Banned From Argo -- Chapter Five
5.
Our head nurse disappeared awhile in the major Dope Bazaar,
Buying an odd green potion “guaranteed to cause Pon-Farr”.
She came home with no uniform, and an oddly cheerful heart,
And a painful way of walking – with her feet a yard apart.
Argo First Pharmaceuticals was an old, large, respectable company that insured its respectability with tons of paperwork. This meant that dealing with them, even for a simple ship’s-supply order, took nearly two hours. By the time she got out the front door, Nurse Christine Chapel was tired, annoyed, and suffering from aching feet. Once out on the street, the first thing she did was look for a taxi, any kind of taxi, ground or air.
While she was looking, a rickshaw – of all things – pulled up by the curb. A middle-aged woman, wrapped in a green sari and carrying a large basket, peered out at her.
“Christine?” the woman asked. “My word! Christine Chapel, is that you?”
“It is,” said Chapel, stepping forward. “But who-- Oh my stars, is it Lana Kasagian?! After all these years?”
“Oh yes,” the woman chuckled. “Hop in: you look as if you could use a ride. What have you been up to since medical school?”
Chapel gladly climbed into the rickshaw, whose operator promptly turned around and demanded an extra three credits for the added weight.
“Here you go,” said Kasagian, handing him some chips. “Now, straight to Greenmarket Boulevard. Ah, Chris, what luck to find you here on Argo! I make regular visits, but I haven’t seen you here before. And isn’t that a Starfleet uniform? Are you working shipboard?”
Chapel gave a quick summary of her life since leaving medical school, while the rickshaw rolled off down the street and turned onto a tree-shaded avenue in a mixed commercial/residential district.
“—so that’s how you came to find me, hot and sore-footed, in front of Argo First Pharmaceuticals,” Chapel finished. “So what have you been doing since you got your last degree in exobiology? I thought you’d be on a research ship by now.”
“Oh, I fell in with bad company, you know.” Kasagian laughed, her merry brown eyes catching the light. “I got into the Naturopath Heresy, so all the big synthetics companies blacklisted me. Not that I cared, by then. I’d saved enough money to found my own little modest company, and now I supply natural medicines to like-minded pharmacies all over the quadrant. I’m here on Argo to pick up some locally-grown plants, fungi, and even helpful bacteria. I take the goodies home and process them myself. My old friend Alison – you remember her from school? – she takes care of the advertising, shipping, and general business end of things. The company has done surprisingly well in the last few years, and I just might retire very rich.”
“It sounds wonderful,” Chapel smiled. “If I ever decide to leave Starfleet, I just might show up on your doorstep asking for a job.”
“You’d get it, in a red-hot minute.”
“Say, didn’t Alison get married? I heard something about that after I left school. What’s her husband doing?”
“That,” Kasagian sniffed, “Is a long and ugly story. She had the bad taste to fall in love with dear Dr. Rochambeau Plankman.”
“Oh no, not The Roach?! How could she fall for that—that arrogant, hot-pantsed, puffed-up, self-centered—“
“She was quite young and naïve at the time, and he made special effort to charm her. She did come from a Society family, you know, and he thought she’d make a good trophy wife.”
“Oh, poor Alison!”
“Naïve, perhaps, but not stupid. It took her no more than two years to understand him completely, call a good divorce counselor, and boot him out.”
“I’m amazed she lasted that long.”
“It’s hard to give up on young love. But anyway, after that she got back into medicine and eventually linked up with me, so everything came out well.”
“I’m glad to hear it. So, where are we going?”
“To the so-called Flower Market,” Kasagian grinned. “Driver, this is fine. Step down, Chris, and have a closer look.”
Chapel stepped out of the rickshaw, while Kasagian paid the operator, and looked around her. Here the boulevard widened out into an oblong park, shaded with grand tall trees and planted underfoot with a sturdy variety of moss that resisted trampling. It needed that resistance, for the park was filled with small tents and booths and their customers. The nearest booths were selling flowers, countless vases of them, in riotous colors and wild designs. A little further up the row Chapel could see other booths selling potted plants. Beyond that, the crowd was too thick for her to make out anything else.
“This way,” said Kasagian, taking her arm. “You have to get further in to see the good stuff.”
