Sister Ships and Alastair - Chapter 7

7. Cliff Richard for Eurovision

Cleo had been marched into the cell wearing a blindfold; she had no idea where in the base she was. Most of the marching had been uphill, up metal steps. Most of the intervening floors had also sounded like metal. The holding cell was a steel box, apparently welded together from individual plates. Cleo had entered it through a steel door. There was a single bunk; the bunk had virtually no padding, and its one and only blanket had hooks and eyes to fasten it down over the bunk's occupant. Cleo wondered if the hooks and eyes were there to restrain prisoners. She felt almost certain she would be able to struggle free of them, though her muscles, of course, were stronger. She had been born on Earth. Yes - that had to be it. The cell had evidently been built to house colonials from low gravity planets. Looking up, she saw a spare blanket hooked-and-eyed to a storage shelf on the ceiling. Oddly, it looked far too high to reach.
Besides the bunk, there was a single dim lightbulb, protected from Cleo by a cage. The cell wall graffiti, scratched into the metal, seemed to stop at CLIFF RICHARD FOR EUROVISION. Cleo had the impression the cell had not been used for a long time. She was not sure whether this was encouraging news or not.
The cell smelt of burnt insulation. It was also cold. At first it had been simply cool, a welcome underground cool after the heat of a summer day. Then she had begun holding her arms close to her body to keep in the heat, and finally she had started shivering in earnest. The cold was almost certainly deliberate, an attempt to soften her up before interrogation. Cleo had been interrogated before, and was beginning to feel like an old hand at it.
She began passing the time by imagining a place far, far better. It would be in Cornwall. No, it would be on a Caribbean island. No; it would be a magic place that floated on a cloud. It would be accessible only by a rainbow bridge from the top of the highest mountain. All right, a suitably high mountain. A mountain above cloud level. This was her daydream, why not? It would be in the shape of a castle. A fairytale castle, halfway between château and cathedral, not some draughty mediaeval fortress with walls fifteen feet thick and rooms four feet across. It would have flue chimneys, and underfloor heating, and plumbing. The water would be heated by dragon. There would be a big friendly dragon down in the utility room, obligingly breathing on the boiler. He would be fed maidens, who would be specially selected by Cleo from among girls she didn't like at school. He would eat them feet first so they were forced to watch the whole process -
The cell door opened, and a man flew into the room. He had flown in on the end of a guard's boot. He was short, fat, white, and had a bad moustache. He was sweating heavily, and his trousers were hanging so low that the crack of his backside was visible. Despite this, he turned round and yelled to the guard, "YOU CAN'T KEEP ME IN HERE WITHOUT TRIAL! I GOT RIGHTS!"
The steel door slammed in his face.
He sank down on the bunk next to Cleo.
"You haven't got rights", said Cleo. "Not as far as they're concerned. It's no concern to them whether you live or die."
The new prisoner shook his head. "They won't kill me."
"What makes you so sure?"
He pulled out the waistband of his trousers. "They took my belt. Scared I'd hang myself with it. The tie, too. I know how it works, I used to be a copper."
"What are you now?"
He looked round the walls and grinned mirthlessly. "A prisoner, I guess. But normally, I'm a private investigator." He extended a hand. "Karg's the name. Hammond Karg."
Karg's hand was wet and sweaty; it was like shaking hands with offal. "Pleased to meet you, Mr. Karg. I believe you have a blue Renault. Why were you following Ant?"
Karg's face went crimson. "Sorry about that. Wasn't sure whether or not you'd spotted me. Those other chaps, they were following Anthony too, of course...they were really annoyed when I broke up their operation. Very professional. Very unobtrusive. Special Branch or Intelligence Service, I've no doubt."
"Guess again", said Cleo. This drove the colour from Mr. Karg's face.
"Er - who are they, then?"
"What would be the point in having a secret intelligence service that everyone knew existed?" said Cleo sweetly.
