"
More protocol about welcoming Gorkrink. Then Gurgurk cleared his
throat with a series of barking sounds.
"My royal master, His Sublime and Ineffable Majesty, is prostrated
with grief," he stated solemnly. "Were his sorrow not so overwhelming,
he would have come in His Own Sacred Person to express the pain and
shame which he feels that people of the Company should be set upon
and endangered in the streets of the royal city."
If he weren't doped to the ears, von Schlichten substituted mentally.
There was a native drug which had, on its users, the combined effects
of hashish, heroin and yohimbine; Jaikark and all his court circle
were addicts. He probably hadn't even heard of the riot.
"The soldiers of His Sublime and Ineffable Majesty came most promptly
to the aid of the troops of the Company, did they not, General von
Schlichten?" Harrington asked.
"Within minutes, Your Excellency," von Schlichten replied gravely.
"Their promptness, valor, and efficiency were most exemplary."
Gurgurk spoke at length, expressing himself as delighted, on behalf of
his royal master, at hearing such high praise from so distinguished a
soldier.
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