As Kasagian led her deeper into the maze of booths, Chapel began to see what she meant. Here stood a tiny shop selling what were plainly medicinal plants; she recognized aloes, chamomile, hemp and foxglove, but there were others whose names and species she couldn’t begin to guess. Further along stood a booth selling what claimed to be herbal teas, but Chapel noted that many of the packages bore names of medicinal rather than flavorful dried plant parts. She saw much the same at another mini-shop supposedly selling spices. Another quaint signboard announced: “Yeasts for Wines and Cheeses” – but the jars on the shelf held an amazing variety of colorful molds. Kasagian stopped to examine the goods at this one, giving Chapel much time to look around.
Next door, set back far enough that it was difficult to see, crouched a booth selling “Essences”, which Chapel assumed meant aromatic oils for perfumes. Certainly the front bench was loaded with tiny colorful bottles. She wondered why the dealer had set her shop in a spot where it was hard to find. She took care to point out the booth to Kasagian, who was just loading her basket with packages.
“Perfumes?” Kasagian laughed. “Oh, that too, but primarily herbal extracts. Many of them have amazing medicinal uses, which is why I’m heading there next. Hmmm, and some of them would outrage the Terribly Respectable city fathers, if only they knew.”
The shopkeeper, an incredibly old woman, knew Kasagian on sight and welcomed her like a long-lost sister. After a quick introduction to Chapel, she whisked the two of them into the tent at the back of her booth where three comfortable folding chairs were set around a tiny folding table. On the table sat a self-warming pot that smelled of bergamot tea, and a group of exquisite porcelain cups. To one side of the tent sat a stack of sealed cartons. The old woman sat Chapel and Kasagian down at the table, poured a cup of steaming tea for each of them, and then dived at the topmost carton.
“I have your usual supplies here, Lana,” she purred, pulling out a flask whose contents gleamed emerald green even in the shadowed tent. “But this is something new and wonderful that I just concocted last month. Here’s the recipe, and notes on where to get the ingredients—” She handed Kasagian a message-padd, which Kasagian duly plugged into her own minicomp to download. “I tried it out on a few select customers, and the response was so overwhelming that I’m afraid I’ll soon be sold out. Now, just from the recipe, what do you think of it?”
“My word,” marveled Kasagian. “If these act synergistically—“
“Oh, they do! Indeed, they do.”
“Why, this should be an immune-system booster that would make corpses jump up and dance!”
“Just about,” the old woman chuckled. “I’d write it up for the journals, if it weren’t for one, ahem, embarrassing side-effect.”
“Drop the bomb, Doctor,” Kasagian nudged.
“Heh-Heh! Well, it’s also a pan-specific aphrodisiac. The real thing.”
“I don’t believe it!” said Kasagian and Chapel together. They both peered over the notes on the minicomp’s display.
“It’s true, dears. Apparently, in setting off the endocrine and nervous systems, it…ah, rouses the libido to amazing levels, in just about every oxygen-breathing species known.”
Chapel and Kasagian looked at each other. “I can see why you wouldn’t want everyone to know about this,” said Chapel. “And yet, the medical applications…”
“Precisely,” grinned the old woman. “My crowning achievement. I intend to retire on this one, Lana. Frankly, I’m giving you the secret just to keep it safe. If the Argo government found out, they’d probably lynch me. Hmmm…” She turned back to the carton, pulled out a second flask and handed it to Chapel. “Safety in numbers, my dear,” she said. “Lana, print her a copy of the recipe and source-notes. This way, if both of us are somehow stopped, the discovery will still make it out of here.”
Chapel gulped, and stuffed the flask quickly into her shoulder-bag. A moment later, Kasagian stuffed the printout in there too.
“Doctor…” Kasagian gave the old woman a hard look. “Don’t tell me you’re planning what I think you’re planning.”
“You bet your britches I am.” The old woman gave a remarkably witchy cackle, probably rehearsed. “Since rebellious kids and old degenerates simply will insist on playing with drugs, let ‘em take one that’s good for ‘em, says I.”
“Oh Heziah, not again!” Kasagian groaned. “I remember that last scandal, when you were pushing niacinamide—“
“A perfectly safe, healthy and legal vitamin, which just happens to counteract the effect of nastier drugs, and also just happens to give you a marvelous rush.”
