“It’s a matter of scientific record that those primitive peoples who survived long enough to be studied were, on the whole, much more decent than any civilized race. If war existed at all, it was a game rather than a butchery contest. Theft, murder, rape, sadism, insanity were rare. Their morality may not have been that of the Decalogue, but they stuck closer to it than we’ve managed to stick to our own codes.”
“And so you think the Ten Commandments are wrong?” asked Marie.
“Not at all,” I said. “An admirable ideal, but so far only workable for primitives. Being civilized, we’re too full of tensions and hatreds to abide by it without a real effort, too great an effort for most people to make consistently. From petty chicanery and backyard malice, up to world war and the Almighty State, civilized man has to hurt his neighbor.”
We came out on the shores of another lake. Squinting against the sunlight sharded on the water, I saw a building on the farther side, a long low thing of tinted plastic. I felt a sagging within myself. The adventure had ended. The lodge stood blatant in the woods.
Well…
“We’ll go and call my HQ for transport,” I said. “Please don’t make it necessary for me to confine you while I do.”
Marie’s lips clamped together again. She went unspeaking by my side as we started around the lake.
“Take us a while to get there,” I said inanely. “It’s been a pleasant trip, hasn’t it?”
No answer. “Look,” I said, “I’m only an agent. I’m terribly sorry to cause you this trouble. But it’s not so different from being a cop and giving you a ticket for speeding, is it?”
Her voice was hard and remote: “The policeman is protecting us. You’re preying on us.”
‘
‘Believe it or not.” I said, “I’m upholding the law. I exist for the public safety.”
“Oh, you’re very smug about it,” she cried. “You have your license, you keep your greasy paws off me…thanks for that much!”
“If it weren’t for the likes of me,” I said, “you could well have been snatched by someone who would not feel bound to keep his paws off you. Or let’s think about the Peace Authority.”
Her cheeks burned, but instead of swinging at me she couldn’t help arguing. In some ways she was too intelligent for her own good, but a man would never be bored in her company. “The Smashup was too much,” she said. “People finally had it knocked into their heads what war means, and the Wastelands are still there to remind them. Don’t you go taking credit for the Authority!”
“Oh, but I do. Consider, as merely one example, German history after the Thirty Years’ War. People never learn. Ruins, Wastelands, historical records, memoirs, warnings, mean nothing. The Peace Authority is possible only because we’ve found a better outlet than war, at least a less harmful one, for the evil in man.”
“But man is not evil,” protested Marie. “He’s born to sin, yes, but he has the possibility of grace.”
“Maybe ‘evil’ was the wrong word,” I agreed. “Let’s say, rather, the hatred in him which comes from being civilized.
“Just before the Smashup, psychodynamics had developed to the point where this could be shown to be a fact—that most men, if not all, hate their civilization, subconsciously but intensely; and that the hatred must be vented somehow. The old-time professional soldier, like the modem professional gangster, was usually a kind, friendly man because his tensions were discharged in wartime. But society can’t afford war any longer.
“It was too late to prevent the Smashup, and civilization was lucky to survive. The destruction, chaos, and suffering of it vented so much wrath that people were fairly peaceable for a decade afterward. That made it possible to institute legalized, regulated crime, as the necessary safety valve. It also, incidentally, abolished such cold-blooded waste-hit fiendishness as locking sound men into cages for one mistake—and, through the institution of outlawry, has begun slowly to eliminate the incredible fatheadedness of turning congenital psychopaths loose on parole. But that’s minor. Even the fun involved—and it is fun—is secondary.
“You seem to be more at peace with yourself than most, Marie; you could live happily in a crimeless, warless world. But not many people can. So we give them crime, and a touch of freedom and color and adventure in their lives, instead of war.
“Therefore I insist, Marie, that in my own way I’m upholding the law and making the world a little safer, a little cleaner. And someday I can have a hand in finding a better answer than this.”
I stopped, quite hoarse from my oration. We walked for a mile or so through summery quietness, rounded the lake and found a path leading to the lodge.
