As from a distance I observed the clumsy efforts of the swimmer, watched the flounderings of the poor, untrained creature.... It was apparent that an override of the autonomic system was required. With dispatch I activated cortical area omicron, rerouted the blood supply, drew an emergency oxygen source from stored fats, diverting the necessary energy to break the molecular bonds.Now, with the body drawing on internal sources, ample for six hundred seconds at maximum demand, I stimulated areas upsilon and mu. I channeled full survival-level energy to the muscle complexes involved, increased power output to full skeletal tolerance, eliminated waste motion.The body drove through the water with the fluid grace of a sea-denizen....
As from a distance I observed the clumsy efforts of the swimmer, watched the flounderings of the poor, untrained creature.... It was apparent that an override of the autonomic system was required. With dispatch I activated cortical area omicron, rerouted the blood supply, drew an emergency oxygen source from stored fats, diverting the necessary energy to break the molecular bonds.
Now, with the body drawing on internal sources, ample for six hundred seconds at maximum demand, I stimulated areas upsilon and mu. I channeled full survival-level energy to the muscle complexes involved, increased power output to full skeletal tolerance, eliminated waste motion.
The body drove through the water with the fluid grace of a sea-denizen....
I floated on my back, breathing in great surges of cool air and blinking at the crimson sky. I had been under water, a few yards from shore, drowning. Then there was an awareness, like a voice, telling me what to do. From out of the mass of Vallonian knowledge I had acquired, I had drawn what I needed. And now I was here, half a mile from the beach, winded but intact. I felt beat and hungry, but I had to keep my mind on the problem of getting to the mainland. It was a fifteen-mile swim, but if the boys on shore could keep each other occupied, I ought to be able to make it. The full moon would make steering easy. And the first thing I would do when I got out of this would be to order the biggest, rarest steak in South America.
CHAPTER XI
I sat at the kitchen table in Margareta's Lima apartment and gnawed the last few shreds off the stripped T-bone, while she poured me another cup of coffee.
"Now tell me about it," she said. "You say they burned your house, but why? And how did you get here?"
"They got so interested in the fight, they lost their heads," I said. "That's the only explanation I can think of. I figured they'd go to some pains to avoid damaging me. I guessed wrong."
"But your own people...."
"Maybe they were right: they couldn't afford to let the Russkis get me."
"But how did you get covered with mud? And the blood stains on your back?"
"I had a nice long swim: five hours' worth. Then another hour getting through a mangrove swamp. Lucky I had a moon. Then a three-hour hike...."
"You'd better get some sleep," said Margareta. "What do you want me to do?"
"Get me some clothes," I said. "A grey suit, white shirt, black tie and shoes. And go to my bank and draw some money, say five thousand. Oh yeah, see if there's anything in the papers. If you see anybody hanging around the lobby when you come back, don't come up; give me a call and I'll meet you."
She stood up. "This is really awful," she said. "Can't your embassy—"
"Didn't I mention it? A Mr. Pruffy, of the embassy, came along to hold Smale's hand ... not to mention a Colonel Sanchez. I wouldn't be surprised if the local cops weren't in the act by now...."
"Where will you go?"
"I'll get to the airport and play it by ear. I don't think they've alerted everybody. It was a hush-hush deal, until it went sour; now they're still picking up the pieces."
"The bank won't be open for hours yet," said Margareta. "Go to sleep and don't worry. I'll take care of everything."
I knew I wasn't alone as soon as I opened my eyes. I hadn't heard anything, but I could feel someone in the room. I sat up slowly, looked around.
He was sitting in the embroidered chair by the window: an ordinary-looking fellow in a tan tropical suit, with an unlighted cigarette in his mouth and no particular expression on his face.
"Go ahead, light up," I said. "Don't mind me."
"Thanks," he said, in a thin voice. He took a lighter from an inner pocket, flipped it, held it to the cigarette.
I stood up. There was a blur of motion from my visitor, and the lighter was gone and a short-nosed revolver was in its place.
"You've got the wrong scoop, mister," I said. "I don't bite."
"I'd rather you wouldn't move suddenly, Mr. Legion."
"Which side are you working for?" I asked. "And can I put my shoes on?"
He rested the pistol on his knee. "Get completely dressed, Mr. Legion."
"Sorry," I said. "No can do. No clothes."
He frowned slightly. "My jacket will be a little small for you," he said. "But I think you can manage."
"How come you didn't figure I was dead?" I asked.
"We checked the house," he said. "No body."
"Why, you incompetent asses. You were supposed to think I drowned."
"That possibility was considered. But we made the routine checks anyway."
"Nice of you to let me sleep it out. How long have you been here?"
"Only a few minutes," he said. He glanced at his watch. "We'll have to be going in another fifteen."
"What do you want with me?" I said. "You blew up everything you were interested in."
"The Department wants to ask you a few questions."
I looked at the pistol. "I wonder if you'd really shoot me," I mused.
"I'll try to make the position clear," he said. "Just to avoid any unfortunate misunderstanding. My instructions are to bring you in, alive—if possible. If it appears that you may evade arrest ... or fall into the wrong hands, I'll be forced to use the gun."
I pulled my shoes on, thinking it over. My best chance to make a break was now, while there was only one watch dog. But I had a feeling he was telling the truth about shooting me. I had already seen the boys in action at the house.
He got up. "Let's step into the living room, Mr. Legion," he said. I moved past him through the door. In the living room the clock on the mantle said eleven. I'd been asleep for five or six hours. Margareta ought to be getting back any minute....
"Put this on," he said. I took the light jacket and wedged myself into it.
The telephone rang.
I looked at my watchdog. He shook his head. We stood and listened to it ring. After a while it stopped.
"We'd better be going now," he said. "Walk ahead of me, please. We'll take the elevator to the basement and leave by the service entrance—"
He stopped talking, eyes on the door. There was the rattle of a key. The gun came up.
"Hold it," I snapped. "It's the girl who owns the apartment." I moved to face him, my back to the door.
"That was foolish of you, Legion," he said. "Don't move again."
I watched the door in the big mirror on the opposite wall. The knob turned, the door swung in ... and a thin brown man in white shirt and white pants slipped into the room. As he pushed the door back he transferred a small automatic to his left hand. My keeper threw a lever on the revolver that was aimed at my belt buckle.
