The large number nine on the bulkhead above slowed me to a crawl. I carefully poked my head above the deck and looked around. No one ,in sight, but voices were sounding from the passageway. The doors had numbers stenciled next to them. One of them had a name on it. COMMUNICATIONS ROOM.
It's now or never, Jim. Look around carefully. Nobody in sight. Take a deep breath. What is that loud hammering noise? Just your heart thudding with the usual panic at a time like this. Ignore it. Step up, step forward, to the door, seize the knob.
Except the knob had been sawn off. Steel bars had been bolted to the door and welded to the frame. The communications room was sealed, shut, inaccessible, tight.
As I was registering these facts and trying to make sense of them a voice spoke in my ear.
"You, what are you doing there?"
If my heart had thought it was thudding along merrily earlier it now tore loose from all its moorings and hurled itself up into my throat. I spun about, swallowed it, tried not to say Glugh! Grimaced and looked at the uniformed figure before. At the shoulders. I sneered.
"I might ask the same thing of you, lieutenant. What are you doing here?"
"This is my ship, major."
"Does that give you permission to speak to a superior officer in that manner?"
"Sorry, sir, didn't see the leaves, sir. But I saw you by the corn room and we had orders about it…"
"You are absolutely correct. Sealed and no one near it at any time, correct?"
"Correct."
I leaned my face close to his and scowled and watched with relief as his skin paled. It is hard to scowl and sneer your words at the same time, but I managed.
"Then you will be pleased to know that my orders are to see that your orders are carried out to the letter. Now, where is General Zennor?"
"Down there, major."
I spun on my heel and walked in the direction that I wished least to take. He would be watching me, I was sure of that. But I had no choice. If I simply tried to leave the ship he might start to think about my presence, get suspicious, sound the alarm. .If I went to the general all doubt would vanish.
Of course I might vanish too. Nevertheless I walked swiftly toward the open door and the murmured voices, turned into it without hesitation.
The officers at the end of the room were conferring over a map. Zennor had his back turned to me.
I turned sharply right and saw the shelves of books against the bulkhead. Without hesitation I went to it, ran my finger down the volumes. I could not see their titles because of the sweat that Was dripping into my eyes. Seized one at random. Turned and started back toward the door. Let my eyes cross over the group of officers.
Who were completely ignoring me. I walked slower, ears straining, but could hear nothing other than a murmured cagal or two, which was required of any military conversation.
When I entered the corridor the lieutenant was just scuttling out of sight. I walked, neither fast nor slow, to the companionway and down it, deck by deck. Waiting for the alarm bells to go off. Though I probably wouldn't have heard them through the pounding of blood in my ears. To the last deck and to the open port with the welcoming blackness of the night beyond.
The guard leapt into the air and my heart followed him.
And landed with his weapon at present arms. I threw him a sloppy salute in return and trotted down the steps to the ground. Another salute and I was walking across the burned grass and waiting for the shot in the back.
It never came. I reached the shadows at the edge of the grounds, slipped into them and leaned against the bole of a tree. And sighed a sigh such as I had never sighed before. When I raised my hand to wipe the perspiration from my brqw I realized that I was still holding the book.
Book? What book? Oh, the book I had lifted from the cabin about four hundred and twelve years earlier. When I held it up and squinted I could just make out the title in the illuminatiop of the distant lamps. Veterinary Practice in Robot Cavalry Units.
It dropped from my limp fingers as my back slid slowly down the tree until I was sitting on the ground.
I rested there in the darkness, let the sweat evaporate, tried not to think about veterinaries for robot horses—and pondered the significance of the sealed door on the communications room.
For openers, it had not been sealed shut to keep me from getting inside. As much as I valued my own importance I was well aware that others, Zennor in particular, were not struck with fear by my presence. For example the combat-ready captain earlier this night. No, Zennor had the door sealed for his own reasons. What were they? Work backward from the obvious.
