O'Leary sat on the floor, blinking into total blackness. Some day he'd have to read up on Freudian dream symbolism. All this business of stumbling around in the dark being beaten by large men must be some sort of punishment wish, probably arising from guilt feelings due to the Adoranne and Daphne sequences—particularly the former.
O'Leary got to his feet, felt his way to a wall, made a circuit of the cell. There were no windows, unless they were above his reach; and just the one door, massive and unyielding. He heard a furtive scuttling. Rats, no doubt. Not a very nice place to spend the rest of his dream. He sighed, regretting again he had been too rattled to provide a few amenities before it was too late. But perhaps he could still manage something . . .
Light, first. A candle would do. He pictured a two-inch stub lying among the litter in the far corner . . . and a match in his pocket.
There was a thump, as though the universe had gone over a tar strip in the road. O'Leary groped among odds and ends, felt straw, small bones—and a greasy lump of wax with a stub of a wick. Aha! Now for a match. In his pocket, a small item like that could have passed unnoticed. He checked, felt the smooth cover of a match folder, pulled it out and lit up. The candle burned with a feeble yellow flame, its light confirming his first impression of the cramped cell. Well, that part couldn't be helped, but it would be wise to think carefully about his next move.
O'Leary settled himself on the driest spot on the floor. It looked as though he were stuck here unless he could manage to regain the sanctuary of his room back at Mrs. MacGlint's house. The last two tries hadn't worked out, but then that was to be expected. After all, who could focus the Psychic Energies with someone hauling him toward a paddy-wagon or threatening to stick a foot of razor-edged steel into his internal arrangements?
At least it was peaceful here in the cell. But going back was a last resort; he couldn't just vanish without even a chance to explain to Adoranne how he had happened to be in her bedroom with a sackful of loot.
What could he do? If things hadn't happened so fast, he could have dreamed up some way out, some last minute rescue. Maybe it still wasn't too late. Nicodaeus, maybe; he could get him out of here. Probably he hadn't heard about his protégé's arrest yet—or, O'Leary amended, he had just heard a few minutes ago. By now he'd be coming along the hall, passing the iron-barred door, ordering guards around, demanding O'Leary's immediate release—
There was a sound from the door. A tiny panel opened; light glared in. O'Leary jumped up as he saw the face at the opening.
"Daphne! What are you doing here?"
"Oh, Sir Lafayette, I knew something terrible would happen!"
"You were right; there's dirty work afoot. Look, Daphne, I have to get out of here! I'm worried about Adoranne; whoever led me to her room—"
"I tried to tell them, sir, but they think I'm your confederate."
"What? Nonsense! But don't worry, Daphne, Nicodaeus will be along soon."
"He tried, sir—but the king was furious! He said it was an open-and-shut case, that you were caught red-handed—"
"But it was a frame-up!"
"At least you won't have a long wait in that awful cell. It's only three hours till dawn; it comes early this time of year."
"They're letting me out at dawn?"
"For the execution," Daphne said sadly.
"Whose execution?"
"Y—yours, sir," Daphne sniffled. "I'm to get off with twenty years."
"But—but they can't! King Goruble needs me to kill the dragon, and—and—"
"OK," a guard's rough voice interrupted, "you seen him, kid. Now how about that smooch?" the panel slammed with a bang. O'Leary groaned and resumed his seat. He'd not only reduced his own credit to zero, but dragged an innocent girl down with him. It looked like the end of the line—the second time in the last few hours that imminent death had stared him in the face. Some dream! What if he failed to wake up in time, and the sentence were actually carried out? He'd heard of people dreaming they were falling, and hitting, and dying in their sleep of heart failure. A hard story to check, but that was one experiment he couldn't afford to try. There was no help for it; he'd have to wake up.
Sitting against the wall, he relaxed, closed his eyes. Mrs. MacGlint's house, he thought, picturing the front porch in the gray predawn light; the dark hall, the creaky stairs, the warped, black-varnished door to his room with its chipped brown-enameled steel knob; and the room itself, the odor of stale cookery and ancient woodwork and dust . . .
He opened an eye. The candle flame across the cell guttered, making shadows bob on the stone wall. Nothing had changed. O'Leary felt uneasiness rising like water in a leaky hold.