“You may be right,” said Marie at last, quite softly.
My heart gave an irrational jump, It shouldn’t matter what a victim thought of me, but in this case it did.
Her eyes turned up toward mine. “I have a right too, though,” she said, “and my father does.”
“I’m sorry for him,” I replied sincerely, “and for you. But aristocracy has always had its penalties as well as its privileges.”
“You…you’re not the sort I imagined you were…not the sort to cause needless pain. You could let me go…
I bit my lip. “I could. But I won’t.”
“Why not? If it’s the money, you’ll be paid ten times over; I swear it.”
“No. It’s a matter of—” I laughed, rather sadly. “Honor. May I use that word? I undertook to do a job, and my brothers are depending on me to do it. I can’t blacken their name. It’s socially important, too. I want to see more and more people delegate their crimes to us pros. We can do it less messily, more considerately; and it helps get our customers out of the habit of violence.”
“But—you would work for that cochon?”
“The fellow who hired me? I don’t like him one little bit. I wish to God your father had hired me against him. But yes, having given my word, I’ll do his job to the best of my ability.”
Gravel scrunched underfoot.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“If he could know how it is—”
“I’ll gladly take a crack at him after this episode is over.”
“After he has gotten what he wants from my father, and is on his guard…” She turned her face.
I saw her stiffen.
I walked on in anguish. It wasn’t right, it wasn’t ‘fair. She was too much alive to be penned away for months. She would come out of it with her own tensions built up, already I could see it happening, another civilized creature with civilized hate to discharge on someone else. Wasn’t I trying to build a society where no one loathed his fellow man, where folk worked together not because they were told to but because it was their free will? I had a member of that future right here, beside me, and I was going to ruin her for the sake of that same future. It didn’t make sense.
We came up to the lodge. Its wealthy guests stared at our sunburnt griminess from their lounging chairs and their cocktail terrace. I wanted to stuff every fat belly in the place with lead.
Shifting my gun conspicuously near my hand, I took Marie into the lobby. “I’m on a job.” I said to the clerk. “Want to make a call from here.”
“Yes, sir, yessir, right this way, sir!” He jumped to it. I was disappointed, needing an excuse to bully someone. We were shown into the office and left in privacy.
I didn’t dial HQ—our lines were undoubtedly tapped by Dulac’s goons—but a laundry in Duluth. Our agent there relayed the call through a scrambler to Twincity. It took a minute or two to raise the operator at that end.
Waiting, I struck a cigarette and slumped. “We’ll have a plane here for you in half an hour,” I said. “That’ll finish my part of the job.”
She didn’t reply, but stood behind me. I could hear how fast she breathed.
“You’ll doubtless say no,” I went on, “and I’ll not blame you. But may I come see you in the hideout, now and then?” When she still made no answer, I smil
ed on one side of my mouth. “At least let me buy you a proper breakfast here. It’s on the expense account.”
The screen lit up before she could respond. I was put through to Swanson at once, and told him briefly what had happened.
“Good boy!” he said warmly. “That was a beaut you pulled. It’ll go down in the annals, believe me. We’ll get a plane up there right away.”
“No hurry,” I said without tone.
“Ah…so. How well I understand.” Swanson bowed in the screen. “Miss Dulac, my deepest apologies. I assure you—”
“Never mind that.” She drew a long breath and leaned over my shoulder, brushing me. Maybe it was just hunger, but suddenly I felt a trifle dizzy. Her voice was crisp, with a bare hint of laughter. “Let me say something first.”
“By all means, Miss Dulac. We aim to please.”
“I have a job for you myself. I want a kidnapping done.”
I distinctly heard my jaw click against my Adam’s apple.
“What?” Swanson recovered himself and sputtered:
“But this isn’t—It’s never been-”
“I insist on my civil rights,” snapped Marie. “Merely being a prisoner hasn’t removed them. I have the same right to take out a license and sign a contract as anyone else.”
