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Shifting my aim slightly, I pulled the trigger. The .375 Bonanza wentoff with a sound like an atom bomb in a telephone booth, and the slugwhiffed between her arm and her body and drilled a crater in the plasterbehind her.
The roar stunned her stiff. The color drained from her face and sheswayed uncertainly. I found time enough to observe that while her bodywas as hard as chromium, her nervous system was still human andsensitive enough to make her faint from a sudden shock. She caughtherself, and stood there stiff and white with one delicate (butsteel-hard) hand up against her throat.
Then I dug the household. They were piling out of the hay like a bunchof trained firemen answering a still alarm. They arrived in all stagesof nightdress in the following order:
The man, about twenty-two or three, who skidded into the room on deadgallop and put on brakes with a screech as he caught sight of the .375with its thin wisp of blue vapor still trailing out of the muzzle.
The twins, aged about fourteen, who might have turned to run if they'dnot been frightened stiff at the sight of the cannon in my fist.
Father and then Mother Macklin, who came in briskly but without panic.
Mr. Macklin said, crisply, "May I have an explanation, Mr. Cornell?"
"I'm a cornered rat," I said thickly. "And so I'm scared. I want out ofhere in one piece. I'm so scared that if I'm intercepted, I may getpanicky, and if I do someone is likely to get hurt. Understand?"
"Perfectly," said Mr. Macklin calmly.
"Are you going to let him get away with this?" snapped the eldest son.
"Fred, a nervous man with a revolver is very dangerous. Especially onewho lacks the rudimentary training in the simpler forms of burglary."
I couldn't help but admire the older gentleman's bland self-confidence."Young man," he said to me, "You've made a bad mistake."
"No I haven't," I snapped. "I've been on the trail of something concretefor a long time, and now that I've found it I'm not going to let it goeasily." I waved the .375 and they all cringed but Mr. Macklin.
He said, "Please put that weapon down, Mr. Cornell. Let's not addattempted murder to your other crimes."
"Don't force me to it, then. Get out of my way and let me go."
He smiled. "I don't have to be telepath to tell you that you won't pullthat trigger until you're sorely driven," he replied calmly. He was soright that it made me mad. He added, "also, you've got four shells leftsince you carry the firearm on an empty chamber. Not used to guns, areyou, Mr. Cornell?"
Well, I wasn't used to wearing a gun. Now that he mentioned it, Iremembered that it was impossible to fire the shell under the hammer byany means except by pulling the trigger.
What he was telling me meant that even if I made a careful but bloodysweep of it with my four shells, there would be two of them left, andeven the twins were more than capable of taking me apart inch by inchonce my revolver was empty.
"Seems to be an impasse, Mr. Cornell," he said with an amused smile.
"You bland-mannered bunch of--"
"Ah now, please," he said abruptly. "My wife is not accustomed to suchlanguage, nor is my daughter, although my son and the twins probablyknow enough definitions to make them angry. This is an impasse, Mr.Cornell, and it behooves all of us to be extremely polite to oneanother. For one wrong move and you'll fire; this will mean completechaos for all of us. One wrong word from you and someone of us will takeoffense, which will be equally fatal. Now, let's all stand quietly andtalk this over."
"What's to talk over?" I demanded.
"A truce. Or call it an armistice."
"Do go on."
He looked at his family, and I followed his gaze. Miss Macklin wasleaning against the wall with a look of concentrated interest. Her elderbrother Fred was standing alert and ready but not quite poised for aleap. Mrs. Macklin had a motherly-looking smile on her face which forsome unknown reason she was aiming at me in a disarming manner. Thetwins were standing close together, both of them puzzled-looking. Iwondered whether they were esper or telepath (twins are always the samewhen they're identical, and opposite when fraternal). The thing thatreally bothered me was their attitude They all seemed to look at me asthough I were a poor misguided individual who had unwittingly tromped ontheir toes after having fallen in among bad company. They reminded me ofthe Harrisons, who looked and sounded so sympathetic when I'd gone outthere seeking Catherine.
A fine bunch to trust! First they swipe my girl and erase all traces ofher; then when I go looking they offer me help and sympathy for mydistress. The right hand giveth and the left hand taketh away, yeah!
I hated them all, yet I am not a hero-type. I wanted the whole Highwaysin Hiding rolled up like an old discarded corridor carpet, with everyMekstrom on Earth rolled up in it. But even if I'd been filled to thescuppers with self-abnegation in favor of my fellow man, I could nothave pulled the trigger and started the shambles. For instead of blowingthe whole thing wide open because of a batch of bodies, the survivorswould have enough savvy to clean up the mess before our bodies got cold,and the old Highways crowd would be doing business at the same oldstand. Without, I might add, without the minor nuisance that people callSteve Cornell.
