Nebula Award, Best Novelette 1966

CALL HIM LORD

Gordon R. Dickson

He called and commanded me

The sun could not fail in rising over the Kentucky hills, ac-
could Kyle Arnam in waking. There would be eleven hou~
and forty minutes of daylight. Kyle rose, dressed, and weat~
out to saddle the gray gelding and the white stallion. He ro~e
the stallion until the first fury was out of the arched andS
Spowy neck; and then led both horses around to tether them
outside the kitchen door. Then he went in to breakfast.
The message that had come a week before was beside his
plate of bacon and eggs. Teena, bis wife, was standing at the
breadboard with her back to him. He sat down and began
eating, rereading the letter as he ate.
". . . The Prince will be traveling incognito under one of his
family titles, as Count Sirii North; and should not be ad-
dressed as 'Majesty.' You will call him 'Lord' . . ."
"Why does it have to be you?" Teena asked.
He looked up and saw how she stood with her back to him.
"Teena" he said, sadly.
"Why?"
"My ancestors were bodyguards to hisback in the wars of
conquest against the aliens. I've told you that," he said. "My
forefathers saved the lives of his, many times when there was
no warninga Rak spaceship would suddenly appear out of
nowhere to lock on, even to a flagship. And even an Emperor
found himself fighting for his life, hand to hand."
"The aliens are all dead now, and the Emperor's got a
hundred other worlds! Why can't his son take his Grand Tour
on them? Why does he have to come here to Earthand
you?"
"There's only one Earth."
"And only one you, I suppose?"
He sighed internally and gave up. He had been raised by
his father and his uncle after his mother died, and in an
argument with Teena he always felt helpless. He got up from
the table and went to her, putting his hands on her and gently
trying to turn her about. But she resisted.
He sighed inside himself again and turned away to the
weapons cabinet. He took out a loaded slug pistol, fitted it into
the stubby holster it matched, and clipped the holster to his
belt at the left of the buckle, where the hang of his leather
jacket would hide it. Then he selected a dark-handled knife
with a six-inch blade and bent over to slip it into the sheath
inside his boot top. He dropped the cuff of his trouser leg
back over the boot top and stood up.
"He's got no right to be here," said Teena fiercely to the
breadboard. "Tourists are supposed to be kept to the museum
areas and the tourist lodges."
"He's not a tourist. You know that," answered Kyle,
patiently. "He's the Emperor's oldest son and his great-grand-
mother was from Earth. His wife will be, too. Every fourth
generation the Imperial line has to marry back into Earth
stock. That's the lawstill." He put 'on his leather jacket,
sealing it closed only at the bottom to hide the slug-gun
holster, half turned to the doorthen paused.
"Teena?" he asked.
She did not answer.
"Teena!" he repeated. He stepped to her, put his hands on
her shoulders and tried to turn her to face him. Again, she
resisted, but this time he was having none of it.
He was not a big man, being of middle height, round-faced,
with sloping and unremarkable-looking, if thick, shoulders.
But his strength was not ordinary. He could bring the white
stallion to its knees with one fist wound in its maneand no
other man had ever been able to do that. He turned her easily
to look at him.
"Now, listen to me" he began. But, before he could
finish, all the stiffness went out of her and she clung to him,
trembling.
"He'll get you into trouble1 know he will!" she choked,
muffledly into his chest. "Kyle, don't go! There's no law
making you go!"
He stroked the soft hair of her head, his throat stiff and
dry. There was nothing he could say to her. What she was
asking was impossible. Ever since the sun had first risen on
men and women together, wives had clung to their husbands
at times like this, begging for what could not be. And always
the men had held them, as Kyle was holding her nowas if
understanding could somehow be pressed from one body into
the otherand saying nothing, because there was nothing that
could be said.
So, Kyle held her for a few moments longer, and then
reached behind him to unlock her intertwined fingers at his
back, and loosen her arms around him. Then, he went.
Looking back through the kitchen window as he rode off on
the stallion, leading the gray horse, he saw her standing just
where he had left her. Not even crying, but standing with her
arms hanging down, her head down, not moving.
He rode away through the forest of the Kentucky hillside.
It took him more than two hours to reach the lodge. As he
rode down the valleyside toward it, he saw a tall, bearded
man, wearing the robes they wore on some of the Younger
Worlds, standing at the gateway to the interior courtyard of
the rustic, wooded lodge.
When he got close, he saw that the beard was graying and
the man was biting his lips. Above a straight, thin nose, the
eyes were bloodshot and circled beneath as if from worry or
lack of sleep.
"He's in the courtyard," said the gray-bearded man as Kyle
rode up. "I'm Montlaven, his tutor. He's ready to go." The
darkened eyes looked almost pleadingly up at Kyle.
"Stand clear of the stallion's head," said Kyle. "And take
me in to him."
"Not that horse, for him" said Montlaven, looking dis-
trustfully at the stallion, as he backed away.
"No," said Kyle. "He'll ride the gelding."
