"Sorry the party got rough," he said. "Will you give parole if I take
those cuffs off and tell you what this is about?"

She studied him again. "Better tell me first," she said shortly.

"All right. We're taking you to Commissioner Tate. We'll be there in
about an hour. He'll tell you himself why he wanted to see you."

Trigger's eyes narrowed for an instant. Secretly she felt very much
relieved. Holati Tate, at any rate, wouldn't let anything really
unpleasant happen to her--and she would find out at last what had been
going on.

"You've got an odd way of taking people places," she observed.

He laughed. "The grabber party wasn't scheduled. You'd indicated you
wanted to speak to the Commissioner. We were sent to the Colonial School
to pick you up and escort you to him. When we found out you'd
disappeared, we had to do some fast improvising. Not my business to tell
you the reasons for that."

Trigger said hesitantly, "Those people who were chasing this car--"

"What about them?" he asked thoughtfully.

"Were they after _me_?"

"Well," he said, "they weren't after me. Better let the Commissioner
tell you about that, too. Now--how about parole?"

She nodded. "Till you turn me over to the Commissioner."

"Fair enough," he said. "You're his problem then." He took a small flat
piece of metal out of a pocket and reached back of her with it. He
didn't seem to do more than touch the cuffs, but she felt the slick
coils loosen and drop away.

Trigger rubbed her wrists. "Where's my gun?" she asked.

"I've got it. I'll give it to the Commissioner."

"How did you people find me so fast?"

"Police keep bank entrances under twenty-four hour visual survey. We had
someone watching their screens. You were spotted going in." He sat down
companionably beside her. "I'd introduce myself, but I don't know if
that would fit in with the Commissioner's plans."

Trigger shrugged. It still was quite possible, she decided, that her own
plans weren't completely spoiled. Holati and his friends didn't
necessarily know about that vault account. If they did know she'd had
one and had closed it out, they could make a pretty good guess at what
she'd done with the money. But if she just kept quiet, there might be an
opportunity to get back to Ceyce and the Dawn City by tomorrow evening.

"Cigarette?" the Commissioner's overmuscled henchman inquired amiably.

Trigger glanced at him from the side. Not amiably. "No, thanks."

"No hard