Tinny had had as good a night's sleep as one could get in a chair, there was very little traffic, and so Jonnie asked Chong-won to stand in for him and went to get dressed.
Mr. Tsung was wearing a little round black-satin pillbox cap with a blue button on the top of it and had not ceased grinning since he had recovered his rank. He bowed and got a bath wheeled in on a mine cart and generally worked to get Jonnie dressed and fed.
Then Mr. Tsung picked up a little thin box on a silk neck cord and put it on and whispered at it, and Jonnie was startled to hear English coming out of it in a flat, electronic monotone.
In response to Jonnie's raised eyebrows, using the box, Mr. Tsung explained it was a gift from the small gray man, Dries Gloton, before he had left on a trip. A gift for starting a bank account! It seemed that Mr. Tsung's daughter was painting tigers and birds on big sheets of handmade rice paper and selling them to the emissaries for fifty credits apiece; the lords said they were “primitives” and collector's items. And his son-in-law had been making pictures of dragons on round metal plates with a molecular sprayer and selling those to the lords for a hundred credits each, and like a good father, even though he despised merchants and the merchant class, he was taking care of their money for them.
Mr. Tsung explained that His Excellency had found the language “court Mandarin Chinese” in his library on the ship and had done the necessary microcopy of it and– you see this little switch here? That's Mandarin to English in the up position, Mandarin to Psychlo in the middle position, and English to Psychlo in the down position. And didn't it sound funny when it turned English into Chinese tones?
But that was not alclass="underline" it was a vocoreader. See this little light on the end? You passed that over Mandarin characters and it read them aloud in English or Psychlo. And it also read Psychlo and English in Mandarin. So now he couldn't be fooled or led into mistakes by wrongly worded speeches.
It ran on body heat so it didn't need any batteries and now he could talk straight to Jonnie! Of course, he'd still learn the languages himself, for he didn't want to sound so monotone. But wasn't Dries Gloton a nice man!
He was glad Mr. Tsung could now talk to him without a Coordinator, but all the same, it made Jonnie feel surrounded by the Galactic Bank.
Mr. Tsung put it to work right away. “I am told you are going in to hear the
sentence and that it somehow includes you. Now since you don't know whether you are going to be found guilty or not, you just sit respectfully and listen, and if they ask you anything, you just bow– you don't answer. Just bow. That is how you open the way to demand a new trial.”
It was good advice, but it did not do much to calm Jonnie's nerves.
Chief Chong-won said the radio was quiet. No, no news of Stormalong, nor Edinburgh nor Russia.
The lords were all assembled. They had rearranged the room. They had a high desk on the platform and Lord Fowljopan was sitting at it. The lords themselves were in orderly rows facing it. Down the side of the room was a line of chairs. Schleim was lying on a mine cart, totally wrapped up in hoist chains, with only his face showing above the links. They had him between the desk and the audience.
Lord Dom indicated that Jonnie should sit on one of the side chairs where Lord Voraz was sitting. It was obvious to Jonnie that they didn't consider him part of their deliberations. The lords didn't even look at him. But at least he wasn't there alongside that mine cart with Schleim!
“They have already discussed all this,” whispered Lord Voraz to Jonnie.
“But they have to review and vote on each finding. It 's really more of a treaty than a trial. I’m surprised the Earth emissary isn't here. But they can proceed without him right up to the signing.”
Lord Fowljopan signaled Lord Browl to call the session to order, which he did.
“We have already agreed upon and committed to treaty form,” said Fowljopan, “the redefinition of the word 'pirate.' I wish to call to your attention, however, that the redefinition can have no bearing on the present findings for it was passed upon after the incident under trial. Is that correct, my lords?”
They signified that it was.
“Therefore,” said Fowljopan, “we are basing this trial on existing findings and clauses. Testimony of Captain Rogodeter Snowl has been heard and duly entered in the record to the effect that he was ordred to disregard the sanctity of the conference area by the Tolnep then-emissary Schleim. I believe it is the desire of this conference to accept the testimony and evidences of the said Snowl, particularly in the light of the fact that he considered he was bound to protect the Tolnep emissary. This absolves Snowl. Do you so vote?”
The lords so voted.
“Therefore,” said Fowljopan, “it is considered established by this conference that the said Tolnep emissary, by name Lord Schleim, did willfully and maliciously order the military forces of Tolnep to attack the conference area. Do you so find?”
They voted unanimously that they so found and Schleim in his chains hissed and spat.
“It was further witnessed and established,” continued Fowljopan, “that the said Tolnep emissary did seek to paralyze, shoot, and otherwise injure other emissaries engaged in their lawful and time-honored duties, contrary to specific clauses numbered here but too numerous to read. Is that your finding?”
They definitely so found and Schleim hissed and spat some more.
“Therefore,” said Fowljopan, “it is adjudicated by this conference, lawfully assembled, by the power of treaty hereby made among planets, that Tolnep shall hereinafter, for a space of one hundred years, be regarded as an outlaw nation! Do you so vote?”
They so voted and with deep scowls of determination.
“All treaties with the planet and nation of Tolnep are canceled here with,” said Fowljopan. “Do you so vote?”
They so voted.
“All embassies and legations and consulates of the Tolnep planet and nation shall be closed and their diplomats expelled, and for the space of the next hundred years, diplomatic functions in minor matters shall be undertaken by the Hawvins' embassies, legations, and consulates at usual charges. Do you concur?” They concurred.
“Since the personal safety of the said Schleim was promised by this conference and since it guaranteed to return the said Schleim unharmed to his planet, it is the decision of this conference that the said Schleim be deposited naked and in chains in the public slave market of the city of Creeth, Tolnep, as an expression of disfavor of this conference. Is this your wish?”
It was their wish. Schleim hissed and spat. Jonnie wondered when they were going to get around to “reparations.” It was a thin hope but it was a hope.
Fowljopan was continuing. “Since Tolnep had the majority of war vessels and since its officer was, according to the testimony of Schleim himself earlier in this conference, the senior and commanding officer of the combined force, it is the finding of this conference that the non-Tolnep nations, which complemented the combined force, are nationally absolved of the offense. But that, as the presence of their forces poses a continued threat in the skies above this conference, this absolution is dependent on the following conditions: (a) that they ensure that the Tolnep fleet deposits any and all prisoners taken unharmed, undamaged, at a spot to be designated by the Earth military commander; (b) that they themselves deposit any prisoners they may have taken, unharmed, undamaged, at the same or similar place; (c) that they then escort, with the use of any military persuasion necessary, the Tolnep fleet back to Tolnep; (d) that they direct the Tolnep fleet to land on the surface of Tolnep, it being known to the conference that the Tolnep fleet cannot, thereafter, take off again; and (e) that they then return to their respective homelands. The forces mandated by this clause are those of the Bolbods, Hawvins, Hockners, Jambitchows, and Drawkins, and any and all forces retained by them and any and all forces of any other planet or nation from outside this system. Is it so decreed?”