"I understand", said Karg. "Top secret. Above top secret."
"Why were you following Ant?" said Cleo again.
"Um, a routine custody case", said Mr. Karg. "Anthony's mother wants proof that his father's not caring properly for him - not feeding him properly, letting him drink and take drugs and so on. I do a lot of that sort of stuff. Shinning up trees and taking photos through bedroom windows, going through rubbish bins and so forth."
Cleo looked at Karg in the utmost disgust. "You do that? For a job?"
Mr. Karg fidgeted uncomfortably. "It's a job", he said. "It's a necessary function in modern society. Who would you have do it, some untrained numpty who just likes opening other people's letters, or a skilled professional? So, these people, do they work for our lot, or for, you know, the other side?"
"Mr. Karg", said Cleo, "it is apparent to me that you have absolutely no idea who the other side are."
"Try me", said Mr. Karg. "Hit me with the info."
"The people on the other side of that door are a secret branch of the World Wildlife Fund devoted to hunting down and capturing werewolves", said Cleo with a face of the utmost truth and sincerity. This shut Mr. Karg up for several seconds. Then he said:
"So, have they captured any yet? Werewolves, I mean?"
Cleo grinned as widely as her mouth was capable. Mr. Karg twitched nervously and edged slightly further down the bunk.
"No, no, that's not true. You're pulling my chain."
"Why isn't that true, Hammond? Do you really think all werewolves are big hairy white men?"
"Did you come here on your own?" said Karg, eager to change the subject. "Nobody knows I'm here. If anyone knows you're here and they get you out, you got to tell them about me. Nobody's coming for me."
Cleo grew bored of pretending to be a werewolf. "I came here with some friends. Don't worry. They'll get me out. I can rely on them." She wished she were as confident as she sounded.
"Where are they now?" said Karg. "Did the, uh, World Wildlife Fund get them?"
Cleo shook her head. "We got into the base by reprogramming the robosheep. Ant and Lieutenant Turpin are still in Robosheep Control. Lieutenant Farthing's still in the base somewhere. I hope she escapes."
"Where do you think she'll hide?" said Karg, apparently unsurprised at the mention of the words 'Robosheep Control'.
"I'm not sure", said Cleo, growing steadily more nervous of this line of questioning. "Why are you interested?"
"Just passing the time", said Karg innocently. "We might be in here for a while -"
He was interrupted by what sounded like the lightbulb. A tinny electronic voice hissed from the light fitting, and said: "All right, Mr. Karg, that will be enough. You've overplayed your hand. At least we now know where two of them are hiding, and that the third is still inside the base. The Highwayman captured alive! Now that really would be something."
The voice was Drague's. On hearing it, Karg nodded and rose to his feet; the cell door opened, and guards ushered him out. The cell door banged shut again.
"Dear me, Miss Shakespeare", said the light fitting, "that really wans't up to your usual high standard, was it? The in-cell interrogation trick is really very, very old. It's said that Hiero, the tyrant of Syracuse, used to deliberately put his prisoners in a cell with a tiny hole in the wall at which he would listen to them talking among themselves..."
Cleo sat ashen with shock.
"You're right", she said. "And it isn't as if I haven't been interrogated before."
"Really? It can't have been me. I'm sure I would have remembered."
"The Russians", said Cleo. "They were very persuasive."
"Pah! Mere amateurs. They understand nothing but the infliction of physical pain. True interrogation is an art form. Pain can be part of it, it's true, but pain can come in many forms. Please be so kind as to leave your cell. We're going to start in earnest now."
As the lightbulb spoke, the steel door swung open on its massive hinges to reveal the corridor outside. Two guards still flanked the way out.
"The door at the end of the hall", said the lightbulb. "I'll be there shortly. I have some business to attend to. There is a water cooler, and I have arranged sandwiches. We are not barbarians. Do you like egg and cress?"
