Chapter VI

"Tonight?" asked Dirk Morris. "You're sure, Neil?"

"This very night," swore Neil Hardesty. "At the Palace Royal. I got it on the highest authority. From one of the Imperial Guard, recently converted to our Cause. A grand meeting of the Emperor's strategy Council, summoned to discuss ways and means--" He grinned--"of apprehending the Galactic Ghost."

Dirk Morris smiled, too, though his features were invisible to his friend.

"The Ghost," he promised, "will attend the Council meeting. Neil, send out a hurried summons to all the Group. Tonight may be the night for which we have waited and planned. The situation has finally turned to our advantage. This is the setting we needed to strike our final, and heaviest, blow. A gathering of all Graed Garroway's most trusted lieutenants! What better time to bring an abrupt end to his tyranny?"

"Destruction?" asked Brian Shaughnessey. "You plan to kill them all, Dirk?"

"That is not the best way. Killing would immortalize Garroway and--in the minds of many misguided people--forever brand the Galactic Ghost as an outlaw and murderer. No ... I will not destroy the Overlord. I will make him appear ignominious in the eyes of his subjects ... prove to all men that his vaunted powers are weak and futile. There is no weapon so strong as mirth, no blade so keen as scorn."

Vurrth grunted heavily. "Maybe better you kill, Dirk. No trust Overlord."

"My plans have been successful thus far," pointed out the Voice of Conscience. "Play along with me a little farther. I think the end is in sight. Neil ... be ready to send your forces into the Palace the moment I give the signal."

"Right!"

"And you, Brian ... see that the audiocast stations are controlled by us in time to speed word to the populace that the Emperor has been taken."

"Right, Dirk."

"And you, Vurrth--"

"Me be on hand," growled Vurrth, "to watch Overlord. No like this."

Dirk laughed. "As you will. Well ... until tonight, comrades!"

Again, as oft before during these past weeks, the assembled brothers of the Group sensed the passage of a tingling vibrancy, and knew their leader had gone back to that strange, mysterious other universe which was now his home. Neil issued orders. The Group disbanded.

* * * * *

Back on Nadron, Dirk Morris sighed and unlimbered himself of the heavy harness which necessity forced his wearing when he made his peregrinations between the two worlds. To the Ptan Slador he said, "Well ... that's all I can do now. I shall try to rest until the hour comes."

"And then?" asked Slador.

"And then," repeated Dirk slowly, "success ... at last. If everything goes well, tonight will mark the beginning of the end. Earth's greatest citadel will fall, carrying with it into destruction not only the Emperor, but all those upon whom the burden of his military power rests.

"With the fall of Earth, half the battle is won. No other planet is so tightly under Garroway's control as ours. With the Overlord imprisoned, the other worlds will burst free of their bondage ... the System will know again the joys of liberty."

Rima said, "Dirk ... you have laid careful plans for tonight? You have plotted every move you will make?"

"Under the circumstances, that is well-nigh impossible. I know only that the Emperor gathers with his staff. I shall have to make my entrance, then decide on the spur of the moment how best to accomplish my aims."

"You are sure--" hesitated the girl--"this is not a trap of some sort?"

"Trap?" Dirk laughed lightly. "How could it be?"

"I don't know. But the Overlord is no fool. He is a ruthless man ... but he is no fool."

"He also," reminded Dirk, "thinks I am dead. The identity of the Galactic Ghost is, to him, a complete mystery. Were he to discover my identity, then perhaps I might have occasion to fear a trap of some sort, for ... as you say ... Garroway is no fool. He would realize, then, that the teleport brought about not death, but some sort of sinister change. But I am sure there is no danger. Ptan Slador ... let us drink to success, and to the final reunion of our freed worlds!"

So they toasted a new life opening to all mankind. And the maiden, Rima, drank the toast with them. But even as she drank, her eyes were grave and thoughtful....

* * * * *

Nevertheless, despite his claims of confidence, it was with some slight degree of trepidation that Dirk Morris prepared for his ultimate exploit later that night. This was, he knew, his boldest stroke to date. He had hurled his forces elsewhere with supreme confidence. But always he had avoided too-close contact with Graed Garroway. For in his heart of hearts he agreed with Rima. He knew the Emperor to be, in truth, no fool ... but a cunning adversary of infinite daring and resource.

Still, the die was cast now. The Group's preparations were made; he could not let them down. He must pave the way for the general uprising which would sweep Garroway from power ... or his own scheming into disaster.

