Chapter 30
GRIMES WAS FINISHING a late breakfast—almost always he took this meal in his own quarters—when the telephone buzzed. He thought that it would be one of his officers wishing to tell him something.
“Captain here,” he said, facing the instrument.
The little screen came alive. To his surprise it was the face of Drongo Kane looking out at him. He thought, at first, that the piratical commodore was aboard the ship, was calling from the mate’s or the purser’s office. That tin Port Captain had told him that it would not be possible for the ship’s telephones to be hooked up with the El Doradan planetary communications system. But the background scenery was wrong. None of the bulkheads in Sister Sue’s accommodation was covered with blue wallpaper on which, embossed in gold, was a floral design.
He said, “How did you get through to me? I was told that I could use the ship’s telephones only to talk to the port office.”
“We can make calls to you,” said Kane smugly. Then, “I hope that you and your merry crew enjoyed last night’s outing.”
“Ha!” growled Grimes. “Ha, bloody ha!”
“Your people,” Kane went on, “would be far happier at the spaceport that the corporation, in recognition of my services, named after me. And you’d be much happier too, knowing that your ship was earning money again. Once she’s on charter she gets paid, even when she’s sitting on her big, fat arse, at my spaceport, waiting for the balloon to go up.”
“I’m thinking about it,” said Grimes grudgingly.
“Just don’t be too long making your mind up, Grimesy-boy. Until you do there’ll be no cargo worked—and then only if you make your mind up the right way. I’ll be waiting to hear from you.”
The screen went blank.
Grimes poured a last cup of coffee, filled and lit his pipe. It was very fortunate, he thought, that Kane did not, as he did, have the services of a tame telepath. He had raised this point already with Mayhew, had been told that the El Doradans would not tolerate the presence on their world of anybody capable of prying into their precious minds.
The telephone buzzed again.
“Captain here,” he told it.
It was another outside call. It was the Princess Marlene.
“Good morning, John.” She laughed prettily. “I hear that you had a very boring time last night. I feel that I should offer some small compensation. Are you free today?”
“I am, M . . . Sorry. Your Highness.”
She smiled out at him. “Marlene would have been better. So you are free. Then I shall call for you at . . . 1100 hours? Will that be suitable? Good. Can you stay overnight at the Schloss? Excellent. Until eleven, then.”
She faded from the screen.
“Mphm?” grunted Grimes, recalling Mayhew’s advice. “Mphm.”
He called for Williams.
The chief officer, as soon as he set foot in Grimes’ cabin, started complaining.
“I’ve been on the blower to that so-called Port Captain,” he said. “He—or it—just couldn’t tell me when any more cargo would be worked. You’ve your contacts here, sir. Can’t you do anything?”
“Just be patient, Mr. Williams,” Grimes told him.
“Patient, sir? You should have heard the growls over the breakfast table. And the engineers were waving those pamphlets about—you know, the advertising for all the fancy facilities at Port Kane. I told them what it would mean if we did shift ship there, the privateering and all the rest of it. They got interested and wanted to know if there was any money in it. And your pet, the Green Hornet, said, ‘Forget it! Our saintly captain would never dirty his hands with piracy! All that he’s fit for is dragging us to prayer meetings, like last night!’”
“There have been pious pirates,” said Grimes. “One of my ancestors was one such. But tell me, what would your reaction be if I accepted Commodore Kane’s offer of employment?”
“I’d be with you, sir,” said the mate at last. “After all, privateering is not piracy. It’s legal. And there should be money in it. The way I understand it is that the people financing the venture—in this case the El Dorado Corporation—would be entitled to a large percentage of the take, the balance being divvied up among the crew, according to rank. Something like a salvage award . . .”
“Sound people out, will you?” Grimes looked at the bulkhead clock. “And now, you’ll have to excuse me. I have to get packed.”
“You’re leaving us, sir?”
“Only for a day. The Princess von Stolzberg will be picking me up at eleven. I shall be staying at the Schloss Stolzberg overnight. You’ll know where to find me if anything horrid happens.”
“Will do, Skipper. And so Her Highness has forgiven you for the swimming party . . . If you can’t be good, be careful.”
“I’ll try,” said Grimes.
