Free Retief and the Rascals by Keith Laumer Page B

boys and His Ex, too, get on with duh haul,
and I'll even forget about duh trick wid duh ironwork an all. How's dat fer
fair, old pal?"
     
                "Equitable enough, I suppose," Magnan
conceded hesitantly. "Jim, do you suppose we could ...?"
     
                "Not a chance, Mr. Magnan," Retief
replied. "Local reinforcements have been arriving steadily via the secret
passage. While you were negotiating, or giving up, or whatever, I've been
listening to them. They've slipped around us and blocked off all the exits. No
way out. I'm afraid Wim's trying to con us."
     
                "Yes, but," Magnan offered,
"since we're outnumbered, we can hardly be expected to offer further
resistance! Imagine!" he mused on. "Wim Dit himself, personally
participating in robbery and smuggling and Lordy knows what else!"
     
                Retief picked up the fallen grille, lifted it
overhead, turned, and threw it into the darkness of the aisle to his left. A
chorus of yells mingled with the clatter of iron on defective concrete.
     
            "—dirty pool! I
never—" Bam Slang carped.
     
            "—easy, yuh
said!" Wim wailed.
     
                "—leave outa here!" Smig Bash
contributed. "I gotta club meeting to go to, or I lose my status as a
Intolerable. Tree misses inna row an' yer out—an' I already got two!"
     
                "Retief," Magnan objected. "I
hardly think further violence—"
     
                "What did you have in mind, Ben?"
Retief inquired. "I've just about run out of violent ideas."
     
                "Why, if one were to activate the emergency
purge system ..."
     
                "Good thinking, sir," Retief replied,
as he went to the service panel and hauled down on the big red knife-switch.
Immediately, with a roar like a primitive ramjet engine, the flushing fans
started up, flooding the storeroom with fire-damping nitrogen gas.
     
                "Yipes!" a voice Retief recognized as
that of Jum Derk exclaimed. "Perzon gas! Duh tricky Terries is tryna
expiate us!"
     
                "Dat's 'asphyxiate', Dum-dum!" Blarp
corrected. "You gotta steal a better translator; you'll give us locals a
bad name fer illegitimacy!"
     
                "Dat's 'illiteracy', " Jum corrected
in turn. "Skip duh fine points o' Terry syntax, OK? Right now we gotta
learn to live widout breadin'!"
     
                "Say, fellows," Foor contributed, with
a deep sigh. "I jus' noticed I'm breadin' good! Maybe we ain't dead."
     
                As the conspirators eagerly compared respiratory
notes, Retief got their location pinpointed and, with a brief instruction to
Ben Magnan, launched himself like a runaway switch-engine, impacting the tight
little group ana knocking them in various directions. Recovering his footing,
Retief delivered one, two, three, four hearty left hooks to as many unshaven
jaws. Only Blarp Show, staggering backward, remained erect. Magnan extended a
foot and tripped the burly lout, whose skull impacted the floor with a
satisfying bonk! The other three thieves, now sitting up and rubbing
their faces, saw Magnan towering over their fallen leader.
     
                "Jeez!" Wim Dit blurted. "I wudda
laid good odds Ben Magnan was no-price! But look at the sneaky rascal! He done
floored all four o' us, especially Bam the Boisterous, which he's a Champeen of
One Hunnert!"
     
                "Get up, you trash!" Magnan barked,
rubbing his unbruised knuckles tenderly on his pants leg. "Before you get
me irritated!"
     
                "Let's go fer it!" Wim blurted,
rolling a few feet before jumping up. He sprinted for the dark recesses at the
back of the cavelike storage room, and his henchmen followed, ignoring Magnan's
order to halt.
     
                "I'll bet they've got a private entry back
there," Magnan suggested to Retief.