"Stand absolutely still, Legion," he said. "If you have a chance, that's it." He moved aside slightly, looked past me to the newcomer. I watched in the mirror as the man in white behind me swiveled to keep both of us covered.
"This is a fail-safe weapon," said my first owner to the new man. "I think you know about them. We leaked the information to you. I'm holding the trigger back; if my hand relaxes, it fires, so I'd be a little careful about shooting, if I were you."
The thin man swallowed. He didn't say anything. He was having to make some tough decisions. His instructions would be the same as my other friend's: to bring me in alive, if possible.
"Who does this bird represent?" I asked my man.
"He's a Soviet agent."
I looked in the mirror at the man again. "Nuts," I said. "He looks like a waiter in a chile joint. He probably came up to take our order."
"You talk too much," said my keeper between his teeth. He held the gun on me steadily. I watched his trigger finger to see if it looked like relaxing.
"I'd say it's a stalemate," I said. "Let's take it once more from the top. Both of you go—"
"Shut up, Legion." My man licked his lips, glanced at my face. "I'm sorry. It looks as though—"
"You don't want to shoot me," I blurted out, loudly. In the mirror I had seen the door, which was standing ajar, ease open an inch, two inches. "You'll spoil this nice coat...." I kept on talking: "And anyway it would be a big mistake, because everybody knows Russian agents are stubby men with wide cheekbones and tight hats—"
Silently Margareta slipped into the room, took two quick steps, and slammed a heavy handbag down on the slicked-back pompadour that went with the Adam's apple. The man in white stumbled and fired a round into the rug. The automatic dropped from his hand, and my pal in tan stepped to him and hit him hard on the back of the head with his pistol. He whirled toward me, hissed "Play it smart" just loud enough for me to hear, then turned to Margareta. He slipped the gun in his pocket, but I knew he could get it out again in a hurry.
"Very nicely done, Miss," he said. "I'll have this person removed from your apartment. Mr. Legion and I were just going."
Margareta looked at me. I didn't want to see her get hurt—or involved.
"It's okay, honey," I said. "This is Mr. Jones ... of our Embassy. We're old friends." I stepped past her, headed for the door. My hand was on the knob when I heard a solid thunk behind me. I whirled in time to clip the FBI on the jaw as he fell forward. Margareta looked at me, wide-eyed.
"That handbag packs a wallop," I said. "Nice work, Maggie." I knelt, pulled off the fellow's belt, and cinched his hands behind his back with it. Margareta got the idea, did the same for the other man, who was beginning to groan now.
"Who are these men?" she asked.
"I'll tell you all about it later. Right now, I have to get to some people I know, get this story on the wires, out in the open. State'll be a little shy about gunning me down or locking me up without trial, if I give the show enough publicity." I reached in my pocket, handed her the black-&-gold-marked cylinder. "Mail this to—Joe Dugan—at Itzenca, general delivery."
"All right," Margareta said. "And I have your things." She stepped into the hall, came back with a shopping bag and a suit carton. She took a wad of bills from her handbag and handed it to me.
I went to her and put my arms around her. "Listen, honey: as soon as I leave go to the bank and draw fifty grand. Get out of the country. They haven't got anything on you except that you beaned a couple of intruders in your apartment, but it'll be better if you disappear. Leave an address care of Poste Restante, Basle, Switzerland. I'll get in touch when I can."
Twenty minutes later I was pushing through the big glass doors onto the sidewalk, clean-shaven, dressed to the teeth, with five grand on one hip and a .32 on the other. I'd had a good meal and a fair sleep, and against me the secret services of two or three countries didn't have a chance.
I got as far as the corner before they nailed me.
CHAPTER XII
"You have a great deal to lose," General Smale was saying, "and nothing to gain by your stubbornness. You're a young man, vigorous and, I'm sure, intelligent. You have a fortune of some million and a quarter dollars, which I assure you you'll be permitted to keep. As against that prospect, so long as you refuse to co-operate, we must regard you as no better than a traitorous criminal—and deal with you accordingly."
"What have you been feeding me?" I said. "My mouth tastes like somebody's old gym shoes and my arm's purple to the elbow. Don't you know it's illegal to administer drugs without a license?"
"The nation's security is at stake," snapped Smale.
"The funny thing is, it must not have worked, or you wouldn't be begging me to tell all. I thought that scopolamine or whatever you're using was the real goods."
"We've gotten nothing but gibberish," Smale said, "most of it in an incomprehensible language. Who the devil are you, Legion? Where do you come from?"
"You know everything," I said. "You told me so yourself. I'm a guy named Legion, from Mount Sterling, Illinois, population: one thousand eight hundred and ninety-two."
Smale had gone white. "I'm in a position to inflict agonies on you, you insolent rotter," he grated. "I've refrained from doing so. I'm a soldier; I know my duty. I'm prepared to give my life; if need be, my honor, to obtain for my government the information you're withholding."
"Turn me loose; then ask me in a nice way. As far as I know, I haven't got anything of military significance to tell you, but if I were treated as a free citizen I might be inclined to let you be the judge of that."
"Tell us now; then you'll go free."
"Sure," I said. "I invented a combination rocket ship and time machine. I travelled around the solar system and made a few short trips back into history. In my spare time I invented other gadgets. I'm planning to take out patents, so naturally I don't intend to spill any secrets. Can I go now?"
Smale got to his feet. "Until we can safely move you, you'll remain in this room. You're on the sixty-third floor of the Yordano Building. The windows are of unbreakable glass, in case you contemplate a particularly untidy suicide. Your person has been stripped of all potentially dangerous items. The door is of heavy construction and securely locked. The furniture has been removed so you can't dismantle it for use as a weapon. It's rather a drab room to spend your future in, but until you decide to co-operate this will be your world."
I didn't say anything. I sat on the floor and watched him leave. I caught a glimpse of two uniformed men outside the door. No doubt they'd take turns looking through the peephole. I'd have solitude without privacy.
I stretched out on the floor, which was padded with a nice thick rug, presumably so that I wouldn't beat my brains out against it just to spite them. I was way behind on my sleep: being interrogated while unconscious wasn't a very restful procedure. I wasn't too worried. In spite of what Smale said, they couldn't keep me here forever. Maybe Margareta had gotten clear and told the story to some newsmen; this kind of thing couldn't stay hidden forever. Or could it?