He tried again, picturing the cracked sidewalk in front of the boarding house, the dusty leaves of the trees that overhung it, the mailbox at the corner, the down-at-the-heels shops along the main street, the tarnished red brick of the Post Office . . .
That was real, not the ridiculous dream about princesses and dragons. He was Lafayette O'Leary, aged twenty-six, with a steady if not inspiring job at which he was due in a very few hours. Old Man Biteworse would be hopping mad if he showed up late, bleary-eyed from lack of sleep. There was no time to waste, idling in a fantasy world, while his real-life job waited, with its deadlines and eyestrain and competition for the next two-dollar raise.
O'Leary felt a faint jar. A breath of warmth touched his face. His eyes snapped open. He was staring into a bright mist that swirled and eddied. The air was hot, moist. Abruptly, he was aware of dampness soaking into the seat of his trousers. He scrambled up, saw vague pale shapes moving in the fog. Out of the steam, figures appeared—the pink bodies of young girls with wet hair, wearing damp towels, carelessly draped. Lafayette gaped. He had made his escape—not back to Mrs. MacGlint's, it appeared, but to a sort of Arabian paradise, complete with teen-age houris.
There were sudden startled yelps; the nearest girls fled, squealing. Others bobbed into view, saw O'Leary, hastily hitched up towels and dashed away, adding to the outcry.
"Oh, no," Lafayette muttered. "Not again . . ." He moved off quickly to his left, encountered a corner and the sound of running water. He tried the other direction, spotted the darker rectangle of a doorless arch, made for it—and collided with a vast bulk in bundlesome tweeds hurtling through from the room beyond. There was a bleat like the cry of an outraged cow hippo defending her young; a rolled umbrella whistled past O'Leary's ear. He ducked; the shadowy giantess charged again, emitting piercing shrieks against the background of lesser yelps. Lafayette backed away, warding off a rain of blows from the flailing implement.
"Madam, you don't understand!" he shouted over the din. "I just wandered in by mistake, and—" his foot slipped. He had a momentary impression of a square red face like a worn-out typist's cushion closing in, the mouth gaping, tiny eyes glaring. Then a bomb exploded and sent him hurtling into a bottomless darkness.
"The way I see it, chief," a meaty voice was saying, "this character hides out over on the men's side last night, see? Then after the joint's locked up, he goes up a rope, out the skylight, across the roof, in the other skylight, down another rope, and hides out in the shower room until Mrs. Prudlock's early-morning modern dance class gets there—"
"Yeah?" a voice like soft mud came back. "So what'd he do with them ropes? Eat 'em?"
"Huh? How could a guy eat forty feet o' rope, chief?"
"The same way he done all that other stuff you said, lamebrain!"
"Huh?"
"Look, I think I got it, chief," an eager voice announced. "He dresses up like a janitor—"
"Only one janitor at the Y. Ninety years old. Checks out clean. Turned in a complaint last year he seen a nood dame. Then: You boys sure you checked that side door?"
"She was locked up tighter'n a card-sharp's money belt, chief."
"Now, my theory is," another voice put in, "he's come in dressed as a broad, like. And after he's inside—"
"—he puts on tight britches and a cape, and jumps out at old lady Prudlock. Yah!"
The discussion continued. O'Leary sat up, winced at a throb from the back of his head and others from various parts of his body representing blows from Alain's sword, jabs from the pikemen and a few assorted kicks, cuffs and falls. He looked around; he was in a small room with walls of white-washed cement, a bare concrete floor, a no-nonsense toilet minus a lid, a tiny washbowl with one water tap and a mirror above. Two bunks were bolted to the wall, on the lower of which he was sitting. Beyond a wide, steel-grilled door he could see a short stretch of two-tone brown-painted hallway, another barred door and beyond it a group of men in baggy dark blue suits with shiny seats and fat leather holsters strapped to wide hips.
O'Leary got to his feet, made it to the small barred window. Outside, early morning sunshine gleamed down on the drowsy view of the courthouse lawn, the park with the Civil War cannon and the second-best shopping street of Colby Corners. He stumbled back and sank down on the bunk. He was home—that much was clear—but how in the name of Goop had he gotten into the county jail? He had been in a dungeon under the palace—the present quarters were a marked improvement over their Artesian equivalent—and then . . .
