started to say something, but Her Majesty went
on, her eyes wide. "Do something quickly!" she said.

"What?" Malone said.

"They've put something in Lou's drink!" Her Majesty hissed.

Malone was on his feet before she'd finished, and he took a step
across the room.

"She's already swallowed it!" the Queen said. "Do something! Quickly!"

The dancers on the floor were no concern of his, Malone told himself
grimly. He didn't decide to move; he was on his way before any thought
filtered through into his mind. Officers and their ladies looked after
him with shocked stupor as he plowed his way across the dance floor,
using legs, elbows, shoulders and anything else that allowed him free
passage. Sometimes the dancers managed to get out of his way.
Sometimes they didn't. It was all the same to Kenneth J. Malone.

Her Majesty followed in his wake, silent and stricken, scurrying after
him like a small destroyer following a battleship, or like a
ball-carrying grandmother following up her interference.

Malone caught sight of Lou, standing at the bar. In that second, she
seemed to realize for the first time that something was wrong. She
pushed herself violently away from the bar, and looked frantically
around, her mouth opening to call. Petkoff was a blur next to her;
Malone didn't look at him clearly. Lou took a step...

And two men with broken, lumpy faces came through a door somewhere in
the rear of the restaurant, closer to her than Malone. Petkoff
suddenly swam into sight; he was standing very still and looking
entirely baffled.

Malone pushed through a pair of dancers, ignored their glares and the
man's hissed insult, which he didn't understand anyhow, and found his
view suddenly blocked by a large expanse of dark grey.

It was somebody's chest, in a uniform. Malone shifted his gaze half an
inch and saw a row of gold buttons. He looked upward.

There, towering above him, was a face. It stared down, looking heavy
and cruel and stupid. Malone, his legs still carrying him forward,
bounced off the chest and staggered back a step or two. He heard a
hissed curse behind him, and realized without thinking about it that
he had managed to collide with the same pair of dancers again. He
didn't look around to see them. Instead, he looked ahead, at the giant
who blocked his path.

The man was about six feet six inches tall, a great Mongol who weighed
about a sixth of a ton. But he didn't look fat; he looked strong
instead,