Point Ultimate

by Jerry Sohl

  There was no sound of pursuit.

  “You shouldn’t have come,” Emmett said, breathing hard. “You should have stayed at the truck. They’ll check up and find you gone. Then they’ll know something’s wrong.”

  “I didn’t stop to consider what I should or shouldn’t do,” Ivy said, sinking to a stump. “I just found myself doing it.”

  They listened, silent, as a flier hissed by in the dark overhead.

  “That was close,” Ivy said.

  “I shouldn’t have come. I should have gone somewhere else. Now you and the others are in trouble. They know I’m with you. It was a bad move.”

  “It wasn’t either.” She moved to his side. “I’m glad you came and so is everybody else. We’ve been in bad spots before. Somehow we always manage to get out of them.”

  He took her shoulders and made her face him squarely. “No, your group will always be under suspicion until they’re sure I’m not with you. I’ve got to move on, away from here, don’t you see that? I want you to go back up on the road and join Bruno as if nothing has happened. You can explain to him. Believe me, Ivy, it’s the only way.”

  Her face was white in the pale light. “You mustn’t, Em. I can’t let you go like that. You’ve got to stay. We need you—and I need you worst of all.” Her lips were pressed close together and she looked away.

  He shook his head. “No, Ivy . . .” And then he was moved deeply by the concern in her face for him. Gently, he drew her to him and kissed her. She clung to him, saying his name over and over.

  “I don’t want to go, Ivy--”

  “Stay then.”

  He drew away. “What’s the use of this? What is there for us? We can’t ever get married. Where would I get the permit? And what about children—and a home?”

  “It’s insecure, I know. But what isn’t? Can’t you see? It’s what’s wrong with the world.”

  He turned away then and said with finality, “Then it is up to someone to do something about it. Somebody has to start, to work against them--”

  “You can’t be the conquering hero all by yourself, Em.”

  He snorted. “My father said the same thing not so long ago.”

  “And he’s right!” Her eyes flashed even in the semidarkness. “You’re trying to carry the load all by yourself, Em, and no man was made who could do that. You’ve got to become part of a plan, part of a group.”

  “You call escorting a bunch of pregnant women across a few counties revolution? What kind of opposition is that?”

  “It’s a small part of the operation.”

  “What kind of operation?”

  “You have to take a thing like that on faith. You have to trust the others or the whole thing’s no good.”

  “Faith? Trust? What does Johannes do with these women? Has he ever told you that?”

  “The less we know the less we can tell.”

  “How many times have I heard that!”

  “Just what are you getting at, Emmett Keyes?”

  “Just this: Hasn’t it ever seemed peculiar to you, what you’re doing? Have you ever wondered what he does with those women, why he wants them? Have you ever thought perhaps Johannes makes money out of it, that he might be working for a large group that somehow capitalizes on such misery?”

  She drew back. “You have learned a lot, haven’t you, Em,” she said coldly. “You’ve learned so much you’ve turned cynical. Pretty soon now you’ll be just like the rest of the people. You’ll shrug your shoulders and not believe them worth saving. And maybe you’ll figure out a way to make something out of it yourself!” ‘

  They stood, six feet apart, glaring at each other. And suddenly Emmett wondered how this could be, how they could be shouting at each other like this. And then the realization that they had been shouting hit him.

  A flier hissed above them. It was lower now. It did not move away. And suddenly the night air was blasted with an amplified voice.

  “We know you’re down there, Keyes,” the speaker boomed. “Come out on the road. There is no escape. We have the woods surrounded.”

  In a moment Ivy was in his arms and he was holding her tight and he was thinking: This is the end. Surely it must be. And he knew with deep pain that there was nothing more he could do now for himself, for Ivy, for his folks, perhaps, or for the people he had dragged into this thing with him. There’d be no slip this time.

  I'd better go up,” he said softly. “You stay here until I get out on the road. Then you can come out. That way you won’t get involved.” He stroked her hair. She looked up at him. His kiss was gentle, tender.

