of the port are being cleared.'
'Enough to dock a squadron?'
'I don't know, I was only by there,” Brescnik said. He looked keenly at Birrel. “Whose squadron?'
Birrel hesitated. “Well, we're not the only Sector that will be represented at this affair, you know. Could be that contingents will come in from Leo or Cepheus.'
'Or Orion?” said Brescnik. And as Birrel was silent, he said grimly, “Look, Jay, if Solleremos sends a squadron here and sets it down beside the Fifth, there's going to be trouble.'
'Absolutely,” affirmed Garstang. “I don't think we could hold our men back — and it wouldn't be just a fistfight, this time.'
No, Birrel thought somberly. It wouldn't be a fistfight. It would be a lot more than that. It might very well be a full-scale collision here between Orion and Lyra, and that could tear it right across the galaxy — that could really tear it.
He hesitated. He had a decision to make and he did not yet have facts enough on which to make it, but he had to make it. This was the price you paid for Commander's rank, for all the salutes and brass and deference.
He said to Brescnik, “I want you to put the Fifth quietly on Ready. I repeat, quietly.'
Brescnik did not quite change expression, but something came into his face that had not been there before. He said, “You're sure you don't want full alert?'
Birrel shook his head. “You couldn't do that without cancelling all leaves and tipping off everyone. Ready is enough.” And then, turning to Garstang, he said, “Come on, Joe, if you want to see the bright lights of Earth. You may not have much time.'
CHAPTER 9
And the lights were bright. With the coming of night the narrow metal-and-stone canyons of the old city became rivers of luminosity, so that the crowds in them seemed to swim in shifting radiance. Centuries before, this congested metropolis had used electric filaments, arcs, neon tubes, to challenge darkness. Now, when localized effects akin to sodium-vapor glows could make the air itself radiant, the ancient tradition of New York persisted and its central streets glowed with displays of light such as Birrel had seen on no other world.
He didn't like it. Riding through the crowded streets with a carful of gay, chattering people that included Lyllin, Garstang, Mallinson and an Earth couple whose names he hadn't even caught, Birrel stared out sourly. He was used to far more awesome lights than these — the titanic splendors of a cluster's massed suns, the sprawl and glow of vast nebulae. But you saw those from the quiet of the bridge, they changed position with godlike deliberation, they didn't whirl past you like all these lights and crowds and noises in the streets.
He wished he had not come on this excursion, but Mallinson had said that, since Charteris was occupied tonight, he was their official host. He had offered to show Lyllin some of Earth's nightlife, and Birrel had felt it would be a rudeness to refuse. Lyllin appeared to be enjoying it, though with her you could never be sure. But of Garstang there seemed no doubt whatever, he had had some drinks and was having himself a time.
Yet Birrel uneasily remembered what Garstang had said after they had left Brescnik at the spaceport that afternoon, and were walking back to the car.
'Brescnik's a good officer,” he said in his mild way. “Obeys orders and asks no questions. I guess that's why he made Vice-Commander.'
Birrel glanced sharply at him. “Yes.'
Garstang added, “And I guess that's why I'll never make Vice-Commander. I ask questions. Like, why are we going on Ready? Like, what the devil's going on?'
Birrel was about to dress him down when something occurred to him. He said, “You heard what was said about an Orion squadron maybe coming in. What makes you think anything else than that is going on?'
Garstang shrugged. “I told you how my crewmen started a row saying we could mop up the whole UW fleet. Well, there was a reason they said that. It was some cracks the UW crewmen at that party made about what were we doing here with a full squadron, did Ferdias have ideas of taking over Earth?'
Birrel stopped. “Has anybody else been talking that sort of thing?'
'It's been mentioned through the squadron on the way here — just a speculation.'
'A real bright one,” Birrel said. “Do they think we'd come on a job like that with full transports?'
'Well,” said Garstang, “there's an idea that that might be just cover-up.'
Birrel said a disgusted word. “Sure,” Garstang agreed. “But you'll have to admit it would be like Ferdias. Anyway, I'm just as glad I've got no family to tag along with me here.'
Birrel had brooded on that all the way to New York. If people were talking like that, Karsh's report to Ferdias had been accurate. There was wide-spread suspicion here of the Fifth's purpose in coming. Such suspicions might indeed have been planted by Orion's agents for their own reasons, but, all the same, they were real. Karsh, who knew the situation here better than he, could tell him how to deal with that. That is, Birrel thought sourly, if he ever got out of this inane round of social doings and made his all-important contact with Karsh.
Mallinson had stopped the car and now he led them along the crowded sidewalks. The press was terrific, people had poured in from far distances for the commemoration. It was a motley crowd, laughing, gay, noisy, under the flaring lights. Persistent music blared, the special commemoration march. As though to top the din, a rolling thunder ripped across the sky. Birrel, listening intently, put it down as another merchant starship.
They went into a place almost as noisy as the street, softly lighted, filled with music and chatter and the rustle of many people dancing. There were other uniforms in here beside Birrel's and Garstang's — black coveralls of the UW, a sprinkling of officers from Cepheus and Leo. But they all looked at Birrel and at Lyllin, whose foreign beauty was a standout even in this crowd.
'I don't see as many of your men tonight as I expected,” Mallinson said after they had a table. “I thought they'd all be in on the town.'
Birrel shrugged. “We've some refitting that's keeping a lot of them busy.'
'Of course,” said Mallinson, smiling. “I'm sure you have much to think about and prepare for.” And he turned to Lyllin and talked brightly of Earth wines and foods.
Go ahead and needle, Birrel thought. You'll not get a thing out of me, no matter what you and Charteris suspect. And where was Charteris tonight, anyway? What was it that kept him so occupied?
The music and the chatter were getting on his nerves. He looked around and saw the curious looks his party was getting. He resented them. He saw two young junior officers in the UW black, at a bar across the room, look at him and Lyllin and then one of them said something and the other laughed. Birrel's temper flared, but at that moment he felt the small buzzing in his pocket.
'Will you excuse me?” he said to the others, and got up and walked out to the lobby of the noisy place and into a privacy-booth. Then he quickly snatched the shortrange Porto out of his pocket, thumbed its button, and said, “Yes?'
No one spoke and he said again, sharply, “Yes?'
He thought he heard a sound like a sigh from the Porto. Then nothing. The tiny blinker on the Porto went out.
Birrel stood, frowning. Only a very few people had the wavelength of his personal Porto. He could not think of one of them who would do a thing like this for a joke.
But was it a joke? He did not think so. What, then? He had not the faintest idea, but he suddenly began to worry. He set his Porto to Brescnik's wave and punched the call button.
Brescnik's voice came, surprised. “Did I call you? No.'
Birrel asked sharply, “How are you out there?'
'Ready,” said Brescnik simply.
'All right, keep it so,” said Birrel, and cut off.
That, at least, removed his major worry. He thought he was probably a little too jumpy. Still, the call bothered him.
On his way back to the table, Birrel passed the bar and saw the two young UW officers who had looked at him and Lyllin and had joked and laughed. The anger that the porto call had interrupted came back to him. He went
