Manning had set on the floor across the room was trained upwards, and the interpreter was still in the darkness. He lowered his head as if in thought and switched on the machine with his foot.

“Is that true, Manning? Are you going to kill them?” His voice was loud and it echoed from the walls.

“I can’t trust them,” Manning said, his voice automatically growing louder in response to Rynason’s own. He stepped forward, pushing Mara in front of him. “They’re not human, Lee—you keep forgetting that, for some reason. Think of it as clearing the area of hostile native animal life—that comes under the duties of a governor, now doesn’t it?”

“And what about the men outside? Did you put it that way to them?”

“They do what I say!” Manning snapped. “They don’t give a damn who they kill. There’s going to be fighting here whether it’s against the Hirlaji or between the townsmen. As governor, I’d rather they took it all out on the horses here. Domestic tranquillity, shall we say?” He was smiling now; he had everything in control.

“So that’s your purpose?” Rynason said. There was anger in his voice, feigned or real—perhaps both. But his voice rose still higher. “Is butchery your only goal in life, Manning?”

Manning stepped toward him again, his eyes narrowing. “Butchery? It’s better than no purpose at all, Lee! It’ll get me off of these damned outworlds eventually, if I’m a good enough butcher. And I mean to be, Lee … I mean to be.”

Rynason turned his back on the man in contempt, and walked past Horng to the base of the ancient altar. He looked up at the Eye of Kor, dim now when not in use. He turned.

“Is it better, Manning?” he shouted. “Does it give you a right to live, while you slaughter the Hirlaji?”

Manning cursed under his breath, and took a quick step toward Rynason; his hard, black shadow leaped up the wall.

“Yes! It gives me any right I can take!”

It happened quickly. Manning was now beside the massive figure of the alien, Horng; in his anger he had loosened his grip on Mara. He raised the disintegrator toward Rynason.

And Horng’s huge fist smashed it from his hand.

 Prev. P 76/80 next