Galactic Medal of Honor

IX

Colonel Donal Mathers returned to North America on a Space Service supersonic jet. He could have made it considerably quicker on one of the rocket shuttle craft, but he was in no hurry. He had gotten in with four or five fleet admirals and commodores and they continued the bust, which had started in Paris, all the way to Bost-Wash.

The past eight or ten days—Don had lost count—had been one long prolonged lost weekend. It had begun, of course, there in Geneva but then, one morning, he had awakened in the Nouveau Ritz in Paris. The new Ritz was situated in the same location as the old, on the Place Vendome, and Napoleon the First still graced the top of the pillar in the square’s center. Not that Don would have known; he had never been in Paris before.

When he awakened that day, it couldn’t be called morning, it was to shakily reach out for the bottle of Anti-Ale which he had taken to leaving on the bedside table. He shook out two of them—it took two these days, rather than the prescribed one—and looked for a carafe of water. There wasn’t any. Muttering profanity, he got up and staggered to the bathroom. There was drinking water there, of course, and he shakily poured a glass and washed down his two pills.

Still feeling like death, he wavered into the bathroom and to one of the windows. It overlooked the Place Vendome, which he didn’t recognize, not even recalling ever having seen pictures of it. He thought that possibly he was somewhere in Italy.

Anti-Ale is quick-acting. It had to be. It was customarily taken when the patient felt he was on the verge of hangover oblivion.

The furniture of the living room was Louis the Fourteenth. Not that Don knew, or cared. It looked ornately uncomfortable to him. Something like Lawrence Demming’s Swiss chalet penthouse, on top of the Interplanetary Lines Building in Center City. A damn museum setting.

He made his way over to the desk and was gratified to find a modern TV phone screen there.

He flicked it on and when the face of a very polite young man appeared, said, “Where in the hell am I?”

The other blinked and hesitated a moment before answering in complete detail. “You are in the Royal Suite of the Nouveau Ritz Hotel, in the City of Paris, in the area which was once known as France, in Europe, mon Colonel.”

Don Mathers closed his eyes, the hangover not quite completely killed. “Oh, I am, eh?”

“Oui, mon Colonel.”

“Speak English, damn it,” Don growled, though what the other had said was obviously quite clear.

“Yes, Colonel Mathers. Is there some manner in which I could serve you?”

“Yeah. Send up a lot of breakfast. Oh, just a minute. Is there an autobar in this damn suite?”

“Yes, Colonel Mathers. It is disguised in the, ah, buffet to your immediate right.”

Don flicked off the screen and went over to the buffet. Sure enough, part of the top lifted to reveal an elaborate autobar. He dialed a Bloody Mary, with a double shot of vodka, and stood there, still a bit shakily, until the bottom of the delivery area sank to return with the drink. He took it up and returned to the window to stare out.

So this was Paris. All his life he had wanted to see Paris.

But what had been his immediate idea of coming here? He couldn’t remember. The last thing he could recall, with any clarity at all, was a fantastic party. He couldn’t even remember who had thrown it. There had been a lot of media people there, but as fellow guests, rather than at work. There had been some fellow Space Service officers, of higher ranks, and, oh yes, there had been several celebrities from the entertainment world. One in particular, the reigning sex symbol of the Tri-Di musical comedies these days.

He closed his eyes and shook his head in an effort to achieve clearer memory. As he recalled, she wasn’t nearly as beautifully sexy in person as she was on lens. However, he couldn’t waste the opportunity. He had spent some time in bed with her. During the party, or after? He was damned if he could remember.

But why in the hell had he come to Paris, and, for that matter, how had he gotten here? The first part of the question finally came to him, but he never did find out the second.

When he had ordered a lot of breakfast, they had taken him at his word. None of this Continental breakfast nonsense, croissants and butter and marmalade and coffee. They brought him every type of breakfast known in the West—and some items from the Orient, for all he knew. Ham, bacon and sausage, all of various types. Eggs a half dozen ways. Cereals. Various types of toast and muffins. Kidneys, kippers and finnan haddie, British style. Caviar, smoked sturgeon and salmon and other Zukouski, Russian style. Cheeses and cold meats, Dutch style. Herring on ice with chives and sour cream sauce, smoked eel and smoked reindeer tongues, Scandinavian style. It had taken three waiters, accompanied by a captain, to wheel it all in.

