Four times, the big screen failed to respond. They were all crowded into one of the executive conference-rooms at the Proconsular Palace, the batteries of communication and recording equipment incongruously functional among the gold-encrusted luxury of the original Masterly furnishings. Shatrak swore.
“Andrey, I thought your people had planted those pickups where they couldn’t be found,” he said to Commander Douvrin.
“There is no such place, sir,” the intelligence officer replied. “Just places where things are hard to find.”
“Did you mention our pickups to Chmidd or Hozhet or any of the rest of the shaveheads?” Shatrak asked Erskyll.
“No. I didn’t even know where they were. And it was the freedmen who found them,” Erskyll said. “I don’t know why they wouldn’t want us looking in.”
Lanz