Slador and Rima accompanied him to the spot on Nadron where his translation was to take place. It was a tiny wooded glade, bathed in the cool moonlight of the alien planet. In the thickets small night-things chirruped, and from somewhere a sleepy bird sang a listless lullaby. Dirk, standing there breathing the sweet, fresh air of Nadron found it hard to believe that the mere pressure of a switch on his belt would place him on the musty, lower levels of that architectural monstrosity which was the Palace Royal ... a towering structure of numberless stories ... at the very topmost of which would be held the conference he pledged himself to end.

He held out a hand; first Slador, then Rima, gripped it warmly.

"Good luck!" said the Ptan. And Rima added, "We'll be waiting ... and watching!"

Dirk nodded, not daring to trust his thoughts to words, and depressed the switch. As oft before he felt a churning moment of vertigo ... then he stood in a lower corridor of the Palace Royal. Not ten feet distant stood an armed guard. This man stirred restlessly, his head turning as if he felt the electric disturbance of Dirk's entrance. But when his searching eyes found nothing, he returned to the pacing of his post. Dirk slipped past him swiftly, noiselessly, and to the first of the long series of staircases he must negotiate.

The Palace Royal was equipped with elevators, but these he dared not use. The movement of an "empty" elevator would be token enough to the wit-sharpened Palace guards that the dreaded Galactic Ghost was in their midst. So he pressed forward and upward to the heights of the tower.

It was a long climb and a brutal one. The Emperor's palace dwarfed to shame the puny "skyscraper" attempts of ancestors a thousand years removed. Thus it was a weary Dirk Morris who finally attained the topmost flight, and there rested himself briefly before entering the suite which comprised the Overlord's council chamber.

The vagrant thought struck him that the Palace was poorly guarded, considering the chaos into which the Ghost's activities should have thrown the Emperor. But this, he reasoned, might be but another proof of the weakening of Graed Garroway's grip; so undermined was the structure of his empire now that not even in his own bailiwick could he command the meticulous discipline he had heretofore exacted of his hirelings.

Rested at last, he moved toward the massive portal of the council hall. It hung slightly ajar; with no effort he inched it open and eased his still-invisible, but now substantial body through.

His entrance found the Overlord addressing a group seated in a semi-circle about the dais from which Garroway spoke. All backs save that of the Emperor himself were turned to Dirk. He moved forward silently, cautiously.

"--therefore, my lords and generals," the Overlord was saying, "it is vitally necessary that we apprehend this dastard, this criminal, who has so dared attack our government. Never until the so-called Galactic Ghost is captured and put to death will we be free to--"

"--to continue," said Dirk loudly, boldly, "your murderous onslaught against the rights and liberties of freedom loving people! Is that your meaning, Graed Garroway? Then abandon the thought. For truly, tonight your empire crumbles beneath you!"

"_The Ghost!_"

* * * * *

The cry lifted in the hall; all heads whirled as one. Eyes opened wide in futile scanning, and jaws fell agape. And of all that vast, terrified assemblage, there was only one who did not freeze with sudden fear. That one was Garroway. Strangely, a smile seized his lips as he cried:

"Yes, the Ghost ... as I had hoped! Guards ... _lights!_"

Instantly the room, which had been cloaked in semi-darkness, blazed with the fury of a thousand beaming flares. And to his horror, Dirk Morris saw....

... not only those who had spun to face him, tight faces wreathed in scowls, hands gripping lethal weapons ... but his own image, reflected a hundred times from every nook and corner of the vast hall! From a hundred mirrors placed to reflect in their revealing rock-quartz surfaces every move he made!

Too late, comprehension dawned upon him! Rima had guessed aright ... this was a trap, ingeniously set for him by the Overlord, and now sprung at the proper moment. The Princess had revealed that which she had seen; the Overlord was clever enough to take advantage of it.

There was but one thing to do, and that quickly! In a trice, Dirk's hand leaped to the control stud on his belt, seeking to depress the switch that would return him to Nadron. But here, too, the Emperor had anticipated his move. His voice again cleft the stark, foreboding silence.

"_Field!_"

And instantly there hummed through the room a shrill, whining current. It took but the split of a second for Dirk Morris to discern its purpose. For when his own hand tightened on the switch ... nothing happened! He did not find himself hurling the vibration-span to the safety of Nadron. He remained where he was, writhing in the coils of an electric agony that coursed through his veins like liquid fire.

It was then the Overlord laughed, his voice a grating triumph.

"You see, Dirk Morris, it is useless! My scientists have probed the secret of your ghostly state ... and you are snared in a net of their devising! Toss down your weapons!"

The grim purpose in his voice left Dirk no choice. Reluctantly he dropped to the floor the weapon with which he had hoped to capture Graed Garroway, stood still as grim-faced guards moved forward to grip him, bundle him to the dais wherefrom watched the smirking Overlord.

The tide was terribly turned. The biter was bitten!