What the hell did they think he was, a squadron?

The waiters hovered about, but he dismissed them, after giving the captain an autograph. He went on back to the autobar and, in view of the fact that he had finished the Bloody Mary, dialed an ice cold double aquavit. He put that down and returned to the food.

Long since, in his drinking career, he had learned to get plenty of food into his stomach before going into the next day of a binge. And he had every intention of continuing this particular binge.

By the time he had finished breakfast, the day was waning.

He went on back into the bedroom in which he had slept—he was to find later that there were three bedrooms in the Royal Suite—and looked around. His clothes were strewn about on the floor. He had been wearing one of his colonel’s uniforms.

The hell with that. He went back to the living room and to the phone screen, called the desk and told, them he wanted some clothes. The obsequious sycophant on the screen gushingly assured him that representatives of the men’s shop would be up immediately.

After he had flicked off the screen, he looked at it for a moment and wondered what would happen if somewhere along here someone actually presented him with a bill. He doubted if he had enough credits in the data banks to pay for a fraction of the tab he was running up in this place.

Hell, they could sue him. That’d be a laugh. How could you sue a holder of the Galactic Medal of Honor? He was getting used to just what that meant.

Eventually bathed, shaved and dressed, he got himself another drink and with it went over to the window and stared out again. It was dark. Why in the hell had he come to Paris?

And then it came back to him.

That, conversation he’d had with Harry Amanroder, proprietor of the Nuevo Mexico Bar. The discussion about Colin Casey.

After he’d gotten his clothing requirements ironed out, he left the suite and found an elevator. To his surprise, it was manned by a live operator. This was really taking ostentation to the ultimate. On the face of it, the Europeans- didn’t carry automation to the point they did in America. Admittedly, the operator was beyond military age, but still, if he was willing to work, why wasn’t he in some defense job he could handle? Well, it was no skin off Don Mathers’ nose. As soon as he could swing it, on a permanent basis, he wasn’t going to be working either—ever again. He’d done his share, hadn’t he? He was on record as having destroyed a Kraden cruiser.

He still didn’t know how he had gotten to Paris, but evidently the fact wasn’t known to either the news people or the man in the street. He passed through the lobby unrecognized. It would seem that the staff of the Nouveau Ritz was discreet; they knew who he was, but they weren’t talking.

He told the doorman to summon a cab and within moments a hovercab was there. It wasn’t automated but boasted a cabby. When Don climbed in and the driver looked back over his shoulder and his eyes widened.

Don said, “Do you understand English?”

“Oui, mon Colonel. What is your destination, mon Colonel?”

So. He was recognized. Not that it was particularly important with a hovercab driver.

Don said, “I have heard that Paris boasts the most fabulous bordellos in the world. What is the most, uh, extravagant of them all?”

The driver gaped at him. “Bordello! Pour Monsieur? But mon Colonel, you need but go to the most exclusive nightclub or bar in Paris and——”

“I know, I know,” Don said impatiently. “But I have always heard of the bordellos of this city and would like to witness one. What is the most famous?”

The cabby’s shrug was pure Gallic. He said, “Undoubtedly, Le Chat Noir, the Black Cat, Monsieur le Colonel.”

“Then that’s it.”

They took off in wild Parisian fashion, and shortly crossed the Seine to the Left Bank after passing through the Place de la Concorde with its famed obelisk. The driver was obviously glum about their destination.

They turned left on the Boulevard Saint-Germain, turned right again on a side street and came to a halt before a rather large private house, the doorway of which was only dimly lit.

“Le Chat Noir,” the driver said, still disapprovingly.

Don reached for his Universal Credit Card and said, “Where’s the payment slot? I’ve never been in a French cab before.”

The other said with dignity, “Not in my taxi, mon Colonel. A holder of the Galactic Medal of Honor does not pay in my taxi. I lost a son, mon Colonel, when the Honneur de France blew when in orbit about Saturn two years ago.”