"He'll want the white."
"He can't ride the white," said Kyle. "Even if I let him, he
couldn't ride this stallion. I'm the only one who can ride him.
Take me in."
The tutor turned and led the way into the grassy courtyard,
surrounding a swimming pool and looked down upon, on
three sides, by the windows of the lodge. In a lounging chair
by the pool sat a tall young man in his late teens, with a mane
of blond hair, a pair of stuffed saddlebags on the grass beside
him. He stood up as Kyle and the tutor came toward him.
"Majesty," said the tutor, as they stopped, "this is Kyle
Arnam, your bodyguard for the three days here."
"Good morning, Bodyguard . . . Kyle, I mean." The Prince
smiled mischievously. "Light, then. And I'll mount."
"You ride the gelding. Lord," said Kyle.
The Prince stared at him, tilted back his handsome head.
and laughed.
"I can ride, man!" he said. "I ride well."
"Not this horse. Lord," said Kyle, dispassionately. "No one
rides this horse, but me."
The eyes flashed wide, the laugh fadedthen returned.
"What can I do?" The wide shoulders shrugged. "I give in
always I give in. Well, almost always." He grinned up at
Kyle, his lips thinned, but frank. "All right."
He turned to the geldingand with a sudden leap was in
the saddle. The gelding snorted and plunged at the shock;
then steadied as the young man's long fingers tightened
expertly on the reins and the fingers of the other hand patted
a gray neck. The Prince raised his eyebrows, looking over at
Kyle, but Kyle sat stolidly.
"I take it you're armed good Kyle?" the Prince said slyly.
"You'll protect me against the natives if they run wild?"
"Yolir life is in my hands. Lord," said Kyle. He unsealed
the leather jacket at the bottom and let it fall open to show
the slug pistol in its holster for a moment. Then he resealed
the jacket again at the bottom.
"Will" The tutor put his hand on the young man's knee.
"Don't be reckless, boy. This is Earth and the people here
don't have rank and custom like we do. Think before you"
"Oh, cut it out, Monty!" snapped the Prince. "I'll be just as
incognito, just as humble, as archaic and independent as the
rest of them. You think I've no memory! Anyway, it's only
for three days or so until my Imperial father joins me. Now,
let me go!"
He jerked away, turned to lean forward in the saddle, and
abruptly put the gelding into a bolt for the gate. He disap-
peared through it, and Kyle drew hard on the stallion's reins
as the big white horse danced and tried to follow.
"Give me his saddlebags," said Kyle.
The tutor bent and passed them up. Kyle made them fast
on top of his own, across the stallion's withers. Looking
down, he saw there were tears in the bearded man's eyes.
"He's a fine boy. You'll see. You'll know he is!" Montia-
ven's face, upturned, was mutely pleading.
"I know he comes from a fine family," said Kyle, slowly.
"I'll do my best for him." And he rode off out of the gateway
after the gelding.
When he came out of the gate, the Prince was nowhere in
sight. But it was simple enough for Kyle to follow, by dinted
brown earth and crushed grass, the marks of the gelding's
path. This brought him at last through some pines to a grassy
open slope where the Prince sat looking skyward through a
single-lens box.
When Kyle came up, the Prince lowered the instrument
and, without a word, passed it over. Kyle put it to his eye and
looked skyward. There was the whir of the tracking unit and
one of Earth's three orbiting power stations swam into the
field of vision of the lens.
"Give it back," said the Prince.
"I couldn't get a look at it earlier," went on the young man
as Kyle handed the lens to him. "And I wanted to. It's a
rather expensive present, you knowit and the other two like
itfrom our Imperial treasury. Just to keep your planet from
drifting into another ice age. And what do we get for it?"
"Earth, Lord," answered Kyle. "As it was before men went
out to the stars."
"Oh, the museum areas could be maintained with one
station and a half-million caretakers," said the Prince. "It's
the other two stations and you billion or so free-loaders I'm
talking about. I'll have to look into it when I'm Emperor. Shall
we ride?"
"If you wish. Lord." Kyle picked up the reins of the
stallion and the two horses with their riders moved off across
the slope.
". . . And one more thing," said the Prince, as they entered
the farther belt of pine trees. "I don't want you to be misled
I'm really very fond of old Monty, back there. It's just that I
wasn't really planning to come here at allLook at me,
Body guard!"
Kyle turned to see the blue eyes that ran in the Imperial
family blazing at him. Then, unexpectedly, they softened. The
Prince laughed.
"You don't scare easily, do you, Bodyguard... Kyle, I
mean?" he said. "I think I like you after all. But look at me
when I talk."
"Yes, Lord."
"That's my good Kyle. Now, I was explaining to you that
I'd never actually planned to come here on my Grand Tour at
all. I didn't see any point in visiting this dusty old museum
world of yours with people still trying to live like they lived in
the Dark Ages. Butmy Imperial father talked me into it."
"Your father, Lord?" asked Kyle.
