Gladiator-At-Law

by Frederik Pohl

  Mundin swallowed and grinned. “Well, as you say, what have we got to lose? Except you, Hubble.”

  “Call me Bliss,” said the financier, wryly. “It’s so descriptive of my entire life.” He hesitated. “Oh, hell,” he said after a moment. “Might as well show my credentials in the club. What you said, Bligh—‘What isn’t hell?’ A good question. You think Belly Rave is tough, you ought to spend some time at a directors’ meeting! You’ve met my wife—fine woman,” he added hastily. “Or was once. But—corruption spreads. Disease spreads. Things are bad at the bottom, they’ve got to get bad at the top.”

  He shook his head, staring like a trapped animal at the

  scorched rug. “All my life, looking for something, trying to do something, trying to take over and change things—I didn’t know how. And I don’t know how now, but maybe you people do. Anyway, I’ll help you try.”

  Norma, for once compassionate, said, “And even all that money doesn’t help?”

  Hubble laughed. “You ask me that. That’s a good one. You’ve got more than I’ll ever see, free and clear. Sell your stock on the Big Board if you want to find out for yourself.” He shook his head and said abruptly, “Hell with it. What do we do now?”

  Mundin, looking around the room, was astonished to find that everyone was looking at him. And then he saw why— Norma was looking to him; and Don was looking where Norma looked; and the others followed the Lavins.

  He cleared his throat; and then he heard, with his mind, what his ears had heard moments before. “The Big Board!” he cried.

  They looked at him. “Don’t you see?” he demanded. “The Big Board, what Hubble said. If we can—what’s that?”

  “That” was a clear, ringing note that came, startlingly, from nowhere. They all looked up; Don Lavin shook himself and got to bis feet, staring around. He started to walk toward the door; Mundin said:

  “Hey, wait a minute! Where are you going?”

  Don called something over his shoulder that sounded like “high wire”; but Mundin didn’t catch it. For just then there was another little explosion in the room, the base of a lamp next to where Don had been sitting; and he had a couple more little fires to put out.

  But there was, as before, no serious damage. “Hope they haven’t got any more of these on a time fuse,” Mundin commented. “Well, where were we?”

  “You started to tell us what to do,” Norvie Bligh said helpfully.

  “Well, not exactly. I was just going to say that we may not be quite licked yet. We’ve got resources. For one, we owe money—maybe a million dollars, I guess; when you get into that kind of red ink, you’re an important firm. For another, our campaign against G.M.L. isn’t going to dry up just because a couple of men walked out on it They’re going to be in

  trouble for a while, come hell or high water; maybe we can fish in the troubled waters. For a third, we still have Our biggest resource of all—Don and his stock. Where’d Don go?”

  “He went out just before that thing blew up,” Norvie said uneasily. “I thought he said something about ‘the high wire,’ but I guess I heard him wrong.”

  “That’s the way I heard it,” puzzled Mundin. “Funny. Excuse me.” He phoned the reception desk, and slowly hung up the receiver. “They say he went out. They asked when he’d be back, and he said he wouldn’t be. Said he was going to the Stadium.”

  There was a dense silence. “Does anybody,” Hubble demanded, “know anything about what a ‘high wire’ may be? There could be some perfectly simple explanation——”

  Norvie Bligh said faintly, “I know quite a lot about high-wire work. It’s the most dangerous turn at the Field Day.” He coughed. “It’s kind of late to mention it. But, Charles, did you get the impression Don’s eyes were shining?”

  Norma and Mundin gasped at once. “The doctor,” said Norma.

  “The doctor!” echoed Mundin. “He said it might not all be out. There might be something deep, planted and left there——”

  Ping.

  A raucous cackle filled the room. Two voices chanted:

  “Absolutely, Mr. Charlesworth?”

  “Positively, Mrs. Green!”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  they worked through the night—hard—and they found the cabby they were looking tor by dawn.

  “Sure, mister. The kid with the con? I hacked him. Right to the artists’ entrance at Monmouth Stadium. Friend of yours? Some kind of a dare?”

  They tried to bribe their way into the arena, and they almost made it The furtive gatekeeper was on the verge of

  swallowing their cock-and-bull story and palming their money when the night supervisory custodian showed up. He was a giant. His eyes shone.