“Oh,” Don said. “Sorry. I remember hearing about it at the time.” He hadn’t, actually, but what could you say? He said, “Thanks, citizen.”

“C’est rien,” the cabby said. “It is nothing. But mon Colonel, are you sure you are safe here, all alone?”

Don said, his voice slurring slightly as a result of his accumulated drinking and the several he’d had in his suite, “My friend, I am beginning to suspect I am safe anywhere.”

The driver looked back at him, “Do not be so sure, Monsieur le Colonel. Not even our Lord Jesus was safe everywhere. Without doubt, there will be some imbeciles who would tear you down.”

Don was to remember his words later.

He got out of the cab, heard it take off behind him, looked at the door and grinned. “Here we go,” he muttered to himself. “What can they do that you can’t get elsewhere and for free?”

There was no identity screen on the door but it opened upon his approach.

He was greeted by the most improbably dressed woman he could offhand ever remember having seen. She wasn’t unattractive, in spite of the fantastic amount of makeup, and appeared to be a chemical blonde of about forty-five. Her wasp-waisted red dress was of another century, her breasts all but bursting out of it, her rear, well bustled.

She began to greet him, then squinted and frowned. She said finally, “Bienvenu, Monsieur.”

He followed her into an ornate sitting room and then realized the wherefore of her costume. The room was done in the decor of the Victorian period, well over a century ago. And it came to him that was the period of the famed houses of ill repute. You supposedly had to go back to the days of Babylon to equal them.

Recognition had evidently come to her, but she didn’t indicate it in her words. She hesitated, momentarily, then said, in English, “If Monsieur will be seated, we will join you shortly.”

Don shrugged inwardly and took a seat on a settee, which visually was one of the most baroque pieces of furniture he had ever witnessed. It wasn’t the most comfortable upon which he had ever sat, either.

She left, for a moment, and then returned, smiling. She said, “Would Monsieur desire a drink… before?”

Before what? he wondered, but said, “Why not?”

“Cognac?”

“Cognac sounds wonderful.”

She had evidently ordered it already, since an aged servant in the costume of a nineteenth century flunky entered with a tray supporting two glasses and a squat bottle covered with dust. It was still corked and the servant, his face stolid, proceeded to open it with an old-fashioned corkscrew.

The glasses were the traditional snifter glasses, meant only for the appropriate brandy.

The woman took hers up and said, “Cheers. And, ah, what do you Americans say? What spins?”

Don tried to arise to the occasion. “My head,” he said, lifting his own glass to answer the toast.

She was immediately distressed. “You are ill?”

He grinned at her sourly. “Not exactly. I have been celebrating.”

She took a sip of her brandy and said approvingly, “And who has a better right?”

So, he was right, she did recognize him. He tried his. In actuality, Don Mathers had never been in a whorehouse before. They were an unknown in Center City; much too much amateur competition. The brandy was excellent. Not as good as what he had in the penthouse gardens of Lawrence Demming, of course, but unbelievably good. Guzzle wasn’t particularly palatable these days, you drank for the effect, not the taste.

He said, “This is very good guzzle.”

She ignored the term he used and said, “It was left to me by my grandfather. There was a note attached. He said it was to await a notable occasion. My grandfather carried the Legion of Honor, the Croix de Guerre—and various other decorations.”

Don, despite being slightly drenched, tried to rise to the occasion, though in a whorehouse. He raised his glass and said, “To your grandfather and to his decorations which I am convinced he deserved manyfold.”

She smiled in gratitude, lifted her own glass in answer to the toast, but said, “They were as nothing, compared to your own decoration, Monsieur.”

She recognized him, all right. Evidently, in a Parisian bordello they pretended, even if they knew who you were, that they didn’t. At least, they didn’t use your name.

Girls began to drift into the large sitting room. And, on the face of it, they had been alerted to his identity since they were inclined to be a bit wide-eyed. They carried on the theme of the house in their dress. Some were fully clothed in much the same style as the madam. Some were in the negligee of an earlier age, some in ludicrous underwear complete to baggy bloomers, or whatever they called them.

