CHAPTER FIVE

"Oh, come, Marilee," said Beverly Dyson in a reasonable tone of voice. "Why shouldn't I call him Mad Dog? It's what his own father called him, isn't it?"

Councilor Dyson touched the base of a stim cone to his left wrist. The disposable injector wore the black and gold striping of a powerful euphoric. In fact, the stock which Dyson carried was loaded with a mild stimulant. It did nothing to disturb the Councilor's plans or the ruthless speed with which he could execute them.

"Don's father hated him, as you well know," snapped Marilee Slade as she stared through the window. The family apartments were on the third floor of Slade House. The Trophy Room in which she sat with Dyson looked across the broad courtyard to the Council Hall beyond. The truck which had for all practical purposes been looted in the courtyard was just getting under way again. It would stop at the service dock behind the House for proper unloading. Ever since a driver had been beaten within an inch of his life, the provisions vehicles touched down in the courtyard first. "That's why," Marilee continued on a rising inflexion, "his father falsified the birth records thirty years ago to make it appear that Thomas was the elder twin."

"Marilee, my dear, we've been over this," said Dyson in a patronizing sing-song. It rasped the woman's nerves like wind on an aspen. Dyson knew that, and his smile was all the broader for that fact. "Legally, your late husband was the Slade Councilor—as your son Edward will be when he comes of age. There's no point trying to overturn a Council decision, especially a decision made so long ago. And after all, if you claim your father-in-law lied to the Council, why do you presume his dying words to his son were the truth? That's not logical, my dear."

"Well, it's the curst truth!" the woman blazed. She turned. Her heels clacked on the mosaics of imported marble which overlaid a floor of sand-finished concrete dating back to the Settlement. The widow was tall, man-tall, though most of her height was from the waist down. The garment she wore had legs when she strode, but it was a single glittering cocoon when she chose to stand straight. The fabric shaded from black at the lower gathering to a flame-shot scarlet on the woman's slim neck. "Listen, Dyson," she snapped along a pointing finger, "even if—"

"Beverly, my dear, please," the handsome man interrupted. "After all, we've known each other all our lives." He too stood, dropping the flaccid stim cone back into the waist pouch from which he had taken it. There was a trash chute in the pedestal table beside him. Using the chute would have permitted others to examine the container, to penetrate a facet of the disguise in which Dyson wrapped himself.

"Councilor Dyson," retorted Marilee Slade. "Look, if you want me to treat you as a human being, then you've got to stop this nonsense about appointing yourself guardian for Edward. He's not a child, he's almost twenty—and if he needs a guardian, it can be me!"

The tall woman pivoted back to the window. Beverly Dyson permitted his face to lose the mobility he maintained when others were watching him. "I don't appoint anyone guardian, Marilee," he said. "That's what the Council meeting is being held to discuss. Though of course I won't deny that many of the Council do believe there should be—a—I'm sorry, but facts are facts—a strong male hand at the helm of the Slade Estate during these troubled times."

When the woman did not respond, Dyson stepped carefully closer to her. He had been beautiful as a child and as a youth. When he reached adulthood, Dyson had been wise enough to eschew the cosmetic treatments that would have frozen that youthful beauty. Twenty-odd years of natural ageing had left Councilor Beverly Dyson ruggedly handsome. He was as attractive to men as to women, and he had none of the smooth cuteness that destroyed respect when power was being discussed.

There was a mark on Dyson's left forehead where age had begun to undo some expensive plastic surgery. The skin there was a trifle shinier than the rest, and there was a path that could be traced back in whorls along Dyson's short-cut hair. "You know, my dear," he went on in a carefully modulated voice, "there's a simple solution. We were friends when we were younger. I still want to be your friend, and more than friend." His hand reached out toward the woman in a gesture that deliberately stopped short of her arm.

The curving crystal surface of the window had been treated during extrusion to permit no reflection on the inner side. There was obvious awareness of the outstretched hand in Marilee's voice, however, as she said, "If you want a strong male hand running the Slade Estate, then wait for Don to return. It can't be long, now that Friesland says they've traced him."

"Marilee," said Dyson sadly. "Even if I believed that weren't one of your little games to delay the Council, my dear, I scarcely think that Mad Dog Slade is what is required on a world already having difficulties with violence among the lower orders." He had difficulty keeping his tone light, and his arm lowered slowly.

"Mad Dog," the woman repeated with seeming amusement. She continued to face the activity in the courtyard below. "You know, I knew Don Slade pretty well, Bev . . . and I never knew him to lose his temper."

"I'm the wrong one to tell that silly lie, lady!" shouted Councilor Dyson. His fresh, bubbling anger drew Marilee's gaze as his attempted tenderness had not. Dyson touched the scar on his forehead. "I'm not going to forget, you see, what he did to me for a childhood prank!"

Marilee smiled. His rage was her victory. "I haven't forgotten that either Bev," she said. "It must have been quite a surprise when Don popped to the surface after you thought you'd bolted the escape hatch over him. But I really don't think he lost his temper when he came for you with the wrench. I think he had just decided the world would be a better place with you dead. Don was never the one to leave dirty jobs for other people when he could handle them himself."

Laughter pursued Councilor Dyson as he strode from the room.