What I really wanted was to find Catherine.
And then it came to me that what I really wanted second of all was topossess a body of Mekstrom Flesh, to be a physical superman.
"Suppose," said Miss Macklin unexpectedly, "that it is impossible?"
"Impossible?" I roared. "What have you got that I haven't got?"
"Mekstrom's Disease," replied Miss Macklin quietly.
"Fine," I sneered. "So how do I go out and get it?"
"You'll get it naturally--or not at all," she said.
"Now see here--" I started off, but Mr. Macklin stopped me with anupraised hand.
"Mr. Cornell," he said, "we are in the very awkward position of tryingto convince a man that his preconceived notion is incorrect. We canproduce no direct evidence to support our statement. All we can do is totell you that so far as we know, and as much as we know about Mekstrom'sDisease, no one has ever contracted the infection artificially."
"And how can I believe you?"
"That's our awkward position. We cannot show you anything that willsupport our statement. We can profess the attitudes of honesty, truth,honor, good-will, altruism, and every other word that means the samething. We can talk until doomsday and nothing will be said."
"So where is all this getting us?" I asked.
"I hope it is beginning to cause your mind to doubt the preconceivednotion," he said. "Ask yourself why any outfit such as ours woulddeliberately show you evidence."
"I have it and it does not make sense."
He smiled. "Precisely. It does not."
Fred Macklin interrupted, "Look, Dad, why are we bothering with all thisguff?"
"Because I have hopes that Mr. Cornell can be made to see our point, tojoin, as it were, our side."
"Fat chance," I snapped.
"Please, I'm your elder and not at all inclined to waste my time. Youcame here seeking information and you shall have it. You will notbelieve it, but it will, I hope, fill in some blank spots after you havehad a chance to compare, sort, and use your own logic on the problem. Asa mechanical engineer, you are familiar with the line of reasoning thatwe non-engineering people call Occam's Razor?"
"The law of least reaction," I said automatically.
"The what?" asked Mrs. Macklin.
Miss Macklin said, "I'll read it from Mr. Cornell's mind, mother. Thelaw of least reaction can be demonstrated by the following: If a bucketof mixed wood-shavings and gasoline are heated, there is a calculableprobability that the gasoline will catch fire first because the gasolineis easier--least reaction--to set on fire."
"Right," I said. "But how does this apply to me?"
Mr. Macklin took up the podium again: "For one thing, your assumptionregarding Catherine is correct. At the time of the accident she wasfound to have Mekstrom's Disease in its e
arliest form. The Harrisons didtake her in to save her life. Now, dropping that side of the long story,we must follow your troubles. The accident, to a certain group ofpersons, was a fortunate one. It placed under their medical care aman--you--in whose mind could be planted a certain mild curiosity abouta peculiar road sign and other evidences. The upshot of this was thatyou took off on a tour of investigation."
That sounded logical, but there were a lot of questions that had open,ragged ends flying loose.
Mr. Macklin went on: "Let's diverge for the moment. Mr. Cornell, what isyour reaction to Mekstrom's Disease at this point?"
That was easy. It was a curse to the human race, excepting that someoutfit knew how to cure it. Once cured, it made a physical superman ofthe so-called victim. What stuck in my craw was the number ofunfortunate people who caught it and died painfully--or by their ownhand in horror--without the sign of aid or assistance.
He nodded when I'd gone about half-way through my conclusions and beforeI got mentally violent about them.
"Mr. Cornell, you've expressed your own doom at certain hands. You feelthat the human race could benefit by exploitation of Mekstrom'sDisease."
"It could, if everybody helped out and worked together."
"Everybody?" he asked with a sly look. I yearned again for the abilityof a telepath, and I knew that the reason why I was running around loosewas because I was only an esper and therefore incapable of learning thetruth directly. I stood there like a totem pole and tried to think.
Eventually it occurred to me. Just as there are people who cannot standdictatorships, there are others who cannot abide democracy; in anyaggregation like the human race there will be the warped souls who feelsuperior to the rest of humanity. They welcome dictatorships providingthey can be among the dictators and if they are not included, they fightuntil the other dictatorship is deposed so that they can take over.
"True," said Mr. Macklin, "And yet, if they declared their intentions,how long would they last?"
"Not very long. Not until they had enough power to make it stick," Isaid.
"And above all, not until they have the power to grant this blessing tothose whose minds agree with theirs. So now, Mr. Cornell, I'll make astatement that you can accept as a mere collection of words, to be usedin your arguments with yourself: We'll assume two groups, one working toset up a hierarchy of Mekstroms in which the rest of the human race willbecome hewers of wood and drawers of water. Contrasting that group isanother group who feels that no man or even a congress of men arecapable of picking and choosing the individual who is to be granted thebody of the physical superman. We cannot hope to watch the watchers, Mr.Cornell, and we will not have on our conscience the weight of having toselect A over B as being more desirable. Enough of this! You'll have toargue it out by yourself later."