“Ah…to be sure…but—”
“We can settle it right here when your man comes. I want you to kidnap the one who had me kidnapped.”
“But we can’t—We’re working for him!”
“Are you, now? You contracted to do one task for him. You have done it. Aren’t you now free to…”
“Well…let me think…yes. Chuck is under his contract and therefore can’t operate against him till it expires. But anyone else in the union…wait a minute!” The sparkle faded in Swanson’s eyes. “You can’t sign a John Doe warrant, you know. You have to name the person you want heisted, and we can’t tell you who he is.”
She made an impatient gesture. “My father is no fool. When the notice of intent was served on me, I asked him who might be responsible and he explained how his affairs stood. Let’s say, then, that I want the…what you call it…snatch put on one James Hardy of New Chicago. The ransom requirement will be that he, ah, arrange my release.” She paused, frowning. “And, yes, that he pay your fees for this job.”
Swanson leaned back in his chair and gasped with laughter.
We sat on the cocktail terrace, watching sunset smolder into the lake. Around us went a muted buzz of conversation, clink of glasses, whisper of music. I didn’t mind, in fact I felt quite kindly toward our fellow guests.
I raised my own glass. “To success,” I said.
Marie nodded and clinked rims. Our shysters had pushed the license, notice, and contract through in a hurry, and we were now awaiting news. Under the circumstances, I had declared that this lodge fulfilled the conditions of a hideout and that we could as well detain the girl here as elsewhere. It had been a good three days; I’d never had better ones.
“You’re a strange man, Charles,” she murmured. “The soul of honor about your profession, yes, but you helped me with a great deal of legal hairsplitting.”
“I had to see that everything was drawn up in proper form,” I said virtuously. “Citizen’s duty to respect the law.”
“The letter of the law, anyhow,” she grinned. “But you were wearing such shining armor when we first met.”
“Armor is not awfully comfortable,” I said. “I’d only wear it for someone like you.”
Her eyes darkened and she shivered. “It is bad to think that you could be killed on your next mission.”
“I have to make a living. Several years to go yet before I can make it doing research.”
“My father…”
“Yes?”
“When I tell him how this was…he likes a clean fighter. He would be glad to offer you a summer position, one that paid well.”
“Sorry. He employs our friendly rivals. I couldn’t fight my own brothers.”
The waiter oozed up with a phone extension and laid it on the table. “Call for you, sir.” I lowered the privacy hood. In order to see the little screen under it, Marie and I had to have our heads together.
Swanson looked minutely out at us. “All done, boy,” he said. “Hardy was still in town. He’d figured Dulac himself put the bee on him, and wasn’t looking for trouble from us. We lifted him right out of his hotel room, and you should have heard him squawk! He’s met the terms, though. Had to, if his enterprises weren’t to go to pot in his absence. You can take Miss Dulac home now.”
“Shucks,” I grinned, above a certain desolation, “you needn’t have been in that kind of a hurry.”
Swanson shook his head. “An unprecedented business, this,” he muttered. “It never happened before that a gang union acted against somebody who was employing one of its own members. There are going to be ICC hearings, and lawsuits, and—Lord knows what’ll come of it.”
“That,” I said, “is one reason why it’s fun to be alive. I can rent a copter here. Never mind sending a plane for us. Cheerio.”
The hood lifted. Marie and I regarded each other for a long while. “I hope you’ll at least stay for dinner,” I said.
“Oh, yes. I should forego a genuine charcoal-broiled yeast mignon?” She laughed joyously and rose. “I’ll just call my father now. Be back at once, mon ami”
I had time for some moody and lonesome thoughts while she was gone, there in the twilight under the Japanese lanterns. She found me a poor companion on her return. “But what is wrong?” she asked.
“Never mind,” I said. “Or…oh, the deuce with it. I was thinking that I’ll take you home in a couple of hours, and I can’t accept that job you offered me, and there’s an end of the matter.”