They came in all sizes and flavors, and, by the time all had gathered, some score of them, they represented just about every type of the feminine beauty Earth produced, ranging from Sengalese ebony to the blondness of the Finns, in complexion; from overly thin to overly plump in figure; from several types of Orientals to a Black Irish girl who was possibly the most striking of all to Don’s North American taste.

They took seats around the room, or draped themselves here and there in what he assumed were meant to be seductive poses. The last to enter had him gawking at first. It was a little girl, say of eleven or twelve, and she was dressed like Alice In Wonderland of the early illustrations. It wasn’t until he saw her closer up that he realized that in spite of her stature and dress she was somewhat older than projected.

Twenty of them! he thought. Surely this place couldn’t boast any more.

He said to his hostess, “But haven’t you any other, uh, business tonight?

She smiled. “We sent them all away. The establishment is yours, exclusively.”

“Sent them away?” he said. “How could you do that without an uproar?”

She laughed in great amusement. “I had them informed, through the girls, that we were expecting a raid by the flics.”

“Flics?”

“The police. They departed hurriedly. And now, would Monsieur, perhaps, wish to see an exhibition?”

Don Mathers had never seen an exhibition, as she called it, though he had read about them in older books. Matters involving donkeys and so forth. The fact was, particularly in America, matters pornographic were becoming all but unknown. There had been a swing of the pendulum, since the all-out days of the 60s and 70s, which had accelerated after the coming of the Kradens. The booming Universal Reformed Church had taken a particularly dim view of all-out sexual freedom. The only thing that truly mattered was the defense against the extraterrestrials and frivolity was frowned upon. Don Mathers had been raised in this atmosphere and though he had never really thought it out, subconsciously revolted against other than the standard sex practices.

“I… I guess not,” he said, bolting back the remainder of his brandy.

She gave him another generous tot and said, “Perhaps Monsieur would rather just select two or three of the girls and… retire. Or perhaps Monsieur enjoys even more… at a time.”

“Two or three?” Don said blankly, taking down another healthy gulp of fine brandy which should have been treated with more appreciation. “What would I do with two or three at a time?”

One of the platinum blondes who boasted a fabulous derriere, among other attributes, shrilled a laugh and said, with a British accent, “We know tricks.”

Don cleared his throat.

The madam had a sudden inspiration and came to her feet. “Or, I know something that might intrigue Monsieur. I believe it is the only one in existence.”

Don Mathers had become somewhat overwhelmed by all of this available pulchritude. He was glad to follow her.

She led him up a flight of stairs, down a corridor which continued to maintain the Victorian decor, and to a very dimly lit bedroom.

On the bed, beneath the antique canopy, was stretched a stunningly beautiful brunette, quite nude.

Madam said, “The idea was given us by a fellow American of yours. It is based on a limerick, evidently famed in your land. It begins, There was a young man from Racine——”

Don said hurriedly, I’ve heard it.” He had carried his glass with him. He took another jolt, even as he stared. “You mean, well, that’s not a real girl?” he said.

She laughed, pleased with herself and the ingenuity of it all. “No, it is quite artificial, foam rubber and electric motors and so forth. However, it will perform ordinary, oral, or even anal sex. You would be surprised how popular it is with our clientele. They are invariably intrigued. Some will have none other.”

Don had a sour taste in his mouth. He said, “As I recall one version of the last line of the limerick was, But it was a hell of a thing to clean.”

“Oh, not at all,” she assured him hastily. “No difficulty whatsoever.”

But that had been the first night of his stay in Paris. As in Geneva earlier, one day, one night, faded into another, and finally, together with his drinking friends, who had accumulated one by one, he was on his way back to North America. It was a well-lubricated flight.

The aircraft, one of the various devoted to high echelon brass, was lavishly equipped. It even had bedrooms and baths, though none of the party took time out to either bathe or sleep. The flight wasn’t as long as all that.

Although all outranked him, and most of them considerably, Don was the focus of the party. Most of them were chairborne officers, only one or two had ever seen space duty. None had ever seen a single Kraden. Everything he said had them round-eyed.