I thought about what Smale had said about my talking gibberish under the narcotics. That was an odd one....
Quite suddenly I got it. By means of the drugs they must have tapped a level where the Vallonian background briefing was stored: they'd been firing questions at a set of memories that didn't speak English. I grinned, then laughed out loud. Luck was still in the saddle with me.
The glass was in double panels, set in aluminum frames and sealed with a plastic strip. The space between the two panels of glass was evacuated of air, creating an insulating barrier against the heat of the sun. I ran a finger over the aluminum. It was dural: good tough stuff. If I had something to pry with, I might possibly lever the metal away from the glass far enough to take a crack at the edge, the weak point of armor-glass ... if I had something to hit it with.
Smale had done a good job of stripping the room—and me. I had my shirt and pants and shoes, but no tie or belt. I still had my wallet—empty, a pack of cigarettes with two wilted weeds in it, and a box of matches. Smale had missed a bet: I might set fire to my hair and burn to the ground. I might also stuff a sock down my throat and strangle, or hang myself with a shoe lace—but I wasn't going to.
I looked at the window some more. The door was too tough to tackle, and the heavies outside were probably hoping for an excuse to work me over. They wouldn't expect me to go after the glass; after all, I was still sixty-three stories up. What would I do if I did make it to the window sill? But we could worry about that later, after I had smelled the fresh air.
My forefinger found an irregularity in the smooth metal: a short groove. I looked closer, saw a screw-head set flush with the aluminum surface. Maybe if the frame was bolted together—
No such luck; the screw I had found was the only one. What was it for? Maybe if I removed it I'd find out. But I'd wait until dark to try it. Smale hadn't left a light fixture in the room. After sundown I'd be able to work unobserved.
A couple of hours went by and no one came to disturb my solitude, not even to feed me. I had a short scrap of metal I'd worked loose from my wallet. It was mild steel, flimsy stuff, only about an inch long, but I was hoping the screw might not be set too tight. Aluminum threads strip pretty easily, so it probably wasn't cinched up too hard.
There was no point in theorizing. It was dark now; I'd give it a try. I went to the window, fitted the edge of metal into the slotted screw-head, and twisted. It turned, just like that. I backed it off ten turns, twenty; it was a thick bolt with fine threads. It came free and air whooshed into the hole. The screw apparently sealed the panel after the air was evacuated.
I thought it over. If I could fill the space between the panels with water and let it freeze ... quite a trick in the tropics. I might as well plan to fill it with gin and set it on fire.
I was going in circles. Every idea I got started with "if". I needed something I could manage with the materials at hand: cloth, a box of matches, a few bits of paper.
I got out a cigarette, lit up, and while the match was burning examined the hole from which I'd removed the plug. It was about three sixteenths of an inch in diameter and an inch deep, and there was a hole near the bottom communicating with the air space between the glass panels. It was an old-fashioned method of manufacture but it seemed to have worked all right: the air was pumped out and the hole sealed with the screw. It had at any rate the advantage of being easy to service if the panel leaked. Now with some way of pumping airin, I could blow out the panels....
There was no pump on the premises but I did have some chemicals: the match heads. They were old style too, like a lot of things in Peru: the strike-once-and-throw-away kind.
I sat on the floor and started to work, chipping the heads off the matchsticks, collecting the dry, purplish material on a scrap of paper. Thirty-eight matches gave me a respectable sample. I packed it together, rolled it in the paper, and crimped the ends. Then I tucked the makeshift firecracker into the hole the screw had come from.
Using the metal scrap I scraped at the threads of the screw, blurring them. Then I started it in the hole, half a dozen turns, until it came up against the match-heads.
The shoes Margareta had bought me had built-up leather heels: hell on the feet, but just the thing to pound with.
I took the shoe by the toe and hefted it: the flexible sole gave it a good action, like a well-made sap. There were still a couple of "if's" in the equation, but a healthy crack on the screw ought to drive it against the packed match-heads hard enough to detonate them, and the expanding gasses from the explosion ought to exert enough pressure against the glass panels to break them. I'd know in a second.
I flattened myself against the wall, brought the shoe up, and laid it on the screw-head.
There was a deafening boom, a blast of hot air, and a chemical stink, then a gust of cool night wind—and I was on the sill, my back to the street six hundred feet below, my fingers groping for a hold on the ledge above the window. I found a grip, pulled up, reached higher, got my feet on the muntin strip, paused to rest for three seconds, reached again....
I pulled my feet above the window level and heard shouts in the room below:
"—fool killed himself!"
"Get a light in here!"
I clung, breathing deep, and murmured thanks to the architect who had stressed a strong horizontal element in his facade and arranged the strip windows in bays set twelve inches from the face of the structure. Now, if the boys below would keep their eyes on the street underneath long enough for me to get to the roof—
I looked up, to get an idea how far I'd have to go—and gripped the ledge convulsively as the whole building leaned out, tilting me back....
Cold sweat ran into my eyes. I squeezed the stone until my knuckles creaked, and held on. I laid my cheek against the rough plaster, listened to my heart thump. Adrenalin and high hopes had gotten me this far ... and now it had all drained out and left me, a frail ground-loving animal, flattened against the cruel face of a tower like a fly on a ceiling, with nothing between me and the unyielding concrete below but the feeble grip of fingers and toes. I started to yell for help, and the words stuck in my dry throat. I breathed in shallow gasps, feeling my muscles tightening, until I hung, rigid as a board, afraid even to roll my eyeballs for fear of dislodging myself. I closed my eyes, felt my hands going numb, and tried again to yell: only a thin croak.
A minute earlier I had had only one worry: that they'd look up and see me. Now my worst fear was that they wouldn't.
This was the end. I'd been close before, but not like this. My fingers could take the strain for maybe another minute, maybe even two; then I'd let go, and the wind would whip at me for a few timeless seconds, before I hit.
Down inside of me a small defiance flickered, found a foot-hold, burned brighter. I would die ... but Hell, that would solve a lot of problems. And if I had to die, at least I could die trying.
My mind moved in to take over from my body. It was the body that was wasting my last strength on a precarious illusion of safety, numbing my senses, paralyzing me. It was a tyranny I wouldn't accept. I needed a cool head and a steady hand and an unimpaired sense of balance; and if the imbecile boy wouldn't co-operate the mind would damn well force it. First: loosen the grip—Yes! if it killed me: bend those fingers!
