“What?” Ronny said.
“Sit down, sit down.” He rushed Ronny to a chair, saw him seated, returned to the desk and flicked an order box switch. “Irene,” he said, “do up a badge for Ronny, will you? You've got his code, haven't you? Good. Send it over. Bronze, of course.”
Sid Jakes turned back to Ronny and grinned at him. He motioned to the report again. “What a name for a planet. Republic. Bunch of screw-balls, again. Out in the vicinity of Sirius. Based their system on Plato's Republic. Have to go the whole way. Don't even speak Basic. Certainly not. They speak Ancient Greek. That's going to be a neat trick, finding interpreters. How'd you like the Old Man?”
Ronny said, dazed at the conversational barrage, “Old Man? Oh, you mean Commissioner Metaxa.”
“Sure, sure,” Sid grinned, perching [pg 019] himself on the edge of the desk. “Did he give you that drink of tequila during working hours routine? He'd like to poison every new agent we get. What a character.”
The grin was infectious. Ronny said carefully, “Well, I did think his method of hiring a new man was a little—cavalier.”
“Cavalier, yet,” Sid Jakes chortled. “Look, don't get the Old Man wrong. He knows what he's doing. He always knows what he's doing.”
“But he took me on after only two or three minutes conversation.”
Jakes cocked his head to one side. “Oh? You think so? When did you first apply for interplanetary assignment, Ronny?”
“I don't know, about three years ago.”