"Yes, he bribed me, you might say," said the Prince
thoughtfully. "He was supposed to meet me here for these
three days. Now, he's messaged there's been a'slight delay
but that doesn't matter. The point is, he belongs to the school
of old men who still think your Earth is something precious
and vital. Now, I happen to like and admire my father, Kyle.
You approve of that?"
"Yes, Lord."
"I thought you would. Yes, he's the one man in the human
race I look up to. And to please him, I'm making this Earth
trip. And to please himonly to please him, KyleI'm going
to be an easy Prince for you to conduct around to your
natural wonders and watering spots and whatever. Now, you
understand meand how this trip is going to go. Don't you?"
He stared at Kyle.
"I understand," said Kyle.
"That's fine," said the Prince, smiling once more. "So now
you can start telling me all about these trees and birds and
animals so that I can memorize their names and please my
father when he shows up. What are those little birds I've been
seeing under the treesbrown on top and whitish under-
neath? Like that onethere!"
"That's a Veery, Lord," said Kyle. "A bird of the deep
woods and silent places. Listen" He reached out a hand to
the gelding's bridle and brought both horses to a halt. In the
sudden silence, off to their right they could hear a silver
bird-voice, rising and falling, in a descending series of cr&-
scendos and diminuendos, that softened at last into silence. For
a moment after the song was ended the Prince sat staring at
Kyle, then seemed to shake himself back to life.
"Interesting," he said. He lifted the reins Kyle had let go
and the horses moved forward again. "Tell me more."
For more than three hours, as the sun rose toward noon,
they rode through the wooded hills, with Kyle identifying bird
and animal, insect, tree and rock. And for three hours the
Prince listenedhis attention flashing and momentary, but
intense. But when the sun was overhead that intensity flagged.
"That's enough," he said. "Aren't we going to stop for
lunch? Kyle, aren't there any towns around here?"
"Yes, Lord," said Kyle. "We've passed several."
"Several?" The Prince stared at him. "Why haven't we
come into one before now? Where are you taking me?"
"Nowhere, Lord," said Kyle. "You lead the way. I only
follow."
"I?" said the Prince. For the first time he seemed to become
aware that he had been keeping the gelding's head always in
advance of the stallion. "Of course. But now it's time to eat."
"Yes, Lord," said Kyle. "This way."
He turned the stallion's head down the slope of the hill they
were crossing and the Prince turned the gelding after him.
"And now listen," said the Prince, as he caught up. "Tell
me I've got it all right." And to Kyle's astonishment, he began
to repeat, almost word for word, everything that Kyle had
said. "Is it all there? Everything you told me?"
"Perfectly, Lord," said Kyle. The Prince looked slyly at
him.
"Could you do that, Kyle?"
"Yes," said Kyle. "But these are things I've known all my
life."
"You see?" The Prince smiled. "That's the difference be-
tween us, good Kyle. You spend your life learning something
1 spend a few hours and I know as much about it as you
do."
"Not as much, Lord," said Kyle, slowly.
The Prince biinked at him, then jerked his hand dismiss-
ingly, and half-angrily, as if he were throwing something
aside.
"What little else there is probably doesn't count," he said.
They rode down the slope and through a winding valley
and came out at a small village. As they rode clear of the
surrounding trees a sound of music came to their ears.
"What's that?" The Prince stood up in his stirrups. "Why,
there's dancing going on, over there."
"A beer garden. Lord. And it's Saturdaya holiday here."
"Good. We'll go there to eat."
They rode around to the beer garden and found tables back
away from the dance floor. A pretty, young waitress came
and they ordered, the Prince smiling sunnily at her until she
smiled backthen hurried off as if in mild confusion. The
Prince ate hungrily when the food came and drank a stein and
a half of brown beer, while Kyle ate more lightly and drank
coffee.
"That's better," said the Prince, sitting back at last. "I had
an appetite . . . Look there, Kyle! Look, there are five, six . . .
seven drifter platforms parked over there. Then you don't all
ride horses?"
"No," said Kyle. "It's as each man wishes."
"But if you have drifter platforms, why not Other civilized
things?"
"Some things fit, some don't. Lord," answered Kyle. The
Prince laughed.
"You mean you try to make civilization fit this old-
fashioned life of yours, here?" he said. "Isn't that the wrong
way around" He broke off. "What's that they're playing
now? I like that. I'll bet I could do that dance." He stood up.
"In fact, I think I will."
He paused, looking down at Kyle.
"Aren't you going to warn me against it?" he asked.
"No, Lord," said Kyle. "What you do is your own affair."
The young man turned away abruptly. The waitress who
had served them was passing, only a few tables away. The
Prince went after her and caught up with her by the dance
floor railing. Kyle could see the girl protestingbut the
Prince hung over her, looking down from his tall height,
smiling. Shortly, she had taken off her apron and was out on
the dance floor with him, showing him the steps of the dance.
It was a polka.
The Prince learned with fantastic quickness. Soon, he was
swinging the waitress around with the rest of the dancers, his
foot stamping on the turns, his white teeth gleaming. Finally
the number ended and the members of the band put down
their instruments and began to leave the stand.
