Free Gordon R. Dickson by Mankind on the Run

his limbs and body. Then he
turned so that Kil saw a heavy gasgun hanging at his side; and suddenly Kil
recognized the glassiness as body armor of the magnetic shield type. He was
confirmed in this recognition as the attendant waddled a few steps forward.
The metal mesh supporting the shield under his clothing must be cruelly heavy.
    Dekko,
however, appeared to pay no attention to the attendant and his illegal
equipment; but turned and vanished down the nearest tunnel entrance. Kil
followed. A short distance on they passed through a door and into a sort of
cave that ascended steeply.
    "What's
all this about Duluth?" asked Kil, when they had gone some ways up the
cave.
    "Close
to the top," answered Dekko. "Like any business, you got to know what
the competition's doing. It's Stick headquarters, so headquarters of eyerything
else isn't far off. For us, that means the O.T.L."
    The cave had leveled off now. They went on a
short distance, opened a final door and stepped out on a strip of shelving
pebbly beach. Overhead, gulls swooped, crying; the early morning sun washed the
ocean shore in white light. For a minute Kil felt shock to discover that his
period of hypnosis had lasted so long. Then this feeling was lost forever in
something greater that crept over and buried it like an avalanche on some
solitary mountain climber—for he saw the sea.
    Water—water.
Water and Ellen—Ellen as she had been the night she had gone away; and the
ocean then stretching wide and silver-dark to the horizon. Like a man in a
dream, Kil turned and took one step toward the curling waves.
    "Kil! Kil!" And then Dekko had him by the arm, holding him back. For-a moment he
began a half-convulsive struggle to free himself. Then the spell snapped and he
turned his back on the wide sea.
    And Dekko drew him away.
     
    CHAPTER SEVEN
    They took the noon rocket back to Duluth and found
themselves a set of rooms in an unclassified hotel outside the Slums. That
night they went to the Northern Star, Duluth's largest entertainment center.
Kil had already gone out during the afternoon to draw from his account and
replenish his dwindling cash reserves. He drew three thousand for himself and
an additional thousand for Dekko. It occurred to him that the little humpback
was still unpaid; and probably, therefore, in need of cash himself.
    This
could hardly have been the case. When he got back to the hotel, he found that
Dekko had spent what could only have been a sizable amount on some evening
clothes. These were not throwaways of plastic like their ordinary, daily dress,
but trousers, tunic and short jacket of pressed silk. Their color was a heavy
yellow, shot with black; a startling combination. And not only that, but the
jacket was squared and stiffened with a high, hooped collar and boxed shoulders
that all but disguised the fact of his hump.
    Kil stared.
    Dekko smiled. It was a different expression
from his former grin, tight-lipped and a little sardonic.
    "We're
working a different territory from here on," he said. "I got you an
outfit, too."
    Kil followed his pointing finger and went to
a closet recess. On the wire, he saw a kilt and tunic also of silk, scarlet
tunic and scarlet and black checkerboard design, pleated kilt. A silver weapon
belt holding a little dress gun and a silver-handle poniard went with it. A fourragère looped from one shoulder of the tunic, and a heavy ring, with a
square-cut emerald hung by a thread from the wire.
    Kil scowled blackly.
    "You expect me to wear this?" he
demanded. "Ill look like a damned pruce."
    Dekko shook with silent laughter.
    "Put it on," he
said. "And get the dye out of your hair."
    Growling,
Kil got into the rig. When it was on, complete to the emerald ring on the index
finger of his left hand, he examined himself in the mirror. The effect was not
as bad as he had expected. He was undeniably overdressed, but a certain sort of
genius seemed to have guided Dekko in his selections. Kil looked not so much
affected as