I was standing a little looser now, my hands resting flat, my legs taking the load. I had a good wide ledge to stand on: nearly a foot, and in a minute I was going to reach up and get a new hold and lift one foot at a time ... and if I slipped, at least I'd have done it my way.
I let go, and the building leaned out, and to hell with it....
I felt for the next ledge, gripped it, pulled up, found a toe-hold.
Sure, I was dead. It was a long way to the top, and there was a fancy cornice I'd never get over, but when the moment came and I started the long ride down I'd thumb my nose at the old hag, Instinct, who hadn't been as tough as she thought she was....
I was under the cornice now, hanging on for a breather and listening to the hooting and hollering from the window far below. A couple of heads had popped out and taken a look, but it was dark up where I was and all the attention was centered down where the crowd had gathered and lights were playing, looking for the mess. Pretty soon now they'd begin to get the drift—so I'd better be going.
I looked up at the overhang ... and felt the old urge to clutch and hang on. So I leaned outward a little further, just to show me who was boss. It was a long reach, and I'd have to risk it all on one lunge because, if I missed, there wasn't any net, and my fingers knew it; I heard my nails rasp on the plaster. I grated my teeth together and unhooked one hand: it was like a claw carved from wood. I took a half-breath, bent my knees slightly; they were as responsive as a couple of bumper-jacks bolted on at the hip. Tough; but it was now or never....
I let go with both hands and stretched, leaning back....
My wooden hands bumped the edge, scrabbled, hooked on, as my legs swung free, and I was hanging like an old-time sailor strung up by the thumbs. A wind off the roof whipped at my face and now I was a tissue-paper doll, fluttering in the breeze.
I had to pull now, pull hard, heave myself up and over the edge, but I was tired, too tired, and a dark curtain was falling over me....
Then from the darkness a voice was speaking in a strange language: a confusion of strange thought symbols, but through them an ever more insistent call:
... dilate the secondary vascular complex, shunt full conductivity to the upsilon neuro-channel. Now, stripping oxygen ions from fatty cell masses, pour in electro-chemical energy to the sinews....
With a smooth surge of power I pulled myself up, fell forward, rolled onto my back, and lay on the flat roof, the beautiful flat roof, still warm from the day's sun.
I was here, looking at the stars, safe, and later on when I had more time I'd stop to think about it. But now I had to move, before they'd had time to organize themselves, cordon off the building, and start a door-to-door search.
Staggering a bit from the exertion of the long climb I got to my feet, went to the shed housing the entry to the service stair. A short flight of steps led down to a storeroom. There were dusty boards, dried-up paint cans, odd tools. I picked up a five-foot length of two-by-four and a hammer with one claw missing, and stepped out into the hall. The street was a long way down and I didn't feel like wasting time with stairs. I found the elevator, got in and pushed the button for the foyer.
In a few seconds it stopped and the doors opened. I glanced out, tightened my grip on the hammer, and stepped out. I could see the lights in the street out front and in the distance there was the wail of a siren, but nobody in the lobby looked my way. I headed across toward the side exit, dumped the board at the door, tucked the hammer in the waist band of my pants, and stepped out onto the pavement. There were a lot of people hurrying past but this was Lima: they didn't waste a glance on a bare-footed carpenter.
I moved off, not hurrying. There was a lot of rough country between me and Itzenca, the little town near which the life boat was hidden in a cañon, but I aimed to cover it in a week. Some time between now and tomorrow I'd have to figure out a way to equip myself with a few necessities, but I wasn't worried. A man who had successfully taken up human-fly work in middle life wouldn't have any trouble stealing a pair of boots.
Foster had shoved off for home three years ago, local time, although to him, aboard the ship, only a few weeks might have passed. My lifeboat was a midge compared to the mother ship he rode, but it had plenty of speed. Once aboard the lugger ... and maybe I could put a little space between me and the big boys.
I had used the best camouflage I knew of on the boat. The near-savage native bearers who had done my unloading and carried my Vallonian treasures across the desert to the nearest railhead were not the gossipy type. If General Smale's boys had heard about the boat, they hadn't mentioned it. And if they had: well, I'd solve that one when I got to it. There were still quite a few 'if's' in the equation, but my arithmetic was getting better all the time.
CHAPTER XIII
I took the precaution of sneaking up on the lifeboat in the dead of night, but I could have saved myself a crawl. Except for the fact that the camouflage nets had rotted away to shreds, the ship was just as I had left it, doors sealed. Why Smale's team hadn't found it, I didn't know; I'd think that one over when I was well away from Earth.
I went into the post office at Itzenca to pick up the parcel Margareta had mailed me with Foster's memory-trace in it. While I was checking to see whether Uncle Sam's minions had intercepted the package and substituted a carrot, I felt something rubbing against my shin. I glanced down and saw a grey and white cat, reasonably clean and obviously hungry. I don't know whether I'd ploughed through a field of wild catnip the night before or if it was my way with a finger behind the furry ears, but kitty followed me out of Itzenca and right into the bush. She kept pace with me, leading most of the time, as far as the space boat, and was the first one aboard.
I didn't waste time with formalities. I had once audited a briefing rod on the boat's operation—not that I had ever expected to use the information for a take-off. Once aboard, I hit the controls and cut a swathe through the atmosphere that must have sent fingers jumping for panic buttons from Washington to Moscow.
I didn't know how many weeks or months of unsullied leisure stretched ahead of me now. There would be time to spare for exploring the boat, working out a daily routine, chewing over the details of both my memories, and laying plans for my arrival on Foster's world, Vallon. But first I wanted to catch a show that was making a one-night stand for me only: the awe-inspiring spectacle of the retreating Earth.
I dropped into a seat opposite the screen and flipped into a view of the big luminous ball of wool that was my home planet. I'd been hoping to get a last look at my island, but I couldn't see it. The whole sphere was blanketed in cloud: a thin worn blanket in places but still intact. But the moon was a sight! An undipped Edam cheese with the markings of Roquefort. For a quarter of an hour I watched it grow until it filled my screen. It was too close for comfort. I dumped the tabby out of my lap and adjusted a dial. The dead world swept past, and I had a brief glimpse of blue burst bubbles of craters that became the eyes and mouth and pock marks of a face on a head that swung away from me in disdain and then the sibling planets dwindled and were gone forever.