"Later?" grunted Fred Macklin. "You're not going to--"
"I certainly am," said his father firmly. "Mr. Cornell may yet be theagency whereby we succeed in winning out." He spoke to me again."Neither group dares to come into the open, Mr. Cornell. We cannotaccuse the other group of anything nefarious, any more than they dare toaccuse us. Their mode of attack is to coerce you into exposing us for agroup of undercover operators who are making supermen."
"Look," I asked him, "why not admit it? You've got nothing sinister inmind."
"Think of all the millions of people who have not had schooling beyondthe preparatory grades," he said. "People of latent psi ability insteadof trained practice, or those poor souls who have no psi ability worthmentioning. Do you know the history of the Rhine Institute, Mr.Cornell?"
"Only vaguely."
"In the early days of Rhine's work at Duke University, there were manyscoffers. The scoffers and detractors, naturally enough, were thosepeople who had the least amount of psi ability. Admitting that at thetime all psi ability was latent, they still had less of it. But afterRhine's death, his associates managed to prove his theories andeventually worked out a system of training that would develop the psiability. Then, Mr. Cornell, those who are blessed with a high ability intelepathy or perception--the common term of esper is a misnomer, youknow, because there's nothing extra-sensory about perception--foundthemselves being suspected and hated by those who had not this delicatesense. It took forty of fifty years before common public acceptance gotaround to looking at telepathy and perception in the same light as theysaw a musician with a trained ear or an artist with a trained eye. Psiis a talent that everybody has to some degree, and today this isaccepted with very little angry jealousy.
"But now," he went on thoughtfully, "consider what would happen if wemade a public announcement that we could cure Mekstrom's Disease bymaking a physical superman out of the poor victim. Our main enemy wouldthen stand up righteously and howl that we are concealing the secret; hewould be believed. We would be tracked down and persecuted, eventuallywiped out, while he sat behind his position and went on picking andchoosing victims whose attitude parallel his own."
"And who is the character?" I demanded. I knew. But I wanted him to sayit aloud.
He shook his head. "I'll not say it," he said. "Because I will notaccuse him aloud, any more than he dares to tell you flatly that we arean underground organization that must be rooted out. He knows about ourhighways and our way stations and our cure, because he uses the samecure. He can hide behind his position so long as he makes no directaccusation. You know the law, Mr. Cornell."
Yes, I knew the law. So long as the accuser came into court with acompletely clean mind, he was safe. But Scholar Phelps could hardly makethe accusation, nor could he supply the tiniest smidgin of directevidence to me. For in my accusation I'd implicate him as anaccessory-accuser and then he would be called upon to supply not onlyevidence but a clear, clean, and open mind. In shorter words, the oldstunt of pointing loudly to someone else as a dodge for covering up yourown crime was a lost art in this present-day world of telepathiccompetence. The law, of course, insisted that no man could be convictedfor what he was thinking, but only upon direct evidence of action. But acrooked-thinking witness found himself in deep trouble anyway, eventhough crooked thinking was in itself no crime.
"Now for one more time," said Mr. Macklin. "Consider a medical personwho cannot qualify because he is a telepath and not a perceptive. Hisvery soul was devoted to being a scholar of medicine like his father andhis grandfather, but his telepath ability does not allow him to be thefull scholar. A doctor he can be. But he can never achieve the finaltraining, again the ultimate degree. Such a man overcompensates andbecomes the frustrate; a ripe disciple for the superman theory."
"Dr. Thorndyke!" I blurted.
His face was as blank, as noncommittal as a bronze bust; I could neitherdetect affirmation nor negation in it. He was playing it flat; I'd neverget any evidence from him, either.
"So now, Mr. Cornell, I have given you food for thought. I've made nodirect statements; nothing that you could point to. I've defended myselfas any man will do, but only by protestations of innocence. Therefore Isuggest that you take your artillery and vacate the premises."
I remembered the Bonanza .375 that was hanging in my hand. ShamefacedlyI slipped it back in my hip pocket. "But look, sir--"
"Please leave, Mr. Cornell. Any more I cannot say without laying us wideopen for trouble. I am sorry for you, it is no joy being a pawn. But Ihope that your pawn-ship will work for our side, and I hope that youwill come through it safely. Now, please leave us quietly."
I shrugged. I left. And as I was leaving, Miss Macklin touched my armand said in a soft voice: "I hope you find your Catherine, Steve. And Ihope that someday you'll be able to join her."
I nodded dumbly. It was not until I was all the way back to my car thatI remembered that her last statement was something similar to wishing mea case of measles so that I'd be afterward immune from them.
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