“’Heziah’?” Chapel flogged her memory. “Wait a minute. Doctor Heziah…Palindo? Aren’t you the one who got two planetary governments to ban ‘dihydrous monoxide’ before anyone with a high-schooler’s knowledge of chemistry could catch up to them?”
“That’s me!” The old woman cackled again. “Don’t you just love puncturing stuffed shirts? Hee-hee-hee!”
Chapel burst out laughing. That ‘dihydrous monoxide’ scandal had been the joke of the quadrant three years back.
“You—you scandal-mongering, trouble-making old dope-dealer, you—“ Kasagian sputtered. “Oh, I can just see where you’re going with this one! When I hear stories of Vulcans having orgies in the fountain at high noon, I’ll know whom to blame!”
“Hah. They could use it; their birth-rate’s dangerously low.”
“Heziah, you’re impossible!”
“Oh, does that mean you don’t want to get involved? Well, just hand back that sample, then.”
“No, I won’t. I intend to put this to good use.”
“Heh-heh! So do I! …Oh, and if you have to hide out quick, I’m at the Hotel Avalon, as always.”
“I intend to take this to Doctor McCoy,” said Chapel. “Never mind the aphrodisiac effects; this could save lives.”
“Precisely.” Doctor Palindo leaned back in her chair and smugly sipped her tea. “I intend to die rich and scandalous – and to be remembered as a great benefactor of all sentient kind.”
* * *
An hour later, Chapel and Kasagian sat at a different table, in the patio restaurant attached to the Argo Inn, enjoying dinner and comparing notes.
“I’m really grateful to have met the Notorious Dr. Heziah Palindo,” Chapel smiled around a mouthful of prawns steamed with coconut. “You know, I’ll be invited to dinner at every port just for the promise of telling this story.”
“The story’s not over yet,” said Kasagian, digging into her beef-and-peapods. “We still have to smuggle the swag to our respective laboratories, analyze it, test it, gather the seeds of the ingredients, breed them under optimum conditions, harvest and extract and mix and package and sell… Oh dear, do you even have samples of all these items in your ship’s stores?”
Chapel thought about that for a moment. “Our ship’s arboretum is overcrowded as it is. There’s still room in the biostock vaults, though. Hmmm, I think we have most of these ingredients, and with Dr. McCoy’s help I should have no trouble getting the rest of them.”
Kasagian made a wry face. “Well, I suppose cloning plant and fungal tissues is halfway between natural growing and synthesizing. Nice to know that there’s some compromise between us Naturopaths and the Synthesists.”
“There’s no such conflict aboard the Enterprise,” Chapel laughed. “Believe me, in the Sickbay of a working starship, we’ll grow, clone, synthesize or trade with the natives to get whatever we need. Dr. McCoy’s attitude is that whatever works, works – and damn the theories.”
“Hmm, you seem to have a close working relationship with him.”
“Don’t even think of matchmaking, Lana. He’s a sadder-but-wiser divorcee.”
“Did someone call me?” boomed a voice in her ear.
Chapel and Kasagian flinched together, and traded horrified looks. Neither of them had heard that voice in years, but both of them instantly recognized it.
“Indeed I’m sadder and wiser. Lana, darling, so good to see you!” Dr. Rochambeau Plankman did his best to loom over the table. This was difficult, because he was only of medium height. Besides, his distinctly thick waistline gave the impression of pulling him downwards. Other than that, he was just as flashily dressed and manicured – just as loud-voiced, just as blind and deaf to subtle expressions, and obviously just as sure that he knew how to charm anything out of anybody – as he had been back in school.
“So very good to see you again,” Plankman amended, pulling over a chair from another table and sitting down without waiting to be invited. “And who is your charming companion?”
“Don’t you remember me from medical school?” Chapel asked, knowing this wasn’t much of a diversionary tactic.
“Med-- Oh yes, of course. Ah, blonde…tall… Ernestine, wasn’t it?” he chirped, clearly not remembering her at all.
“Christine,” Chapel corrected, trying to sound chilly and offended.
“Oh, right: Christine. Easy mistake, darling: there was another tall blonde named Ernestine,” he chatted, noticing nothing. “How marvelous to meet you again.”
“And what a coincidence,” added Chapel, wondering why this boor was here, now, on an off-track world like Argo.