A fleet admiral said, “Colonel Mathers, I’ve never heard a detailed account of your action. Could you give us a blow by blow description?”

Don took a pull at his drink, he seldom, these days, seemed to be without a drink in his hand and said, modestly, “Well, it all happened so fast that parts of it are blank to me.”

A commodore pressed him. “The last thing we saw from the video-tapes, you had just told your admiral that you were going in, and we could see you cocking your flakflak gun. You blanked out the screen and the scanners and the next thing we saw were the shots Commodore Franco of Monitor Task Force Three took of both the Kraden wreck and your One Man Scout. Couldn’t you fill us in?”

“Well…” Don began.

They all learned forward. One stretched forth a bottle and refilled his glass.

He said, “I came in as fast as I could and got as close as I could, figuring, I suppose, that the closer I was the more difficult it would be for them to bring their weapons to bear on me. Sometimes, I was within a meter or two of their hull.”

“Almighty Ultimate,” one of them muttered.

“On my first pass, I raked them from stern to bow. Then I flipped over—I have a suspicion it was the quickest turn in the history of the One Man Scout—and started back, raking them again.”

“Were they firing at you?” A fleet admiral broke in.

The others scowled at him for interrupting.

But Don looked at him and frowned, as though trying to remember details. “In actuality, I don’t know. I suppose so. Things were going so fast, I can’t truly remember. I came back and raked them again from bow to stern. I hadn’t the time to make out what effect my flakflak gun was having, if any. I wasn’t sure but that their defenses’ were proof against anything as puny as a short beam flakflak. At any rate, I rolled and hit them again amidships, and followed completely around the whole diameter, and over and over again. I… well, I wasn’t even aware of the fact that I’d run out of energy for the gun when Commodore Franco came up with his Monitors.”

A fleet admiral laughed huskily. “You mean you were still circling him, still firing, or trying to, with an empty gun?”

Don laughed too, as though embarrassed. “Yes, sir, I guess so. I suppose I wasn’t coordinating very well by that time.”

“Damnedest action in military history,” the commodore blurted. “It’s as though a liberty launch, armed with a machine gun, had attacked and sunk the Forrestal”

Don looked at him questioningly.

“Before your time,” the commodore said. “The Forrestal was the largest aircraft carrier of its day back when we had surface navies.”

They landed at the Octagon airport in Bost-Wash, said their goodbyes in great fellowship, and went their various ways.

Don Mathers considered only passingly going into Bost-Wash proper and continuing his celebration but then decided the hell with it. The prolonged binge was beginning to catch up with him. Instead, he took a commercial carrier to Center City, getting the usual attention. The stewardesses hovered over him, both the captain and copilot came back to shake hands, and at least a good round dozen of his fellow passengers got his autograph. He was getting used to it. He put down only a few drinks on the short trip, trying to taper off. Besides, the liquor was the standard guzzle of the day and he was already used to better things.

At the airport in Center City, he escaped the mob that gathered, got into an automated hovercab and dialed the hi-rise apartment house that contained his digs.

Once in his own mini-apartment, he looked about in contemptuous amusement. He had been gone about two weeks, but somehow it was as though it had been years. It seemed impossible that the place was this small and this sterile. He had always hated it. The thing was that before there had been no alternative, no point in a negative attitude.

He put down the small bag he had brought with him from Paris. He hadn’t bothered to pack any of the endless clothing they had supplied him with, nor any of the guzzle, save one imperial quart of the Scotch the President of the Solar System League had sent over.

It was hardly evening but he had the prolonged dissipation accumulated in him and touched the button that brought the bed from the wall, then ripped the civilian clothes he was wearing off and tossed them to a chair. He didn’t awaken until morning.

He took his time showering and shaving, then went back into his living room, returned the bed to the wall and went over to his order box. He dialed himself a space colonel’s dress uniform and for once was able to utilize his Universal Credit Card. Off hand, he couldn’t remember having used it since he’d received his medal. Not even in that cathouse in Paris. Almighty Ultimate that had been an experience. That platinum blonde hadn’t been kidding when she said they knew tricks.

Dressed, he looked about the apartment and grunted contempt. It was the last night that he’d ever spend in this miniature dump.