  “You still don’t know me, Em,” she said. “You still don’t understand.” She searched his face. “There’s nothing without you, can’t you get that through your thick head? Come on.” She took his arm. “We’ll go out together or we don’t go out at all.”

  “This is your last warning, Keyes,” the voice boomed. “Come out now or we’ll sleep the whole place and come in and carry you out.”

  He clenched his teeth, dared not look at her as he held her hand tightly in his and they started to walk.

  Together they emerged from the woods.

  CHAPTER - 19

  “In here,” the soldier said, opening the heavy, paneled door for him.

  Emmett walked into a long room. At the end of it sat two men, one a small, bushy-haired, snapping-eyed man, a brief case at his side on the table, the other a larger, stocky man with a bullet head.

  He walked to the single table, the eyes of the men never leaving him.

  “Sit down,” the smaller man said coldly.

  Emmett took the only chair on his side of the table.

  “I’m Colonel Pushkin,” the thickset man said, his voice heavy with accent. His eyes were heavy-lidded but alert, his voice low and steady. “This is Captain Johnson.”

  The captain arranged papers before them.

  “Keyes,” the colonel said, “I will put important things first. Your life, the lives of your parents and those of the people who harbored you are at stake. If you co-operate, all will be spared. If you do not, you will be executed and the others will go to labor camps. Is that clear?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sir!” Johnson added.

  “It’s all right, Captain. Mr. Keyes feels he owes us no fealty.

  If he proves informative, his lack of use of a title of respect will be forgiven.”

  Johnson glared.

  Emmett glared back.

  “Now then,” the colonel continued amiably, “we trust your trip here was a comfortable one.”

  “A little unexpected,” Emmett said.

  “Of course,” Pushkin smiled. “You did not expect to be caught, is that it?” He laughed a little. “But then it is the right attitude not to expect arrest. An agent can hardly operate successfully with a negative outlook, now can he? I presume this is your first trip to New York?” The eyes were sly.

  “I've never been out of Illinois before.”

  The eyebrows arched. “Is that so? That’s very interesting, Keyes. Do you find New York to your liking?”

  “It’s bigger than I imagined.”

  “Yes, of course. It is bigger than I thought it would be, too. IVe been here seven years this August and IVe not got used to it myself. Do you think you would like living here in New York?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve been whisked from here to there and haven’t really had a good look at it yet.”

  The colonel nodded. “I sympathize. All those perfunctory questionings. It is too bad, but necessary. Try to understand. But it needn’t be like that, Keyes. There’s a good job waiting for you here, if you wish. It all depends on what you want, you see?”

  “You’re leading up to something,” Emmett said. “Why not get to the point?”

  “Ah,” Pushkin said, smiling, “you do understand. I shall not waste time then.” He coughed lightly. “Now, perhaps we should begin with Point Ultimate.”

  “Point Ultimate?” Emmett
could only stare at him blankly.

  The colonel reddened, Johnson darted him a glance, his lip curling ever so slightly.

  “Yes,” Pushkin said, “Point Ultimate.”

  Emmett frowned. He had heard the words before, but he could not for the moment remember where or when.

  “Don’t tell us you never heard of it,” the colonel said drily. “No,” he said truthfully, “I can’t say that. But I can’t remember where.”

  Johnson snorted.

  The colonel’s eyes glittered. “Perhaps Mr. Keyes is not aware of the seriousness of his charges, Captain. Will you read them to him, please?”

  “Yes, sir.” The captain shuffled papers on the table, picked up one. “The People’s State of the United States of America versus

  Emmett Keyes. On this day--”

  “All right,” Pushkin interrupted, “just the meat of the matter, if you please, Captain. The list of crimes.”

  The captain’s eyes fell to matter lower on the page. “The specific charges are: The murder of Party Member Cadwallader

  Tisdail, the murder of Party Member Tisdail’s wife--”

  “His wife!” Emmett was shocked. “I didn’t kill his wife!”