“Isn’t it, though?” said Plankman, turning back to Kasagian. “I happened to be passing through on my way back from a conference, and I heard that you were in the neighborhood. So what have you been up to, darling, and how is your little health-food business?”
“We were just finishing dinner,” Kasagian said coldly.
“No problem,” Plankman beamed, “I’ve already eaten. I’ll just share a dessert wine with you. Waitress?”
While he waved signals toward the waiters’ station, Kasagian and Chapel traded looks and fast gestures. Chapel’s said: ‘how do we get rid of him?’ Kasagian’s answered: ‘I don’t know’.
“A local white Ziffunil,” Plankman told the waitress, then turned back to Kasagian, giving a passing smile to Chapel. “I’ve never found a bad white Ziffunil, have you? Care to join me in a bottle?”
“I never touch alcohol,” gritted Kasagian.
“I’m fine,” said Chapel, pointing to her glass of plum wine.
“Just a demi for me, then.” Plankman’s hand moved as if he considered sending the waitress off with a pat on the bottom, but he caught himself at the last moment. “Where was I? Oh, right. Lana, dear, I hear that your business is doing well.”
Kasagian’s only answer was a quick nod as she dug resolutely into the beef.
“And how is Alison doing?” Plankman leaned closer to the table. “I still care about her, you know. Hardly a day goes by that I don’t wonder where she is, how she’s doing, all that. Did she ever marry again, do you know?”
“She’s fine,” growled Kasagian, around a mouthful of peapods.
Right there, Chapel realized that Dr. Rochambeau Plankman knew very well that Alison Leesburg had not remarried, that she was doing quite well as Kasagian’s partner, and that she was presently manning the main office back on Alpha Centauri Four. She also knew that Plankman hadn’t come here by accident. Now she had the middle of the story; what was the beginning and the intended end?
“I never did fall out of love with her.” Plankman affected a wistful look, which was only slightly spoiled by the waitress returning with his order. Plankman tossed a chip on her tray, poured himself a glassful of wine and reset his wistful look to fit around the wineglass. “It was she who left me, you remember. I always loved her best.”
“What, Dawn and Kitty and Moriah notwithstanding?” Kasagian said acidly.
“Momentary lapses.” Plankman waved a hand as if shooing a fly. “Just the stress of the moment. Those girls never meant anything to me.”
Kasagian rolled her eyes, but said nothing.
“I always really wanted to get back together with her,” Plankman finally played his trump card. “If you see her again, tell her all that, will you? Please?”
But why? Chapel wondered. For love, possession, or…
Kasagian struggled not to give a really rude answer, and almost choked on her drink.
Consider,Chapel thought. Kasagian’s business might be bigger than she mentioned. Alison just might have a good bit of money on her own. The Roach might know.
Find out.
“Other than that,” Chapel cut in, smiling sweetly, “How have you been doing? Where are you working now?”
“Oh, well…” Plankman made that shoo-fly motion again. “I finally left that synthetics company that I worked for when I was married to Alison. Made some investments in pharmaceuticals. Also…” He grinned conspiratorially. On him, it didn’t look good. “There’s a chance I might be appointed to the Medical Review Board here on Argo. Yes, I’m doing quite well, but there’s no one to share it with. I still miss Alison.”
Another memory clicked; the synthetic pharmaceutical business had taken a steep dip on the stock market just a year ago. Perhaps Plankman didn’t think that a specialist in natural drugs – or, for that matter, any friend of hers – would have heard about it. And now The Roach was trying to get a bureaucrat’s job, on Argo, no less. Chapel would have bet her eyeteeth that to get that job Plankman would have to spend some money, wining and dining influential people. She caught Kasagian’s look, and their eyes spoke volumes: Plankman wanting cash, Alison with plenty. Right.
And Chapel got a marvelous idea.
“Investments in pharmaceuticals?” Chapel smiled innocently. “Why, what a coincidence. I was just thinking of investing some of Daddy’s money in Lana’s company. After all, I have to put it somewhere; I can’t just leave it sitting around in a bank, and I couldn’t spend it all in a lifetime.” She marveled that she could lie so smoothly.
The way Plankman’s head swiveled toward her erased any last doubts Chapel might have had about why he wanted Alison back.
Kasagian stared at both of them, her jaw dropping.
“Wh—why, I’m sure Lana’s company would be an excellent investment,” Plankman beamed. “In fact, I know of several other excellent investments you could make too. Why, I have scads of information in my hotel room, if you’d care to come by.”