The Prince, with the girl trying to hold him back, walked
over to the band leader. Kyle got up quickly from his table
and started toward the floor.
The band leader was shaking his head. He turned abruptly
and slowly walked away. The Prince started after him, but the
girl took hold of his arm, saying something urgent to him.
He brushed her aside and she stumbled a little. A busboy
among the tables on the far side of the dance floor, not much
older than the Prince and nearly as tall, put down his tray and
vaulted the railing onto the polished hardwood. He came up
behind the Prince and took hold of his arm, swinging him
around.
". . . Can't do that here." Kyle heard him say, as Kyle came
up. The Prince struck out like a pantherlike a trained boxer
with three quick lefts in succession into the face of the
busboy, the Prince's shoulder bobbing, the weight of his body
in behind each blow.
The busboy went down. Kyle, reaching the Prince, herded
him away through a side gap in the railing. The young man's
face was white with rage. People were swarming onto the
dance floor.
"Who was that? What's his name?" demanded the Prince,
between his teeth. "He put his hand on me! Did you see that?
He put his hand on me!"
"You knocked him out," said Kyle. "What more do you
want?"
"He manhandled meme!" snapped the Prince. "I want to
find oat' who he is!" He caught hold of the bar to which the
horses were tied, refusing to be pushed farther. "He'li'leam to
lay hands on a future Emperor!"
"No one will tell you his name," said Kyle. And the cold
note in his voice finally seemed to reach through to the Prince
and sober him. He stared at Kyle.
"Including you?" he demanded at last.
"Including me, Lord," said Kyle.
The Prince stared a moment longer, then swung away. He
turned, jerked loose the reins of the gelding and swung into
the saddle. He rode off. Kyle mounted and followed.
They rode in silence into the forest. After a while, the
Prince spoke without turning his head.
"And you call yourself a bodyguard," he said, finally.
"Your life is in my hands. Lord," said Kyle. The Prince
turned a grim face to look at him.
"Only my life?" said the Prince. "As long as they don't kill
me, they can do what they want? Is that what you mean?"
Kyle met his gaze steadily.
"Pretty much so, Lord," he said.
The Prince spoke with an ugly note in his voice.
"I don't think I like you, after all, Kyle," he said. "I don't
think I like you at all."
"I'm not here with you to be liked. Lord," said Kyle.
"Perhaps not," said the Prince, thickly. "But I know your
name!"
They rode on in continued silence for perhaps another half
hour. But then gradually the angry hunch went out of the
young man's shoulders and the tightness out of his jaw. After
a while he began to sing to himself, a song in a language Kyle
did not know; and as he sang, his cheerfulness seemed to
return. Shortly, he spoke to Kyle, as if there had never been
anything but pleasant moments between them.
Mammoth Cave was close and the Prince asked to visit it.
They went there and spent some time going through the cave.
After that they rode their horses up along the left bank of the
Green River. The Prince seemed to have forgotten all about
the incident at the beer garden and be out to charm everyone
they met. As the sun was at last westering toward the dinner
hour, they came finally to a small hamlet back from the river,
with a roadside inn mirrored in an artificial lake beside it, and
guarded by oak and pine trees behind.
"This looks good," said the Prince. "We'll stay overnight
here, Kyle."
"If you wish, Lord," said Kyle.
They halted, and Kyle took the horses around to the stable,
then entered the inn to find the Prince already in the small
bar off the dining room, drinking beer and charming the
waitress. This waitress was younger than the one at the beer
garden had been; a little girl with soft, loose hair and round
brown eyes that showed their delight in the attention of the
tall, good-looking, young man.
"Yes," said the Prince to Kyle, looking out of the corners
of the Imperial blue eyes at him, after the waitress had gone
to get Kyle his coffee, "This is the very place."
"The very place?" said Kyle.
"For me to get to know the people betterwhat did you
think, good Kyle?" said the Prince and laughed at him. "I'll
observe the people here and you can explain themwon't
that be good?"
Kyle gazed at him, thoughtfully.
"I'll tell you whatever I can, Lord," he said.
They drankthe Prince his beer, and Kyle his coffeeand
went in a little later to the dining room for dinner. The
Prince, as he had promised at the bar, was full of questions
about what he sawand what he did not see.
". . . But why go on living in the past, all of you here?" he
asked Kyle. "A museum world is one thing. But a museum
people" he broke off to smile and speak to the little,
soft-haired waitress, who had somehow been diverted from
the bar to wait upon their dining-room table.
"Not a museum people, Lord," said Kyle. "A living people.
The only way to keep a race and a culture preserved is to
keep it alive. So we go on in our own way, here on Earth, as a
living example for the Younger Worlds to check themselves
against."
"Fascinating ..." murmured the Prince; but his eyes had
wandered off to follow the waitress, who was glowing and
looking back at him from across the now-busy dining room.
