The salons of chance occupied a series of six immense halls radiating from the private office of Gaspar Hannas, which was situated at the very hub of the New Moon’s wheel.
The walls of the office were transparent from within, and Hannas, from the huge swivel chair within his ring-shaped desk, could look at will down any one of the halls.
They were huge and costly rooms.
The walls bore expensive statues, expensive murals, golden statues set in niches. And their polished floors were covered with thousands of tables of chance.
Beneath each hall ran an armored tunnel, unsuspected by most of the players above, where their losses were swiftly examined for counterfeit, counted, tabulated, and dispatched to the impregnably armored treasure vault beneath the office of Gaspar Hannas.
A continuous tape, fed through a slot in the circular desk, revealed minute by minute the New Moon’s gains and losses.
The losses all appeared in red but that color was rarely seen.
“The laws of probability,” Gaspar Hannas always insisted, smiling his fixed and mindless smile, “are all I need.
Every game is fair.” And cynics, it had been suspected, were apt to find their doubts very unexpectedly terminated in the Hall of Euthanasia.
The six halls, tonight, were more than commonly crowded.
For the whisper of the Basilisk had run over all the New Moon, and a great many thrill-seekers in their gayest silks and jewels had turned out to see what would happen at midnight. The play, however, as recorded on the endless tape, was somewhat slow—too many had heard that the highest winner was unlikely to keep his winnings.
Gaspar Hannas, for once, was not watching the tape.
He was walking with the three Legionnaires through the Diamond Room, where no limit was placed upon the stakes.
Hal Samdu, in his great gnarled hand, carried a tattered notice of reward.
“This convict, Derron,” he insisted. “He’s your Basilisk.”
And he refreshed his memory, from time to time, with another look at the bronze-haired, space-tanned likeness of Chan Derron.
“Yonder!” Jay Kalam paused abruptly. “Derron was a big man.
There’s one as big.”
They followed his grave dark eyes.
“Ah, so!” Giles Habibula was puffing mightily, from keeping pace with Hal Samdu’s impatient stride.
“A majestic figure of manhood.
And a lovely lass at his side!”
The man stood like a tower above all the restless, bright-clad players.
His hair was dark, dark glasses shaded his eyes, and his skin had a singular pallor.
A long scar marred his face.
The blond girl beside him was equally striking.
With a queen’s proud grace, she wore a lustrous cloak of priceless white Callistonian fur.
A queer white star-shaped jewel—it looked, Jay Kalam thought, like a hugely magnified snow-crystal—hung at her throat.
“Six-feet-three!” Hal Samdu caught a gasping breath, and the poster trembled hi his mighty hand.
“He can’t hide that—and the paleness and the dark hair and the glasses could be disguise!”
He beckoned to one of the soldiers hi plain clothes, trailing unobtrusively behind.
“We’ll arrest him, and soon find out.”
Jay Kalam’s head shook sharply.
“Shadow him,” he whispered.
“But if he is Derron—and the Basilisk—we must see more of his methods.
Meantime—”
He breathed something to Giles Habibula.
“In life’s name, Jay!”
The small fishy eyes of the old man rolled at him, startled.
“Don’t ask me that!
Don’t command a poor old soldier to throw away his life!”
“Remember, Giles.”
Hal Samdu caught his shoulder.
“It’s for the keeper of the peace.”
Giles Habibula winced, and heaved himself away.
“Don’t mangle me, Hal!” he gasped.
“For life’s blessed sake!
Of course I’ll do what Jay desires.
Aye, for the keeper—” He turned ponderously to the white giant hi black.
“Ah, Mr. Hannas,” he wheezed, “now I must have your order for a thousand blue chips.”