Cleo did not bother to reply, but left the cell. The guards made no attempt to stop her.
***
Pete was sitting at the Ovine Telemetry screen, Ant and Lieutenant Turpin watching him on either side. Lieutenant Farthing's Personal Orgonizer lay on Turpin's lap. The screen in front of Pete said:
EXPORTING TO SHEEP
Pete sat back slowly and deliberately in his chair, aware that his every movement was being followed by Ant and Turpin as intently as a dog might follow a piece of meat.
"Saints alive", grinned Pete through nicotine-yellowed teeth, "am I that scary?"
Having been taught lying was a sin, Ant nodded. Pete burst out laughing so heartily that Ant expected him to lurch forward at any moment to seize a wrist, butt into a head, poke fingers in an eye. But Pete did none of those things.
"The lights on the console are pretty", said Wise from the floor behind Turpin. Turpin continued to watch Pete, his hand on the grip of the Orgonizer.
"You shouldn't worry about little me", said Pete. "What harm could I do to you?" He winked at Turpin.
"I feel like giving everyone a great big hug", announced Wise. Turpin's eyes stayed on Pete. The screen had now stopped EXPORTING TO SHEEP, and was now showing the contents of the Sheep Aggression Matrix. ALLSHEEP was currently set to 1.
"You might as well", said Pete. "Tie my hands again, I mean. You were thinking of doing that, weren't you?"
Just as Pete said those words, Wise leapt from the floor behind Turpin and gave him a great big hug round the throat.
Ant was too shocked to move. Turpin's voice gurgled in his throat, unable to escape. Pete dived for Turpin's legs.
"- teach YOU to inflict ecstasy on me -" Ant heard Wise yell. Turpin was sagging in Wise's arms. Pete was using Turpin's legs as levers to turn him over and sit on his back while Wise strangled him.
Ant seized up a weapon from the top of the console and trained it helplessly on the three writhing men. It was apparent that if he fired, he would almost certainly hit some part of Turpin.
Despairingly, he turned to the keyboard, leaned on the zero key, EXPORTed TO SHEEP, turned the weapon on the console and pulled the trigger. The weapon hissed in his hands, flames billowing out of the holes in the side of its barrel, and the console exploded in a shower of sparks, plastic keys, and acrid black smoke.
He turned to see whether this had distracted anybody. The result was surprising. Behind him, everybody was laughing. Wise was slapping his knees in merriment, Pete was rolling on the floor crying with laughter, and Turpin was lying on his back chortling at the ceiling, spinning the Personal Orgonizer round one finger.
"You thought the effect hadn't worn off!" guffawed Wise at Turpin, "but it had!"
"He was looking at me the whole time!" roared Pete. "But he should have been looking at you!"
Turpin held up the Orgonizer. "I shot you both through myself!" he smaned. "It's a sonic weapon! It projects sound waves! Sound travels through solid objects!"
Pete laughed so loud he hugged his insides to stop them bursting out. "When all this wears off, I'm going to be so mad I'm going to bang my head against the wall!"
"Bang his head against the wall!" chuckled Wise, slapping Turpin on the back. "Bang his head against the wall!"
"You're going to have to get me out of here", tittered Turpin to Ant, "before we all come round, or they're both going to kill me!"
"Kill you!" guffawed Wise, collapsing backwards with the sheer hilarity of the situation.
"Bang my head against the wall!" chuckled Pete cheerily. "Bang my head against the wall!" He banged his head against the wall. When his head came back, it was still smiling. "Bang my head against the wall!" He banged his head against the wall again.
Turpin laughed and pointed at the blood jetting from Pete's head. "You're going to have to drag me out of here!" he shrieked. "He's trying to kill the effect with pain!"
"Bang my head against the wall!" yelled Pete. "Bang my head against the wall! Oh, lordy!"
Ant put down the rocket rifle, grabbed Mr. Turpin's leg, and began dragging him out of the room with difficulty.
