Reward for Retief by Keith Laumer

had
greeted Retief stood ready with a baseball-bat sized club to greet the next
arrival. He swung and missed as a smallish, slightly-built man incongruously
clad in a seersucker dicky-suit only slightly disheveled by contact with the
mob at his heels, dashed through, shied at the near miss and uttered a yelp of
protest.
     
                "The very idea!"
he cried. "A matron of your years clowning in such a disgraceful
fashion!"
     
                "What's a matron?"
somebody called.
     
                "Some kinda
dance," another supplied. "He thinks Blinky's dancin!"
     
                "Don't take it so hard,
Mate," Blinky advised the newcomer. "What's goin on out there? Looks
like we got a regular invasion here. How'd you boys get the 'pillars' all
worked up, anyways?"
     
                "Enough of your
insolence, Madam!" the frail-looking new arrival snapped. He stood on
tiptoes to scan the room over the heads of its occupants. Blinky moved in to
block him off. "A spy, hey?" he charged, shoving the slightly larger,
but unathletic stranger.
     
                "It's OK," Henry
advised his guests. "Blinky can handle it. Looked to me like one o' them
topsiders. Wonder how he got past the patrol."
     
                "That's Mr. Magnan, a
professional associate of mine," Retief told the big fellow. "I'd
better introduce him before Blinky does something a little too permanent."
     
                "Suit yourself,
pal," Henry conceded, and began to ply a well-worn toothpick on his large,
square, yellow teeth.
     
                As Magnan disappeared from
his view in the gang of excited men, Retief rose. "Excuse me," he
said. "Bill, order another round and I'll be right back."
     
                "Retief!" Magnan
yelled from the midst of the huddle of waving arms and raised voices.
"There you are! I feared the worst! Get away, you hussy!" he snapped
at a paunchy deck-ape type who was attempting to frisk him. "Take your
grimy paws off my person instanter, or I shall be forced to resort to harsh
measures!"
     
                Blinky recoiled, blinking
rapidly. "Zounds!" he exclaimed, whipping off his warped nautical
cap. "Best belay that, me hearties," he advised his modey crew.
"Most planet-lubbers know when to keep their jaw shut, but this here one
seems to be made of sterner stuff!"
     
                "Quite right,
Madam," Magnan told the frustrated fellow. "You may now conduct me to
your leader."
     
                "Still too cheeky by
arf," Blinky remarked, then, addressing Magnan: "You wouldn't be a
shipmate of my chum Retief, I don't suppose?"
     
                "Indeed I am!"
Magnan averred. "Now stand aside."
     
                "Sure, bub," Blinky
agreed, backing away, shooing his minions from Magnan's path. "Any pal o'
Retief and Big Henry is OK with me!"
     
                "Big Henry,
indeed!" Magnan snapped and forged into the press directly toward Retief,
who led him to the table.
     
                "May I join you, gentlemen?"
Magnan inquired rhetorically as he sank into an empty chair. He mopped at his
forehead dramatically with an Ambassador-only issue hanky.
     
                "Well!" he
remarked to Retief by way of greeting, "I rather thought you could have
come along sooner to assist me with that cutthroat crew, rather than continuing
to linger here in low company, swilling whatever it is you're swilling."
     
                "I was admiring your
technique, Mr. Magnan," Retief explained blandly. "You handled
matters quite well, I thought."
     
                Magnan dug at his eyes with
the heels of his hands. "Of course," he snapped, "I was at no
moment at a loss for the correct mode of response to those hussies."
     
                " 'Hussies'," Big
Henry echoed. "That's some kinda dames, ain't it? If you seen one, that's
the second