The Thief of Thoth

8

IT WAS ANOTHER potential client, a tall, saturnine aristocrat who abruptly waved off Quicksilver's protests that he was at the moment contemplating undertaking a commission. The caller's counter argument was persuasively eloquent. In a gruff, clipped voice he flatly offered one million munits if Quicksilver would set his previous commitment aside and undertake the new assignment. Before so dealing an argument, Hautley's preoccupation with Pawel Spiro evaporated.

The least he could do was to listen to what the man had to say—after all, Quicksilver was a businessman.

Philosophically, he switched on the radiobeacon and guided his second visitor of the day down to the surface of the small planetoid.

Client-prospect #2 introduced himself as The Royal Heveret Twelfth, Proprietor of Canopus. He was quite a dandy, despite his frosty manner—slim as a dancing master, clad in a tight fawn velvet with a great emerald trembling like a drop of liquid green fire in his left earlobe, he had carmine hair arranged in exquisite locks that foamed over his high peaked collar of snowcat fur. His eyes, dyed vermillion, flashed with supercilious, sardonic superiority. In a curt, cold voice, His Dignity came to the point with disconcerting directness:

''This is Our certified check for one million monetary units, drawn on the Royal Bank of Orion. Fetch for Us the antique, jeweled crown of the extinct Cavern Kings of the planet Thoth. It is the fourth planet of the star Thoin IV in the Derghiz Cluster in the First Quadrant of the Carina-Cygnus Arm. The Crown is to be delivered to a post office box registered under the pseudonym of H. Veret in the Chantilly Port Mail Center. When you have secured and delivered the Crown, place an entry in the personal columns of the Chantilly Port News-Sentinel, saying: 'Done. Q' "

Quicksilver's face remained impassive, but his mind reeled. Two clients in one morning after the same thing!

"I—" he attempted. But the Royal Heveret was not quite finished. Raising a peremptory hand, he continued:

"As soon as your entry appears, the Royal Bank will be instructed to pass the check, and Our connection will be severed. Is this clear?"

"Quite, but—"

A slim hand was extended, holding a folder.

"Here is a complete dossier of information relevant to the Crown of Thoth, together with the key to the post office box. Time is of the—"

The small canary-colored dragon clinging to the broad shelf of Quicksilver's right shoulder hissed furiously like a berserk teakettle as the hand neared, and gold eyes sparked viciously. Heveret Twelfth withdrew the hand hastily, and gingerly dropped the file folder on an adjacent comer of Quicksilver's desk.

Hautley accepted the folder and leafed through it noncommittally, while His Dignity lifted a pounce box to his nostrils and sniffed delicately, regarding the small dragon with a sour eye. Then the Proprietor of Canopus cleared his throat distinctly, and glanced at his ring-watch.

"Come, come, my man! Let Us print the contract; you must be about the business."

Hautley shuffled the documents together and lay them down. Leaning back, he regarded the Royal Heveret with a polite but quizzical glance.

"I was not aware that Your Dignity was given to the hobby of collecting rare antiquities," he commented.

Heveret Twelfth smiled thinly, baring a brace of incisors inset with rose-diamond chips after the current mode.

"Our motives cannot be of any conceivable effect on this business arrangement, hence are irrelevant. Come, come, Ser Hautley, let us thumbprint your contract and be off. As the quaint folk-phrase of Our native realm has it: 'Tym-zah waystin.' "

Hautley demurred. "I shall need leisure to check over the data in this dossier. Your Dignity will understand that my professional reputation, humble though it be, rests upon each successful case. I dare not risk accepting a contract which upon mature consideration I discover to be beyond my meagre abilities."

But Heveret Twelfth was not to be put off.

"Our time is precious, Ser Hautley, and matters of State press. We must conclude this matter now. There is no question of the fee—two million, if you need monetary stimulus to reach a swift decision!"

Behind his imperturbable mask of suave impassivity, Hautley boggled at the incredible stipend thus dangled before him. But it was his curiosity that was aroused, not his cupidity. What was there about the reptilian artifact that had triggered this stampede to his door? He was determined to find out. He was equally determined to accept no contract he might later regret. Our Quicksilver possessed in the extreme, as the patient reader will doubtless discover ere this history concludes, a superb sense of professional ethics.

Thus Hautley persisted in his equivocation. With tact unruffled and demeanor serene, he remained adamant to His Dignity's impatient efforts at persuasion, firmly declining to commit his services prior to a depth check of the relevant factors. Suavely extracting a phone number from the reluctant blue blood, he ushered his royal visitor out, promising to deliver a definite answer within twenty-seven hours.

As client-prospect #2 ascended vertically into the superstratosphere, Hautley shook his head in numb bafflement. What in the Name of Arnam's Sacred Beard was going on?

Intenser bafflements awaited in near futurity, though Quicksilver knew it not.