***
He was waiting at the foot of the ramp when the Princess’s air car came in. It was not the gaily colored mechanical dragonfly in which he had ridden with her before, years ago. It was a far more sober vehicle, although conforming to the current El Doradan fad or fashion. “A Daimler . . .” whispered Williams reverently to his captain as the elegant black vehicle, its silver fittings gleaming in the late morning sun, came in to an almost noiseless landing.
“A bloody hearse,” muttered Ms. Connellan. “It’s even got vultures following it!”
But they were not, of course, vultures. The pair of watch-birds, circling alertly overhead, were more like ravens.
Two doors of the car opened, one forward, one aft. The Princess, Grimes saw, was sitting in the front seat. She turned her head to smile at him invitingly. She looked softly maternal in a frilly pink dress—and yet there was more than a hint of the slim, golden girl whom Grimes had once known.
He threw his overnight bag into the rear of the vehicle, wondering if he was doing the right thing as he made to board at the front end. Apparently he was; the inviting smile did not fade as he took his seat by his hostess.
The doors closed.
Marlene’s hands remained demurely folded on her lap, were not lifted to take the controls.
“Home,” she ordered.
The car lifted. Inside it was as silent as the pseudo-Rolls had been.
***
She broke the silence, asking, “Do you remember the last time, John?”
“Yes, Marlene.”
“You will find little changed,” she told him. “The Croesus Mines are still in operation . . .”
Yes, there was the low, spotlessly white building in the shallow, green valley. Below it, Grimes knew, were the fully automated subterranean workings. He wondered over how great an area these now extended.
“And the Laredo Ranch . . . Senator Crocker is still playing at cowboys, rounding up his herds and all the rest of it. He’s conquered his prejudice against robot ranch hands now . . .”
Looking down, Grimes saw that a round-up was in progress, a milling herd of red-brown cattle with horsemen keeping the beasts grouped together. Which one of them was Crocker and which were the robots? They all looked the same from up here.
“Count Vitelli’s vineyards. His wines are improving all the time.”
“The Baroness d’Estang,” said Grimes, “kept a good stock of them aboard her yacht, The Far Traveler . . .”
“I still find it hard to understand,” she said, “how and why you—of all people!—became a yachtmaster. And to that woman, of all possible employers!”
“Mphm.”
“Some people,” she went on cattily, “think that she married beneath her. If anything, the reverse is the case. The Baron is descended from an English lord. He had no trouble at all establishing his claim to the title . . .”
I wonder how much it cost him? thought Grimes.
“And she, of course, is descended from a French pirate . . .”
“A privateer,” said Grimes. He would have liked to have said, And you, my dear, are descended from German robber barons . . . He thought better of it. He would not bite the hand that, hopefully, was going to feed him.
“A privateer,” she repeated. “What’s the difference? Oh, there is a difference now, of course. The Baron’s fleet will do nothing illegal. If I thought otherwise I would not have allowed Ferdinand to volunteer to serve as a liaison officer . . .”
“Will Ferdinand be at the castle?” asked Grimes, half hoping and half fearing that the answer would be in the affirmative.
“No. He is at Port Kane with the other El Doradan officers. Perhaps it is as well. It could be embarrassing if you met him in my company.” Her hands went up to the wheel, grasped it firmly. It was an indication, thought Grimes, that she was determined to control the course of events. “And it will be as well, John, if he never knows that you are his father.”
“Will he be seconded to my ship?” asked Grimes. “Assuming, that is,” he added hastily, “that I join the enterprise.”
“No. If he were it is possible that the relationship would become public knowledge. He will be attached to Agatha’s Ark, under Captain Agatha Prinn. A strange woman, John, but, I believe, a highly competent spaceperson. Meanwhile, I understand that Baron Kane intends to appoint you commodore of the privateers. As you will be in overall charge you will be able to keep a watchful eye on my son. Our son.”
“I haven’t decided yet,” said Grimes, “if I’m going to take Kane’s offer.”
“But you will,” she said.
She relinquished her hold on the wheel so that she could point ahead. There, on a hilltop, was the grim, grey pile, a castle that was straight out of a book of Teutonic mythology. Schloss Stolzberg. As before, Grimes wondered how much it had cost to transport it, stone by numbered stone, from Earth. I wish that somebody would give me a job like that, he thought. He tried to arrive at a rough estimate of what the freight charges would have been.