"Not fascinating. Necessary, Lord," said Kyle. But he did
not believe the younger man had heard him.
After dinner, they moved back to the bar. And the Prince,
after questioning Kyle a little longer, moved up to continue
his researches among the other people standing at the bar.
Kyle-watched for a little while. Then, feeling it was safe to do
so, slipped out to have another look at the horses and to ask
the innkeeper to arrange a saddle lunch put up for them the
next day.
When he returned, the Prince was not to be seen.
Kyle sat down at a table to wait; but the Prince did not
return. A cold, hard knot of uneasiness began to grow below
Kyle's breastbone. A sudden pang of alarm sent him swiftly
back out to check the horses. But they were cropping peace-
fully in their stalls. The stallion whickered, low-voiced, as
Kyle looked in on him, and turned his white head to look
back at Kyle.
"Easy, boy," said Kyle and returned to the inn to find the
innkeeper.
But the innkeeper had no idea where the Prince might have
gone.
". . . If the horses aren't taken, he's not far," the innkeeper
said. "There's no trouble he can get into around here. Maybe
he went for a walk in the woods. I'll leave word for the night
staff to keep an eye out for him when he comes in. Where'11
you be?"
"In the bar until it closesthen, my room," said Kyle.
He went back to the bar to wait, and took a booth near an
open window. Time went by and gradually the number of
other customers began to dwindle. Above the ranked bottles,
the bar clock showed nearly midnight. Suddenly, through the
window, Kyle heard a distant scream of equine fury from the
stables.
He got up and went out quickly. In the darkness outside, he
ran to the stables and burst in. There in the feeble illumina-
tion of the stable's night lighting, he saw the Prince, pale-
faced, clumsily saddling the gelding in the center aisle be-
tween the stalls. The door to the stallion's stall was open. The
Prince looked away as Kyle came in.
Kyle took three swift steps to the open door and looked in.
The stallion was still tied, but his ears were back, his eyes
rolling, and a saddle lay tumbled and dropped on the stable
floor beside him.
"Saddle up," said the Prince thickly from the aisle. "We're
leaving." Kyle turned to look at him.
"We've got rooms at the inn here," he said.
"Never mind. We're riding. I need to clear my head." The
young man got the gelding's cinch tight, dropped the stirrups
and swung heavily up into the saddle. Without waiting for
Kyle, he rode out of the stable into the night.
"So, boy . . ." said Kyle soothingly to the stallion. Hastily
he untied the big white horse, saddled him, and set out after
the Prince. In the darkness, there was no way of ground-
tracking the gelding; but he leaned forward and blew into the
ear of the stallion. The surprised horse neighed in protest and
the whinny of the gelding came back from the darkness of the
slope up ahead and over to Kyle's right. He rode in that
direction.
He caught the Prince on the crown of the hill. The young
man was walking the gelding, reins loose, and singing under
his breaththe same song in an unknown language he had
sung earlier. But, now as he saw Kyle, he grinned loosely and
began to sing with more emphasis. For the first time Kyle
caught the overtones of something mocking and lusty about
the incomprehensible words. Understanding broke suddenly
in him.
"The girl!" he said. "The little waitress. Where is she?"
The grin vanished from the Prince's face, then came slowly
back again. The grin laughed at Kyle.
"Why, where d'you think?" The words slurred on the
Prince's tongue and Kyle, riding close, smelled the beer heavy
on the young man's breath. "In her room, sleeping and happy.
Honored . . . though she doesn't know it . . . by an Emperor's
son. And expecting to find me there in the morning. But I
won't be. Will we, good Kyle?"
"Why did you do it, Lord?" asked Kyle, quietly.
"Why?" The Prince peered at him, a little drunkenly in the
moonlight. "Kyle, my father has four sons. I've got three
younger brothers. But I'm the one who's going to be Emper-
or; and Emperors don't answer questions."
Kyle said nothing. The Prince peered at him. They rode on
together for several minutes in silence.
"All right, I'll tell you why," said the Prince, more loudly,
after a while as if the pause had been only momentary. "It's
because you're not my bodyguard, Kyle. You see, I've seen
through you. I know whose bodyguard you are. You're
theirs!"
Kyle's jaw tightened. But the darkness hid his reaction.
"All right" The Prince gestured loosely, disturbing his
balance in the saddle. "That's all right. Have it your way. I
don't mind. So, we'll play points. There was that lout at the
beer gaiBea Who put his hands on me Bat no one would tell
me his name, yoa said. All right, you managed to bodyguard '
him. One point for you. But you didn't manage to bodyguard
the girl at the inn back there; One point for me. Who's going
to win, good Kyle?"
Kyle took a deep breath.
"Lord," he said, "some day it'll be your duty to marry a
woman from Earth"
The Prince interrupted him with a laugh, and this time
there was an ugly note in it.
"You flatter yourselves," he said. His voice thickened.
"That's the trouble with youall you Earth peopleyou
flatter yourselves."