"Ha ha ha!" yelled Turpin. "That hurts!"
"Ho ho ho!" yelled Pete. "I'm going to want to kill you so bad once this wears off!"
"Of course", giggled Lieutenant Turpin, "you could just shoot him dead." Both Pete and Wise found this hilarious and laughed until they had to bite their lips till they bled to stop the hilarity.
Ant's mobile phone buzzed in his pocket. Furious at the interruption, he stopped dragging Lieutenant Turpin, pulled out the phone and examined it. His face fell.
The phone said: This is a pre-texted message! All is lost! We have been captured! Save yourselves! Luv n hugs, Cleo XXXX
Ant's hand shook on the phone. Setting his jaw, he put the phone away and recommenced the painful process of moving Lieutenant Turpin. Turpin's head hit the doorstep as Ant dragged him right out of the house. He found this incredibly funny. Close by was the nearest in the line of cars, a gigantic, ancient night-black saloon. Ant dragged Lieutenant Turpin towards it. Somewhere there would be keys. The cars had all been valet-parked by the same person. They were too straight in their boxes. And the place a lazy parking valet would put the keys was...
Ant opened the door of the saloon, flipped down the sun visor, and caught the keys before they hit the seat.
The difficult part was going to be getting Lieutenant Turpin into the passenger seat. And convincing the police he was over seventeen if they spotted a car being driven by someone whose head barely cleared the steering wheel. He thanked heaven his dad had given him highly illegal driving lessons.
Now - cars had fewer gears than trucks, didn't they? And the car wouldn't bend obligingly in the middle as he reversed it round corners. He'd have to be ready for that. He couldn't see down and around him at all either - small children and dwarfs would be crushed if he didn't lean out of the window to check they weren't scurrying under his wheels. And the car's mirrors looked barely larger than the ones his dentist used to check his molars.
Heart thrumming in his chest, he began dragging Turpin into the car.
***
The interrogation room was quite cosy. There was a table, on which biscuits and sandwiches had been placed as promised. Cleo had not touched either. There was also, as promised, a water cooler. Cleo had not drunk anything from the water cooler.
There was a comfy sofa, and a metal stool. These faced each other over a desk table. A flexible lamp faced the comfy sofa. Clearly, thought Cleo, the comfy sofa was intended to seat the person being interrogated, who would thus be put at a psychologically important lower level than the interrogator, who would sit on the deceptively uncomfortable stool. The desk light would then be shone in the eyes of whoever had been foolish enough to sit on the sofa.
There was also a tape recorder and, for some unaccountable reason, a rubber plant. On past performance, Cleo suspected the rubber plant to be bugged, or possibly to be some sort of killer robot masquerading as a rubber plant. She avoided it.
It was a long time before Mr. Drague came in. When he did, he was holding the device Cleo had been dreading - a small box the size of a TV remote control. A green light was flashing on its upper surface.
"Ah, so you've seen one of these before", said Drague. "Good, that avoids the banality of having to explain its function and prove to you that it works."
"It's a lie detector", said Cleo. "I know it works. Don't worry, I'm not going to tell you any lies."
"I certainly hope not." Drague sat down on the sofa, looked up at Cleo, seemed to realize Cleo was sitting on a higher level than him, and flipped open the arm of the sofa to reveal a control console. Idly, he selected a button and pressed it; the sofa rose a quarter metre into the air. Now looking down on Cleo, he unfolded a set of papers on the tabletop, put down the lie detector with its green light winking, and turned the desk lamp round so it faced in Cleo's direction. Then he cleared his throat and said:
"Testing Testing 1-2-3. The Pope Is Catholic. The Moon Is A Balloon." The lights on the lie detector winked green and red in quick succession.