“Why, I’d love to,” Chapel cooed, trying to sound stupid, greedy and easily seduced. “What time should I show up?”
“Why not right now?” Plankman was practically drooling.
“Oh, not right now, you silly thing.” Chapel did her best not to giggle. “I have to finish dinner, then go bathe and change and do my nails, and check in with my broker first. Suppose I drop by at, say, eight?”
“Perfect.” Plankman actually grabbed her hand and tried to kiss it. “Here’s my card; I’ll just write my room number on the back. I’m right here in the Argo Inn. Eight o’clock it is.”
“And do put on something nicer than that silly suit, won’t you?” Chapel sank her last harpoon.
“Uh? Oh, of course. See you at eight. Don’t be late, now.” Plankman almost fell out of his chair in his scramble to get up. Trailing waves, smiles, and fond backward glances, he hurried away – blessedly away – to change his suit and set up for seduction.
“Christine!” Kasagian hissed, leaning over the table, “What in all the stars are you doing?!”
“I got him out of our hair, didn’t I?” Chapel grinned. “And you’ll notice that I didn’t give him my last name, or room number.”
“True.” Kasagian sank gratefully back in her chair, then tensed again. “Oh-oh. If you’re staying in the same hotel, you’re bound to run into him again. And even if you don’t, you know he’ll come nattering after me, instead.”
“I don’t have to stay in this hotel,” Chapel considered. “I’ll beam my gear back to the ship, check out and find another place. Hmm, why not the Hotel Avalon, with Heziah?”
“Why not, indeed. But that still leaves me for him to chase after – not to mention Alison.”
“Hmmm…” A really cruel plot was unfolding before Chapel’s inner eye. No, it might not work; she shouldn’t tell Kasagian yet. “Well, I’ll think of something,” she promised. Something is right. If I pull this off successfully, he’ll be too busy to bother chasing you, or Alison, ever again.
* * *
At exactly 7:30, Chapel poured a tiny amount of the green potion into a very small vial. The vial went into her fancy handbag, along with her communicator and The Roach’s card.
She gave her hairdo, makeup job and dress a careful, critical going-over in the mirror; the idea was to look innocently sexy, rich but dumb – not quite like an Argelian joy-girl. Well, the high neck on the Zenobian spider-silk dress would look innocent enough, and the clingy fabric of the tight bodice should do the rest. The war-paint looked just right, and the hair looked cute but not fussy. Yes.
“Let the games begin,” she murmured, pulling out her communicator.
Two brief calls later, all her gear was beamed back to her quarters on the Enterprise, the hotel was aware that she was checking out, and her bill was settled.
“Forward to the lions,” she grinned, stuffing the communicator back in her fancy purse. She left the door unlocked, and strode out.
At exactly 8:06 – just enough of a wait to look dumb and make The Roach nervous – Chapel knocked on Dr. Plankman’s hotel-room door. Down at the end of the hall, she noted with glee, a passing hotel employee had paused in his errands to give her a disapproving look. She kept her side turned to him, hoping that from that angle she really did look like an Argelian joy-girl. Now let the staff gossip.
Behind the door, she heard music being hastily turned on, and then turned down, and footsteps hurrying across the floor. Guessing what she’d encounter next, Chapel plastered a cheerful, silly smile on her face and waited for the door to open.
Sure enough, there stood Dr. Plankman with a smile splitting his face from ear to ear. He wore a green-on-green leisure suit, which did absolutely nothing for his complexion. The room behind him had endured a quick redecorating in Early Hollywood Outrageous style, complete with holographic fake fireplace, hidden speakers playing painfully corny “mood” music, and a real-life bucket of ice with a champagne bottle sitting in it. The curtains were pulled wide to show off the balcony and the view of the city beyond, and that was just about all of the décor that was original. There were a few papers and brochures set out on the coffee-table in front of the fake fireplace, just enough to provide a legitimate excuse.
“Christine, darling!” Plankman boomed, “How good to see you again. Come right in.” He took her arm with a little more force than necessary, and steered her toward the couch. “I have all the information right here: local companies, sector-wide corporations, whatever you like. Would you care for some refreshment?”
He reached for the champagne.