They rode on in silence. Kyle said nothing more, but kept
the head of the stallion close to the shoulder of the gelding,
watching the young man closely. For a little while the Prince
seemed to doze. His head sank on his chest and he let the
gelding wander. Then, after a while, his head began to come
up again, his automatic horseman's fingers tightened on the
reins, and he lifted his head to stare around in the moonlight.
"I want a drink," he said. His voice was no longer thick,
. but it was flat and uncheerful. "Take me where we can get
some beer, Kyle."
Kyle took a deep breath.
"Yes, Lord," he said.
He turned the stallion's head to the right and the gelding
followed. They went up over a hill and down to the edge of a
lake. The dark water sparkled in the moonlight and the
.farther shore was lost in the night. Lights shone through the
trees around the curve of the shore.
"There, Lord," said Kyle. "It's a fishing resort, with a bar."
They rode around the shore to it. It was a low, casual
building, angled to face the shore; a dock ran out from it, to
which fishing boats were tethered, bobbing slightly on the
.black, water. Light gleamed through the windows as they
hitched their horses and went to the door.
The barroom they stepped into was wide and bare. A long
bar faced them with several planked fish on the wall behind it.
Below the fish were three bartendersthe one in the center,
middle-aged, and wearing an air of authority with his apron.
The other two were young and muscular. The customers,
mostly men, scattered at the square tables and standing at the
bar wore rough working clothes, or equally casual vacationers'
garb.
The Prince sat down at a table back from the bar and Kyle
sat down with him. When the waitress came they ordered beer
and coffee, and the Prince half-emptied his stein the moment
it was brought to him. As soon as it was completely empty, he
signaled the waitress again.
"Another," he said. This time, he smiled at the waitress
when she brought his stein back. But she was a woman in her
thirties, pleased but not overwhelmed by his attention. She
smiled lightly back and moved off to return to the bar where
she had been talking to two men her own age, one fairly tall,
the other shorter, bullet-headed and fleshy.
The Prince drank. As he put his stein down, he seemed to
become aware of Kyle, and turned to look at him.
"I suppose," said the Prince, "you think I'm drunk?"
"Not yet," said Kyle.
"No," said the Prince, "that's right. Not yet. But perhaps
I'm going to be. And if I decide I am, who's going to stop
me?"
"No one, Lord."
"That's right," the young man said, "that's right." He drank
deliberately from his stein until it was empty, and then sig-
naled the waitress for another. A spot of color was beginning
to show over each of his high cheekbones. "When you're on a
miserable little world with miserable little people... hello,
Bright Eyes!" he interrupted himself as the waitress brought
his beer. She laughed and went back to her friends. ".. . You
have to amuse yourself any way you can," he wound up.
He laughed to himself.
"When I think how my father, and Montyeverybody
used to talk this planet up to me" he glanced aside at Kyle.
"Do you know at one time I was actually scaredwell, not
scared exactly, nothing scares me . . . say concernedabout
maybe having to come here, some day?" He laughed again.
"Concerned that I wouldn't measure up to you Earth people!
Kyle, have you ever been to any of the Younger Worlds?"
"No," said Kyle.
"I thought not. Let me tell you, good Kyle, the worst of the
people there are bigger, and better-looking and smarter, and
everything than anyone I've seen here. And I, Kyle, Ithe
Emperor-to-beam better than any of them. So, guess how
aH you-~erelook tome?" He stared at Kyle, waiting; "Well,
answer me, good Kyle. Tell me the truth. That's an order."
"It's not np to you to judge, Lord," said Kyle.
"Not? Not up to me?" The blue eyes blazed. "I'm going
to be Emperor!"
"It's not up to any one man. Lord," said Kyle. "Emperor or
not An Emperor's needed, as the symbol that can hold a
hundred worlds together. But the real need of the race is to
survive. It took nearly a million years to evolve a survival-
type intelligence here on Earth. And out on the newer worlds
people are bound to change. If something gets lost out there,
some necessary element lost out of the race, there needs to be
a pool of original genetic material here to replace it."
The Prince's lips grew wide in a savage grin.
"Oh, good, Kylegood!" he said. "Very good. Only, I've
heard all that before. Only, I don't believe it. You seeI've
seen you people, now. And you don't outclass us, out on the
Younger Worlds. We outclass you. We've gone on and got
better, while you stayed still. And you know it."
The young man laughed softly, almost in Kyle's face.
"All you've been afraid of, is that we'd find out. And I
have." He laughed again. "I've had a look at you; and now I
know. I'm bigger, better and braver than any man in this
roomand you know why? Not just because I'm the son of
the Emperor, but because it's born in me! Body, brains and
everything else! I can do what I want here, and no one on this
planet is good enough to stop me. Watch."
He stood up, suddenly.
"Now, I want that waitress to get drunk with me," he said.
"And this time I'm telling you in advance. Are you going to
try and stop me?"
Kyle looked up at him. Their eyes met.
"No, Lord," he said. "It's not my job to stop you."
The Prince laughed.
