Lone Star Planet

jumble of buildings piled beside and on top of one another, as though it had been in

the barbecue, but to leave word with the doorman where they could be found. Hoddy, Thrombley and I then went in, to be met by a coupl

as fretting. "I do hope we haven't k

from his desk and hurried across the room as soon as th

w Ambassador, I suppose. And this-" He caught sight of Hoddy Ringo, bringi

ficer who had chased us to the Embassy. But this frightened little rabbit of a fellow simply

ls out of his briefcase and handed them to me, and I handed them to the Secretary of State, Mr. William A. Palme. He barely glanced at t

edited and accepted A

her less than convinced that it would be. His eyes kept returning in horrified fascination to my belt.

chinson; he is most anxious to meet you, Mr

tside the Secretary of State's office, into a huge room, the concrete floor of which was oil-stained, as though vehicles were continually being driven in and out. It was about a hundred feet wide, and two or three hundred in length. Daylight was

seemed to be at least two square-dances going on, to the music of competing bands. At the distant end of the plaza, over the heads of the crowd, I could see the piles and tracks of an overhead crane, towering above what looked like an open-hearth furnace. Between us and the bulk of the

dread these things

thing could happen,"

ecue!" Hoddy gloated. "No

me toward the short end of the plaza, on our

gul

ill all go to

ld building of warm-tinted adobe. I had never seen it before, but somehow it was familiar-looking. And then I remembered. Although I

Thromble

a replica of

don't let anybody hear you ask that. That

ering, and finally understanding, what my psycho-hi

nto a spaceship, brought it here, forty two light-years away from Terra, and reverently s

perspace-drive. They had gone from Terra cherishing dreams of things that had been dumped into the dust bin of history, carrying with them pictures of ways of li

they had come clo

ble. They ignored the fact that their life here on Capella IV was possible only by application of modern industrial technology. That rodeo down t

oks I had been reading on the ship.

of the Alamo, and with them I saw the dress blues of my two Marines. There was a little three-wheeled motorcart among them, from which they were helping thems

time, boys. Hoddy, you better get in on some o

hey hastily got things out of their

d. "I'm protected by the gam

e door of the President's office and both of them

oking for all the world like a professor in his academic halls. Since then, maybe before then, I had

ender, stoop-shouldered man in a black-and-gold laced jacket. He had a narrow compressed mouth and eyes that seemed to be watching every corner of t

; but where Palme was a rabbit, twitching to take flight at the first whiff of danger, H

e heeled; you're smart. You wouldn't be here today if poor Silas Cumshaw'd been as smart a

ght with him as bodyguard?"

You got a good trigger-man, though, Mr. Ambassador. Good man to watch your back f

or a little drink, before we go outside

is desk, with four glasses. Palme got some water tumble

op and gulped it down at once. He might act as though he were descended from a long line of

rs who had escorted us from Palme's office, and Hutchinson's retinue-surrounded us, and we made our way down the plaza, through the crowd. The din-ear-piercing yells, whistles, cowbells, pistol shots, the

Hutchinson screamed into my ear. "On this planet, to pa

son was one of the leading scholars on New Texas and had once been pr

m, somebody let off what sounded like a fifty-mm anti-tank gun five or six times. Hutchinso

slowly, until I could hear

fools! We can't eat

rds. I gathered that lengthy speeches at

or, there is one here who is more deserving of your notice than I; one to whom I, also,

ottle of superbourbon. I ostentatiously threw the water out of t

. "Stick close to me," I whispered. "Cue me in on the local notables, and the other members of the Diplomatic Corps." Then we all got down off the platform

. "Don't feel any reluctance about shaking hands with a sandwich in your other hand; that's standard practi

d hot relish, wrapped in tortillas of

I was discovering that I had never really eaten supercow before. I finished the first sand

the usual collection of wei

mespuns. His Embassy, if it was like the others I had seen elsewhere, would be an outsize cottage with

fashioned plug hat and tail-coat. They were a frustrated lot. They had gone into space to practice

r from Deseret-Delta

ing little fellow, with a head like a seal's, lon

human if he hadn't had blood with a copper base instead of iro

s and home planets of the Ambassadors as they came up, handing me little slips of paper on which he had written phonetically correct renditions of the gree

mes, sir. T

r the fact that their ancestry had been canine instead of simian. They had, of

they enjoyed barbecued Terran even bette

, extending his t

h Solar League representative," he said

mself. I answered in the Basic English t

tories we tell to our young of you are at the top of our books.

administered to z'Srauff ships in the past. "We will be in the same place again times with no number," the alien

ves; prominent citizens, mostly Judge so-and-so, or Colonel this-or-that. It was all a blur, so mu

assador." The lovely voice was

" I ex

e barbecue, Gail?" Presid

on ahead from the hotel. He wants to meet th

r hands for a while," Hutchinson said.

m in my hands!" she

know. "I know, I was supposed to

iful fool of me a

thing. My Embassy staff in

d the clip of a pistol. I couldn't even hear what else I said. I

!" I roared in her ear. "

explain anything!"

nocent man!" I yelled back at her

f the loud-speakers and it sounded like an H-bomb going off. She

led. "And this bette

mp, lighted by widely-sc

on in space-ships is one thing, but it's as much as a girl

re what happened to their reputations. We discovered that after l

erate Courts Building. There won't

Embassy, and about the chase by the Rangers. Before I was half through, she was laughing heartily,

e said. "I think there's a reading room of the Law Libra

e door, there was a R

hello, Gail. Just in time; they're g

cked at the door. Gail loo

he said. "We can't get o