Mia MacIver snapped to attention. It was absurd, she felt with a surge of anger that a man could make fools of the Venusian authorities as the Renegade had done for years.
She knew little of Venus. Her life had been spent in boarding schools on Earth. But when she'd received news that her father was dead, murdered by the Renegade, she'd booked passage to Venusport at once, determined to manage the plantation herself.
"Here's a special bulletin," the announcer was saying. "The plantation owners are subscribing ten thousand monads to be added to the price already on the Renegade's head. That makes a total of fifty thousand monads for his capture. A punitive expedition is also being organized against his headquarters in the Cloud Mountains."
Mia MacIver switched off the Newscaster, stood up. The notes of the pipes drifted into her study, exotic, compelling. She bit her lip, stepped through the window onto the vine roofed patio.
"Stop that noise, Cosmo! You're driving me insane!"
Cosmo Horn took the Venusian pipes from his mouth, said dryly, "I didn't think I was that bad."
He was sprawled in a hammock, looking like a handsome, rather distinguished tramp.
"Did you hear the Newscaster, Cosmo?"
"No." He shook his head. He had a lean, hawk-like visage, close cropped brown hair, green eyes.
"The Renegade was at the Bemmelman plantation last night!"