Galactic Courier: The John Grimes Saga III (76 page)

“You can put those away,” said Grimes, gesturing.

“Not so fast, Skipper,” said Williams. “
We
can use some coffee. And I’m never averse to a free smoke.”

“All right. Pour me a cup while you’re about it.”

“Why should the coffee and the smokes not be required, Captain?” asked the catering officer.

“You’ll see,” said Grimes.

Venner appeared in the doorway.

“The Port Captain, sir,” he announced, then withdrew.

The robot entered.

It said, in a quite pleasant, not overly mechanical voice, “Yes. That is my title. I am also Collector of Customs, Port Health Officer and Immigration Officer. If I may be allowed to scan your papers I shall soon be able to inform you whether or not all is in order.”

Grimes had seen the thing’s like before, both on El Dorado and aboard the Baroness d’Estang’s spaceyacht. It could have been a handsome, well-made human being with a metallic skin. Williams and Magda, however, were familiar only with the common or garden varieties of robot, only crudely humanoid at the best. (They had seen, of course, the exquisite, golden figurine that had been given to Grimes before lift-off from Port Southern—but she was only a beautiful miniature, not life-size.)

The automaton moved to the desk, went through the papers like a professional gambler dealing playing cards. It seemed to have no trouble reading things upside down. After only seconds the documents were back in their original order.

The subtly metallic voice said, “You are cleared inwards.”

“Don’t I get certification?” asked Grimes.

“That, Captain, is not required. The Monitor has cleared you. You will, however, be issued the usual Outward Clearance documents prior to your departure.”

“When will discharge be started?” asked Grimes.

“Your cargo is not urgently required, Captain. Perhaps tomorrow the shipment of caviar will be off-loaded. The other items? At the moment there is no warehouse space available.”

“So I have to sit here,” exploded Grimes, “with my ship not earning money, paying wages to my crew and feeding them . . . And you, I suppose, will be charging port dues.”

“Of course, Captain.”

“Demurrage . . . ?” wondered Grimes aloud. “Compensation for delay?”

“That is not applicable in your circumstances.”

Perhaps, perhaps not, Grimes thought. He would have to make a careful study of
The Shipmaster’s Business Companion.

“Another point,” he said. “I was last here as an officer of one of the Survey Service’s cruisers.”

“We are aware of that, Captain Grimes.”

“ . . . so I had no cause to find out what facilities are available to merchant vessels. Is there a Shipping Office here? I may have to pay off one of my officers.”

“There is no Shipping Office here. In any case, as you should know, outworlders may not be dumped on this planet. And that seems to have concluded all immediate business. Should you require stores, repairs or other services you may call the Port Master’s office on your NST. I wish you good day.”

“Is my NST hooked up to the planetary telephone service?” asked Grimes.

“It is not, Captain. You may, however, use the telephonic facilities in the reception area in the main office. Such calls will be charged against you. Again I wish you a good day.”

The Port Captain turned, strode out of the office. They could hear his (its) footsteps, too heavy to be those of a human being, in the alleyway outside—and, for quite a while, on the treads of the spiral staircase leading down to the after airlock.

Grimes, Billy Williams and Magda Granadu looked at each other with raised eyebrows.

Williams said, “I don’t think that I shall like this world, Skipper, where even robots treat us like dirt.”

“The last time I came here,” said Grimes, “there was a human Port Captain. The Comte Henri de Messigny. He wasn’t must better than his tin successor.”

“What happened to the . . . Comte?”

“He . . . died.”

“Were you involved, Skipper?”

“Yes,” said Grimes shortly. “And now, Mr. Williams, you’d better see to it that the caviar is ready for discharge when somebody condescends to send a team of stowbots out to us. And you, Ms. Granadu, can let the Port Captain’s office know what stores you require. Try to confine yourself to inexpensive items, will you? That is, if anything here
is
inexpensive . . . Mphm.” He poured himself another mug of coffee, sipped it thoughtfully. “I think I’ll take a stroll ashore,” he went on. “I might make one or two phone calls . . .”

“Looking up the old girl friends, Skipper?” asked Williams cheerfully.

“Surely you don’t think, Mr. Williams,” said Grimes coldly, “that any El Doradan lady would have anything to do with a mere spaceman?”