  He said politely, “I’m sorry, folks. Unauthorized access is prohibited. However, lineup for bleacher seats begins in a couple of hours, so—— Hello, Mr. Bligh. I haven’t seen you around lately.”

  “Hello, Barnes,” Norvie said. “Look, can you possibly let us through? There’s a fool kid we know who signed up on a dare. It’s all a silly mistake, and he was muggled up.”

  The giant sighed regretfully. “Unauthorized access is prohibited. If you had a pass——”

  The hackie said, “I don’t mind waiting, folks, but don’t you have better sense than to argue with a con?”

  “He’s right,” said Norvie. “Let’s try Candella. He used to be my boss, the louse.”

  The taxi whizzed them to General Recreations’s bubble-city and Candella’s particular pleasure dome. Ryan snoozed. Norma and Mundin held hands—scared, without erotic overtones. Bligh looked brightly interested, like a fox terrier. Hubble, hunched on a jump seat, mumbled to himself.

  Candella awakened and came to the interviewer after five solid minutes of chiming his bell. Obviously he couldn’t believe his eyes.-

  “Bligh?” he sputtered. “Bligh?” This time, no fawning on Bligh of G.M.L. The word had been passed.

  “Yes, Mr. Candella. I’m sorry to wake you, but it’s urgent Can you let us in?”

  “Certainly not!” The interviewer bunked off. Norvell leaned on the chime plate and Candella reappeared. “Damn it, Bligh, you must be drunk. Go away or I’ll call the police!”

  Mundin elbowed Norvell away from the scanner eye. “Mr. Candella——” in his best hostile-witness voice “—I’m Charles Mundin, attorney-at-law. I represent Mr. Donald Lavin. I have reason to believe that Mr. Lavin took a release and is now in the artists’ quarters at Monmouth Stadium, due to appear in tomorrow’s—today’s, that is—Field Day. I advise you that my client is mentally incompetent to sign a release and that therefore your organization will be subject to heavy damages should he be harmed. I suggest that this contretemps can be most quickly adjusted by your filling out the necessary

  papers canceling your contract with him. Naturally, we’re prepared to pay any indemnity, or service fee, that may be called for.” He lowered his voice. “In small bills. Plenty of them.”

  “Come in,” said Candella blandly.

  The door opened. As they entered he muttered, “My God, an army!”

  The house intercom said in a female voice, “What is it,

  Poopsie?”

  Candella flushed and said, “Business. Switch off, please, Panther-Girl. I mean Prudence.” There was a giggle and a click. “Now, gentlemen and miss—no, I don’t care what your names are—let me show you one of our release forms. You, you said you were a lawyer, have a look.”

  Mundin studied it (or ten minutes. Ironclad? Water-tight? No. Call it tungsten-carbide-coated. Braced, buttressed, riveted, welded, and fire-polished. Airtight, hard-vacuum-proof, guaranteed not to wilt, shrink, sag, wrinkle, tear, or bag at the clauses under any conceivable legal assault.

  Candella was enjoying his face as he read.

  “Think you’re the first?” He snickered. “If there’s been one, there’s been ten thousand. And each one that got away with it at first caused an overhaul job on this release. But there hasn’t been a successful suit for thirty ye
ars, Mr. Attorney-at-Law.”

  Mundin pleaded, “The hell with the law, Mr. Candella. The hell with the bribe too, if you don’t want it. Think of the kid. It’s a humanitarian matter. The kid’s got no business in there.”

  Candella was being righteous. “I’m protecting my company and its stockholders, Mr. Whoever-you-are. As a policy matter we can allow no exceptions. Our Field Days would be a chaos if every drunken bum——”

  Mundin was about to clobber him when Norvell unexpectedly caught his arm. “No use,” the little man said. “I never saw it before, Charles. He’s a sadist. Of course. Who else would hold his job and enjoy it? You’re interfering with his love life when you try to take one of his victims away. We’ll have to go higher.”

  Candella snorted and showed them pointedly to the door.

  In the taxi again, Mundin said meditatively, “We could

  hook them for damages, of course. But they don’t care about that. Bliss, I guess this is where you take over.”

  The financier flipped through a notecase and reached for the phone as they rolled back toward the Stadium. He snapped, “Sam? Mr. Hubble here. Good morning to you. Sam, who’s in charge of General Recreations—the outfit that puts on the Monmouth Field Days? I’ll wait.” He waited, and then said, “Oh. Thanks, Sam.” He hung up the phone and told them, looking out the window, “Trustee stock. Held by the .Choate firm. And we know who they run errands for, don’t we?”

