He reviewed the situation bitterly as he strode through the brightly-lit streets.
The Rastolians were a peculiar race. They looked something like reptiles walking on their hind feet, but they had warm blood and were mammalian in several respects. The Government of Earth knew that much about them.
What the Government didn't seem to know much about was the Rastolian moral code. The Rastolians did not believe that any government had a right to kill one of its citizens. Even murder could be punished only by life imprisonment. Usually, though, a Rastolian convicted of murder was simply given a gun with one shot in it and left alone in his cell. Regardless of how despicable his crime may have been, no Rastolian was so completely without honor that he would refuse to take the proper steps to punish himself.
Galth of Rastol had been convicted and condemned. He had, the jury found, murdered an Earthman in cold blood over a gambling dispute. But if Earth sent him to the execution chamber, his fellow beings, outraged over the injury and the insult to their way of life, would take steps to avenge him. And that would be the end of the small colony of humans on Rastol III.
Stone thought of his wife—who looked much too young to be the mother of two children, who looked as fresh and desirable as she had the day Stone had married her. She would perish with them. His sons; his home. He shook his head bitterly. The tragedy could be averted if he could reach the Governor's Secretary, if he could convince the Secretary that there must be a stay of execution. The Government had to allow Galth of Rastol the chance to kill himself in accordance with his people's customs.
He glanced up at the street-sign. This was the street. It was a quiet, residential block, lacking the fluorescent streetlamps of the business district. He saw the house, and headed for it.
As he started up the long walk toward the house, two figures stepped out of the shadows.
"Put up your hands, Mr. Stone," said the taller of the two. "The Secretary wants to see you."
Stone frowned puzzledly, but made no resistance. He didn't care to argue with a naked gun, and they were taking him where he was heading anyway. He raised his hands and folded them behind his head, and let them march him up the concrete pathway.