Oh, yes. The houris and all that steam, and the big woman with the umbrella . . .
"Look, chief," a rubbery-voice cop was saying, "What's the rap we're hanging on this joker?"
"Whatta ya mean, what's the rap? Peeping Tom, trespasser, breaking and entering, larceny—"
"We didn't find no busted locks, chief. Illegal entry, maybe, but the Y is open to the public."
"Not the YW! Not to the male public, it ain't! Besides he probably swiped something!"
"Naw, he just come fer the scenery." Guffaws rewarded this sally. The eager one cleared his throat. "What's the penalty for looking at nood dames, chief?"
"Hey, chief, can we hang a peeping Tom on a guy if he's working in broad daylight?"
O'Leary tuned out the legal hassle. There was something very strange here. From what the cops were saying, it was clear enough that he'd actually been in the YW. That part hadn't been a dream, and the knot on the back of his head where the tile floor had come up and hit it confirmed it. The old battleaxe had called in the police, hence his presence in a cell. But how—and why—had he gotten into the shower room in the first place? It was a good five blocks from Mrs. MacGlint's; about the same distance, he realized with dawning comprehension, as that from the Ax and Dragon to the palace. Did that mean that he had actually covered the distances that he had dreamed of moving? Had he walked in his sleep? But he never wore pajamas, and—he looked down quickly, confirming that he was wearing pants—
Tight-fitting pants, of a deep blue, with tiny bows at the knee. And low-cut shoes, with thin soles and silver buckles.
He gulped, staring at himself. Excitement started up, like distant drums. There was something strange here, something more than a back-fired experiment with self-hypnosis.
Artesia was no dream; the clothes he had gotten there were real. And if the clothes were real—he tugged at the cloth, felt its reassuring toughness—then perhaps all of it . . .?
But the whole thing was too idiotic! O'Leary came to his feet, grunted as his wounds throbbed—those were real enough, too—and took a quick turn up and down the cell. You couldn't go to bed and dream, and then wake up and find it had all really happened! Maybe he was at home, dreaming that he was in Artesia dreaming that he was in jail?
Hell, if that were so, he was already hopelessly skitzy. He put a hand against the wall; it was rough, cold, solid. If it wasn't real cement, it might as well be.
O'Leary went back to the bunk and sat down. This was all going to be very hard to explain to Mr. Biteworse. When the story got out that he had been arrested in the girl's shower at the Y, wearing funny pants and a shirt with ruffles—
Well, it was goodby job—even if the police released him, which seemed unlikely, in view of the charges being discussed in the outer office. He had to do something—but what? If he were back in Artesia, he could simply conjure up a key to the door, and be on his way. Things weren't quite that simple here in Colby Corners. Solid objects had a way of staying solid. If you wanted a telephone, say, you had to go find one previously installed by the Bell Company. You couldn't just whistle it up . . .
Lafayette sat up, holding a tight rein on a racing imagination. After all, he'd dreamed up all of Artesia; why not just one little old telephone? It could be out in the hall, maybe—mounted on the wall. And if he reached through the bars—
It was worth a try. O'Leary rose, eased over to the barred door and stole a look. The coast was clear. He closed his eyes, pictured a phone bolted to the brick wall, surrounded by scribbled numbers, with a tattered book dangling below . . .
Cautiously, he reached, and found nothing. He drew a deep breath, gathered his resources. It's there, he hissed. Just a little farther to the right . . .
His groping hand encountered something hard, cool. He grasped it, brought it into view. It was an old-fashioned instrument with a brass mouthpiece. He lifted the dangling ear unit and paused. He hadn't seen a phone in Nicodaeus' lab, but that could be fixed. There had been a lot of locked cabinets with solid wood doors; the phone would be fitted inside one of them—the one just to the left as you entered the lab . . .
"Central," a bright voice said tinnily in his ear. "Number, please."
"Ah, nine five three four . . . nine oh oh . . . two one one," Lafayette said, noticing how the number seemed to spell itself out.
"Thank you. Hold the line, please."