  He drummed his fingers and snapped, “Bligh, you must know some way for us to get in. You worked there, after all.”

  Norvell said, “The only way in is with a release.”

  Norma Lavin said with dry hysteria, “Then let’s sign releases.” They started. “No, I’m not crazy. We want to find Don, don’t we? And when we find him we restrain him—with a club if we have to. We can sign for crowd extras or something like that—can’t we, Norvie? Something not too dangerous. It’s all volunteer, isn’t it?”

  Norvell swallowed and said, “Remember, I wasn’t a pit boss. I was on the planning end. From the planning end it was all supposed to be volunteer all right.” He looked sick; but he said brightly, “Maybe it’s not such a bad idea. I’ll tell you what, I’ll go in alone. I know the ropes, and——”

  “Like hell,” said Mundin shortly. “He won’t want to be found, is my guess. He’ll fight. I’ll go.”

  They would all go, even Hubble and old Ryan. And then Norvell had a bright idea and it took a lot more small bills to get the hackie to take them to Belly Rave and an hour to find Lana of the Wabbits.

  “We’ll be there,” she said grimly.

  The briefing room beneath the stands was huge and it was crowded. About a quarter of the occupants were obvious rum-dumbs, another quarter were professionals, another quarter swashbuckling youngsters in for a one-shot that they could brag about for the remainder of their lives. The rest seemed to be—just people. It was twelve-thirty and everybody had been given an excellent hot lunch in the Stadium cafeteria. One professional noticed Mundin greedily wolfing down his meal and

  said casually, “Better not, stranger. Belly wounds.” And Mun-din stopped, suddenly thoughtful.

  There was no sign so far of Don Lavin, which was not odd. Easy enough to lose yourself in that crowd, even if you didn’t try. And Don, under the compulsion implanted hi him, would be trying. They looked, as thoroughly as they could; but it was no use. They gathered together when time grew short and looked at each other searchingly, but no one had seen Don. “The Wabbits,” Nome said hopefully. ‘They’ll spot him from the stands and signal us. Then——”

  Then it might be too late. The whole thing depended on getting to him at once, which meant being Li the same event; and they couldn’t be sure of that. It had been a job keeping even the Wabbits in the stands; Lana had held out for signing up for the Kiddie Kut-Ups number, until Norvell had threatened to leave her out entirely, on the grounds that that was one number they could be sure Don wouldn’t be in.

  Mundin looked up, startled. Norvell was saying coldly, “Get the hell away, damn it! I thought you learned your lesson after I bent the pipe over your head.”

  A big, shaggy man was backing away from the little gamecock. “No, no,” he said pleadingly. “Shep had it coming, he shouldn’t have been fooling around with——Never mind. Shep’s sorry. Damn, damn inpounding debt worry; I got to pay you back. I want to help.”

  Mundin caught Norvell’s eye. “Where’d he come from?”

  Norvell said blackly, “That Lana. She brought him along. He used to be a kind of bodyguard till I—fired him. My wife’s idea.”

  Mundin said, “We can use another man.”

  Norvell shrugged. All he said was, “Watch yourself.”

  The big man fawned on Norvell gratefully, and Mundin looked on wonderingly.

  Someone on the rostrum said, “May I have your attention, please? Will you all God-damn-it shut your yaps, please? You stumblebums in the corner there, that means you too. Shut up, you bastards! Thanks, all.” He was a distraught young man who ran his fingers through his hair. Norvell muttered to Mundin:

  “Willkie. He’ll have a nervous breakdown by tonight. Every year. But——” wistfully “—but he’s a good M.C.”

  Willkie snapped, “You know this is the big one, the show of the year, ladies and gentlemen. Double fees and survivor’s insurance for this one. And in return, ladies and gentlemen, we expect you all to do your damnedest for the Stadium.”

  He measured the crowd. “Now, let’s get on with the cast-big. First, a comedy number. We need some old gentlemen and ladies—nothing violent; padded clubs hi a battle-royal to the finish. The last surviving lady gets five hundred dollars; the surviving gentlemen gets one thousand. Let’s s.ee some hands there! No, not you, buster—you can’t be a day past sixty.”

  “Take it,” Bligh urged Ryan. “Go with them and keep your eyes open for Don.”

