It was an anachronism to have a human receptionist in this hall of lucent plastic, among machines that winked and talked between jade columns soaring up into vaulted dimness - but a remarkably pleasant one when she was as long-legged and redheaded a stunblast as the girl behind the desk.  Captain Torres drew to a crisp halt and identified himself.  Traveling down sumptuous curves, his glance was jarred by the needle gun at her waist.

"Good day, sir," she smiled.  "I'll see if Freeman van Rijn is ready for you."  She switched on an intercom.  A three-megavolt oath bounced out.  "No, he's still conference on the audivid.  Won't you be seated?"

Before she turned the intercom off, Torres caught a few words: "- he'll give us the exclusive franchise or we embargo, ja, and maybe arrange a little blockade too.  Who in Satan's squatpot do these emperors on a single planet think they are?  Hokay, he has a million soldiers under arms.  You go tell him to take those soldiers, with hobnailed boots and rifles at port, and stuff them -" Click.

Torres wrapped cape around tunic and sat down, laying one polished boot across the other knee of his white culottes.  He felt awkward, simultaneously overdressed and naked.  The formal garb of a Lodgemaster in the Federated Brotherhood of Spacefarers was a far remove from the coverall he wore in his ship or the loungers of groundside leave.  And the guards in the lobby, a kilometer below, had not only checked his credentials and retinal patterns, they had made him deposit his sidearm.

Damn Nicholas van Rijn and the whole Polesotechnic League!  Good saints, drop him on Pluto with no underwear!

Of course, a merchant prince did have to be wary of kidnappers and assassins, though van Rijn himself was said to be murderously fast with a handgun.  Nevertheless, arming your receptionist was not a polite thing to do.

Torres wondered, a trifle wistfully, if she was among the old devil's mistresses.  Perhaps not.  However, given the present friction between the Company - by extension, the entire League - and the Brotherhood, she'd have no time for him; her contract doubtless had a personal fealty clause.  His gaze went to the League emblem on the wall behind her, a golden sunburst afire with jewels, surrounding an ancient rocketship, and the motto: All the traffic will bear.  That could be taken two ways, he reflected sourly.  Beneath it was the trademark of this outfit, the Solar Spice & Liquors Company.

The girl turned the intercom back on and heard only a steady rumble of obscenities.  "You may go in now, please," she said, and to the speaker: "Lodgemaster Captain Torres, sir, here for his appointment."

The spaceman rose and passed through the inner door.  His lean dark features were taut.  This would be a new experience, meeting his ultimate boss.  It was ten years since he had had to call anybody "sir" or "madam."