But, undaunted, I essayed another approach. When he got back up to me again, I explained how every sentient being of our type had yet retained, left over from evolution, a reptile brain below and between the lobes. This brain was what prompted blind leadership. I even drew him a picture of it in the slanted dirt. And then I diagnosed his trouble as a reptile brain deficiency that made him blind to the necessity of blindly following where I led. But once more all the thanks I got was him falling down to the bottom once more.
However, I did not permit this problem to blunt the acute pleasure I was taking in my stroll across this vast land. Not only did it have no Tug Onein it, it had neither Heller nor Krak and only the faintest shadow of Lombar Hisst.
As days proceeded onward, I must have shot at least five hundred songbirds. Some of them, when they fell, were hard to get to or only wounded and my driver often had trouble recovering them, burdened as he was.
But he was making his own trouble. I told him to throw away the identoframe: we would never again have need of an airbus, so why carry the frame you have to turn in to get a replacement? I just couldn't seem to get through to him about this.
He couldn't be taught in other ways as well. Each time we would make a camp, instead of locating dry wood, he would start a fire with the greenest bark to hand and for the last half hour of daylight, huge columns of white smoke would rise like pillars into the air, absolutely towering into the sky. I tried and tried but I couldn't break him of it. I decided he was simply atavism deficient!
Thus, when the cold muzzle of the gun awoke me that dawn, I was not too surprised to hear my driver talking in a rather high, urgent voice when any atavistic impulse would have been to shut up!
"... And so we almost had the contrabandists and they up and shot us down!" Ske was saying. "But true to our duty, we have been following them day after day, scouting on their trail. They left fantastic amounts of evidence behind. You just look at that game bag! We found it just last night and it's full of fancy feathers!" One always studies the enemy. The two fellows who had us were dressed in the green of game wardens. They had the emblem of some Lord sewn on their chests. They looked very ugly. They were heavily armed. I heard a twig snap back under the trees and knew there was a third one back there, covering us.
"And," Ske was saying, his voice pitched even higher, "to prove that we flushed them and that they fled afraid of us, look at that needle blastgun they left behind!"
"Ah," said a three-hundred-pound brute, the other one that wasn't holding the gun on my chin. He picked up my needlegun. "We'll just confiscate this. Nice gun."
"Evidence of the Crown," I said hastily. "You must not tamper with legal evidence!"
"This," said the three-hundred-pounder impressively, "is Lord Mok's preserve. All half-million acres of it. And anything found in it is Lord Mok's!" For "Lord Mok's," I thought, substitute "game warden's." The gun muzzle bruised my chin with a poke. "Get up. We're taking you in!" I noticed for the first time that they had a rope around Ske's neck. The "you" didn't seem to include Ske as the three-hundred-pounder seemed to be looking about for a limb to hang him from. Oh, well, I thought. One can always get a replacement driver.
Ske did not seem to take to the idea of being hanged. But instead of grovelling, he grabbed the rope to slacken it and drew himself up tall. Not very tall as he isn't very big.
"That!" said Ske pointing dramatically at me, "is Officer Gris of the Apparatus! He is on a secret mission for the Emperor!" His voice could be heard for a mile!
It produced an interesting effect. Threemen emerged from the trees and came forward at a run with levelled guns! It looked like there was going to be a double hanging right now!
Ske had freed himself for an instant. He dived to my side. He yanked open the flap of a pocket, grabbed out my communication disc and screamed into it, "For the sake of the Gods, don't fire! Officer Gris will be in your range!" It was a pretty silly thing to do as we were about ten times the distance that that communication disc could reach.
Ske whispered to me frantically, "Tell them they're all under arrest!" I blinked. The yokels had all hauled up. They were suspended, looking up and around anxiously. Yokels, indeed. Lord Mok didn't hire smart men for game wardens.
I got up. "You're all under arrest," I said.
"For posing as game wardens!" shouted Ske.
This hanging or battle or whatever it had been about to become, disintegrated into, "We've got credentials!" and "How do we know you are an Officer Gris?" and that sort of thing.
Everybody showed everybody their badges. Ske ran around pushing my identoplate into people's faces.
They finally told me that they'd have to keep the needlegun and game bag as "evidence" we'd actually been following poachers. And they said they had a supply plane leaving their preserve headquarters the next morning for Government City and we could hitch a ride on it.
Ske seemed very elated and almost cheering.
I wasn't. It seemed like the sky had fallen in. I was very certain that catastrophe awaited me. The very thought of going back made my stomach hurt!
Chapter 6
Dispiritedly, I sat and watched the Transport Issue Clerk.
The wardens had dropped us off at the Apparatus Vehicle Center in Government City, not even thanking me for the needlegun and game bag.
Ske had lugged in the frame from the wreck and the Transport Issue Clerk, instead of giving Ske a blast, had practically cooed over it. Ske had written out a report – Crash in Line of Duty –and
"Uuuuuu! It's been promoted!" cried the Transport Issue Clerk. "It's a Grade Eleven now!" He slapped Ske's wrist: "You naughty boy. You didn't have to wreckthe other to get a new one. You just could have brought it in. What unnecessary paper work you drivers make!" And then he was onto his communications link with the commercial suppliers – Zippety-Zip Manufacturing Outlet – in Commercial City. "Uuuuu, Chalber, dear," he said musically to whomever was on the other end. "We've had a promotion.And it will need a Model 794-86 right away." He muted the disc and turned to Ske. "They've only one with purple upholstery and green tassels. Will that do?" Apparently Ske thought it would, for the clerk got "Dear Chalber" to rush right over with it himself.
"Oh, you are so lucky," said the clerk to Ske. "The Model 794-86 is absolutely adorable! It has the circular seat in back that makes down into a bed."
"Hot Saints!" exclaimed Ske, and well he might for he had to sleep in my vehicle most of the time.
"Oh, yes," cooed the clerk. "And it has window blinders and the cutest bar. You and me will just have to take a ride in it," wink, wink, "won't we?" I decided there were things I didn't know about Ske.
Shortly "Dear Chalber" arrived and there was a hurried and furtive interchange between him and the clerk and I saw the golden flash of money changing hands. Aha! So that was why the Apparatus had so many strange vehicle wrecks!
The clerk gave "Dear Chalber" a kiss and when a following vehicle had flown him off, the clerk turned to Ske and there was a furtive interchange there and I distinctly saw another, smaller golden flash.
The new airbus was quite elegant: purple light spinners and green landing wheels with a bright red band all around it. Hardly the thing for undercover work! The interior was so cleanit was disgusting. I got in wearily.