  Ryan got the nod, and tottered away with the other old ladies and gentlemen.

  “Now, are there two good men who fancy themselves as knife-fighters? Scandinavian style? It’ll be ntJced, so don’t waste my time if you have a potbelly.” Scandinavian style was fastened together by a belt with two feet of slack. “One thousand? Anybody at one thousand? All right, damn it, I’ll make it twelve fifty, and if there isn’t a rising ovation we drop the number, you yellow skunks!” Perhaps a dozen pros hopped up, grinning. “Fine response! Let’s make it six matches simultaneous. Take ‘em away, boys!”

  The casting went on. Spillane’s Inferno; Lions and Tigers and Bears; High-Pressure Chug-a-Lug. Lana shot Mundin a despairing glance. No Don Lavin—but the crowd was thin-ing. “We must have missed him,” croaked Hubble.

  “Roller Derby!” Willkie called. “Spiked elbows, no armor. Five hundred a point to contestants. Twenty flat to audience, a hundred if a contestant lands on you and draws blood.”

  Norvell gathered the eyes of Mundin, Norma, and Hubble. Shep trailed along as they rose, were accepted for “audience” and were hustled out of the briefing room, still vainly peering about for Don.

  And then, of course, they saw him—only after the glass door closed irrevocably behind them. He was rising—with glazed eyes—for High Wire with Piranha. Price, ten thousand dollars. And he was the only volunteer, even at that price.

  Norma straggled with the immovable door until two matrons peeled her away and shoved her in the direction of the ready room.

  “Ill think of something,” Norvell kept saying. “I’ll think of something.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  norvell tried the chummy approach with the ready-room manager. He was brushed off. Norvell tried entreaties, and then threats. He was brushed off. The ready-room manager droned, “You made yer bed, now lay in it. Alluva sudden you an’ yer frenns get yella, it’s no skin offa my checks. Derby audience ya stood up for, derby audience yer gonna be.”

  “What’s the trouble, Kemp?” A fussy and familiar voice suddenly demanded.

  It was Stimmens, strolling thro
ugh the pits like an Elizabethan fop through Bedlam. Nome’s ex-assistant, Norvie’s Judas of an ex-assistant who had quietly and competently betrayed his boss into Belly Rave.

  It would have been delicious to jump him, but the stakes were too high.

  “Mr. Stimmens,” Norvell said humbly.

  “Why, Mr. Bluh—why, Norvie! What are you doing here?”

  Norvie brutishly wiped his nose on his sleeve. “Trying to make a buck, Mr. Stimmens,” he whined. “You know how it is in Belly Rave. I stood up for the Roller Derby audience, but—but Mr. Kemp here says I got yellow. Maybe I did, but I want a switch. From Derby Audience to High-Wire Heckler. I know it’s only ten bucks, but you don’t get one of those spiked-elbow girls in your lap. Can you do it for me, Mr. Stimmens? And a couple of friends of mine?”

  Stimmens basked. “It’s unusual, Norvie. It makes trouble. It creates confusion.”

  Norvell knew what he was waiting for. “Pleasef he wept.

  Stimmens said tolerantly, “We can bend some rules for an old employee, eh, Kemp? See that he’s switched.”

  “And my friends, please, Mr. Stimmens?”

  Stimmens shrugged. “And his friends, Kemp.” He sauntered on, glowing with the consciousness of a good deed done that humiliated his ex-boss and caused him no trouble at all.

  “You heard him,” Norvell snarled. “Switch!”

  Kemp growled and reached for his cards.

  Back on the bench, Norvell told the others briefly, “We’re in. It ups his chances plenty. We might even fish him out, . if—”

  “Nah,” said Shep. “Excuse me. But nah. Tell you what, though. Any of you got money on you, real folding money? Pass some around to the other High-Wire Hecklers when we go on. Tell them to lay off.”

  “Or else,” seconded Norvell, after a momentary resentment. “That’s all right, Shep. Reward ‘em if they lay off, into the drink if they don’t. Hubble, you’ve got money?”

  Hubble had. And then there was nothing to do but watch through the glass wall. Norvell inconspicuously pointed out the Wabbits, spotted throughout the ringside seats—trust Lana’s gang to worm their way to the front. “Zip guns,” he whispered. “She promised. The idea was, knock off the hecklers if necessary.”