vering Sidney with it, occasionally
moving the muzzle to the left to include the z'Srauff Ambassador and his
two attaches.

By this time, Nelson and the other eight judges were in their seats,
trying to look calm and judicial.

"Your Honor," I said, "I fully realize that no judge likes to have his
court turned into a shooting gallery. I can assure you, however, that my
action here was not the result of any lack of respect for this court. It
was pure necessity. Your Honor can see that: my government could not
permit this crime against its Ambassador to pass unpunished."

Judge Nelson nodded solemnly. "Court was adjourned when this little
incident happened, Mr. Silk," he said.

He leaned forward and looked to where the three Bonney brothers were
making a mess of blood on the floor. "I trust that nobody will construe
my unofficial and personal comments here as establishing any legal
precedent, and I wouldn't like to see this sort of thing become
customary ... but ... you did that all by yourself, with those little
beanshooters?... Not bad, not bad at all, Mr. Silk."

I thanked him, then turned to the z'Srauff Ambassador. I didn't bother
putting my remarks into Basic. He understood, as well as I did, what I
was saying.

"Look, Fido," I told him, "my government is quite well aware of the
source from which the orders for the murder of my predecessor came.
These men I just killed were only the tools.

"We're going to get the brains behind them, if we have to send every
warship we own into the z'Srauff star-cluster and devastate every planet
in it. We don't let dogs snap at us. And when they do, we don't kick
them, we shoot them!"

That, of course, was not exactly striped-pants diplomatic language. I
wondered, for a moment, what Norman Gazarian, the protocol man, would
think if he heard an Ambassador calling another Ambassador Fido.

But it seemed to be the kind of language that Mr. Vuvuvu understood. He
skinned back his upper lip at me and began snarling and growling. Then
he turned on his hind paws and padded angrily down the aisle away from
the front of the courtroom.

The spectators around him and above him began barking, baying, yelping
at him: "Tie a can to his tail!" "Git for home, Bruno!"

Then somebody yelled, "Hey, look! Even his wrist watch is blushing!"

That was perfectly true. Mr. Gglafrr Ddespttann Vuvuvu's watch-face,
normally white, was now glowing a bright ruby-red.

I looked at Stonehenge and