  “But you did kill Tisdail?”

  “Of course I killed Tisdail. I’d do it over again, too.”

  “There is little likelihood of that, my friend. But you might as well take the blame for the murder of Mrs. Tisdail. What’s the difference? One murder more or less, what does it matter?” “I didn’t even know she was dead,” Emmett said. Now he realized what she meant when she said she was going to take the blame for Tisdail’s murder. She had killed herself to make it appear she had taken her husband’s life and then her own. Only somehow it now looked as if he had killed them both.

  “The murder of Central Illinois Area Director Alfred Gniessin--”

  “That’s a lie!” Emmett cried. “Whatever gave you that idea? He died in the steam bath as a result of a heart attack.”

  “Really?” the colonel said archly. “You should not have made him stay in there so long, Keyes. It was poor planning.”

  “How could I make him do anything? His robot Jascha kept him from harm every step of the way!”

  “Read the next part, Captain.”

  “The destruction of a Personal Servant Series VII Robot Jascha with a blow7 on the head.”

  “Jascha followed him in the steam bath,” Emmett explained. “He was overcome by the heat. I'll admit I bashed his head in.”

  “You bashed it in before you locked Gniessin in the steam bath.”

  “I did not!”

  “Proceed,” Pushkin said drily.

  “Assisting Dr. Averell Smeltzer, a state prisoner assigned to Area Director Gniessin, to escape from the Area Director’s villa.”

  I'll admit that.”

  “It is not a matter of your admitting anything,” the colonel said. “These are the facts. They need no corroboration.”

  “And miscellaneous items,” Johnson continued, “all of them crimes against the state, namely, robbing an Area Director, stealing state weapons, the theft and destruction of a model three government flier, the unlawful sleeping of an entire farm family, and flight to avoid arrest.”

  “Quite a list, isn’t it?” the colonel said. “It’s no wonder you’ve been ordered executed—but of course you needn’t be, if you’d tell us a few things, such as w7here Point Ultimate is.”

  “I don’t even know what it is.”

  Pushkin leaned forward, all humor gone from his face. “Mr. Keyes, do you mean to sit there as a member of the Manumit and tell us you don’t know where Point Ultimate is?”

  “Manumit?” Emmett stared at the man again.

  Pushkin threw his arms in the air in resignation. “How stupid can you think w7e are, Keyes?” he cried. Then, more controlled, he said, “I suppose the next thing you’re going to tell us is that you’re not immune.”

  Emmett was silent. The questioning had got out of hand. These men were talking about things he knew nothing about. And his immunity! How did they guess about that?

  “A man kills so many people,” the colonel said, “he escapes from so many places, knows the right people to contact, and yet he sits here like a schoolboy who has forgotten his lessons. Do you expect us to believe you're not an agent of the Manumit?”

  “I don't give a damn what you believe,” Emmett said. “I'm no agent of anything.”

  “Oh, you're not, eh?” Pushkin glowered. “I suppose you think we ought to be stupid enough to try probing your mind?”

  Emmett had wondered why they hadn't anesthetized his brain to get information they wanted the way Gniessin had ordered Dr. Smeltzer to do.

  “That would have been fine, wouldn’t it?” the colonel went on. “A nice, easy way out for you. Poof! And you've become a corpse and we get nothing out of you.” He shook his head. “We had thought you'd choose to live, Keyes. Life must look attractive to one as young as you. Why do you lie? Didn't you realize we'd ask you about these things? What did you expect us to do?”

  “Frankly, I thought I'd go straight to a labor camp. That’s what usually happens, isn't it?”

  “For a man in your position, Keyes, you're very funny. It's too bad we can't operate and take out that little gadget you carry around behind your ears. You people are very thorough in that respect. I’ve seen them melt into globs of metal on the operating table. I don't think we'll waste your time trying to recover yours. It will be melting soon enough, though neither Captain Johnson nor I will care to watch it.” He sighed. “Well, for the last time and for the record, Keyes, are you going to tell us about these things or not?”

