“Quite an interesting story,” I said, “and I see now how it ties up with that squirrel. But it does raise one or two queries in my mind.”
Indeed?” said Rupert Kingman politely.
I always like to get to the bottom of things, and I knew that my host had played a part in the Jovian War about which he very seldom spoke. I decided to risk a long shot in the dark.
“May I ask how you happen to know so much about this unorthodox military engagement? It isn’t possible, is it, that you were K.15?”
There was an odd sort of strangling noise from Carson. Then Kingman said, quite calmly: “No, I wasn’t.”
He got to his feet and went off towards the gun room.
“If you’ll excuse me a moment, I’m going to have another shot at that tree-rat. Maybe I’ll get him this time.” Then he was gone.
Carson looked at me as if to say: “This is another house you’ll never be invited to again.” When our host was out of earshot he remarked in a coldly cynical voice:
“You’ve done it. What did you have to say that for?”
“Well, it seemed a safe guess. How else could he have known all that?”
“As a matter of fact, I believe he met K.15 after the War: they must have had an interesting conversation together. But I thought you knew that Rupert was retired from the service with only the rank of lieutenant commander. The Court of Inquiry could never see his point of view. After all, it just wasn’t reasonable that the commander of the fastest ship in the Fleet couldn’t catch a man in a space suit.”