“There are precedents,” said the Mate. “Drongo Kane, for a start . . .”

And me before him,
thought Grimes—but maintained his sour expression.

Chapter 23

THE SPACEPORT WAS ALMOST
as he remembered it, with only a few minor additions and alterations. And regarding these, he thought, his memory could be playing him tricks. He walked slowly across the apron to the Port Control building, a gleaming, white truncated pyramid topped by the graceful latticework pylon of the control tower. The main door was composed of two huge panels of opalescent glass which swung inward, to admit him, as he approached. He walked over the highly polished floor with its swirling inlaid designs toward the spiral staircase that rose from the center of the huge, high-ceilinged room. He stepped on to the bottom tread. Nothing happened. The last time that he had performed this action—how many years ago?—he had been borne smoothly upward to what were to be his temporary quarters and to much appreciated refreshment. This time, obviously, there were to be no free meals and drinks.

He turned away from the spiral staircase, walked to an open booth against one of the walls. There was no panel with dials or buttons but he could recall the procedure. Inside the booth, facing the rear wall, he said, “Get me the Princess Marlene von Stolzberg.”

The rear wall became a screen, three dimensional. From it stared a robot servitor, pewter-faced, clad in archaic livery, black, with silver braid and buttons and white lace ruffles.

“Who is calling?” asked the metallic voice.

“John Grimes. Captain John Grimes.”

The servant moved away from the screen. Grimes was looking into a room, dark paneled, with antique suits of armor ranged against the walls.
So she’s still living in the same place,
he thought.
That gloomy Schloss of hers . . .

The picture flickered, faded, was replaced by that of one of the other rooms in the castle, a boudoir, frumpishly feminine in its furnishings.

And she . . . she was not quite a frump, Grimes decided, although she was no longer the golden girl whom he had known. She was not quite fat, although the fine lines of her face were partially obscured by the overlay of fatty tissues. The padded robe that she was wearing concealed her body but, Grimes thought, it must have thickened. (When he had known her she had been a hearty eater.) Her hair was still golden but somehow dulled.

She looked out at him through blue eyes that were clear but cold, cold.

“Grimes,” she said without enthusiasm. “John Grimes. Captain John Grimes. Should I congratulate you on your having achieved command? But I see from your uniform that you are no longer in the Survey Service. You are a commercial shipmaster?”

There was a note of disdain in her voice as she asked the question—or made the statement.

“Yes, Marlene. But I’m also a shipowner. I own my ship.”

“The correct form of address, Captain Grimes, is Your Highness. As you should remember.”

“Your Highness,” repeated Grimes, his prominent ears flushing angrily.

“And why have you called me, Captain Grimes?”

“I . . . Well . . . Surely you remember, M . . . Sorry. Your Highness. You sent me a solidograph of yourself and . . . And a baby.”

“Yes. I remember.
My
son. The Graf Ferdinand von Stolzberg.”

“I . . . I wonder if I could see him . . .”

“To satisfy your idle curiosity? The Graf and yourself would have nothing in common. Are you trying to tell me that you have paternal instincts, Captain Grimes? Ferdinand has never felt the need for a father—and even if he did would not wish to acknowledge a common spaceman as such.”

“I apologize for wasting your time, Your Highness,” said Grimes at last.

“The pleasure, if any, was all yours,” she said.

The screen went blank.

Grimes filled, lit and smoked a soothing pipe. Then he said, slowly and deliberately, “Get me the Baroness Michelle d’Estang.”

The screen came alive. This time the robot servitor had the appearance of a human female, a pretty, golden girl in severe black and white lady’s maid uniform.

“Who is calling, please?”

“Captain John Grimes, late of
The Far Traveler
and
Little Sister
, now master/owner of
Sister Sue
.”

The face and upper body in the screen were replaced by those of a man.

“Micky’s out, Grimesy,” said Drongo Kane. “Will I do?”

Grimes stared at his old enemy, at the face that looked as though it had been shattered at some time and then reassembled by a careless plastic surgeon, topped by an untidy shock of straw-colored hair.

“Please tell the Baroness that I called, Commodore Kane,” said Grimes.