"I thought so," he said. He swung away and walked
..between the tables toward the bar and the waitress, still in
conversation with the two men. The Prince came up to the
bar on the far side of the waitress and ordered a new stein of
beer from the middle-aged bartender. When it was given to
him, he took it, turned around, and rested his elbows on the
bar, leaning back against it. He spoke to the waitress, inter-
rupting the taller of the two men.
"l*ve beenwanting to talk to yott," Kyle heard him say.
The waitress, a little surprised, looked around at him. She
smiled, recognizing hima little flattered by the directness of
his approach, a little appreciative of his clean good looks, a
little tolerant of his youth.
"You don't mind, do you?" said the Prince, looking past
her to the bigger of the two men, the one who had just been
talking. The other stared back, and their eyes met without
shifting for several seconds. Abruptly, angrily, the man
shrugged, and turned about with his back hunched against
them.
"You see?" said the Prince, smiling back at the waitress.
"He knows I'm the one you ought to be talking to, instead
of"
"All right, sonny. Just a minute."
It was the shorter, bullet-headed man, interrupting. The
Prince turned to look down at him with a fleeting expression
of surprise. But the bullet-headed man was already turning to
his taller friend and putting a hand on his arm.
"Come on back, Ben," the shorter man was saying. "The
kid's a little drunk, is all." He turned back to the Prince.
"You shove off now," he said. "Clara's with us."
The Prince stared at him blankly. The stare was so fixed
that the shorter man had started to turn away, back to his
friend and the waitress, when the Prince seemed to wake.
"Just a minute" he said, in his turn.
He reached out a hand to one of the fleshy shoulders below
the bullet head. The man turned back, knocking the hand
calmly away. Then, just as calmly, he picked up the Prince's
full stein of beer from the bar and threw it in the young man's
face.
"Get lost," he said, unexcitedly.
The Prince stood for a second, with the beer dripping from
his face. Then, without even stopping to wipe his eyes clear,
he threw the beautifully trained left hand he had demon-
strated at the beer garden.
But the shorter man, as Kyle had known from the first
moment of seeing him, was not like the busboy the Prince had
decisioned so neatly. This man was thirty pounds heavier,
fifteen years more experienced, and by build and nature a
natural bar fighter. He had not stood there waiting to be hit,
but had already ducked and gone forward to throw his thick
arms around the Prince's body. The young man's punch
bouaced harmlessly off the round head, and both bodies hit
the floor, rolling in among the chair and table legs.
Kyle was already more than halfway to the bar and the
three bartenders were already leaping the wooden hurdle that
walled them off. The taller friend of the bullet-headed man,
hovering over the two bodies, his eyes glittering, had his boot
drawn back ready to drive the point of it into the Prince's
kidneys. Kyle's forearm took him economically like a bar of
iron across the tanned throat.
He stumbled backwards choking. Kyle stood still, hands
open and down, glancing at the middle-aged bartender.
"All right," said the bartender. "But don't do anything
more." He turned to the two younger bartenders. "All right.
Haul him off!"
The pair of younger, aproned men bent down and came up
with the bullet-headed man expertly handlocked between
them. The man made one surging effort to break loose, and
then stood still.
"Let me at him," he said.
"Not in here," said the older bartender. "Take it outside."
Between the tables, the Prince staggered unsteadily to his
feet. His face was streaming blood from a cut on his fore-
head, but what could be seen of it was white as a drowning
man's. His eyes went to Kyle, standing beside him; and he
opened his mouthbut what came out sounded like some-
thing between a sob and a curse.
"All right," said the middle-aged bartender again. "Outside,
both of you. Settle it out there."
The men in the room had packed around the little space by
the bar. The Prince looked about and for the first time
seemed to see the human wall hemming him in. His gaze
wobbled to meet Kyle's.
"Outside . . . ?" he said, chokingly.
"YOU aren't staying in here," said the older bartender,
answering for Kyle. "I saw it. You started the whole thing.
Now, settle it any way you wantbut you're both going
outside. Now. Get moving!"
He pushed at the Prince, but the Prince resisted, clutching
at Kyle's leather jacket with one hand.
"Kyle."
"I'm sorry, Lord," said Kyle. "I can't help. It's your fight."
"Let's get out of here," said the bullet-headed man.
The Prince stared around at them as if they were some
strange set of beings he had never known to exist before.
"No . .." he said.
He let go of Kyle's jacket. Unexpectedly, his hand darted in
towards Kyle's belly holster and came out holding the slug
pistol.
"Stand back!" he said, his voice high-toned. "Don't try to
touch me!"
His voice broke on the last words. There was a strange
sound, half grunt, half moan, from the crowd; and it swayed
back from him. Manager, bartenders, watchersall but Kyle
and the bullet-headed man drew back.
"You dirty slob .. ." said the bullet-headed man, distinctly.
"I knew you didn't have the guts."
"Shut up!" The Prince's voice was high and cracking. "Shut
up! Don't any of you try to come after me!"
He began backing away toward the front door of the bar.
