The doctor shuffled to the drawer, tossed Paddy an envelope.
Paddy looked at the girl. 'Now yours.'
Without a word she tossed him a vial. The doctor's eyes hungrily followed the arc of the flight, riveted on Paddy's arm as he pocketed the drugs.
'Now move,' said Paddy blithely. 'You're both under death sentences, like me in the brick jail at Akhabats. Except I was an honest thief. You two are traitors to your old Mother Earth.'
The doctor led them along the sour-smelling hall, slowly, hoping for interruption. Paddy said pleasantly, 'And if there's trouble, Doc, I'll smash these bottles down on the floor.' The doctor's gait lengthened. He opened a narrow door, led them down a flight of damp stones heavy with a musty reek of some nameless Spade-Ace mold.
Two flights down and the stairs opened into the basement below the clothing store, a long low room dug into the ground, lit by antique glow-tubes. Old cases, dusty furniture cast tall black shadows-junk brought across the mindless miles of space to rot and moulder in a basement.
Quietly, sedately, they moved through the basement, forming strange silhouettes against the higgledy-piggledy background. Paddy grinned. They didn't dare attack, they didn't dare run. He had them in a double grip with the gun and the poison.
The doctor glanced at his watch. 'Fifteen minutes,' he said thickly. 'Then the antidote does us no more good.' He looked at Paddy with hot eyes, waiting for Paddy to answer.
Paddy motioned silently. The doctor turned, stepped up on a bench, heaved at a slanting door. It swung up and out, letting a slender shaft of white light into the basement. The doctor looked right, left, motioned with a plump arm.
'Come on up, all's clear.'
He stepped on up, the woman followed nimbly and then came Paddy, cautiously. They stood at the bottom of a light well, between two buildings, with a slit two feet wide running out to the street.
Paddy said to the girl, 'Where is the space-boat?'
'North of town on the dust-flat.'
'Let's go.'
They sidled from between the buildings out into a dark street. The doctor turned to the right, led them among the dismal mud huts of the Asmasian quarter. At a square of light he paused, looked at his watch.
'Ten minutes.' He turned to Paddy. 'Did you hear me? Ten minutes!'
Paddy waved him on. The doctor turned and they continued out into the open country in back of the town-a region of open sewers, fields packed with unwanted refuse from a thousand stolen ships. Here and there stood the shack of some creature with habits too disgusting to be tolerated even by the tolerant men of Eleanor.
They came out on a plain of white volcanic dust, dark-gray in the planet-spangled night of Spade-Ace, and the town of Eleanor was at their backs-a low unsightly blotch spotted with white and yellow lights.
Paddy searched across the field for the dark shape of the boat. He turned a stormy glance at the woman. The doctor peered at his watch. 'About a minute…'
The woman's voice glistened with triumph. 'I have a spaceboat. It's not here. It's at the main field. You're bluffing, Paddy Blackthorn. You want my space-boat more than I want my life. Now I'
'And kill you I will,' growled Paddy, pulling out his gun.
'And kill yourself at the same time. Langtry agents are pouring into Eleanor by the boatload. They know you're here. They'll get you inside of four hours. You can't hide and you can't get away. I'm your only chance. Cooperate with me, and we both win-and Earth wins. Refuse and we both die-and Earth loses because before they kill you they'll get what they want from you.'
Paddy stood limp, angry. 'Ah, you scheming, hag-woman, you've got me like Cuchulin's goat. You still have the audacity to claim you serve Earth?'
She smiled in the darkness. 'You don't believe me? You've never heard of the Earth Agency?'
The doctor whined, 'The antidotes! Hurry, man, or we'll be dead!'
'Come here,' growled Paddy. He grabbed the woman, felt for scars that might be left by an amputated skin- flap. 'No, you're no Shaul. And sure you're no Eagle, no Badau. You're not white enough for a Koton-not to mention the eyes-and you're not yellow enough for a Loristanese. Of course,' he grumbled, 'there's a little profit in wondering about your race-you might be selling out to any of them.'
The woman said, 'I work for Earth Agency. It's your last chance. Give me the antidote-or I'll die and you'll die and the Langtry worlds will lord it over the universe for the rest of time. There'll never come another chance like this, Paddy Blackthorn.'
Paddy contemptuously tossed them the antidotes. 'Go on then. Save your miserable lives, and let me be.' He turned on his heel, strode off across the powdery dust.
The woman's voice came to his back. 'Wait a minute, Paddy Blackthorn. Don't you want to leave Spade- Ace?'
Paddy said no word, paced on, blind with rage.
Her voice came to him, 'I have a space-boat!' She came running up beside him, panted, 'We'll take the secret of the drive to Earth.'
Paddy slowed his stride, halted, looked down into her wide dark eyes. He turned, went back to where the doctor stood forlornly. Paddy grasped the doctor by the shoulders.
'Look now, Tallogg. You have your half million that you got selling me out. Buy yourself a boat this very night- this very hour. Leave the planet. If you make it to Earth you can sell the boat and be a rich man. Do you hear?'
'Yes,' said Tallogg dully. His shoulders hung as if under a yoke.
'Then go,' said Paddy. 'And if you love old Earth don't return to your office. Don't go there at all.'
The doctor muttered something indistinguishable, became a blot in the gray murk. He was gone.
Paddy looked after him. 'Better should I have burnt a hole in him and so saved us much concern for the future.'
The woman said, 'Never mind that. Let's go and we'll head for Earth.'
'Very well.' Paddy sighed. 'It's not as I had planned it.'
'Be glad you're alive,' she said. 'Now let's go.'
By a back route they walked to the space-field, quietly crossed to her boat at the far end. Paddy looked at the boat doubtfully from end to end.
'Those are crowded quarters for the pair of us, I'm thinking. Now maybe a decent respectable girl wouldn't care to-'
She snapped, 'Never mind that, Paddy Blackthorn. You keep your distance, I'll keep mine-and my reputation can look after itself.'
'Yerra,' muttered Paddy, 'and who'd want to touch such a spit-cat and plain to boot? Well then-into the boat with you and may the best man of us win.'
As she opened the port the beam of light fell on them. A man's voice said hoarsely, 'Just a minute, just a minute.'
Paddy put his hand on the girl's back, shoved her in, started after her. 'Come back here,' said the dark shape and the voice was louder. 'I'll shoot!'
Paddy turned, aimed at the light with Dr. Tallogg's gun. His beam struck square. In the spatter of orange and purple flames from the shorted powerpack, Paddy glimpsed the man's face-the narrow-faced narrow-eyed man who had been leaning against the hangar when Paddy dropped down to the spacefield. His face was convulsed by pain, surprise, hate, by the shock of the beam. The lamp guttered into a red flicker, died-and the dark shape seemed to slump.
'Quick!' hissed the girl. 'There'll be more.'
Paddy jumped in. She sealed the port, ran to the pilot's seat, pulled back the power-arm-and the boat rose into the ash-gray sky of Spade-Ace.
