MISS FENG MAKES A SERIES OF
OBSERVATIONS
The guards escorted
me out of the dining pavilion and up two flights of stairs, then
along a passageway to a palatial guest suite which had been made
available for the members of the Club. Miss Feng followed,
outwardly imperturbable, although I heard her swear very quietly
when the guards locked and barred the main door.
“Dash it all.” I
stumbled and sat down on a pile of cushions. “I’ve got to rescue
her before it’s too late!”
Miss Feng raised one
thin eyebrow. “Indubitably, sir. However, we appear to be locked in
a guest suite on the second floor of a heavily fortified palace
built by a paranoid emperor, with guards standing outside the door
to prevent any unscheduled excursions. Perhaps Sir would consider
an after-dinner digestif and a postprandial nap
instead?”
But I was too far
gone in my funk to take heed. “This is my fault! If only I’d talked
to her instead, she wouldn’t be here. This isn’t like Abdul,
either. I know him, he’s a good egg. There must be some
mistake!”
“If Sir will listen
to me for a minute.” Miss Feng drew a deep and exasperated breath,
her chest swelling beneath her traditional black jacket in a most
fetching manner. “I believe the key to the problem is not rescuing
Miss Laura, but making a successful escape
afterward. Sir will perhaps recall the planetary defense
gras ers and orbital arbalests dug into the walls of the caldera?
While I am an adequate pilot, I would much prefer our departure
from the second-most-heavily-fortified noble house on Mars to be
facilitated by traffic control rather than fire control. And”—she
raised one eyebrow, infinitesimally—“Sir did promise his sister to take care of her
mammoth.”
“Dash it all to hell
and back!” I bounced to my feet unsteadily. “Who cares about
Jeremy?”
Miss Feng fixed me
with a steely gaze. “You will, if your
sister thinks you’ve mislaid him on purpose, sir.”
“Oh.” I nodded,
crestfallen, and ambled over to the screen of intricately carved
soapstone fretwork that separated the central lounge from the inner
servants’ corridor. Small thingumabots buzzed and clicked outside,
scurrying hither and yon about their menial tasks. “I suppose
you’re right. Well, then. We need to rescue Laura, retrieve Jeremy
from whatever drunken escapade he’s got himself into, and talk our way out of this. Bally nuisance, why
can’t life be simple?”
“I couldn’t possibly
comment, sir. Compared to covering for one of Prince W XIII’s
little escapades, this should be a piece of cake. Incidentally, did
you notice anything odd about His Excellency the Sheikh Abdul
tonight?”
“What? Apart from his
rum desire to butcher my beloved—”
“I was thinking more
along the lines of the spinal parasite crab someone has
enterprisingly planted on him since the race, sir.”
“The spinal
what? Dear me, are you telling me he’s
caught something nasty? Do I need to take
precautions?”
“Only if Sir wishes
to avoid having his brain hijacked by a genetically engineered
neural parasite, his prefrontal lobes scooped out and eaten, and
his body turned into a helpless meat puppet. Mr. al-Matsumoto’s
burnoose covered it incompletely, and I saw it when he turned
round: you might have noticed he’s not quite himself right now. I
believe it is being controlled by Toshiro ibn-Rashid, the
vizier.”
“Oops.” I paused a
moment in silent sympathy. “Bloody poor show, that.”
“I’ve seen more than
one attempted coup d’etat in my time, sir, and it occurs to me that
this is an unhealthy situation to be in. The banquet continues for
three more days, and Sir might usefully question the wisdom of
staying to the end. After all, His Excellency’s puppet master
didn’t throw a party and invite all of the prince’s personal
friends along for no good reason, did he?”
“Then I suppose we’ll
just have to rescue Laura and make our escape.” I stopped. “Um. But
how?”
“I have a plan, sir.
If you’d start by taking this sober-up, then I’ll explain . .
.”