’ve heard yet. So we jettison the junk and start from scratch … the big question
being-flow? You’re implying a Grand Duke. We can’t go running around sticking nitrobarb into Grand Dukes at
random.”
“How true; but you’ve read about how the old FBI used to catcch the top mobsters?”
“Uh-huh. CPA’s.”
“So look. Durward is in Sector Ten. Algonia is in Three” Aston is in Six, Nevander is in Thirteen and Gastonia is a
rim-world clear to hellangone out on the edge of Twenty.”
“How did Gastonia sneak into this muddle? It was muddled enough already, without another question mark.” “My
own idea. Empress Stanley Five started exiling rebels there way back in the twenty-two hundreds sometime and
they’ve been doing it ever since. What could be nicer for recruiting purposes? But to get back on the beam, the
Head thinks this thing is getting ripe. If it is, whoever’s doing it has had to do a lot of heavy work and spend an