That’s my cue. “Why, I’d love some,” Chapel cooed, batting her eyes. “Ooh, that’s Tetterer’s, isn’t it? You have to let it breathe for a minute before you pour it, you know. Ooh, are these the companies you meant?”
She bent over the scattering of brochures, giving Plankman the benefit of her rear view. Sure enough, he fumbled the champagne cork and the frothy liquid shot all over his leisure suit. He swore, and almost dropped the bottle.
“Ooh, you poor thing!” Chapel trotted back to him, oozing concern. “Here, let me clean that up for you.”
“That’s all right, dear.” Plankman patted a handkerchief absently to the wet spots on his suit, his eyes glued to her clingy dress. “Say, would you tell me how to spell your last name, again? I never could remember spellings.”
Ye gods, he didn’t even ask my name before he set this up! Chapel marveled. “It’s Morgenstern, with one ‘o’ and two ‘e’s.” Just like the ancient Earth weapon. “And I think Rochambeau is a perfectly lovely name. Here, darling; you sit down and explain about all those companies and things, and I’ll pour the champagne.”
“Oh, right.” Plankman was eager enough to get to the couch. “Well now, the larger corporations are less likely to suffer sudden losses, but also unlikely to give you spectacular gains…”
While he ran through his opening spiel, Chapel poured one glass of champagne for herself, then quickly pulled out the tiny vial and emptied it into the bottle. Last, she poured out a glass of the now-dosed champagne for Plankman.
“The smaller companies are more of a gamble, you know…” Plankman took the glass she offered him without a second glance. “They could collapse overnight…” A wistful look darted across his face, strongly hinting that he’d learned that lesson the hard way. “But then again, they could take off like a battle-courier overnight, and you’d wake up rich the next morning.” A sustained eager look revealed that he still hadn’t learned the lesson completely.
“Ooh, so it’s something of a gamble, then?” Chapel batted her eyes once more, and took a tiny sip of her champagne.
Sure enough, Plankman took a more-than-tiny sip from his glass. “Yes,” he leered, “But I’ve always been a bit of a gambler. I’m even willing to gamble with my heart, to risk falling in love at first sight…”
Not wasting any time, is he? “Ooh, you’re a Romantic, then,” she giggled. “You know, I’m something of a Romantic myself.” Liar, liar. How long does it take for that stuff to work? And I need an excuse to keep him busy…
She needn’t have worried: the buzzword ‘Romantic’ set off Plankman’s prepared speech about life-is-too-short-to-waste, love-is-too-precious-to-deny, follow-your-heart, yakkety, yakkety, yak – every word of it copied from holovid soap-operas. All Chapel had to do was look wide-eyed, nod at regular intervals and sip her champagne. Plankman swigged recklessly as he warmed to his subject. The level in his glass sank to almost nothing.
“—so here I am, pouring out my heart to an old school chum.” He did his best to look soulful. “And perhaps we’ll go our separate ways and never see each other again, but there’s always the chance that a chance encounter might lead to something more, might strike a spark that could kindle into the love of a lifetime, and I’m always willing to take that kind of chance, to leap bravely into the unknown country of the heart. I believe in love, and I believe that you believe too. Am I right, Christine darling? Do you have that kind of faith in the power of love?”
Chapel batted her eyes again, looked soulfully into his face, and said: “I’ve got to go to the bathroom.”
Plankman halted with his mouth hanging open, looking faintly pole-axed.
“Champagne always does that to me,” Chapel giggled, getting up. “But I love it anyway. Don’t go away, now; I’ll be right back.”
With that, she turned and hurried to the bathroom. She paused at the door only long enough to give him an encouraging smile, and noted that he’d reached for the champagne bottle again. She shut the door behind her, and locked it.
It took effort to keep from laughing out loud as she turned on the faucet, hard enough to cover any noise, whipped the lipstick out of her purse and scrawled the words on the mirror: SORRY I COULDN’T STAY. START WITHOUT ME.
Now for the communicator, a quick beam-up call, and out of here. She flipped the communicator open.
Nothing but static answered.
Oops.
It took all of two seconds to realize that the building’s structure must be interfering with the transmission. She’d have to get out on the balcony. How could she get there from the bathroom?
Her eye fell on the bathroom window.
“Christine, darling,” sounded from behind the door, “Don’t take too long.”
Was Palindo’s Potion taking effect already?
