Around them stood and sat a hundred or so people dressed in the latest fashion of the fourteenth century. Or the twelfth. Or the tenth. Or maybe the ninth. They nibbled at pasties and swigged ale, laughing and cheering, while peddlers circulated among them with food and drink, and troubadours and gleemen strolled about singing and chanting. An occasional monk stood near, inveighing against the evils of tournaments and enjoining the faithful to repent.
Lona turned to the chauffeur. “Sure you didn’t take us to the wrong address? Say, maybe a mental hospital?”
“Not at all,” the chauffeur assured her. “This is Mr. Bocello’s house.” And there it was, rising high behind the medieval crowd in full Gothic splendor, looking more like a public monument than a dwelling.
“A man’s castle is his home,” Dar murmured.
“Mr. Bocello is entertaining,” the chauffeur explained. “Just a few friends from his club.”
Dar eyed the crowd. “Not what I think of as the usual plutocrat-orgy set.”
“Very few of them are wealthy, sir. But all share Mr. Bocello’s fondness for the medieval. He has gathered them to celebrate the return to Terra of, ah, in his words, ‘the greatest gleeman of our age.’ ”
A slow grin spread over Whitey’s face. “Now, that’s what I call honoring me according to my own taste and style! I am more of a gleeman than a poet, anyway! Come on, folks—if the man does me honor, let’s honor his doing!”
A very tall, skinny man in full ducal robes shouldered his way through the crowd with a peasant lass on his arm. “Tambourin!”
“Cello, you filthy old wastrel!” Whitey reached up high to slap the duke’s shoulder. “How’d you get this crowd together on only a day’s notice?”
“Oh, I had a few words with their employers, and they were more than happy to oblige. You didn’t think you could set foot on old Terra again without causing a festival, did you?”
“Well, I did have some naïve notion about slipping in unnoticed,” Whitey admitted.
Bocello raised an eyebrow. “What is it this time—a vengeful husband, or an irate sheriff?”
“It’s more like a list, really…”
“Oh, is it indeed!” Horatio turned the peasant wench around and sent her off with a pat on the backside. “Off with you, child—I have a feeling we’re about to be saying things that you truly want to be able to claim you didn’t hear. Come now, no pouting—I saw the way you were eyeing that acrobat; deny it if you can …” He turned back to Whitey as the girl swept off with a blush and a giggle. “Now, then! It’s been a while; perhaps you and your entourage would like a quick tour of my gardens?”
“We would indeed! Preferably out in the middle of a wide expanse of lawn, free from prying mechanical eyes and ears…”
“Ah, but one can never be totally certain of that anymore.” Horatio took Whitey by the arm and led him away. “They’re doing such wonderful things with miniaturization these days. Still, my gardeners do, ah, ‘sweep’ the lawns every morning, so we’ve a reasonably good chance … By the way, what did you think of Greval’s latest epic?” And they were off, happily ripping apart other artists’ work in the time-honored tradition of amateur critics, as they wove and dodged their way through the crowd. The gang had to scramble to keep up with them, and by the time they came out onto the open grass, Dar was winded.
Sam was starry-eyed.
Dar glanced at her, glanced again, and scowled. What was she looking moonstruck about? He glanced around quickly, but didn’t see any gorgeous hunks of manhood nearby. As a last resort, he glanced back at Sam, and followed the direction of her gaze; it arrowed straight toward Horatio. Dar felt a sudden, biting jealousy, which surprised him.
“Now, then!” Horatio stopped in the middle of a wide, open field, chewed into mud at its center. “The lists are the most private place we’ll find, at least until the next joust. Let’s have your list. Who’s chasing you first?”
“The Solar Patrol, at the moment,” Whitey answered with a grin, “cheered on by a weasel named Canis Destinus.”
“Canis what?” Horatio frowned. “Why is he on your trail?”
“Because I’m helping a friend.” Whitey nodded toward Dar. “And this Canis guy is chasing him because he’s on a secret mission of some sort. It involves getting to the Executive Secretary for a few minutes.”
“I think he does have an opening on his calendar, next Thursday…” Horatio pursed his lips. “Still, it’s a difficult appointment to make.”
“Especially with Canis trying to cancel it,” Whitey agreed. “We can’t be sure, mind you, but we think he’s the one who’s been rousing the local police against us on every planet we’ve been to. There must be at least three warrants out for me, along my backtrail.”
“Well, that’s nothing new.” Horatio’s scowl deepened. “Still, I expect the honor’s being bestowed for the wrong reasons. What charge has he drummed up?”
“Now, we’re not sure, mind you,” Whitey said, frowning, “but we think he’s managed to convince the LORDS that we’re a bunch of telepaths, and that we’ve been aided and abetted by telepaths all along our route in from the marches.”
Horatio stared. “You’re the Interstellar Telepathic Conspiracy?”
“Well, that is kinda what we think they’ve got in their heads, yeah,” Whitey muttered.
Horatio glared down at him, his face slowly turning purple. Dar stood frozen, with his heart in his throat. If Whitey were just a little bit mistaken about his old buddy, they could all wind up in prison at the snap of a finger. He could fairly feel that restraining field pressing in on him from all sides already…
Then Horatio blew. “Foul!” he bellowed, fingers clawing into fists. “How foul, how fell! That the High Gleeman of scores of worlds should be hounded and harassed like a common felon! And all for the brain-sick nightmare of a diseased and petty mind! Nay, nay! I have stood and smiled, I have gnashed my teeth whiles I watched them play their petty games of plot and counterplot; I have schooled myself to patience while the reek of their corruption stank in my nostrils—but this I cannot bear! Nay, how can there be any gram of goodness biding in a sovereignty that’s so riddled with malice that it dreams up excuses to harry its bravest and best? Terra is become a stench-filled sty, a globe no longer fit for glee, a domain no longer fit for dwelling—nor can any planet be that falls within its sphere of influence!”
Whitey dug in his toes and braced himself against the gale. “Peace, now, peace, good fellow! Hope lives on yet! Even corruption has its day, and ceases, and the seeds of goodness sprout up from it, to flower again in virtue!”
“Aye, but in how many years?” Horatio glowered down at him. “Nay, centuries! I am not minded to hold my peace and bear myself in silence whiles I wait!”
Dar felt a surge of panic. Was this madman going to try a one-man rebellion, or something?
But Whitey suddenly became very casual. “Well then, if you truly feel so, flee! There be no dearth of G-type suns, nor of worlds like Terra. If you find all known worlds so swinishly unfit, go seek the unknown! Go sail into uncharted skies and find a world to make anew, after the fashion of your dreaming!”
Dar held his breath. What Whitey was saying was, in effect, put up or shut up.
But Horatio was staring at him as though he’d spoken an idea never thought of before. “Aye,” he breathed. “Aye, surely!”
He whirled away toward the house, crying, “Where are these hearts? Where are my comrades?”
The whole group stared at his retreating back.
“I, ah, think we might want to go along with him,” Whitey suggested. “He sometimes needs restraining when he gets into these moods.” He set off after Horatio.
The troupe followed, and caught up with him.
“What’s the matter with her?” Whitey muttered to Dar.