Bors said grimly, "Majesty, I've very bad news."
King Humphrey shrugged. He spoke in a listless voice.
"I doubt it differs from ours. You captured a passenger-liner off Mekin, you will remember. You sent it here. When it arrived we found that all its passengers knew that Kandar was not occupied and that the fleet sent to capture it had not reported back."
"My news is worse," said Bors. "The continued existence of our fleet, and the fact that it defeated a Mekinese force, is common knowledge on at least five planets--all of them now in revolt against Mekin."
The king's expression had reached the limit of reaction to disaster. It did not change. He looked almost apathetic.
"Mekin," he said dully, "sent a second squadron to Kandar to investigate the rumors of defeat. We have a very tiny force there--three ships. Of course our ships won't attack the Mekinese, but they might as well. Knowing that we destroyed their first fleet and that we still live, Mekin will assuredly retaliate."
"And not only on Kandar," said Bors. "On Tralee and Garen and Cassis and Meriden--"
"Majesty! All this is more reason to listen to me! I've been telling you that all my Talents agree--"
King Humphrey interrupted tonelessly, "We've made our final arrangements, Bors. We are going to release the cargo-ships and the passenger-ship you sent us. We will use them as messengers. We are going to send a message of surrender, to Mekin."
Bors swallowed. His most dismal forebodings had produced nothing more hopeless than this moment.
"We have to sacrifice," said the king in a leaden voice, "not only our lives but our self-respect, to try to gain something less than the total annihilation of Kandar. We shall tell the Mekinese that we will return to Kandar and form up in space. If they send a small force to accept our surrender, they shall have it. If they prefer to destroy us, they can do that also. But we submit ourselves to punishment for having resisted the original fleet. We admit our guilt. And we beg Mekin not to avenge that resistance upon our people, who are not guilty."
Bors tried to speak, and could not. There was a sodden, utterly unresilient stillness in the room, as if all the high officers of the fleet were corpses and the king himself, though he spoke, was not less dead.