He held the receiver, listening to the hum, punctuated by an occasional crackle, then a loud pop. There was a harsh buzz. Pause. Buzz. Pause. What if Nicodaeus wasn't home? The cops would notice him any minute now, and—
There was a clunk! and the sound of heavy breathing.
"Hello?" a deep voice said cautiously.
"Nicodaeus!" Lafayette gripped the earpiece.
"Lafayette! Is it you my boy? I thought—I feared—"
"Yeah, let's skip that for now. I seem to have made a couple of small errors, and now—"
"Lafayette! Where did you get my number? I didn't think—that is, it's unlisted. And—"
"I have my methods—but I'll go into all that later. I need help! What I want to know is, ah, where—I mean, how—oh, dammit, I don't know what I need! But—"
"Dear me, this is all very confusing, Lafayette. Where did you say you are now?"
"I'd tell you, but I'm afraid you wouldn't understand! You see, you don't actually exist—that is, I just thought of you—but then, when Goruble slapped me in the cell, I decided to wake up—and here I was!"
"Lafayette—you've hurt your head, poor lad. Now, about my telephone number—"
"To heck with your telephone number! Get me out of here! I've got half a dozen stupid cops debating which of six assorted felonies I'm to be held without bail for—"
"Dumb cops, huh?" an ominous voice growled. The phone was yanked from Lafayette's hand and he stared into the bovine countenance of a thick-lipped redhead with old boxing scars on his cheekbones.
"You don't talk to no mouthpiece without the chief says okay, see?" The cop put the phone out of sight. "An' that'll be a dime for the call."
"Put it on my bill," Lafayette said bitterly. The cop snorted and turned away.
With a groan, Lafayette stretched out on the hard bunk and closed his eyes. Maybe it was nutty, but his only chance seemed to be to try to get out of this idiotic situation the same way he'd gotten into it. All he had to do was slide back into some other dream; a nice, restful place this time, he decided; to hell with romantic old streets and cozy taverns and beautiful princesses . . . But Adoranne had been gorgeous—and that flimsy nightgown . . . Damn shame he had to go off like that, leaving her thinking he was a liar and a cheat.
The man—the one who had come for him—had there been something familiar about the fellow? Who had sent him—and why? Alain, maybe? No, the count was a stuffed shirt, but not really the devious type; he'd simply have run him through. Nicodaeus? But what motive would he have?
O'Leary's ruminations were cut short by a sudden sensation of sliding, as though the cell had silently skidded a foot in some undefined direction. He sat up, staring across at the window. There were red-checked curtains beside it and a potted geranium on the sill—
Curtains? Geranium? O'Leary jumped to his feet and stared around the room. It was low-ceilinged, crooked-floored, spotlessly clean, with a feather bed in a polished wooden frame, a three-legged stool and a door made of wooden planks. Gone were the iron-grilled door, the concrete walls, the barred window, the cops. He went to the window, looked out at a steep street filled with the ring of a blacksmith's hammer, the shouts of stall-keepers hawking their wares. Half-timbered fronts loomed up across the way, and behind and beyond he saw the pennant turrets of a castle. He was back in Artesia!
O'Leary felt himself smiling foolishly. In spite of himself, he was glad to be here. And now that he was, he might as well take the time to clear up his misunderstanding with Adoranne.
O'Leary washed up quickly at the basin on a stand in the corner, tucked in his shirt tail, smoothed back his hair, dropped on the bed one of the small gold pieces he found in his pocket and went down to the street. The hammering, he saw, was emanating from a shop with a sign announcing Flats Fixed While U Wait. A wooden steam cart was jacked up with two wheels on the sidewalk while the smith pounded out a new steel-strap tire for a massive oak wheel.
O'Leary turned down the first side street leading toward the palace, threading his way through a bustling throng of plump Artesian housewives doing their morning shopping at the food stalls. He sniffed and caught the aroma of fresh-baked bread. He hadn't realized how hungry he was. But then he hadn't eaten since—when?
The bake shop was just ahead—into a cozy room crowded by two tiny tables. He ordered pastries and a cup of coffee from a red-cheeked girl in starched white. He reached for his money, hesitated. The city guard just might be looking for him. It wouldn't do to leave a trail of gold pieces all over town, but if there were some smaller coins in among the sovereigns . . .