The life boat was completely equipped, and I found comfortable quarters. An ample food supply was available by the touch of a panel on the table in the screen-room. That was a trick my predecessor with the dental jewellery hadn't discovered, I guessed. During the course of my first journey earthward and on my visits to the boat for saleable playthings while she lay in dry-dock, I had discovered most of the available amenities aboard. Now I luxuriated in a steaming bath of recycled water, sponged down with disposable towels packed in scented alcohol, fed the cat and myself, and lay down to sleep for about two weeks.
By the third week I was reasonably refreshed and rested. The cat was a godsend, I began to realize. I named her Itzenca, after the village where she adopted me, and I talked to her by the hour.
"Say, Itz," said I, "where would you like your sand-box situated? Right there in front of the TV screen?"
No, said Itzenca by a flirt of her tail. And she walked over behind a crate that had never been unloaded on earth.
I pulled out a box of junk and slid the sand-box in its place. Itzenca promptly lost interest and instead jumped up on the junk box which fell off the bench and scattered small objects of khaff and metal in all directions.
"Come back here, blast you," I said, "and help me pick up this stuff."
Itz bounded after a dull-gleaming silver object that was still rolling. I was there almost as quick as she was and grabbed up the cylinder. Suddenly horsing around was over. This thing was somebody's memory.
I dropped onto a bench to examine it, my Vallonian-inspired pulse pounding. Itz jumped up into my lap and nosed the cylinder. I was trying to hark back to those days three years before when I had loaded the lifeboat with all the loot it would carry, for the trip back to Earth.
"Listen, Itz, we've got to do some tall remembering. Let's see: there was a whole rack of blanks in the memory-recharging section of the room where we found the three skeletons. Yeah, now I remember: I pulled this one out of the recorder set. I showed it to Foster when he was hunting his own trace. He didn't realize I'd pulled it out of the machine and he thought it was an empty. But I'll bet you somebody had his mind taped, and then left in a hurry, before the trace could be color-coded and filed.
"On the other hand, maybe it's a blank that had just been inserted when somebody broke up the play-house.... But wasn't there something Foster said ... about when he woke up, way back when, with a pile of fresh corpses around him? He gave somebody emergency treatment and to a Vallonian that would include a complete memory-transcription.... Do you realize what I've got here in my hand, Itz?"
She looked up at me inquiringly.
"This is what's left of the guy that Foster buried: his pal, Ammaerln, I think he called him. What's inside his cylinder used to be tucked away in the skull of the Ancient Sinner. The guy's not so dead after all. I'll bet his family will pay plenty for this trace, and be grateful besides. That'll be an ace in the hole in case I get too hungry on Vallon."
I got up, crossed the apartment and dropped the trace in a drawer beside Foster's own memory.
"Wonder how Foster's making out without his past, Itz? He claimed the one I've got here could only be a copy of the original stored at Okk-Hamiloth, but my briefing didn't say anything about copying memories. He must be somebody pretty important to rate that service."
Suddenly my eyes were rivetted to the markings on Foster's trace lying in the drawer. "Zblood! The royal colors!" I sat down on the bed with a lurch. "Itzenca, old gal, it looks like we'll be entering Vallonian society from the top. We've been consorting with a member of the Vallonian nobility!"
During the days that followed, I tried again and again to raise Foster on the communicator ... without result. I wondered how I'd find him among the millions on the planet. My best bet would be to get settled down in the Vallonian environment, then start making a few inquiries.
I would play it casually: act the part of a Vallonian who had merely been travelling for a few hundred years—which wasn't unheard of—and play my cards close to my gravy stains until I learned what the score was. With my Vallonian briefing I ought to be able to carry it off. The Vallonians might not like illegal immigrants any better than they did back home, so I'd keep my interesting foreign background to myself.
I would need a new name. I thought over several possibilities and selected "Drgon." It was as good a Vallonian jawbreaker as any.
I canvassed the emergency wardrobe that was standard equipment on Far-Voyager life-boats and picked one in a sober color, then got busy with the cutting and seaming unit to fit it to my frame.
The proximity alarms were ringing. I watched the screen with its image of a great green world rimmed on one edge with glading white from the distant giant sun, on the other, flooded with a cool glow reflected from the blue outer planet. The trip was almost over and my confidence was beginning to fray around the edges. In a few minutes I would be stepping into an unknown world, all set to find my old pal Foster and see the sights. I didn't have a passport, but there was no reason to anticipate trouble. All I had to do was let my natural identity take a back seat and allow my Vallonian background to do the talking. And yet....
Now Vallon spread out below us, a misty grey-green landscape, bright under the glow of the immense moon-like sister world. I had set the landing monitor for Okk-Hamiloth, the capital city of Vallon. That was where Foster would have headed, I guessed. Maybe I could pick up the trail there.
The city was directly below: a vast network of blue-lit avenues. I hadn't been contacted by planetary control. That was normal, however. A small vessel coming in on auto could handle itself.
A little apprehensively I ran over my lines a last time: I was Drgon, citizen of the Two Worlds, back from a longer-than-average season of far-voyaging and in need of briefing rods to bring me up to date on developments at home. I also required assignment of quarters ... and directions to the nearest beer-joint. My tailoring was impeccable, my command of the language a little rusty from long non-use, and the only souvenirs I had to declare were a tattered native costume from my last port of call, a quaint weapon from the same, and a small animal I had taken a liking to.
The landing-ring was visible on the screen now, coming slowly up to meet us. There was a gentle shock and then absolute stillness. I watched the port cycle open; I went to it and looked out at the pale city stretching away to the hills. I took a breath of the fragrant night air that was spiced with a long-forgotten perfume, and the part of me that was now Vallonian ached with the inexpressible emotion of homecoming.
I started to buckle on my pistol and gather up a few belongings, then decided to wait until I'd met the welcoming committee. I whistled to Itzenca and we stepped out and down. We crossed the clipped green, luminous in the glow from the lights over the high-arched gate marking the path that curved up toward the bright-lit terraces above. There was no one in sight. Bright Cintelight showed me the gardens and walks and, when I reached the terraces, the avenues beyond ... but no people.
