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"There was nothing."

So Paula had been, Clark thought. He looked again at Isadora. If they had operated on Isadora, as the records said, how much better it had been, and when the various schemes all round fell through she would have died quietly, at a convenient moment, in a manner that befit her life.

Teresa said, "If that were all there was to it, Paula's death would have been a formality, to show that they kept their word. They would have done it at a convenient time and you would be the first to hear about it, Mr. Maxwell. Instead their agent followed her for weeks, and then he killed her at the moment when everyone in the Army of Daybreak on Paffir Haretz was watching. And you weren't even told."

Marlow stared at her with his eyes still, rather as though he had been shot. A thin voice seemed to emerge from inside his usual one as he said, not moving lips, "Other...considerations may have guided them." It was defeat. He came around the desk to sit beside his wife.

Clark said, "I'm going to take your files, Maxwell."

The ambassador scarcely looked at him. "Is your plan simply to make all this public?" he asked. "You don't have much political experience, if so."

"Aren't you afraid that if he doesn't make it public, the Viyato may try to harm you, since you hold so much damaging information and Paula is dead?" Teresa asked.

Maxwell turned his palms upward.

No one said anything. Maxwell swallowed, and Clark saw he had not spoken because his mouth was dry. Afraid! What an oddball, he thought, though he could not have said why a monster shouldn't be afraid to die. "They would certainly lose all hope of a new contract if they...were shown to have harmed me," Maxwell said at last. "My government would take strong action."

Isadora sighed.

"Your government would just give the new contract, the protectorship, to the Ketries," Teresa said. "And those two families are allied, aren't they?"

"Nevertheless, I doubt the Viyato family would relish that situation," Maxwell said.

"The Viyato like the Ketries better than the Uchide," Teresa replied. "You've thought this out before, both of you, and decided you would have to go to the Uchide if Paula were killed, to keep the Viyato from killing you. Isadora explained that to me, how frightened you are, and I don't blame you."

Isadora poked at the rug with her feet.

"Cow," Maxwell whispered to her. Lifting his head, he said calmly, "Yes, of course I have considered all aspects of the current situation." He smiled suddenly, so warmly that the perspiration glistening on him in the window light seemed now to glow from inner radiance. "And what shall I do for you?"

Clark said, "Give me a--" At this moment the technical phrase nearly failed him, and he thought desperately of Greyesar. "A transit authorization to get back on Paffir Haretz and return here again. And we understand the Viyato won't be given planetary protectorship, right?" He thought he sounded too tentative, but there was no undoing it.

"Of course," said Maxwell, visibly relieved. "That understanding is central to our relationship. Now let's get you a transit." He activated a screen on his desk. Clark, looking over his shoulder, read, "Eyicomp."

"No! Kill him, kill him, kill him," Isadora panted, as though her allegiance had shifted from life to death now that Paula was gone.

Marlow accessed the entire Viyato system area and talked them through to the travel policy file, either as a show of power and trust or because he didn't know how the information was organized. Clark saw the name "Pahid" flash by and stopped him, but the entry merely identified the Lir Temple priest, reported the delivery of the sterile horses and dates of some interviews by hologram. It would be interesting to compare the dates of Pahid's visions and see which were real visions and which only hallucinations--or which were real visions and which only holos. Maxwell answered all identification challenges by saying, "It's all right," and the machine knew his voice. List after list and file after file unfurled themselves to his inspection. The Viyato must have given him free run of their knowledge. When he entered Clark's name on the authorization list and touched Print, the machine produced not a sensidisk but an eye-readable card.

"This should do you," Maxwell said. "Now, having my Viyato collection, you can consider your safety with regard to me assured...Clark? Yes, Clark. And you really aren't in a position to incur the wrath of my government, so I can trust you. Let's touch on that." He extended his palm in Resheborian style, beaming as though he pledged from the deepest affection. Clark met his hand.

Isadora followed them to the door. "He'll have you killed," she hissed in Clark's ear, then rushed past them and down the carpeted hall, past the secretary who scarcely looked up. Two hefty women in dark uniforms joined her there and the three, their arms around each other's waists, turned a corner with military precision.

"Bodyguards?" Clark asked.

"Isn't it silly?" Teresa responded. "Now she's going to run away to Reshebora with them. Great big interclan girls afraid of their shadows. But they're very good markswomen, and we can rely on them to care for her."

Outside, Clark leaned on the embassy gate. Now that the sun was going down, he could bathe his eyes with the cooling air. After Maxwell's bright office, the pale evening sky felt soft.

"Are you going back to Paffir Haretz right away?" Teresa asked.

He nodded. "We're going to find Sevit. And I'll bring back evidence about the involuntary medication, the implants, whatever's left of the Love's Arrow factory. Then the Uchide will get the protectorship until we can declare autonomy."

"Will it be difficult to collect the evidence?" Teresa asked. Her voice was sad.

Clark shook his head. "They never even bothered to hide it."

They stood watching a band of orange overlay the pink horizon and slowly fade to blue.

"You've shown me the way," Clark said.

"My pleasure. It's been fun having you here. I hope you come back." She blotted her eyes with the heel of her palm. "Just look at this carrying on. Well, good luck." She turned and hurried off. A thin strip of Eyimalia's single moon shone tawny low before her. The embassy's outside lights went on, hard and bright, as Clark walked from the gate.

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CONTINUE.....................

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