The room watched in silence, even Kyle standing still. As he
backed, the Prince's back straightened. He hefted the gun in
his hand. When he reached the door he paused to wipe the
blood from his eyes with his left sleeve, and his smeared face
looked with a first touch of regained arrogance at them.
"Swine!" he said.
He opened the door and backed out, closing it behind him.
Kyle took one step that put him facing the bullet-headed man.
Their eyes met and he could see the other recognizing the
fighter in him, as he had earlier recognized it in the bullet-
headed man.
"Don't come after us," said Kyle.
The bullet-headed man did not answer. But no answer was
needed. He stood still.
Kyle turned, ran to the door, stood on one side of it and
flicked it open. Nothing happened; and he slipped through,
dodging to his right at once, out of the line of any shot aimed
at the opening door.
But no shot came. For a moment he was blind in the night
darkness, then his eyes began to adjust. He went by sight, feel
and memory toward the hitching rack. By the time he got
there, he was beginning to see.
The Prince was untying the gelding and getting ready to
mount.
"Lord," said Kyle.
The Prince let go of the saddle for a moment and turned to
look over his shoulder at him.
"Get away from me," said the Prince, thickly.
"Lord," said Kyle, low-voiced and pleading, "you lost your
head in there. Anyone might do that. But don't make it worse.
now. Give me back the gun. Lord."
"Give you the gun?"
The young man stared at himand then he laughed.
"Give you the gun?" he said again. "So you can let
someone beat me up some more? So you can not-guard me
with it?"
"Lord," said Kyle, "please. For your own sakegive me
back the gun."
"Get out of here," said the Prince, thickly, turning back to
mount the gelding. "Clear out before I put a slug in you."
Kyle drew a slow, sad breath. He stepped forward and
tapped the Prince on the shoulder.
"Turn around. Lord," he said.
"I warned you" shouted the Prince, turning.
He came around as Kyle stooped, and the slug pistol
flashed in his hand from the light of the bar windows. Kyle,
bent over, was lifting the cuff of his trouser leg and closing his
fingers on the hilt of the knife in his boot sheath. He moved
simply, skillfully, and with a speed nearly double that of the
young man, striking up into the chest before him until the
hand holding the knife jarred against the cloth covering flesh
and bone.
It was a sudden, hard-driven, swiftly merciful blow. The
blade struck upwards between the ribs lying open to an
underhanded thrust, plunging deep into the heart. The Prince
grunted with the impact driving the air from his lungs; and he
was dead as Kyle caught his slumping body in leather-
jacketed arms.
Kyle lifted the tall body across the saddle of the gelding
and tied it there. He hunted on the dark ground for the fallen
pistol and returned it to his holster. Then he mounted the
stallion and, leading the gelding with its burden, started the
long ride back.
Dawn was graying the sky when at last he topped the hill
overlooking the lodge where he had picked up the Prince
almost twenty-four hours before. He rode down towards the
courtyard gate.
A tall figure, indistinct in the pre-dawn light, was waiting
inside the courtyard as Kyle came through the gate; and it
came running to meet him as he rode toward it. It was the
tutor, Montlaven, and he was weeping as he ran to the gelding
and began to fumble at the cords that tied the body in place.
"I'm sorry ..." Kyle heard himself saying; and was dully
shocked by the deadness and remoteness of his voice. "There
was no choice. You can read it all in my report tomorrow
morning"
He broke off. Another, even taller figure had appeared in
the doorway of the lodge giving on the courtyard. As Kyle
turned towards it, this second figure descended the few steps
to the grass and came to him.
"Lord" said Kyle. He looked down into features like
those of the Prince, but older, under graying hair. This man
did not weep like the tutor, but his face was set like iron.
"What happened, Kyle?" he said.
"Lord," said Kyle, "you'll have my report in the morn-
ing .."
"I want to know," said the tall man. Kyle's throat was dry
and stiff. He swallowed but swallowing did not ease it.
"Lord," he said, "you have three other sons. One of them
will make an Emperor to hold the worlds together."
"What did he do? Whom did he hurt? Tell me!" The tall
man's voice cracked almost as his son's voice had cracked in
the bar.
"Nothing. No one," said Kyle, stiff-throated. "He hit a boy
not much older than himself. He drank too much. He may
have got a girl in trouble. It was nothing he did to anyone
else. It was only a fault against himself." He swallowed. "Wait
until tomorrow. Lord, and read my report."
"No!" The tall man caught at Kyle's saddle horn with a
grip that checked even the white stallion from moving. "Your
family and mine have been tied together by this for three
hundred years. What was the flaw in my son to make him fail
his test, back here on Earth? / want to know!"
Kyle's throat ached and was dry as ashes.
"Lord," he answered, "he was a coward."
The hand dropped from his saddle horn as if struck down
by a sudden strengthlessness. And the Emperor of a hundred
worlds fell back like a beggar, spurned in the dust.
Kyle lifted his reins and rode out of the gate, into the forest
away on the hillside. The dawn was breaking.