Universe Twister - Keith Laumer [234]
"Quiet!" a thunderous tone broke through the hubbub. "Ladies and gentlemen—quiet! I must have silence in order to think!"
"Who might you be, sir?" "Where did he go?" "What's happened to Countess Daphne?" The clamor broke out again at once.
"I said QUIET!" the old man roared: he made a curt gesture—and sudden, total silence fell. O'Leary could see lips moving feebly, but not a sound was audible. The crowd stood as if bemused, staring at nothing.
"Well, that's better," the old man in blue said, his voice alone audible. "Now . . ." He half closed his eyes. "Hmmm. Quelius is a tricky devil. Who'd have thought he'd have thought of using the Mark III in that fashion? And where would he have fled? Not the caves . . . He knows I know . . ."
Lafayette! Help! a silent voice rang in O'Leary's ears—or no—not in his ears. Inside his head.
Daphne! Where are you? he cried silently.
It's dark, Lafayette! Lafayette . . .!
The elder in blue was standing before him.
"Lafayette—it is you, isn't it? Oh, it's all right; you may speak."
"I've got to get out of here," O'Leary said. "Daphne needs me—"
"Lafayette—don't you know me?"
"Sure—I saw you in a cave, you climbed out of a coffin and tried to bite me!"
"Lafayette—I'm your ally! You knew me as Lom, an assumed name, true, but then I was hardly in a position to trust you, eh? My real name is Jorlemagne."
"You're Lom? Are you out of your mind? Lom is a little shrimp under five six with a bald head and—"
"Surely you, of all people, can understand, Lafayette! Your description is of Quelius! I was caught by surprise, or he'd never have succeeded in exchanging identities with me!"
"You mean—you were Lom? And Lom was—"
"You! Simple enough, eh, now that I've explained it?"
"Wait a minute: even if you are Lom—or Jorelwhatsit—or whoever that was I made the jailbreak with—what makes you think I think you're any friend of mine? The way I analyzed the situation, you conned me into sneaking you into the palace so you could join forces with your sidekick, played by me—"
"But you were wrong, my boy, eh? What need to enter the palace by subterfuge if I were in fact in league with Quelius? Actually, on leaving the tower, I was trapped in a broom closet for the better part of half an hour by four palace guardsmen playing a surreptitious game of chance. When they were called away to attend a disturbance in the ballroom, I followed."
"And another thing: I've been thinking about that sudden trip to Thallathlone—wings and all. Not your doing, I suppose?"
"Oh, that. Pray forgive me, lad. At that point I was under the not unwarranted impression that you were Quelius' dupe. I employed a sophisticated little device which should have phased you back into what I assumed was your natural Locus—namely, Central. But naturally, since you were in fact the O'Leary ego, from Colby Corners, occupying the Zorro body—native to Artesia—the coordinates I used had the effect of switching you right out of the base-plane of the continuum. But I did keep tabs on you, and make contact as soon as you phased back in, you must concede that."
"All right—that's all gravy over the tablecloth now. What about this Quelius?"
"Ah, yes. Quelius. He planned his operation with care—but right at the beginning he made a slip. His original intention was to displace my ego into the body of a prize hog, and store my body—as well as his own—the Lom body, occupied by the mind of a pig—in a stasis tank for future use; but I was able to effect a last-second baffle and shunt my ego into his corpus, while the pig-mind occupied my unconscious body. You see?"
"No. And where was he in the meantime?"
"Oh, Quelius assumed the identity of a chap who happened along. Just as a stopgap, you understand. His real objective was to exchange identities with you."
"You mean—that wasn't really the Red Bull I met at the Axe and Dragon?"