Tauncer's smile faded into a wary look. “What do you mean?'
'You're expecting someone to help you or you wouldn't be so cocky,” Birrel said. “Who?'
'I haven't any idea what you're talking about,” Tauncer said lightly. But his smiling stopped.
Birrel's forebodings deepened. He prowled the house and grounds more vigilantly than ever, and every time a car hummed down the road or a flitter buzzed over, he stopped and listened.
The hot noon hours went by. The sun passed its zenith and now big clouds began to build in the western sky. Birrel began to chafe restlessly at this waiting. He realized it would take Brescnik a little while to find among the technicians of the Fifth a man who could operate a vera-probe. But, even so, he should have been able to get one up here by fast flitter by now.
The bastions of cloud in the west swelled higher, and humidity became intolerable. Birrel went out and looked around again. From a distance came the sound of Vinson's auto-tractors lumbering about the fields on their appointed programs. The sky darkened, and Birrel thought that a storm was building. He came back to the house to find the black cat sitting on the porch and looking at him with an insolent air of ownership.
Lyllin met him at the door. “No one?'
'No one,” he said. “What's the matter with Brescnik? A flitter will have trouble locating this place, if a storm comes up, and—'
A flash and then a crash of thunder interrupted him. Birrel swore. “That's fine.'
'It won't last long, will it?” said Lyllin.
He gloomily said that he wished he knew. At that moment they heard a scratching and mewing outside the door.
'The cat,” said Lyllin. “I think it's scared of the storm and wants in.'
'Let it go to the barn,” he said.
Lyllin smiled, and went to the door and opened it. The black cat stalked in, keeping well away from her, with its tail erect and a general look of being annoyed at the delay in answering the door.
Birrel started to say that for sheer insolence the cats of Earth took the palm, but another crash interrupted him and this time the old house shook to its foundations. The thunder came closer quickly, and now the flashes of lightning outside the rain-dashed windows were blinding.
Then as the uproar lulled for a moment, he thought he heard the buzz of a flitter close overhead. He raced back through the kitchen to the porch, and by another world-illumining flash he glimpsed the flitter making a rough landing between the house and the barn..
Birrel waited for the next flash. It showed two men climbing out of the flitter. He raised his shocker.
The two were running toward him through the rain, but it was too dark to see their faces. Why didn't another flash come? Then one did, and he saw them clear and close.
One was Joe Garstang. The other was a young officer with the badge of a Technic-First-Class, who looked a bit scared as they ran up onto the porch out of the smashing rain. Garstang shook himself and growled, “I've seen worse storms on other worlds, but I never saw one come up so bloody quick.'
'What are you doing here?” demanded Birrel. “Why aren't you with your ship?'
'Brescnik told me to come along. By the way, this is your vera-probe operator. Vathis, T-first-class.'
'Why did Brescnik send you? What's wrong?'
Garstang waited until the reverberations of another crash of thunder died away, and the old house stopped shaking. Then he said, with a puzzled look on his broad face, “We're not sure anything's wrong. But Brescnik's worried. Traffic — normal merchant traffic — is only running one way down at that spaceport. Ships keep going out, but none come in.'
He paused, then added, “Brescnik thinks that the UW authorities are quietly evacuating the space port.'
Birrel thought of that, and he did not like the shape or sound of it.
He asked, “You haven't any evidence why?'
Garstang shook his head. “Not a glimmer. All we have is a guess. You know what that guess is.'
Birrel knew. If Charteris and Mallinson and the rest had some foreknowledge that Orion squadrons were on their way to strike, they'd get their ships off the spaceport. And if that was what it was, he had better get the Fifth off too.
But he would be going blind, if he took off now, with no information as to Orion's plans. His worries had suddenly increased tenfold, but he had to delay long enough to probe Tauncer.
He told Garstang rapidly about Tauncer. Without waiting for Garstang's reaction to that, he turned to young Vathis.
'You come along. I want the probe set up and used as quickly as possible.'
They went to the living-room. Lyllin sat composedly there and Birrel noticed that the cat was sitting across the room from her, pricking up his ears at each crash of thunder. Garstang went over to speak to Lyllin, but Birrel took the young technician to the vera-probe in the corner.
'How long will it take you to set it up?'
Vathis looked over the apparatus. “It seems a conventional hook-up. Fifteen minutes.'
'Make it ten,” said Birrel. Then he said, “Make it five.” At that moment, in the comparative lull between the crashes of the receding storm, there came a clangorous peal from the old-fashioned doorbell.
'You expecting somebody else?” said Garstang.
'Oh, Lord,” said Birrel. “That'll be Vinson, he said he'd come back. A neighbor here. You go ahead and get the probe ready, I'll get rid of him.'
He hurried to the door and opened it. But the man standing outside it was not Vinson.
It was Mallinson. And despite the fact that he wore a streaming slicker, the tall, young bureaucrat looked as elegant as ever. He walked coolly in past the stricken Birrel, saw Lyllin and bowed to her, and then turned around. He said, “So this is Ferdias little spy-nest on Earth? Very clever, Commander.'
There was, Birrel realized, not the slightest use in lying. Mallinson's glance through the open door of the next room, at Joe Garstang and the uniformed young technician and the partly set-up vera-probe, had ended the possibility of that. There was nothing Birrel could say. But there might be something he could do.
He reached into the pocket that contained the shocker. Mallinson, who was taking off his wet slicker, did not turn toward him but said casually, “Perhaps I should say that I have a number of men outside. I'm afraid they're getting pretty wet.'
CHAPTER 14
Birrel took his hand away from his pocket. He knew now that he was in real trouble and that force would not get him out of it. He had to talk fast and make the other believe him, but he did not know how much chance there was of that.
Mallinson was looking around the room and its old-fashioned furniture.
'The old, ancestral home,” he said. “How natural that you should want to see where your people came from on Earth. What a laudable sentiment'
His voice suddenly became cutting and his bitter hostility came through. “I never did buy that, Commander, not for one minute. And when we got a report that officers of your squadron had come up here to huddle with you, I knew I was right — that your sentimental pilgrimage was just to cover up while you stabbed Earth in the back.'
Birrel got angry. “No one is stabbing Earth in the back. At least, none of us.'
''Ah, yes,” Mallinson said ironically. “Lyra is wholly innocent. It's Orion that has intentions on us and you're trying to protect us. Isn't that your line?'
Birrel controlled his anger. Shouting was not going to get him anywhere.
'It's not just my line, it's the truth,” he said. “I was just going to prove it, when you came. I would have called you as soon as we had proof to show you.'
'Proof of what?'
'Proof of what Solleremos is planning. We've caught Tauncer, his ace agent. We're going to use the vera- probe to question him.'
