ns. "I see you're heeled; you're smart. You wouldn't be here
today if poor Silas Cumshaw'd been as smart as you are. Great man,
though; a wise and farseeing statesman. He and I were real friends."

"You know who Mr. Silk brought with him as bodyguard?" Palme asked.
"Hoddy Ringo!"

"Oh, my God! I thought this planet was rid of him!" The President turned
to me. "You got a good trigger-man, though, Mr. Ambassador. Good man to
watch your back for you. But lot of folks here won't thank you for
bringing him back to New Texas."

He looked at his watch. "We have time for a little drink, before we go
outside, Mr. Silk," he said. "Care to join me?"

I assented and he got a bottle of superbourbon out of his desk, with
four glasses. Palme got some water tumblers and brought the pitcher of
ice-water from the cooler.

I noticed that the New Texas Secretary of State filled his three-ounce
liquor glass to the top and gulped it down at once. He might act as
though he were descended from a long line of maiden aunts, but he took
his liquor in blasts that would have floored a spaceport labor-boss.

We had another drink, a little slower, and chatted for a while, and then
Hutchinson said, regretfully that we'd have to go outside and meet the
folks. Outside, our guards--Hoddy, the two Marines, the Rangers who had
escorted us from Palme's office, and Hutchinson's retinue--surrounded
us, and we made our way down the plaza, through the crowd. The
din--ear-piercing yells, whistles, cowbells, pistol shots, the cacophony
of the two dance-bands, and the chorus-singing, of which I caught only
the words: _The skies of freedom are above you!_--was as bad as New
Year's Eve in Manhattan or Nairobi or New Moscow, on Terra.

"Don't take all this as a personal tribute, Mr. Silk!" Hutchinson
screamed into my ear. "On this planet, to paraphrase Nietzsche, a good
barbecue halloweth any cause!"

That surprised me, at the moment. Later I found out that John Hutchinson
was one of the leading scholars on New Texas and had once been president
of one of their universities. New Texas Christian, I believe.

As we got up onto the platform, close enough to the barbecue pits to
feel the heat from them, somebody let off what sounded like a fifty-mm
anti-tank gun five or six times. Hutchinson grabbed a microphone and
bellowed into it: "Ladies and gentlemen! Your attention, please!"

The noise began to diminish, slowly, until I could hear one voice, in
the crowd