Grimes stood at the base of the slender golden tower that was The Far Traveler, waiting for the after airlock door to open, for the ramp to be extended. With him were Wheeldon and Jock Tanner, the Paddington chief of police who, until things became properly organized, would be in charge of such matters as Customs, Immigration and Port Health formalities. And there was Shirley Townsend, the Mayor's secretary. (Mavis herself was not present She had said, "I just might get up at sparrowfart to see a king or a queen or a president comin' in, but I'm damned if I'll put meself out for some rich bitch . . .")
"Takin' their time," complained Tanner.
"Perhaps we should have gone round to the servants' entrance," said Grimes half seriously.
The outer door of the-airlock slowly opened at last and, as it did so, the ramp extruded itself, a long metal tongue stretching out to lick the dew that still glistened on the grass. Like the shell-plating of the ship it was gold—or, thought Grimes, gold-plated. Either way it was ostentatious.
A man stood in the airlock chamber to receive them. He was tall and thin, and his gorgeous uniform, festoons of gold braid on dark purple, made him look like a refugee from a Strauss operetta. His lean face bore what seemed to be a permanently sour expression. Among the other gleaming encrustations on his sleeve Grimes could distinguish four gold bands. So this had to be the captain . . . And why should the captain be doing a job—the reception of port officials—usually entrusted to, at best, a senior officer?
The yachtmaster looked down at the boarding party. He seemed to decide that Grimes—wearing a slightly modified airship captain's uniform, light blue, with four black stripes on each shoulderboard, with a cap badge on which the silver dirigible had been turned through ninety degrees to make it look like a spaceship—was in charge. He said, "Will you come aboard, please? The Baroness d'Estang will receive you in her sitting room."
Grimes led the way up the ramp. He introduced himself. "Grimes, Acting Port Captain," he said, extending his hand.
"Billinger—Master de jure but not de facto," replied the other with a wry grin.
Grimes wondered what was meant by this, but discreet inquiries could be made later. He introduced his companions. Then Captain Billinger led the party into an elevator cage. He pushed no buttons—there were no buttons to push—but merely said, "Her Excellency's suite."
The locals were obviously impressed. Grimes was not; such voice-actuated mechanisms were common enough on the worlds with which he was familiar. The ascent was smooth, the stop without even the suspicion of a jolt. They disembarked into a vestibule, on to a thick-piled purple carpet that made a rich contrast to the golden bulkheads. A door before them slid silently open. Billinger led the way through it. He bowed to the tall, slim woman reclining on a chaise longue and announced, "The port officials, Your Excellency."
"Thank you, Captain," she replied in a silvery voice, adding, "You may go."
Billinger bowed again, then went
Grimes looked down at the Baroness and she up at him. She was slim yet rounded, the contours of her body revealed rather than hidden by the filmy white translucency that enrobed her. There was a hint of pink-nippled breasts, of dark pubic shadow. Her cheekbones were high, her mouth wide and firm and scarlet her chin not overly prominent but definitely firm, her nose just short of being prominent and delicately arched. Her lustrous bronze hair was braided into a natural coronet in which flashed not-so-small diamonds. Even larger stones, in ornate gold settings, depended from the lobes of her ears.
She reminded Grimes of Goya's Maja—-the draped version—although her legs were much longer. And the furnishings of her sitting room must be like—he thought—the appointments of the boudoir in which that long ago and far away Spanish aristocrat had posed for the artist. Certainly there was nothing in these surroundings that even remotely suggested a spaceship.
He was abruptly conscious of his off-the-peg uniform, of his far from handsome face, his prominent ears. He felt these blushing hotly, a sure sign of embarrassment.
She said sweetly, "Please sit down, Acting Port Captain. I assume that the rank is both de facto and de jure. . ." She smiled fleetingly. "And you, Deputy Port Captain. And you, City Constable. And, of course, Miss Townsend . . ."
"How did you . . . ?" began Shirley. (It came out as " 'Ow did yer . . . ?") "That de facto and de jure business, I mean . . ."
