speck. I spent this week making enquires about IC. It is a phantom. This is a trickster company that had a couple of projects on some planets that nobody has heard anything about, — and these planets had been expelled from the United Nations. A planet that's not a UN member — from a financial viewpoint — Kissur, is a planet where the public companies' accounting doesn't have to follow the Federal financial committee standards. They have a well developed system — they bribe an official, issue the stocks, advertising their 'connections to the government', peddle these stocks to fools through a phony company, the stocks grow, the company cleans the cream off, and then — kabloom! Got it?
'Got it,' Kissur said. 'I got it, that our companies have a merry choice — they can choose between a disreputable greenmailer and a company like IC.'
Kissur left soon, having loud-mouthed the Federation envoy and publicly promised some official to set the dogs at him, 'If you, bastard, demonstrate your disdain to the sovereign again by parking your ill-gotten with bribes Rolls-Royce next to the Nut Pavilion.'
He did, however, invite Bemish for a dinner at Red Dog restaurant the day after tomorrow.
The next day, Bemish returned to the city and went, first thing, to DJ securities. The flower pot with summer hyacinths, right in front of the office entrance, was bent in by bulky jeep tires and people bustled through the wide open office doors like ants in a smashed anthill.
'What's going on?' Bemish inquired from Krasnov coming out to meet him.
'Tax police visited us,' Krasnov said. 'They locked up all the paperwork.'
'What laws did you break?'
'You should better ask what laws we didn't break! What laws can you avoid breaking in a country where the regulations are made not with the goal of paying the taxes to the state but with the goal of paying the hush money to the tax collectors!'
'Haven't you tamed the tax collectors?'
'We? Come on, Bemish, every month… They apologized — we wouldn't do it but we were ordered to…'
'Who exactly signed the order?'
'A man named Danisha. He is a protege of Shavash's, by the way.'
'Is it because of Assalah?'
The broker shrugged his shoulders.
'Have you seen the article?'
` 'What article?'
Krasnov took a battered yellowish newspaper from a desk drawer and gave it to Bemish. The newspaper was local and Bemish was only able to make out Shavash's picture and he was barely able to get the paper's name — Red Star. On the picture, Shavash appeared from the waist up, presenting an outrageous sight with a girl, dressed only in a band, coquettishly tied around her neck.
'What is it about?'
'It is about the Assalah company investment auction, where a corrupted and lewd official Shavash settled with a foreign shark Bemish to sell him Assalah for the price of a rotten melon.'
Bemish took the newspaper with him and, in half an hour, he drove through Kissur's mansion gate. The majordomo wordlessly walked him to the living room; excited voices were coming from it. Bemish entered. The voices stopped. A very beautiful thirty-year-old woman, with the eyes, black as boysenberries, and a black braid tied around her head, rose to meet him. On the coach, dismayed Shavash pressed himself against the pillows. Shavash hurled the bundle of papers, he held in his hands, to the floor and said,
'Let me introduce you — Terence Bemish — the house mistress.' Bemish realized that Mrs. Idari, Kissur's wife, was in front of him and he bowed awkwardly. The woman laughed. Her laughter was akin to a silver bell.
'Where is Kissur?' Bemish asked stupidly.
'Kissur is not here,' the official answered. 'He will fly in tomorrow.'
Bemish suddenly felt himself blushing furiously.
'I… I will go… I didn't know…'
'Please stay,' Idari said politely, 'I will leave. It is not befitting for a woman to stay too long with a man her husband hasn't introduced to her.'
She bowed and left — only the black braid tied around her head glistened in the door. Bemish was looking after her and blinking piteously. Then, he turned to the official.
'Sit down, ' Shavash waved his hand, 'sit down and eat. Every time this obnoxious majordomo sees me with his mistress, he would even bring a peddler to the room.'
The peddler comparison didn't please Bemish.
Shavash took him by his hand and walked him to a veranda where a round table covered for two people stood next to the gold-gilded rails. A plump maid was already standing next to a silver hand washing jar. Bemish washed his hands and dried them carefully with an embroidered towel and, when he turned around, the servants were already loading on the table a flat leather dish with an aromatic mound of chopped steaming meat.
Having propped himself on the pillows, Shavash watched the Earthman.
'What is, 'Shavash asked, 'sticking out of your pocket?
'The Red Star article.'
'Ahh,' Shavash drawled. 'These nutcases… Where did you get it, by the way?'
'My broker showed it to me. Tax police busted him. A man named Danisha.'
Bemish got used to Shavash enough to be ready now for an ugly snub from him. He could easily imagine Shavash smiling and saying, 'Oh, Terence, what should we do! The Earthmen allow themselves so much on Weia, it's scary! These people had three different sets of books and didn't pay any taxes this year. They can loose the license.'
But Bemish didn't expect to see what happened next.
Shavash's eyebrows levitated in astonishment.
'What are you saying!' the small official said. 'Verily, if you send an idiot to bring you water, he will revert a spring to your house!'
He grabbed a T-phone off his belt.
'Danisha,' Shavash started speaking in the receiver in several seconds, 'what happened to DJ securities?'
The receiver quacked.
'I'll show you three sets of books,' Shavash screamed. 'I'll show you taking the license away! You will bring me the fine, they paid you, personally. And you will bring me, what Giles paid you! You will bring it in an hour or you can go away to Inissa as a cheese inspector in two hours.'
Shavash threw the receiver down.
'Not convincing,' Bemish said.
'I have nothing to do with it,' Shavash snorted. 'I just introduced Danisha to this scoundrel of Giles.'
'And the Red Sun article is not yours.'
'Come on!' Shavash drawled. 'That's disgusting sleaze. I would sue them but I don't want to get my hands dirty.'
'Well, this article came out just right for you. Now, you can refer to the article to say, 'if I sell this company to Bemish, I will lose my reputation.'
Shavash shrugged his shoulders.
'I don't even want to listen to you, Terence. Red Star is the zealots' newspaper. They tried to assassinate me twice.'
'What zealots?'
'You saw them yourself while walking with Kissur — remember the iron people show?'
Bemish shuddered slightly. As if it's not enough, that Shavash already knew who and when anyone visited Kissur's villa in Assalah! What's he doing — does he follow Bemish's every step?
'Where did this iron men story come from?'
'It was an old book,' the finance vice-minister smiled, 'with an iron braggart story. There was a prophecy at
