“If she’s a fake, then she’s a good one.” Lucas replied. “I’minclined to believe she’s genuine. I think Apollodorus is definitely the one towatch.”
“Caesar’s guards all looked very capable to me,” Delaneysaid. “Alert, high level of fitness, taller than average … they could easilybe our men.”
“Caesar seemed very ambivalent about having them around,”said Lucas. “What do think. Travers?”
Travers sighed. “I think there’s a good chance he maydismiss them. unless Cleopatra manages to change his mind. The question is,what will we do if he doesn’t?”
“Well have to make sure he does,” said Lucas. “An attempt onCleopatra’s life would convince him that there are people in Rome who fear herinfluence on him and conspire to assassinate her. He’d believe the threat toher was greater than any threat to himself and assign his Egyptian guard toprotect her. That would get them out of our way.”
“It might work, but it would be dangerous.” said Travers.
“We knew that going in,” Delaney said. “But we’ve only got alittle over a week left. We can’t afford to waste any more time.”
They turned into a quiet side street.
“The best way to get inside would be through the gardens atthe back of the house,” said Lucas. We go in wearing masks and we knock out theguards. We don’t want to kill any of them, at least not until we’re sure aboutthem. The thing is. we want to get close. but not too close. We need to makeenough of a commotion to arouse the guards inside the house, so that-”
Travers suddenly cried out as a bright beam of laser lightpenetrated through his left shoulder. It all happened very fast. The two slavesahead of them dropped their torches and fell as laser beams stabbed throughthem. Two of their armed guard dropped before any of them had a chance toreact.
“It’s an ambush!” Delaney cried out, dropping to the groundas the street became a crisscross latticework of light. The three remainingslaves took off in fright. One of them, ran directly into a beam, screaming ashe fell. Lucas vanished as he translocated and a second later. Delaney alsodisappeared as he clocked out.
“Get back to the house!” Andre shouted to Travers as he fumbledfor the controls of his warp disc. Then. suddenly, it was all over. It had alltaken no more than twenty seconds. Travers vanished, clocking hack to thetransition coordinates inside his house about three quarters of a mile away.Andre stayed put, stretched out behind the body of one of the fallen slaves.She had pulled the laser pistol. which she had strapped to her lower thigh,beneath the loose, ankle-length. pleated tunic she wore. She lay very still,staring intently into the darkness. The street was deserted. A moment later,she heard Lucas.
“Andre, it’s me.”
“Are you all right’?”
“Get back to the house. Right now.” She reached for her warpdisc, which was disguised as a heavy bracelet, and punched in the preprogrammedtransition code for Travers’ house. Moments later, they were all together inthe library. Travers was in some pain, but fortunately, his wound wasn’t veryserious. The beam had penetrated the shoulder bone and gone straight through.cauterizing the wound.
“Well, it looks like the cards are on the table.” Andre saidas she examined his wound. “Did you see any of them?”
“Yeah.” said Lucas. frowning as he opened up the hidden weaponscache beneath the floor. “We found them.”
She paused and glanced up at him. “You found them?”
“They were dead.” Delaney said, taking a laser pistol from Lucasand checking its power pack. “We found six bodies. I recognized two of themfrom Cleopatra’s house. One of them served us dinner. They’d been shot with lasers.”
“What the hell’?” said Andre. But. who?”
“We don’t know,” Delaney said. “But whoever it was saved ourasses.”
“It was probably the Underground,” someone said from behindthem. They spun around to see Sabinus standing casually in the entrance to thelibrary. Only he had spoken to them in English. There was something veryfamiliar about his voice. Castelli suddenly came up behind him, putting a laserpistol to the back of his head.
“Don’t move,” he said.
Steiger froze.
“I’m sorry about what I said back at the penthouse. Priest.”he said evenly. “but as you can see. I had my reasons.”
“Steiger!”
“Jesus Christ.” said Andre. “I knew there was something familiarabout him!”
“It’s all right, Castelli.” Delaney said. ‘He’s one of us.Capt. Castelli. Col. Steiger.”
“I’ll be damned. Sorry about that. Colonel,” Castelli said,putting away his gun.
“That’s perfectly all right. Captain,” Steiger said. You didpretty good back there.”