“But who said anything about a gunman’s position?” she asked in surprise. “Your psychodynamics has uses in industry, no? You know enough already to hold down a well-paid summer job, and…” Her voice trailed off. “If you wish to cease being a gangster,” she concluded uncertainly.
I twirled the glass in my hands. It was no easy choice. I hadn’t counted on hanging up my guns for years. I needed enough hunting to satisfy my instincts for the rest of an uneventful life…
But hell! Wasn’t research a hunt? Had Newton or Darwin or Einstein ever felt the need to kill and steal? Hardly. They were after bigger game.
I lifted the glass and finished my drink.
Progress does get made, however slowly and with however many setbacks. It is the work of those who are too brave to despair. Our descendants may yet create a society saner than any which has gone before. But will this keep them from insanities of their own?
Strange Bedfellows
Suddenly the plain exploded. A pillar of steam shot skyward, bone-white against darkness and the stars, tinged red with incandescent drops of metal. Steel chunks from the drill rig whizzed out of that boiling and roaring, struck the ground and skittered murderously across kilometers. They sounded like bees heard through thunder. Cracks opened around the well, broadened to meters-wide ravines as they ran outward. The hole stretched itself into a crater and spat ash and boulders. Then the rush of steam was hidden in smoke, and in dust that whirled up from the shuddering surface.
Don Sevigny had thrown himself prone when the convulsion began. He clung in blindness to rock, felt it heave against his belly and heard the shrapnel that had been machinery go past. A taste of blood was in his mouth. Poy, his mind stammered, Erich, they were right on the spot!
What went wrong?
The explosions ended. Great hollow echoes rolled back from the cliffs of the Caucasus, toned away and were lost in the growl and seethe of the newborn volcano. The ground still quivered, but the first dreadful seasick roll was over. Sevigny jumped to his feet. Dust roiled around his helmet. He was cut off from his men, from Earth and Moon, alone in a night that clamored.
“Report!” he yelled. “By the numbers!”
Names trickled in, on
e, Aarons, two, Bergsma, three, Branch, four…nobody, Erich Decker was mute…five, Gourmont, six…
“…Twelve,” said R’ku’s vocalizer.
Youkhannan finished with twenty. All accounted for but Decker and Leong.
The haze was leaving Sevigny’s vision as the mineral flour settled. Bit by bit he made out the scene, the gray plain chopped off two kilometers away by the brutal upsurge of the Caucasus, the stars that glittered above those peaks, the scattered shapes of men and equipment. He turned to sec the eruption and looked straight at Earth, not far above the near southern horizon. It was waning from full toward half phase, but the white-banded blue brilliance was nonetheless such that for a moment he was again blind.
The dazzle departed in ragged after-images. He saw a black geyser gushing from the riven soil. At five hundred meters it spread mushroom-like. By then it was pale azure in the Earth-glow—ice crystals condensing at seventy-five degrees below Celsius zero. The cloud was not large; it melted at the edges, scattered by the thin swift wind that blew steadily east toward the sun.
There was no time to be afraid. Two men had been caught near the blast. They might be alive. Lava would soon come out of that hole. Sevigny plunged after the nearest moontrac. “Three of you help me,” he called. “Maybe we can hook Poy and Erich out of there.”
Even under Lunar gravity, it was an awkward scramble in his airsuit to reach the high-mounted cap. He leaned panting over the control board for several seconds before he realized that no one had joined him.
Huh?
The canopy was raised, the cab exposed to a wintry heaven. Camp had been established some time ago. Given inflated domes, covered with Lunar dust against the heat and radiation that would come at sunrise, people had no need to maintain vehicles at pressure or keep their screen generators in operation. Sevigny had only to lean over the edge and shout, “Whats ailing you? I want three helpers.”
Some heartbeats passed when only the volcano spoke. Then Branch replied, his sound amplifier tuned to maximum, as if in extra defiance: “Are you out of your brain? Those jims are dead!”
Seven Conquests Page 19
