Ministry of Disturbance | Page 2

of inches consistent with military dignity. The Thoran
captain saluted by touching his forehead, his heart, which was on the
right side, and the butt of his pistol. Paul complimented him on the
smart appearance of his detail, and the captain asked how it could be
otherwise, with the example and inspiration of his imperial majesty.
Compliment and response could have been a playback from every
morning of the ten years of his reign. So could Dorflay's question:
"Your Majesty will proceed to his study?"
He wanted to say, "No, to Niffelheim with it; let's get an aircar and fly
a million miles somewhere," and watch the look of shocked
incomprehension on the captain-general's face. He couldn't do that,
though; poor old Harv Dorflay might have a heart attack. He nodded
slowly.
"If you please, general."
Dorflay nodded to the Thoran captain, who nodded to his men. Four of
them took two paces forward; the rest, unslinging weapons, went
scurrying up the corridor, some posting themselves along the way and
the rest continuing to the main hallway. The captain and two of his men
started forward slowly; after they had gone twenty feet, Paul and
General Dorflay fell in behind them, and the other two brought up the
rear.
"Your Majesty," Dorflay said, in a low voice, "let me beg you to be
most cautious. I have just discovered that there exists a treasonous plot
against your life."
Paul nodded. Dorflay was more than due to discover another treasonous
plot; it had been ten days since the last one.
"I believe you mentioned it, general. Something about planting loose

strontium-90 in the upholstery of the Audience Throne, wasn't it?"
And before that, somebody had been trying to smuggle a fission bomb
into the Palace in a wine cask, and before that, it was a booby trap in
the elevator, and before that, somebody was planning to build a
submachine gun into the viewscreen in the study, and--
"Oh, no, Your Majesty; that was--Well, the persons involved in that
plot became alarmed and fled the planet before I could arrest them.
This is something different, Your Majesty. I have learned that
unauthorized alterations have been made on one of the cooking-robots
in your private kitchen, and I am positive that the object is to poison
Your Majesty."
They were turning into the main hallway, between the rows of portraits
of past emperors, Paul and Rodrik, Paul and Rodrik, alternating over
and over on both walls. He felt a smile growing on his face, and
banished it.
"The robot for the meat sauces, wasn't it?" he asked.
"Why--! Yes, Your Majesty."
"I'm sorry, general. I should have warned you. Those alterations were
made by roboticists from the Ministry of Security; they were installing
an adaptation of a device used in the criminalistics-labs, to insure more
uniform measurements. They'd done that already for Prince Travann,
the Minister, and he'd recommended it to me."
That was a shame, spoiling poor Harv Dorflay's murder plot. It had
been such a nice little plot, too; he must have had a lot of fun inventing
it. But a line had to be drawn somewhere. Let him turn the Palace
upside down hunting for bombs; harass ladies-in-waiting whose lovers
he suspected of being hired assassins; hound musicians into whose
instruments he imagined firearms had been built; the emperor's private
kitchen would have to be off limits.
Dorflay, who should have been looking crestfallen but relieved,

stopped short--shocking breach of Court etiquette--and was staring in
horror.
"Your Majesty! Prince Travann did that openly and with your consent?
But, Your Majesty, I am convinced that it is Prince Travann himself
who is the instigator of every one of these diabolical schemes. In the
case of the elevator, I became suspicious of a man named Samml
Ganner, one of Prince Travann's secret police agents. In the case of the
gun in the viewscreen, it was a technician whose sister is a member of
the household of Countess Yirzy, Prince Travann's mistress. In the case
of the fission bomb----"
The two Thorans and their captain had kept on for some distance before
they had discovered that they were no longer being followed, and were
returning. He put his hand on General Dorflay's shoulder and urged him
forward.
"Have you mentioned this to anybody?"
"Not a word, Your Majesty. This Court is so full of treachery that I can
trust no one, and we must never warn the villain that he is suspected--"
"Good. Say nothing to anybody." They had reached the door of the
study, now. "I think I'll be here until noon. If I leave earlier, I'll flash
you a signal."
* * * * *
He entered the big oval room, lighted from overhead by the great
star-map in the ceiling, and