He concentrated, picturing silver pieces, then checked the contents of his pocket. Success! He selected a quarter, handed it to the girl, started for the door—
"Beg pardon, sir," the girl called after him. "Ye've give me furrin money—by mistake, I don't doubt . . ."
Sure enough, a U.S. two-bit piece. "Sorry," he muttered; he took out a gold piece and handed it over. "Keep the change." He flashed her a quick smile, started out—
"But sir! A whole sovereign! Wait here half a sec and I'll pop across to Master Samuel's stall and—"
"Never mind; I'm . . . ah . . . in a hurry." Lafayette went up the steps, the girl behind him.
"Ye must be daft, sir!" she called indignantly. "A sovereign fer tuppence 'orth o' cakes?"
People were staring. A lantern-jawed woman with a basket on her arm jerked as though someone had pulled a wire attached to her neck. She pointed.
"It's him!" she squawked. "Last night, at the grand ball. I seen the rascal, plain as I'm seeing him now, when I come in to trim the wicks!"
Lafayette plunged past her, rounded a corner at a full run. Behind him a shout was rising; feet pounded in pursuit. He glanced back, saw a big-chested man in an open vest round the corner, hair flying, legs pumping.
O'Leary sprinted, bowled over a cart loaded with gimcracks and miniature pink-and-white Artesian flags, skidded into a narrow alley, pounded up a cobbled way toward the looming wall of a church. Someone shot from a side alley ahead, whirled, arms spread; Lafayette straight-armed him, jumped the sprawling body, emerged into an open court. There was an eight-foot wall rimming the yard. He ran for it, leaped, caught the top, pulled himself up and over. He dropped into a tiny back yard where an old man trimming roses with a pair of heavy shears opened a toothless mouth as Lafayette bounded past him through a door, along a short dark hall redolent of wood smoke and burst out onto a quiet side street. He paused a moment, took a deep breath, looked left and right.
The hunt, rounding the corner half a block above, gave a shout as they saw him. He whirled, dashed off down the slope. If he could make the turn ahead in time to duck out of sight before they caught up . . .
The street curved, widened into a plaza with a fountain surrounded by flower stalls and a dense throng of shoppers, vivid in the shafts of morning light pouring down past the cathedral towers. An inviting street turned off to the left just ahead. He ducked into a crouch as he pushed in among the crowd; maybe they wouldn't pick him out in the press if he didn't stick up so high. People gave way before him as he worked his way through, back curved, neck bent. A motherly woman handed him a copper. A legless man seated under the lamp post on the corner with a hat in his lap gave him a resentful look.
"Hey, buddy, you joined the union?"
O'Leary dodged past him, straightened, went up the street at a lope. The geography of the town, it occurred to him, was similar to that of Colby Corners. The main difference was that back home they'd leveled the ground; here the streets wound up and down over the little hills and valleys that in a less romantic clime had been hammered into drab horizontality.
The street he was now in was analogous to the alley running behind Pott's Drug Store and Hambanger's Hardware. That being the case, if he took a right just ahead, and another right, he'd hit the park—and maybe, among the trees and underbrush, he could lose his pursuers. He could hear them behind him, closing in again. He caught a glimpse as he rounded the corner. A big man with a pitchfork was in the lead now, running hard. Lafayette ran for the next turn, skidded into it, pelted uphill, saw the gap ahead where the buildings ended and the open green began. He leaped for the grass, threw himself flat behind a hedge, twisted to see the pursuit streaming past. Nobody, as far as he could tell, had noticed his dash for the park. Maybe he was safe here for a while.
He cautiously worked his way behind the shelter of the hedge to a clump of arbor vitae. He rested for a moment, then crawled inside the concealment of the ring of trees. It was quiet here, in a green gloom of leaf-filtered sunlight. He settled himself on a carpet of piney mold and prepared to wait until dark. Apparently the story of his having invaded the princess's bedroom was all over town. Until he cleared up that little misunderstanding, there'd be no peace and quiet for him here.