“Just a minute, dear,” Chapel warbled back, shoving the reluctant window open. “I’ve got a snag in my pantyhose.”
Outside, the balcony ended just short of the window. She could reach it, reach the railing certainly – if she hung out the window with both hands and reached with her feet.
“Time to abandon the shoes,” she muttered, kicking them off. “They were cheap, flashy things anyway.” She slung the purse on her shoulder and climbed feet-first out the window.
From far below came the sound of surprised voices, then squawks of dismay. Obviously, somebody down there had noticed a woman’s legs sticking out of the window. Well, no time to worry about that now.
She was halfway out, belly pressed to the windowsill and feet groping blindly for the railing, when she heard Plankman calling again. His voice sounded a bit rougher. Ye gods, that stuff must work fast! she thought, just as her toes brushed the top of the rail.
“What in heaven’s name is going on up there?!” howled a voice from the ground below.
“Call the police!” shrilled another voice, female.
“Christine?” wailed Plankman.
“Patience, darling,” she shouted back. “Just let me get my skirt smoothed down.”
“It’s got to be something obscene,” echoed from below.
“What room is that?” demanded an official-sounding voice.
Chapel hooked one foot over the railing, then her knee, and she inched backward out the window.
“Don’t do it, lady!” howled someone below. “Whoever he is, he’s not worth it!”
Must be quite a crowd down there by now, Chapel considered, as she hung by her hands and knee. She couldn’t spare the effort to look down and see what was happening there. She glanced toward the balcony. If she could just get her left foot into the uprights of the railing…
“Christine!” bellowed Plankman, knocking on the bathroom door, loud enough to be heard out the window.
“She’s trying to get away from an attacker!” another voice shrilled from the ground.
Brilliant deduction, Holmes, Chapel laughed to herself. She could hear someone else pounding on the front door of the suite, and someone yelling something about Hotel Security. No more time. She took a deep breath, let go of the windowsill and pulled hard with her anchored leg.
Below, several voices screeched.
The landing was as awkward as a belly-flop. Chapel’s left foot skidded off the edge of the balcony, leaving her right knee to take all her weight, and she swung bottom-first into the uprights. She could hear her dress tear, and feel the bruises she was going to have tomorrow.
She could also see, for one upside-down moment, the sizable crowd gathered on the sidewalk below. She noticed one man with a camera, another talking rapidly into a communicator. She could also hear, through the wall, Hotel Security seriously pounding on the front door.
Whispering expletives that would have startled her captain, Chapel hauled herself up onto the edge of the balcony. She also heard Plankman pounding furiously on the bathroom door, ignoring the noise out front. Muscles twinged from her waist to her toes as she dropped onto the balcony, clawed open her purse, and pulled out the communicator.
“If this doesn’t work,” she muttered to no one in particular, “I swear, I’ll brain him with the champagne bottle – unless Hotel Security gets him first.”
She could hear the bathroom door giving way under Plankman’s hammering. She could also hear the Security staff at the door clattering their master keys. The crowd below was cheering.
“Enterprise, transporter room, Rand,” came loud and clear through the communicator – just as the bathroom door went crashing down.
Chapel hit the emergency beam-up button.
* * *
Yeoman Rand stared, not saying anything, as Nurse Chapel pulled herself up from a crouch on the transporter pad. She noted the nurse’s ripped dress, and the slow and painful way she moved off the pad, as if her thigh muscles were so sore that she couldn’t pull her feet together.
“Oof,” Chapel panted, feeling the extent of her strains and bruises. “Yeoman, could you please contact a Dr. Heziah Palindo, either in the Flower Market on Greenmarket Boulevard or at the Hotel Avalon? I’ll take the call in my quarters. Oww…”
“TheDr. Palindo?” Rand couldn’t help asking. “’Dihydrous Monoxide’ Palindo?”
“That’s the one. I have to tell her how well her potion worked. Ouch.”
“I’ll have the call sent to your quarters as soon as I contact her,” Randpromised, watching Chapel limp out the door. What potion? she wondered. And why is she the third officer to beam back here with their clothes half ripped off?
She wondered if she could persuade the infamous Dr. Palindo to chat a bit with her, or if she should check the city news and police reports first.
It seemed that there were a few compensations for being stuck on ship while everyone else went down on shore leave.