"Excellent", said Drague, and smiled. "Green for truth, red for lies, you see. So! Cleopatra Nefertiti Shakespeare. Born Chatham, Kent, on the thirty-first of October, 1986, to proud parents Leonard and Letitia. Four feet eleven inches tall. School prizes in fashion studies, information technology, and history, fashion studies three years running, very impressive. Waistline twenty-seven inches, collar size fourteen, dress size eight. Mobile phone number 07866 475165. Website favourites last month: IJUSTCAN'TGETIT STRAIGHT.com (A How-To Guide For Owners Of Afro-Caribbean Hair), 81 hits; Orbital Dynamics for Newbies, 53 hits, Russian for Beginners, 30 hits, and Rate My Fuzzy Wuzzy Noo Noo (an interactive appreciation of the Persian Cat), 1,178 hits. Sister Tamora Athena, one family pet, ginger tom named Tailrings, Persian of course, weight seven kilos." Drague looked up dourly from Cleo's file. "Your cat is overweight."
Cleo felt her skin crawling on her bones as if it were trying to escape and leave her skeleton to face the music. "Inspired guesswork", she lied.
Drague raised his eyebrows, put on a pair of glasses with great deliberation, and said:
"Page thirty-three of your diary: 'Lieutenant Turpin is evil, but at the same time smoking hot like Satan. I must resist his influence.' "
Cleo's cheeks went smoking hot like Satan. "I take your point."
Drague took off his glasses, though Cleo was aware the glasses could go back on at any time. "You see, Cleopatra, we have a wealth of information on you. We have been observing you for quite some time."
"My watch", said Cleo. "You've been tracking me using my watch. Lieutenant Farthing said it was radioactive. She made me take it off."
"Very perceptive of the pair of you", smiled Mr. Drague. "You have no idea how much trouble we had intercepting that watch at the jeweller's, and getting the right changes made to it. Don't worry, the amount of radiation really was very small. You'd have had to wear it for around ten thousand years to be at any significant risk of cell mutation. It was only a trick of fate that prevented us from tracking the signal in your watch to your rebel confederates' ship earlier on today. You see, unfortunately, the tracker handsets we have only have a range of around a kilometre. Once you lost my bungling minions by turning off the motorway - something they evidently hadn't considered you might try - they had to cast about for quite a while to pick up your trail again. But now, of course, all is well. You've kindly made us aware of the locations of Mr. Turpin and Miss Farthing, and we'll bring them in. Make no mistake - we will bring them in. Which leaves us with the question - well, let's call it Question Number One, I have simply dozens - where is their ship?"
Cleo stared sullenly back across the table. "If you're so certain you can bring them in, why do you need to know where their ship is?"
"Their ship is stolen property, Miss Shakespeare. It belongs to the Crown."
Cleo's teeth showed in an unexpected grin. "You know, you have no idea just how right and how wrong that statement is."
More wrinkles than usual split Drague's face. "I'm sorry, I don't understand. Please explain."
"I don't have to explain. If I'm a civilian, I have rights. You can only keep me locked up here for twenty-four hours without charging me, which has to be done through the courts and allow me access to a lawyer. And if I'm a soldier, all I have to do is give you my name, rank and number."
"Interesting." Drague's ancient-looking fountain pen poised itself over a memo pad. "What is your rank?"
"That's not the point! The point is that I have a legal right to remain silent! Which I am exercising!"
Drague smirked. "Not very well, it seems."
"I can be silent any time I like", said Cleo huffily.
In order to prove this, she sat quiet for several seconds.
"I could be silent all day. You might not get a peep out of me till the end of this interrogation", she said.
"Dear me. What would the folks on your home planet think of you then?"
"This is my home planet", said Cleo.
"You know which home planet I mean", said Drague.
"Gondolin?" said Cleo.
"Thank you", said Drague, and wrote down 'GONDOLIN' on his memo pad. "So you're working for Drummond. And of course he has an intelligence officer assigned to him by the US Zed, an American fellow who will have given you your orders. So what were your orders in coming here? Sabotage? Theft of nuclear materials? I know the man; that would be his style."