The cat and I walked across the terrace, passed through the open arch to a refreshment lounge. The low tables and cushioned couches stood empty under the rosy light from the ceiling panels.
I stood and listened: dead silence. The lights glowed, the tables waited invitingly. How long had they waited?
I sat down at one of them and thought hard. I had made a lot of plans, but I hadn't counted on a deserted spaceport. How was I going to ask questions about Foster if there was no one to ask?
I got up and moved on through the empty lounge, past a wide arcade, out onto a terraced lawn. A row of tall poplar-like trees made a dark wall beyond a still pool, and behind them distant towers loomed, colored lights sparkled. A broad avenue swept in a wide curve between fountains, slanted away to the hills. A hundred yards from where I stood a small vehicle was parked at the curb; I headed for it.
It was an open two-seater, low-slung, cushioned, finished in violet inlays against bright chrome. I slid into the seat, looked over the controls, while Itzenca skipped to a place beside me. There was a simple lever arrangement: a steering tiller. It looked easy. I tried a few pulls and pushes; lights blinked on the panel, the car quivered, lifted a few inches, drifted slowly across the road. I moved the tiller, twiddled things; the car moved off toward the towers.
Two hours later we had cruised the city ... and found nothing. It hadn't changed from what my extra memory recalled—except that all the people were gone. The parks and boulevards were trimmed, the fountains and pools sparkled, the lights glowed ... but nothing moved. The automatic dust precipitators and air filters would run forever, keeping things clean and neat; but there was no one there to appreciate it. I pulled over, sat watching the play of colored lights on a waterfall, and considered. Maybe I'd find more of a clue inside one of the buildings. I left the car and picked one at random: a tall slab of pink crystal. Inside, I looked around at a great airy cavern full of rose-colored light and listened to the purring of the cat and my own breathing. There was nothing else to hear.
I picked a random corridor, went along it, passing through one empty room after another. I went out on a lofty terrace overlooking gardens, leaned on a balustrade, and looked up at the brilliant disc of Cinte.
"We've come a long way to find nothing," I said to Itzenca. She pushed her way along my leg and flexed her tail in a gesture meant to console.
I sat on the balustrade and leaned back against the polished pink wall, took out a clarinet I'd found in one of the rooms and blew some blue notes. That which once had been was no more; remembering it, I played thePavane for a Dead Princess.
I finished and looked up at a sound. Four tall men in grey cloaks and a glitter of steel came toward me from the shadows.
I had dropped the clarinet and was on my feet. I tried to back up but the balustrade stopped me. The four spread out. The man in the lead fingered a wicked-looking short club and spoke to me—in gibberish. I blinked at him and tried to think of a snappy comeback.
He snapped his fingers and two of the others came up; they reached for my arms. I started to square off, fist cocked, then relaxed; after all, I was just a tourist, Drgon by name. Unfortunately, before I could get my fist back, the man with the club swung it and caught me across the forearm. I yelled, jumped back, found myself grappled by the others. My arm felt dead to the shoulder. I tried a kick and regretted that too; there was armor under the cloaks. The club wielder said something and pointed at the cat....
It was time I wised up. I relaxed, tried to coax my alter ego into the foreground. I listened to the rhythm of the language: it was Vallonian, badly warped by time, but I could understand it:
"—musician would be an Owner!" one of them said.
Laughter.
"Whose man are you, piper? What are your colors?"
I curled my tongue, tried to shape it around the sort of syllables I heard them uttering, but it seemed to me a gross debasement of the Vallonian I knew. Still I managed an answer:
"I ... am a ... citizen ... of Vallon."
"A dog of a masterless renegade?" The man with the club hefted it, glowered at me. "And what wretched dialect is that you speak?"
"I have ... been long a-voyaging," I stuttered. "I ask ... for briefing rods ... and for a ... dwelling place."
"A dwelling place you'll have," the man said. "In the men's shed at Rath-Gallion." He gestured, and snapped handcuffs on me.
He turned and stalked away, and the others hustled me after him. Over my shoulder I got a glimpse of a cat's tail disappearing over the balustrade. Outside, a long grey aircar waited on the lawn. They dumped me in the back seat, climbed aboard. I got a last look at the spires of Okk-Hamiloth as we tilted, hurtled away across the low hills.
I had had an idealistic notion of wanting to fit into this new world, find a place in its society. I'd found a place all right: a job with security.
I was a slave.
CHAPTER XIV
It was banquet night at Rath-Gallion, and I gulped my soup in the kitchen and ran over in my mind the latest batch of jingles I was expected to perform. I had only been on the Estate a few weeks, but I was already Owner Gope's favorite piper. If I kept on at this rate, I would soon have a cell to myself in the slave pens.
Sime, the pastry cook, came over to me.
"Pipe us a merry tune, Drgon," he said, "and I'll reward you with a frosting pot."
"With pleasure, good Sime," I said. I finished off the soup and got out my clarinet. I had tried out half a dozen strange instruments, but I still liked this one best. "What's your pleasure?"
"One of the outland tunes you learned far-voyaging," called Cagu, the bodyguard.
I complied with theBeer Barrel Polka. They pounded the table and hallooed when I finished, and I got my goody pan. Sime stood watching me scrape at it.
"Why don't you claim the Chief Piper's place, Drgon?" he said. "You pipe rings around the lout. Then you'd have freeman status, and could sit among us in the kitchen almost as an equal."
"I'd gladly be the equal of such a pastry cook as yourself," I said. "But what can a slave-piper do?"
Sime blinked at me. "You can challenge the Chief Piper," he said. "There's none can deny you're his master in all but name. Don't fear the outcome of the Trial; you'll triumph sure."
"But how can I claim another's place?" I asked.
Sime waved his arms. "You have far-voyaged long indeed, Piper Drgon. Know you naught of how the world wags these days? One would take you for a Cintean heretic."
"As I've said, in my youth all men were free; and the High King ruled at Okk-Hamiloth—"
"'Tis ill to speak of these things," said Sime in a low tone. "Only Owners know their former lives ... though I've heard it said that long ago no man was so mean but that he recorded his lives and kept them safe. How you came by yours, I ask not; but do not speak of it. Owner Gope is a jealous master. Though a most generous and worshipful lord," he added hastily, looking around.
"I won't speak of it then, good Sime," I said. "But I have been long away. Even the language has changed, so that I wrench my tongue in the speaking of it. Advise me, if you will."