A large, peach-colored crescent moon had risen behind the church towers before O'Leary emerged from his sanctuary. The streets, inadequately illuminated by the yellow gaslights at the corners, were deserted. A few small windows gleamed warm yellow and orange against the dark facades, shedding patches of light on the cobbles below. O'Leary moved along quickly across the park and found the high wall that surrounded the palace grounds. The palace itself, of course, was located in the same relative position as the YMCA back in Plainview. The gate was half a block ahead; he could see the sentry in his bearskin shako standing stiffly at parade rest before the narrow sentry box. No use trying to get through there; he'd be recognized in an instant.
O'Leary turned in a direction opposite to that of the gate. Ten minutes later, in the deep shadow of a clump of tall elms growing just inside the wall, he looked carefully in both directions, then found fingerholds, scrambled up the wall and peered over the top. No guards were in sight. Cautiously, he pulled himself higher, threw a leg over and crouched astride the wall. The tree that provided the shadow was too high, he saw, craning his neck, to be of any help.
Below there was a sudden thump of feet, the unmistakable rasp of a blade sliding from a sheath.
"Hold, varlet!" a hostile voice barked. Lafayette, startled by the sudden interruption, grabbed to retain his balance, missed, went over sideways with a choked yell. He saw the flash of light along a bared blade, had just an instant to picture himself impaled on it as he twisted aside and landed full on the man with a impact that knocked the breath from him. He rolled free and saw the watchman stretched on his back, out cold. Someone shouted—from the left, O'Leary thought. He came to his feet, struggling to breathe, and staggered off in the direction of the deepest shadow. Running feet approached. O'Leary leaned against the three-foot trunk of the largest elm, drawing painful breaths.
"It's Morton," a squeaky voice piped. "Somebody clobbered him!"
"He couldn'a of went far," a deep voice boomed. "You check over that way, Hymie; I'll scout along here."
O'Leary tried to quiet his wheezing; he heard hoarse breathing, the whack of a sword blade beating the bushes against the wall. He eased around the trunk as the searcher passed six feet away. O'Leary then tiptoed toward some shrubbery across the path twenty feet distant.
"Grab him, Hymie!" the deep voice yelled from the other direction. Lafayette sprang into action, dived for cover, hit the dirt, wriggled through, rose to a crouch on the far side, scuttled for the shelter of an ornamental hedge.
Another man, looking tall in a floppy hat and boots, sprang from nowhere into his path, brandished a sword aloft and charged with a yell. O'Leary ducked aside and dashed for the hedge, rounded right end, leaped to a marble bench, veered barely in time to miss the lily pool. There was a yell and splash behind him; the pursuer had misjudged the water hazard.
In the clear for the moment, O'Leary sprinted for the tall shadow of the palace, angling to the right to miss a pavilion glowing with strung lanterns. Judging from the yells, he had a dozen men on his trail now, mostly behind him, but some ahead, off to the right. If he could reach the shelter of the wall before they spotted him . . .
Two men dashed into view ahead and skidded to a halt.
"They went that way!" O'Leary shouted. The two newcomers whirled and dashed back out of sight. O'Leary veered sharply, reached a line of trees leading generally palaceward and pounded ahead. A wing of the massive building stretched out toward the trees. O'Leary cleared the end of the row, raced for the refuge of the deep shadows ahead and saw a man back into view fifty yards distant, his attention on the bushes from which he had emerged. Lafayette put on a spurt, dived for the tangle of ivy against the palace wall just as the fellow turned.
"Hey! Here he is, boys!" the man yelled. O'Leary muttered curses and worked his way behind the trailing curtain of vines, forcing his way along against the rough-hewn stone blocks. Feet pelted past and he froze; voices called near at hand. There was the clang of a blade thrust through the vines.
"We got him pinned down, men!" someone exulted. "Spread out and work that ivy!" More clashing of metal against stone, coming closer. O'Leary moved cautiously, gained another foot. Tricky work, trying not to shake the vines. But if he could just get past the corner.
A projecting buttress blocked his way. He felt along its edge; the vine cover ended two feet along it. He was trapped—cornered. Unless . . .
O'Leary closed his eyes, remembering the palace layout. This was the southwest face of the building. He'd never been on this side of the palace, so it ought to be safe.
