The Greatest Works of E. E. Smith. E. E. Smith
artistically-disarranged, red-bronze-auburn mop. Her soft and dewy eyes—Virgilia Samms could control her eyes as perfectly as she could her highly educated hands—were at the moment gold-flecked, tawny wells of girlish innocence and trust.
"But I can't give you this next dance, too, Herkimer—Honestly I can't!" she pleaded, snuggling just a trifle closer into the embrace of the young man who was just as much man, physically, as she was woman. "I'd just love to, really, but I just simply can't, and you know why, too."
"You've got some duty-dances, of course ..."
"Some? I've got a list as long as from here to there! Senator Morgan first, of course, then Mr. Isaacson, then I sat one out with Mr. Ossmen—I can't stand Venerians, they're so slimy and fat and repulsive!—and that leathery horned toad from Mars and that Jovian hippopotamus ..."
She went down the list, and as she named or characterized each entity another finger of her left hand pressed down upon the back of her partner's right, to emphasize the count of her social obligations. But those talented fingers were doing more—far, far more—than that.
Herkimer Third, although no little of a Don Juan, was a highly polished, smoothly finished, thoroughly seasoned diplomat. As such, his eyes and his other features—particularly his eyes—had been schooled for years to reveal no trace of whatever might be going on inside his brain. If he had entertained any suspicion of the beautiful girl in his arms, if anyone had suggested that she was trying her best to pump him, he would have smiled the sort of smile which only the top-drawer diplomat can achieve. He was not suspicious of Virgilia Samms. However, simply because she was Virgil Samms' daughter, he took an extra bit of pain to betray no undue interest in any one of the names she recited. And besides, she was not looking at his eyes, nor even at his face. Her glance, demurely downcast, was all too rarely raised above the level of his chin.
There were some things, however, that Herkimer Herkimer Third did not know. That Virgilia Samms was the most accomplished muscle-reader of her times. That she was so close to him, not because of his manly charm, but because only in that position could she do her prodigious best. That she could work with her eyes alone, but in emergencies, when fullest possible results were imperative, she had to use her exquisitely sensitive fingers and her exquisitely tactile skin. That she had studied intensively, and had tabulated the reactions of, each of the entities on her list. That she was now, with his help, fitting those reactions into a pattern. And finally, that that pattern was beginning to assume the grim shape of MURDER!
And Virgilia Samms, working now for something far more urgent and vastly more important than a figmental Galactic Patrol, hoped desperately that this Herkimer was not a muscle-reader too; for she knew that she was revealing her secrets even more completely than was he. In fact, if things got much worse, he could not help but feel the pounding of her heart ... but she could explain that easily enough, by a few appropriate wiggles ... No, he wasn't a reader, definitely not. He wasn't watching the right places; he was looking where that gown had been designed to make him look, and nowhere else ... and no tell-tale muscles lay beneath any part of either of his hands.
As her eyes and her fingers and her lovely torso sent more and more information to her keen brain, Jill grew more and more anxious. She was sure that murder was intended, but who was to be the victim? Her father? Probably. Pops Kinnison? Possibly. Somebody else? Barely possibly. And when? And where? And how? She didn't know! And she would have to be sure ... Mentioning names hadn't been enough, but a personal appearance ... Why didn't dad show up—or did she wish he wouldn't come at all...?
Virgil Samms entered the ball-room.
"And dad told me, Herkimer," she cooed sweetly, gazing up into his eyes for the first time in over a minute, "that I must dance with every one of them. So you see ... Oh, there he is now, over there! I've been wondering where he's been keeping himself." She nodded toward the entrance and prattled on artlessly. "He's almost never late, you know, and I've ..."
He looked, and as his eyes met those of the First Lensman, Jill learned three of the facts she needed so badly to know. Her father. Here. Soon. She never knew how she managed to keep herself under control; but, some way and just barely, she did.
Although nothing showed, she was seething inwardly: wrought up as she had never before been. What could she do? She knew, but she did not have a scrap or an iota of visible or tangible evidence; and if she made one single slip, however slight, the consequences could be immediate and disastrous.
After this dance might be too late. She could make an excuse to leave the floor, but that would look very bad, later ... and none of them would Lens her, she knew, while she was with Herkimer—damn such chivalry!... She could take the chance of waving at her father, since she hadn't seen him for so long ... no, the smallest risk would be with Mase. He looked at her every chance he got, and she'd make him use his Lens ...
Northrop looked at her; and over Herkimer's shoulder, for one fleeting instant, she allowed her face to reveal the terrified appeal she so keenly felt.
"Want me, Jill?" His Lensed thought touched only the outer fringes of her mind. Full rapport is more intimate than a kiss: no one except her father had ever really put a Lens on Virgilia Samms. Nevertheless:
"Want you! I never wanted anybody so much in my life! Come in, Mase—quick—please!"
Diffidently enough, he came; but at the first inkling of the girl's news all thought of diffidence or of privacy vanished.
"Jack! Spud! Mr. Kinnison! Mr. Samms!" he Lensed sharp, imperative, almost frantic thoughts. "Listen in!"
"Steady, Mase, I'll take over," came Roderick Kinnison's deeper, quieter mental voice. "First, the matter of guns. Anybody except me wearing a pistol? You are, Spud?"
"Yes, sir."
"You would be. But you and Mase, Jack?"
"We've got our Lewistons!"
"You would have. Blasters, my sometimes-not-quite-so-bright son, are fine weapons indeed for certain kinds of work. In emergencies, it is of course permissible to kill a few dozen innocent bystanders. In such a crowd as this, though, it is much better technique to kill only the one you are aiming at. So skip out to my car, you two, right now, and change—and make it fast." Everyone knew that Roderick Kinnison's car was at all times an arsenal on wheels. "Wish you were in uniform, too, Virge, but it can't be helped now. Work your way—slowly—around to the northwest corner. Spud, do the same."
"It's impossible—starkly unthinkable!" and "I'm not sure of anything, really ..." Samms and his daughter began simultaneously to protest.
"Virgil, you talk like a man with a paper nose. Keep still until after you've used your brain. And I'm sure enough of what you know, Jill, to take plenty of steps. You can relax now—take it easy. We're covering Virgil and I called up support in force. You can relax a little, I see. Good! I'm not trying to hide from anybody that the next few minutes may be critical. Are you pretty sure, Jill, that Herkimer is a key man?"
"Pretty sure, Pops." How much better she felt, now that the Lensmen were on guard! "In this one case, at least."
"Good! Then let him talk you into giving him every dance, right straight through until something breaks. Watch him. He must know the signal and who is going to operate, and if you can give us a fraction of a second of warning it will help no end. Can do?"
"I'll say I can—and I would love to, the big, slimy, stinking skinker!" As transliterated into words, the girl's thought may seem a trifle confused, but Kinnison knew exactly what she meant.
"One more thing, Jill; a detail. The boys are coming back in and are working their partners over this way. See if Herkimer notices that they have changed their holsters."
"No, he didn't notice," Jill reported, after a moment. "But I don't notice any difference, either, and I'm looking for it."
"Nevertheless, it's there, and the difference between a Mark Seventeen and a Mark Five is something more than that between Tweedledum and Tweedledee,"