Sime puffed out his cheeks, frowning at me. "I scarce know where to start," he said. "All things belong to the Owners ... as is only right. Men of low skill are likewise property; and 'tis well 'tis so; else would they starve as masterless strays ... if the Greymen failed to find them first." He made a sign and spat.
"Now men of good skill are freemen, each earning rewards as befits his ability. I am Chief Pastry Cook to the Lord Gope, with the perquisites of that station, therefore, that none other equals my talents."
"And if some varlet claims the place of any man here," put in Cagu, "then he gotta submit to the trial."
"Then," said Sime, "this upstart pastry cook must cook against me; and all in the Hall will judge; and he who prevails is the Chief Pastry Cook, and the other takes a dozen lashes for his impertinence."
"But fear not, Drgon," spoke Cagu. "A Chief Piper ain't but a five-stroke man. Only a tutor is lower down among freemen."
There was a bellow from the door, and I grabbed my clarinet and scrambled after the page. Owner Gope didn't like to wait around for piper-slaves. I saw him looming up at his place, as I darted through to my assigned position within the huge circle of the viand-loaded table. The Chief Piper had just squeezed his bagpipe-like instrument and released a windy blast of discordant sound. He was a lean, squint-eyed rascal fond of ordering the slave-pipers about. He pranced in an intricate pattern, pumping away at his vari-colored bladders, until I winced at the screech of it. Owner Gope noticed him about the same time. He picked up a heavy brass mug and half rose to peg it at the Chief Piper, who saw it just in time to duck. The mug hit a swollen air-bag; it burst with a sour bleat.
"As sweet a note as has been played tonight," roared Owner Gope. "Begone, lest you call up the hill devils—"
His eye fell on me. "Now here's a true piper. Summon up a fair melody, Drgon, to clear the fumes of the last performer from the air before the wine sours."
I bowed low, wet my lips, and launched into theOne O' Clock Jump. To judge from the roar that went up when I finished, they liked it. I followed withLittle Brown JugandString of Pearls. Gope pounded and the table quieted down.
"The rarest slave in all Rath-Gallion, I swear it," he bellowed. "Were he not a slave, I'd drink to his health."
"By your leave, Owner?" I said.
Gope stared, then nodded indulgently. "Speak then."
"I claim the place of Chief Piper. I—"
Yells rang out; Gope grinned widely.
"So be it," he said. "Shall the vote be taken now, or must we submit to more of the vile bladderings ere we proclaim our good Drgon Chief Piper? Speak out."
"Proclaim him!" somebody shouted.
Gope slammed a huge hand against the table. "Bring Iylk, the Chief Piper, before me," he yelled.
The piper reappeared.
"The place of the Chief Piper is declared vacant," Gope said loudly. "—since the former Chief Piper has been advanced in degree to a new office. Let these air-bags be punctured," Gope cried. "I banish their rancid squeals forever from Rath-Gallion. Now, let all men know: this former piper is now Chief Fool to this household. Let him wear the broken bladders as a sign of his office." There was a roar of laughter, glad cries, whistles.
I gave themMairzy Doatsand the former piper capered gingerly. Owner Gope roared with laughter.
"A great day for Rath-Gallion," Gope shouted. "By the horns of the sea-god, I have gained a prince of pipers and a king of fools! I proclaim them to be ten-lash men, and both shall have places at table henceforth!"
I looked around the barbarically decorated hall, seeing things in a new way. There's nothing like a little slavery to make a man appreciate even a modest portion of freedom. Everything I had thought I knew about Vallon had been wrong: the centuries that passed had changed things—and not for the better. The old society that Foster knew was dead and buried. The old places and villas lay deserted, the spaceports unused. And the old system of memory-recording that Foster described was lost and forgotten. I didn't know what kind of a cataclysm could have plunged the seat of a galactic empire back into feudal darkness—but it had happened.
So far I hadn't found a trace of Foster. My questions had gotten me nothing but blank stares. Maybe Foster hadn't made it; there could have been an accident in space. Or perhaps he was somewhere on the opposite side of the world. Vallon was a big planet and communications were poor. Maybe Foster was dead. I could live out a long life here and never find the answers.
I remembered my own disappointment at the breakdown of my illusions that night at Okk-Hamiloth. How much more heartbreaking must have been Foster's experience when and if he had arrived back here.
And Foster's memory that I had been bringing him for a keepsake: what a laugh that was! Far from being a superfluous duplicate of a master trace to which he had expected easy access, my copy of the trace was now, with the vaults at Okk-Hamiloth sealed and forbidden, of the greatest possible importance to Foster—and there wasn't a machine left on the planet to play it on.
Well, I still meant to find Foster if it took me—
Owner Gope was humming loudly and tunelessly to himself. I knew the sign. I got ready to play again. Being Chief Piper probably wasn't going to be just a bowl of cherries, but at least I wasn't a slave now. I had a long way to go, but I was making progress.
OWNER Gope and I got along well. He took me everywhere he went. He was a shrewd old duck and he liked having such an unusual piper on hand. He had heard from the Greymen, the free-lance police force, how I had landed at the deserted port. He warned me, in an oblique way, not to let word get out that I knew anything about old times in Vallon. The whole subject was tabu—especially the old capital city and the royal palaces themselves. Small wonder that my trespassing there had brought the Greymen down on me in double quick time.
One afternoon several months after my promotion I dropped in at the kitchen. I was due to shove off with Owner Gope and his usual retinue for a visit to Bar-Ponderone, a big estate a hundred miles north of Rath-Gallion in the direction of Okk-Hamiloth. Sime and my other old cronies fixed me up with a healthy lunch and a bottle of melon wine, and warned me that it would be a rough trip; the stretch of road we'd be using was a favorite hang-out of road pirates.
"What I don't understand," I said, "is why Gope doesn't mount a couple of guns on the car and blast his way through the raiders. Every time he goes off the Estate he's taking his life in his hands."
The boys were shocked. "Even piratical renegades would never dream of taking a man's life, good Drgon," Sime said. "Every Owner, far and near, would band together to hunt such miscreants down. And their own fellows would abet the hunters! Nay, none is so low as to steal all a man's lives."
