antry would have stood
firm. Even under their native-officers and sergeants, they should not
have broken as they did, but the best of these had paid for their
loyalty to the Company with their lives, and the rest had destroyed
their authority by revolting against the source from which it was
derived. At that, the Skilkan peasantry who made up the Tenth Infantry
and the Zirk cavalrymen tried briefly to fight as individuals,
shrieking "_Znidd suddabit!_" until the Kragans were upon them,
stabbing and shooting. They drove the rioters from the steps or killed
them there, they wiped out those who had gotten into the semicircle of
the storm-porch. The inside doors, von Schlichten saw, were open, but
beyond them were Terrans and a dozen or so Kragans. Hideyoshi O'Leary
and Barney Mordkovitz seemed to be in command of these.

"We had about thirty seconds' warning," Mordkovitz reported, "and the
Kragans in the hall bought us another sixty seconds. Of course, we all
had our pistols...."

"Hey! These storm-doors are wedged!" somebody discovered. "Those
goddam geek servants ...!"

"Yeah, kill any of them you catch," somebody else advised. "If we
could have gotten these doors closed...."

The mob, driven from the steps, was trying to reform and renew the
attack. From up the street, the machine-guns, silent during the
bayonet-fight, began hammering again. The mob surged forward to get
out of their fire, and were met by a rifle-blast and a hedge of
bayonets at the steps; they surged back, and the machine-guns flailed
them again. They started to rush the building from whence the
automatic-fire came, and there was a fusillade and a shriek of "_Znidd
geek!_" from up the street. They turned and fled in the direction from
whence they had come, bullets scourging them from three directions at
once.

For a moment, von Schlichten and the three Terrans and eighty-odd
Kragans who had survived the fight stood on the steps, weapons poised,
seeking more enemies. The machine-guns up the street stuttered a few
short bursts and were silent. From behind, the beleaguered Terrans and
their Kragan guards were emerging. He saw Jules Keaveney and his wife,
Commander Prinsloo of the _Aldebaran_, Harry Quong and Bogdanoff. Ah,
there she was! He heaved a breath of relief and waved to her.

The Kragans were already setting about their after-battle chores.
About twenty of them spread out on guard; the others, by fours, went
into the street, one covering