"You've got it all wrong", said Cleo. "Captain Yancy only sent us here to check up on you. The US Zed are scared you're going to do something you'll both regret. You're sending cobalt weapons out to the front line."
"Are we?" said Drague innocently, writing down 'YANCY' on his memo pad. "I hardly even notice these things." The lie detector winked red. "I'd find it most surprising if Yancy had sent just one ship." The lie detector switched back to green.
"Be surprised", said Cleo. "There's only one ship." Drague nodded and wrote down ONLY ONE SHIP. "My men reported the takeoff of a single armed fighter of unidentified type at the safari park", he said. "This surprises me. I would have expected a utility ship like the one Turpin came in last time - nothing larger could get through our defences, and all the USZ's fighters are two-seaters. Besides, Gondolin would hardly send a Bulge class strike ship for a four-man reconnaissance mission -"
"Gondolin has no Bulge class ships", said Cleo. "It has one Revere class cruiser, as you're perfectly well aware."
"Quite so, now", said Drague solemnly, writing down GONDOLIN - 1 REVERE CLASS CRUISER on the memo pad. Then he put the top on his pen, folded his arms contentedly, and said:
"Well now. Gondolin. The Thirteenth Star on the US Zed flag. The mysterious secret colony. The place we don't know how to find. The only US Zed base we couldn't annihilate if we wanted." He grinned widely. "How terrible it would be, how absolutely awful, if we had just discovered its location. We could snuff out the entire US Zed fleet just like THAT." He clicked bony fingers.
Cleo looked down in horror. The lie detector was still winking green.
"Now, Cleo", said Drague. "I'll call you Cleo, because only people you hate call you Cleopatra, and I am your friend. Your supposed new friends from Gondolin are, legally, nothing more than fugitives from British and American military justice. And I can sit here all day asking you questions and writing down what I think your answers are based on the output from this damned contraption." He tapped the lie detector with the pen. "But, don't you know, this machine is fallible. I know this because I've been beating it, in a sense, for the last twenty minutes or so. I find it a very useful interrogation tool not because it provides me with perfect proof that what my interrogation subject is saying is true, but because when I say things to the subject, the subject is prone to look down at the lie detector and blindly trust that what I am saying is true. I have, you see, for much of the last half hour, been lying through my teeth. Whereas you have just told me that your US Zed home planet is Gondolin, that Gondolin's US Zed intelligence attaché is a Captain Yancy, and that Gondolin is only protected by a single Revere class cruiser. You know the number of people I've ever interrogated who've actually ever been to Gondolin? Zero, Miss Shakespeare. You're the first."
For what it was worth, the lie detector flashed green. Cleo looked at the device as if it were the devil himself.
"Don't blame the machine", said Drague. "It's just that isn't very bright. A human being is a far better liar and a far better lie detector. And I know a way to get far better information out of you than I have been getting so far."
Cleo realized her hand was trembling. She grabbed hold of it with her other hand to stop it.
"Relax, Miss Shakespeare. I did explain before that physical pain is a clumsy tool at best. It encourages people to make up anything they think the interrogator wants to hear just to make the pain stop. And that is hardly what we want, now, is it?"
He moved Cleo's file aside to reveal another four files - two extremely thick, one thinner, one very thin indeed. He cleared his throat.