"I heard, and watched, the introductions at the airlock," said the Baroness, waving a slim, long hand toward what looked like a normal although ornately gold-framed mirror.
The police officer fidgeted on the edge of a spindly-legged chair that looked as though it was about to collapse, at any moment, under his weight. He said, "If you'll excuse me, Baroness, I'll go an' see the skipper about the port formalities. . ."
"They will be handled here," said the Baroness firmly. She did not actually finish the sentence with "my man" but the unspoken words hung in the faintly scented air. She went on, "I have always considered any of my business too important to be left to underlings." She clapped her hands. A man dressed in archaic servant's livery—white, frilled shirt, scarlet, brass-buttoned waistcoat, black knee-breeches, white stockings, black, gold-buckled shoes—entered silently. A man? No. He was, Grimes realized, one of those uncannily humanoid serving robots with which he had become familiar during his visit to El Dorado, years ago. He—it?—was carrying folders of documents—clearances, crew and passenger lists, declarations, store lists and manifests. Without hesitation he handed the papers to the City Constable.
"Is he all gold?" asked Shirley in an awed voice. "Under his clothes and all?"
"Yes," the Baroness told her. Then, speaking generally, "Will you take refreshment? There is coffee, if you wish, or tea, or wine. I know that, by your time, it is early in the day—but I have never known Spumante Vitelli to come amiss at any hour of the clock."
"Spumante Vitelli?" asked Shirley Townsend, determinedly talkative. "Sounds like an emetic . . ."
"It's an El Doradan sparkling wine," Grimes said hastily. "From Count Vitelli's vineyards."
"You know El Dorado, Port Captain?" asked the Baroness, polite but condescending surprise in her voice.
"I was there," said Grimes. "Some years ago."
"But this is a Lost Colony. You have had no facilities for space travel since the founders made their chance landing."
"Commander Grimes is out of the Federation's Survey Service," said Jock Tanner.
"Indeed?" The fine eyebrows arched over the dark violet eyes. "Indeed? Commander Grimes? There was—I recall—a Lieutenant Grimes . . ."
"There was," said Grimes. "Me." Then—the memories were flooding back—"You must know the Princess Marlene von Stoizberg, Your Excellency."
The Baroness laughed. "Not intimately, Port Captain or Commander. She's too much of the hausfrau, fat and dowdy, for my taste."
"Hausfrau?" echoed Grimes bewilderedly. That was not how he recalled Marlene.
"Many women change," said the Baroness, "and not always for the better when they become mothers." She went on maliciously, "And what about the father of the child? As I recall it, there was quite a scandal. You, and dear Marlene, and that mad old Duchess, and poor Henri . . . It's a small universe, John Grimes, but I never did meet you on El Dorado and I never dreamed that I should meet you here.
The robot servitor was back, bearing a golden (of course) tray on which was a golden ice bucket, in it a magnum of the Spumante, and gold-rimmed, crystal goblets. He poured, serving his mistress first. Glasses of the sparkling, pale golden wine were raised in salute; sipped from.
"Not a bad drop o' plonk," said Shirley, speaking with deliberate coarseness.
Jock Tanner, doing his best to divert attention from her, put his glass down on the richly carpeted deck, picked up a sheath of the papers. "John," he said, "You know more about these things than I do . . . This clearance from Tallifer . . . Shouldn't it have been signed by the Chief Medical Officer?"
"Not necessarily," said Grimes, putting down his own glass and getting up from his chair, walking across to the police officers. "But I think we'd better get Shirley—she's used to wading through bumf—to make sure that everything has been signed by a responsible official."
"Orl right," grumbled the girl. "Orl right." She drained her glass, belched delicately, joined Grimes and Tanner. The hapless Wheeldon, out of his social depth and floundering, was left to make polite conversation with the Baroness.
Shortly thereafter The Far Traveler was granted her Inward Clearance and the boarding party trooped down the golden gangway to the honest turf.