“I’ll do that. You’re looking quite prosperous, Grimesy. And I hear that you’ve got yourself a real ship at last. But I warn you—you’ll not find it so easy to find cargoes to fill her. I should know.”

“I’ve managed so far,” said Grimes.

“And how many voyages have you made in that rustbucket of yours? Two, to date. Well, if you get stuck here you can always give me a call. I might, I just might, have something for you.”

“That’ll be the sunny Friday,” said Grimes.

(For him to have replied otherwise would have been out of character.)

“Don’t go looking gift horses in the mouth, Grimes. I’m prepared to let bygones be bygones. But I can always change my mind. And remember—sunny Fridays have a habit of coming around.”

The screen went blank.

There was one last call that Grimes thought that he would make.

“Get me,” he ordered, “Her Grace the Duchess of Leckhampton.”

The robot servant looking out from the screen was, save for his grey metal face, a traditional English butler.

“Good morning, sir. Who shall I say is calling?”

“Captain John Grimes.”

“Very good, sir. I shall ascertain if Her Grace wishes to speak with you.”

After a very short wait the butler was replaced in the screen by the Duchess. She looked no older. (But she had never looked young.) Her thin white hair was carelessly arranged. Her cheeks were painted. She was wearing a gaudy emerald and scarlet shirt. There was a necklace of glittering stones that looked far too large to be genuine diamonds—but which almost certainly were genuine—about her wrinkled throat. Her black eyes sparkled from among the too liberally applied eye shadow.

“Young Grimes,” she cackled, “but not so young any longer. And a captain. This is a pleasure.”

“It is a pleasure,” said Grimes, not untruthfully, “seeing you again.”

“And when are you coming out to see me, John Grimes? What about this evening? Can you get away from your ship? But of course you can. You’re the captain now. It is short notice, but I should be able to arrange a little party. I’ll ask Marlene . . .”

“I’ve already talked to her,” said Grimes. “She didn’t seem all that pleased to see me.”

“Too bad. She’s a silly girl, and dotes on that useless son of hers. But I shouldn’t have said
that
, should I? After all, he’s yours too. But whom else can I ask? Michelle? You know her, of course. And that husband of hers. And Baron Takada. And Chief Lobenga and the Lady Eulalia . . . Just leave it to me. And perhaps you could bring one or two of your senior officers . . .”

“But where do you live, Your Grace?”

“In El Dorado City, of course. I’ll send a car for you. Can you be ready to leave your ship at 1800 hours?”

“I can, Your Grace.”

“Good. I am looking forward to meeting you again, Captain Grimes.”

He left the Port Control Office, walked back to the ship. He saw that a conveyor belt had been set up to connect with one of the upper cargo ports and that at its base a medium-sized air truck and a couple of spidery stowbots were waiting. As he watched, the first of the cartons slid out of the aperture in the hull, was followed by others in a steady stream. With a smooth economy of motion the robot stevedores loaded them into the body of the truck.

He walked up the ramp into
Sister Sue’s
after airlock, took the elevator to the cargo compartment in which the shipment of caviar was stowed. He found Williams there and also the Port Captain, the agent or extension of the Monitor, who, wordlessly, was supervising the activity of the pair of stowbots which were loading cartons onto the top of the belt.

“Mr. Williams,” said Grimes, “I think that our friend here can be trusted to function as a master stevedore. Come up to see me, please, and collect Ms. Granadu on the way.”

“Aye, aye, Skipper. I’ll just see the next tier broken—it’s rather tightly stowed—then I’ll be with you.”

Grimes carried on up to his quarters, sat down in his day cabin to wait. Before long the mate and the catering officer had joined him.

“Sit down,” he said. Then he asked, “Are you free this evening?”

“Free, Skipper? You have to be joking. We’re confined to the vicinity of this blasted spaceport. There’s no public transport. I asked the so-called Port Captain if we could use of the ship’s boats to take a run into the city and I was told that intrusion into El Doradan air space by outworlders is prohibited.”

“I’ve been asked to a dinner party, Mr. Williams, by the Duchess of Leckhampton. She suggested that I bring two of my senior officers with me. Does the Dog Star Line run to mess dress?”

“Only in their passenger ships, Skipper, and I was never in them. But I’ve a civilian dinner suit.”