  “I lost you back there a few minutes ago,” Emmett said. “I don’t know what you're talking about now.”

  “That's all we wanted to know then,” Pushkin said gruffly.

  Johnson started shoving papers back into his brief case.

  Emmett heard the door far behind him open, the click of hard heels in military unison. His arms were seized.

  “This man,” Pushkin told the two soldiers at Emmett's sides, “is to be taken to the political prisoner detention cell to await execution.”

  The soldiers saluted, turned Emmett around and walked

  briskly to the door. Once outside, the soldiers relaxed, moved down the long corridor.

  A short distance down the hallway, they were approached by two other soldiers who barred their way.

  “Is this the prisoner Emmett Keyes?” the taller of the two new soldiers asked.

  “Yes. We’re taking him to the detention cell,” the soldier to his right said.

  “We have orders to take him to the execution area,” the shorter soldier said. “We just came from the detention cell.”

  “But you can’t have him yet,” the soldier to Emmett’s left protested. “We haven’t signed him in for detention.”

  “He must be executed at once,” Tall said. “He’s a dangerous man. It has been so ordered by the general.”

  Short nodded. “You’ll have to answer to him if you delay the transfer.”

  “Do you have orders?”

  “Of course. Here.”

  The soldier on Emmett’s right took the papers, glanced over them.

  He never finished reading them.

  The action was too fast for Emmett; besides, he had not been expecting anything unusual. But the next moment he felt the pressure on his arms leave and the soldiers at his sides slumped to the floor.

  He was standing, open-mouthed, looking down at the two soldiers on the floor, when Tall and Short took his arm.

  “Here,” Tall said, shoving a capsule in his hand. “Break this open and breathe deeply. Hurry! There isn’t much time.”

  “Come on,” Short said.

  A bell rang somewhere.

  The ceiling suddenly blossomed into a row of red lights down the center of it.

  “Condition Red! Condition Red!” a voice boomed.

  “Now we’re
in for it!” Short said.

  The hallway was filling with soldiers and civilians.

  “Halt!” the voice boomed. “Stay where you are everyone!”

  The hurrying figures froze, the furore evaporated.

  Then the speaker said, “All activity will cease until the emergency on Floor fifty-four is investigated and cleared. No one will leave the building. Entry except for Class four officials is forbidden until the emergency is over. Class three officials may now move on that floor to investigate.”

  A door clicked open down the hall. Pushkin and Johnson came running down the corridor, stopping at the sight of the two soldiers on the floor. Then Pushkin looked up and saw Emmett and the two soldiers at his sides.

  “What is the meaning of this?” he demanded angrily, striding forward.

  “Stay where you are,” Tall said. He had a sleeper in his hand.

  “You’re crazy!” Johnson said. “You’ll be executed for this!”

  “Condition Red,” Pushkin cried, “this is Pushkin. There are two imposters—!” He never got any further. There was a click of the sleeper and the two men dropped. A gasp went up from those in the corridor who had been halted by the speaker. They moved toward Tall and Short.

  Suddenly everyone slumped to the floor except Emmett and the pair at his side.

  “Well!” Short said. “I never thought the brain would get around to sleeping them soon enough.”

  Emmett stared at the inert forms on the floor. He was lost, confused.

  “Here,” Tall said, “I brought these along for you, Keyes.” He handed him a sleeper and a heater. “You may need them.”

  “Who are you two?” Emmett asked, taking the weapons.

  “Time enough for that later,” Short said. “In case you’re wondering why you didn’t sleep like the rest, it’s because that capsule is a sleeper antidote. We took ours a little earlier. Come on.”

  Picking their way over the reclining figures on the floor, they moved down the corridor.

  “Halt!” the speaker kept booming. They paid no attention.

  “Can’t take the elevator,” Tall said. “We’ll have to walk up.”