He left the apartment and went down to the service elevators and took one to the motor pool in the basements. He wanted to avoid meeting any other residents in the building. He was beginning to get autograph signer’s cramp in his right hand.

He summoned an auto cab and was able to get into it quickly enough to avoid more than two handshakes and one autograph. He dialed the Interplanetary Lines Building.

By the time he had covered the distance between the curb and the huge building’s entry, a small crowd had gathered and were applauding him. He grinned and waved at them, but darted inside before anyone could come up with paper and stylo.

The lobby was packed with bustling citizens to the point where nobody recognized him, which was all right with Don Mathers. He made his way over to the series of reception desks. Most of them were automated, but two boasted live girls.

The one he stopped before knew him immediately and she ogled him in surprise.

She was a cute little thing, very trim in her Interplanetary Lines uniform, which, stiff and proper though it was, failed to disguise her ripeness. She was very brunette, her black hair and brows reminding him of Dian Keramikou, her red mouth that of the German girl in Geneva, the one who was willing to put out on her honeymoon. What was her name? He couldn’t remember.

He said, “I’d like to see either or both Lawrence Demming or Maximilian Rostoff.”

She stood immediately. “I’ll personally escort you, Colonel Mathers.”

They headed for an elevator set off to one side of the public elevator banks and obviously private.

When they entered it, he grinned at her and said, “What are you doing tonight, Miss?”

Her face went pale. “Oh, anything, sir.”

He grinned again. “Maybe I’ll take you up on that if I’m not too busy.”

He had never seen anyone so taken aback. She said, all flustered, “I’m Toni… Toni Fitzgerald. You can just call this building and ask for me. Any time. Any time at all.”

“When are you off?”

“That doesn’t make any difference, Colonel Mathers.”

“Don,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to get you fired.”

“I… I mean, my supervisor wouldn’t dream of firing me, or anything else, if I was with you… Don.”

“Well, maybe we’ll get together,” he smiled. “But meanwhile, let’s see Old Man Demming.”

That took her back too. She said weakly, “Mr. Demming has been out in SanSan. I don’t know if he has returned as yet. But Mr. Rostoff is in his office.”

SanSan, the West Coast equivalent of Bost-Wash. The city currently extended from what was once San Francisco to what was once San Diego and was still expanding, north, south and east. Only the Pacific prevented it from edging west as well.

The elevator whooshed them to rarefied altitudes and they left it to emerge into a labyrinth of extensive offices, most overrunning with computers and chattering business machines, none of which Don recognized.

“This way, Colonel Mathers,” she said. “Mr. Rostoff has recently established offices in the Interplanetary Lines Building. Three floors.”

He followed her, hard put to keep his eyes from her trim buttocks which managed to sway ever so slightly, despite the stiff uniform.

She said, “I’ve applied six times for Space Service, but they won’t take me. My two brothers were lost in that collision between the Minerva and Sioux City off Pluto last year.”

Don, who was to her right and very slightly behind her said, “That’s too bad, Toni. However, the Space Service isn’t as romantic as you might think. And the name’s Don.”

“Yes, sir,” Toni Fitzgerald said, her soul in her eyes. “You ought to know… Don. Nobody will ever believe me when I tell them you told me to call you by your first name.”

Don Mathers was somehow irritated, though he didn’t know why. He said nothing further until they had reached their destination in the gigantic office building. He thanked her after she had turned him over to another receptionist.

However, his spirits had been restored by the time he was brought to the door of Max Rostoff’s private office. His new guide, as impressed as had been Toni, hadn’t even bothered to check on the interplanetary magnate’s availability before ushering Mathers into the other’s presence.

Max Rostoff looked up from his half acre of desk, looking wolfishly aggressive as ever.

He came to his feet, smiling, and extended a hand to be shaken. “Why, Colonel,” he said, turning on such charm as he could muster. “How fine to see you again. Nora, that will be all.”

Nora gave the interplanetary hero one more long worshipful look and then turned and left.

As soon as the door had closed behind her, Max Rostoff turned on his visitor and snarled, “Where have you been, you rummy son of a bitch?”