He pictured a door, just a small one, set a foot or two above ground level. It was made of stout oak planks, weathered but sound, and it was secured by a hasp—a rusty one. Very rusty. It was concealed by the vines, of course, and opened into a forgotten passage which led—somewhere.
At the comforting jolt in the smooth flow of the universe, O'Leary opened his eyes, started feeling over the wall, as steel clashed less than ten feet away. His hands encountered wood, a rough frame, then the door, a squat entry four feet by five, with rust-scaled hinges and a massive padlock dangling from a corroded hasp. O'Leary let out his breath in a preliminary sigh of relief, pushed against the panel. It stirred, came up against the restraint of the hasp. He pushed harder; rusted screws tore out of the wood with a crunching sound.
"Hark, men! What's that?" Hands were tearing at the vines. O'Leary pushed at the resisting door, got it open a foot, slipped inside, forced it shut behind him. A moldering beam lay on the floor; brackets to fit it were mounted on either side of the doorway. He lifted the timber, grunting, settled it into place as a hand slammed the oak from the outside.
"Hey, Sarge! A door! Look!" a muffled voice came through the barrier. More talk, thumps, then a heavy blow.
"He couldn'a got through there, ya dummy, it's locked."
"Hey—if this guy's a like sorcerer . . ."
"Yeah, what's a locked door to a guy like that?"
O'Leary looked both ways along a narrow, low-ceilinged passage, closely resembling the one through which he had been led to Adoranne's room—less than twenty-four hours before, he realized with wonderment; it seemed like days. As for the passage, it was probably part of a system running all through the building. With a little luck, he'd be able to find his way back to the princess' apartment and explain what had happened without having to venture out into the open.
He moved off, barely able to see by random glints of dim light filtering through chinks in the crudely mortared walls. The passage ran straight for twenty feet, then right-angled. There was a door a few feet beyond the turn. O'Leary tried the latch; it opened, revealing a wide, clean room, smoothly floored, crowded with bulky dark shapes the size of upright pianos. Along the left wall there was a complex pattern of highlights from massed dial faces and polished metal fittings. To the right, more panels, like computer programmer's consoles, were set under wide TV-type screens.
The whole thing, O'Leary thought, looked like a blockhouse where a space shot was being readied. How did all this fit into the simple Artesian scene? True, there were a few electric lights in the palace, and he had seen a number of clumsy mechanical devices in use—but nothing approaching the technology implied here. It didn't make sense—unless Nicodaeus knew something about it. That had to be it. There was definitely something fishy about the court magician. That candid camera he'd used, disguised as a lighter, for example . . .
But that wasn't finding Adoranne. He closed the door, noting the thick metal plate bolted to it. It would take some doing to force your way past that. He went on along the passage, passed a heavy metal-clad door like a butcher's walk-in refrigerator. More modern devices; maybe Nicodaeus had set it up and stocked it with foods in season, which he later miraculously produced. There was nothing like fresh frozen strawberries in the dead of winter to endear a sorcerer to a gourmet king.
Thirty feet past the refrigerator, the passage dead-ended. O'Leary thumped the walls, looking for concealed doors, then started back the way he had come—and stopped dead at a sound from the darkness ahead.
He stood, head cocked, listening, aware of the musty odor of the dead air, the rasp of his own breathing. The sound came again—a soft scraping. He flattened himself against the wall. There was a movement—a stirring of shadows against the darkness. Something was coming toward him—something bulky, crouched, no more than waist-high. O'Leary tried twice, managed to swallow. No wonder the secret passages were deserted; ordinarily, he didn't believe in spectral ogres, but—
It was closer now, no more than two yards away, waiting there in the darkness. O'Leary pictured diabolical eyes studying him, goblin fangs gaping . . .
He fumbled in his pockets; he had no weapon—damned careless of him. But he couldn't just stand here and wait to be savaged; he'd rather attack in the blind, come to grips with whatever it was. He took a deep breath, set himself—
"Hiya, Sir Lafayette," a bass voice rumbled. "What you doing down here?"
O'Leary jumped violently, cracking his head, and slumped back against the wall, weak with relief.
"Yokabump," he managed. "Fancy meeting you here."