"Eric Frank Russell - Basic Right" - читать интересную книгу автора (Russell Eric Frank)

"It shall be done, sire."
Zalumar now switched attention back to the twelve. "After you have been registered you may go
back to your posts in the city. Your first act will he to declare this spaceport the sole and exclusive
property of the Raidan fleet now occupying it. All Terran officials will be removed from the port, none
will be allowed to enter except with my permission."
They received that in the same silence as before. He watched them go out, moving dully along one
behind the other, following Arnikoj's lead. Great God in Heaven, what witless animals they were!
Zalumar flow stared querulously at Fox, McKenzie, and Vitelli. "Where are the other seventeen
members of your expedition?"
"They remained in the city, sire," explained Fox.
"Remained? Who said they could remain? They are required here, here!" He slammed an angry fist
upon the desk top. "They have not the slightest right to stay behind without an order to that effect. Who
do they think they are? I shall swiftly show them how we deal with those who think they can do as they
like. I shall—"
"Sire," chipped in Fox, cutting short the tirade, "they asked if they might stay a short while to clean up
and change into more suitable clothing. I told them I felt sure you would approve of them looking more
presentable. It didn't seem reasonable to suppose that you might resent their efforts to please you."
A momentary confusion afflicted Zalumar's mind. If a trooper goes AWOL solely to fetch his
commanding officer a gold medal, what does the latter do about it? For the first time he sensed a vague
touch of the indefinable something that was troubling the uneasy Lakin. All was not quite as it should be.
This Fox fellow, for instance, was twisting his arm in front of two witnesses and there was nothing much
he could do about it. Determined to concoct a gripe, he growled, "All right, let us accept that their
concern for my pleasure is praiseworthy and therefore excusable. Why have you and these other two not
shown the same desire to gratify me? Why have you returned in those shapeless and filthy clothes, your
faces still covered with bristles? Are you telling me that seventeen care but three do not?"
"No, sire," said Fox, busily polishing apples that might prove to be scoot-berries. "Someone had to
come back. We hope that when the seventeen return you might graciously permit us to go and get
cleaned up in our turn."
"You had better do that," conceded Zalumar. "We can recognize animals with no trouble at all.
Therefore it isn't necessary for you to look like them, smell like them."
He watched the other carefully, seeking a hint of hidden anger such as a slight narrowing of the eyes
or a tightening of the jaw muscles. Fat lot of good it did him. Fox's features remained wooden behind his
polar mask of hair. McKenzie acted like he was stone-deaf. Vitelli wort the same unctuous smile that
never left his moonlike face.
"Get out," he ordered. "Report to Arnikoj. Tell him you have my permission to visit the city after the
others have returned. Be back by nightfall."
"And after that, sire?"
"You will remain under Amikoj's personal command. I will send for you whenever I want you."
When they had gone he strolled to the nearest port, gazed out at the great city. Slowly and with
miserly lovingness he took in its towers, spires, skyways, and bridges. Mine, he thought, all mine. A
worthy prize for the worthy. The battle to the strong, the spoils to the bold and brave.
Lakin mooched in, said hesitantly, "I have been thinking, sire. We're sort of all bunched up together.
Ten ships practically standing side by side. Might it not be better if we spread ourselves a little? Couldn't
we keep, say, four ships here and place three each in two other spaceports?"
“Why?”
"We don't yet know what their best weapons are like—but we do know that one well-placed bomb
could vaporize the lot of us."
"So could three bombs. So what have we to gain by splitting up?"
"Unless they dropped them simultaneously, the first blow would warn the rest. Some of us could
escape and hit back."