"The corsairs themselves know full well that in their next life they may be simple goodmen—even slaves," the Chief Wine-Pourer put in. "For you know, good Drgon, that when a member of a pirate band suffers the Change the others lead the newman to an Estate, that he may find his place...."
"How often do these Changes come along?" I asked.
"It varies greatly. Some men, of great strength and moral power, have been known to go on unchanged for three or four hundred years. But the ordinary man lives a life of eighty to one hundred years." Sime paused. "Or it may be less. A life of travail and strife can end much sooner than one of peace and retirement. Or unusual vicissitudes can shorten a life remarkably. A cousin of mine, who was marooned on the Great Stony Place in the southern half-world and who wandered for three weeks without more to eat or drink than a small bag of wine, underwent the Change after only fourteen years. When he was found his face was lined and his hair had greyed, in the way that presages the Change. And it was not long before he fell in a fit, as one does, and slept for a night and a day. When he awoke he was a newman: young and knowing nothing."
"Didn't you tell him who he was?"
"Nay!" Sime lowered his voice. "You are much favored of Owner Gope, good Drgon, and rightly. Still, there are matters a man talks not of—"
"A newman takes a name and sets out to learn whatever trade he can," put in the Carver of Roasts. "By his own skills he can rise ... as you have risen, good Drgon."
"Don't you have memory machines—or briefing rods?" I persisted. "Little black sticks: you touch them to your head and—"
Sime made a motion in the air. "I have heard of these wands: a forbidden relic of the Black Arts—"
"Nuts," I said. "You don't believe in magic, do you, Sime? The rods are nothing but a scientific development by your own people. How you've managed to lose all knowledge of your own past—"
Sime raised his hands in distress. "Good Drgon, press us not in these matters. Such things are forbidden."
I went on out to the car and climbed in to wait for Owner Gope. It was impossible to learn anything about Vallon's history from these goodmen. They knew nothing.
I had reached a few tentative conclusions on my own, however. My theory was that some sudden social cataclysm had broken down the system of personality reinforcement and memory-recording that had given continuity to the culture. Vallonian society, based as it was on the techniques of memory preservation, had gradually disintegrated. Vallon was plunged into a feudal state resembling its ancient social pattern of fifty thousand years earlier, before development of memory recording.
The people, huddled together on Estates for protection from real or imagined perils and shunning the old villas and cities as tabu—except for those included in Estates—knew nothing of space travel and ancient history. Like Sime, they had no wish even to speak of such matters.
I might have better luck with my detective work on a big Estate like Bar-Ponderone. I was looking forward to today's trip.
Gope appeared, with Cagu and two other bodyguards, four dancing girls, and an extra-large gift hamper. They took their places and the driver started up and wheeled the heavy car out onto the highroad. I felt a pulse of excitement as we accelerated in the direction of Bar-Ponderone. Maybe at the end of the ride I'd hit paydirt.
We were doing about fifty down a winding mountain road. As we rounded a curve, the wheels screeching from the driver's awkward, too-fast swing into the turn, we saw another car in the road a quarter of a mile ahead, not moving, but parked—sideways. The driver hit the brakes.
Behind us Owner Gope yelled "Pirates! Don't slacken your pace, driver. Ram the blackguards, if you must!"
The driver rolled his eyes, almost lost control, then gritted his teeth, reached out to switch off the anti-collision circuit and slam the speed control lever against the dash. I watched for two long heart beats as we roared straight for the blockading car, then I slid over and grabbed for the controls. The driver held on, frozen. I reared back and clipped him on the jaw. He crumpled into his corner, mouth open and eyes screwed shut, as I hit the auto-steer override and worked the tiller. It was an awkward position for steering, but I preferred it to hammering in at ninety per.
The car ahead was still sitting tight, now a hundred yards away, now fifty. I cut hard to the right, toward the rising cliff face; the car backed to block me. At the last instant I whipped to the left, barrelled past with half an inch to spare, rocketed along the ragged edge with the left wheel rolling on air, then whipped back into the center of the road.
"Well done!" yelled Cagu.
"But they'll give chase!" Gope shouted. "Masterless swine!"
The driver had his eyes open now. "Crawl over me!" I barked. He mumbled and clambered past me and I slid into his seat, still clinging to the accelerator lever and putting up the speed. Another curve was coming up. I grabbed a quick look in the rear-viewer: the pirates were swinging around to follow us.
"Press on!" commanded Gope. "We're close to Bar-Ponderone; it's no more than five miles—"
"What kind of speed have they got?" I called back.
"They'll best us easy," said Cagu cheerfully.
"What's the road like ahead?"
"A fair road, straight and true, now that we've descended the mountain," answered Gope.
We squealed through the turn and hit a straightaway. A curving road branched off ahead. "What's that?" I snapped.
"A winding trail," gasped the driver. "It comes on Bar-Ponderone, but by a longer way."
I gauged my speed, braked minutely, and cut hard. We howled up the steep slope, into a turn between hills.
Gope shouted. "What madness is this?"
"We haven't got a chance on the straightaway," I called back. "Not in a straight speed contest." I whipped the tiller over, then back the other way, following the tight S-curves. I caught a glimpse of our pursuers, just heading into the side road behind us.
"Any way they can head us off?" I yelled.
"Not unless they have confederates stationed ahead," said Gope; "but these pariahs work alone."
I worked the brake and speed levers, handled the tiller. We swung right, then left, higher and higher, then down a steep grade and up again. The pirate car rounded a turn, only a few hundred yards behind now. I scanned the road ahead, followed its winding course along the mountainside, through a tunnel, then out again to swing around the shoulder of the next peak.
"Pitch something out when we go through the tunnel!" I yelled.
"My cloak," cried Gope. "And the gift hamper."
We roared into the tunnel mouth. There was a blast of air as the rear deck cover opened. Gope and Cagu hefted the heavy gift hamper, tumbled it out, followed it with a cloak, a wine jug, assorted sandals, bracelets, fruit. Then we were back in the sunlight and I was fighting the curve. In the rear-viewer I saw the pirates burst from the tunnel mouth, Gope's black and yellow cloak spread over the canopy, smashed fruit spattered over it, the remains of the hamper dragging under the chassis. The car rocked and a corner of the cloak lifted, clearing the driver's view barely in time.
"Tough luck," I said. "We've got a long straight stretch ahead, and I'm fresh out of ideas...."