"First file - Leonard Toussaint Shakespeare. Born Kingston, Jamaica, 1956. Left school Bletchley, Buckinghamshire, 1972. Wheeltapper, British Rail Engineering Limited, Wolverton, Buckinghamshire, 1972. Shop steward, National Union of Wheeltappers, British Rail Engineering, Wolverton, 1977-82. East Anglian Area representative, NUW union congress, 1983-93. Graduate in law, University of East Anglia, 1991 - course funded by the National Union of Wheeltappers. President of the National Union of Wheeltappers, 1994 to the present day. School governor. Amateur dramatist. Member of the All Saints' Church Bellringing Committee. Second file - Letitia Floribunda Shakespeare, née Sebastian, born Brixton, London, 1958. Conservative councillor, Abingsley Ward, Northampton Borough Council, 2001 to the present day. Third file, Tamora Shakespeare, born Northampton 1989. Schoolgirl. Captain, under elevens school hockey, 1999-2000. Stated ambitions: To be the very latest an greatest, innit." He glanced up meaningfully before opening the final folder. "Tailrings, born Northampton 1996. Cat. Ginger Persian. Parents - Heironymous Fortescue Simply Superfluous Fur Explosion of Mount Pleasant and Princess Celestia Cutie-Wutie Love Muffin The Third of Fluffy Acres. Occupations - lying in the back garden. Mousing."
Cleo was trembling with rage rather than fear now, and making no attempt to hide it.
"Don't you dare hurt my cat", she said.
"I take it, then", said Drague, removing, breathing on and polishing his glasses, "that we can hurt your parents?"
"Or my parents. Or even my sister. I'll track you down", said Cleo. "I'll hone myself into a living weapon. I'll do weights. I won't rest until I have drunk your blood."
Drague nodded. "I believe you, I believe you. Though I wouldn't drink my blood if I were you - anaemia, you know. And I repeat - I have absolutely no intention at this juncture of physically hurting your parents, or grandparents, or goldfish. I only ask you to imagine this - what would happen to your father if he found himself suddenly persona non grata with his union? With the people who have supported him, paid his way, educated him, provided him with every start he's had in life? It only takes one complaint, however unfounded, one whisper in the ear of a senior official. And your mother - how would she feel, I wonder, if she suddenly found herself no longer welcome in her political party? A discreet press release to an unscrupulous newspaper, allegations of financial wrongdoing - maybe even an aggressive audit by Her Majesty's Internal Revenue? Perhaps someone might use her credit card number - which, by the way, is written down here - and PIN number - written down here - to wreak havoc with her finances. Of course, nobody would actually get hurt. Not physically. But pain comes in many forms, Cleopatra."
Cleo sat staring at Drague in powerless rage. The lie detector continued to flash green.
"So", said Mr. Drague, "you appear to have a choice. Do you continue to work for the US Zed, and watch your family collapse around you, or do you work for us, while working for the US Zed? We can make it worth your while. All the Persian cats, new frocks, and latest-generation mobile telephones you can handle. I know how the female mind works. Exactly the same way as the male mind, only in pink."
He fished in his pocket and put down a device on the table. It looked like a mobile phone.
"It's a mobile phone", said Mr. Drague. "Using it, you will be able to talk to us on any world on which our intelligence network has a presence. That is to say, Earth, Alpha Four, the American colonies and a surprising number of the Russian ones. Send us texts rather than telephoning us - it uses less bandwidth."
Cleo looked at the phone in suspicion. "Won't they know?"
"How would they know? They don't know a mobile phone from a TV remote control, the poor dear things. It will also work as an ordinary mobile telephone, you understand. The only difference is that there is one address in your contacts list that cannot be deleted. It is called BEST FRIEND. If you call it, we will hear you. We will also know your location, no matter where you are on the planet. The phone may grow rather hot in the process. Don't worry about this - the phone is just using more power than it normally would. We will also know if the phone is destroyed, and will of course take this as an indication that we have no deal."
"I can tell you now", said Cleo, "that we have no deal."
"Fine", said Mr. Drague. "Keep the phone anyway. Opinions can change." He pushed the phone over the table. "You don't have to use it."
Cleo stared at the phone. It was quite a beautiful phone, smooth and rounded as a wave-worn pebble.
"All right", she said. "But I'm telling you again, we have no deal."
"Of course we don't", said Mr. Drague pleasantly.
Cleo took the phone and pocketed it. Then alarms went off fit to shake the teeth out of her head.