I picked the phone up, just in case. Nothing. The line was dead. Alek, that swine. Couldn’t get an alarm system, could you? And what if someone were to suddenly develop appendicitis? The miserable miser, all he wanted to do was charge his clients more …
There was another knock on the door, and once again I quickly grabbed the Luger. This time, I found myself face to face with Mr. Moses himself: the werewolf, the Venusian, the same old rutabaga with the same old mug in his hand.
“Sit by the door,” I said. “There’s the chair.”
“I can stand,” he grumbled, looking severely at me.
“Suit yourself,” I said. “What do you want?”
Still bristling, he took a sip from his mug.
“What more proof do you need?” he asked. “You’re killing us. Everyone understands. Everyone, except you. What do you need from us?”
“Whoever you are,” I said. “You’ve committed a series of crimes. And you will have to answer for them.”
He sniffed loudly, walked to the chair and sat down.
“Of course I should have taken my case to you a long time ago,” he said. “But I kept hoping the whole time that somehow it would work itself out, and that I could succeed in avoiding contact with the authorities. If it wasn’t for that damned accident, I would be long gone from here. There wouldn’t have been any sort of murder. You would have found the Finch tied up and unwound the whole tangle of crimes that Champion accomplished with my help. I swear that all the costs that have fallen to you due to my presence here will be reimbursed. Some of them I can pay right now—I’m ready to hand over official government currency totaling around a million crowns. The rest, your government will receive in gold, pure gold. What else do you require?”
Looking at him wasn’t doing me any good. It wasn’t doing me any good because I was starting to feel sorry for him. I was sitting face to face with an obvious criminal, feeling sorry as I listened to him. It was a sort of delusion, and in order to shake off this delusion, I asked dryly:
“So you were the one who ruined my table and stuck the note to it?”
“Yes. I was afraid that if I didn’t, a draft would blow the note away. More importantly, I wanted you to realize that this wasn’t a hoax.”
“The gold watch?…”
“That was also me. And the Browning. I needed you to believe, and to take an interest in Hinkus and arrest him.”
“It was sloppily done,” I said. “Everything worked out the opposite of what you intended. I didn’t think that Hinkus was a gangster: what I thought was that someone was trying to make me believe he was a gangster.”
“Is that so?” Moses said. “I see … Well, that was to be expected, I suppose. I am not able to pull such things off … that’s not why I’m here …”
Once again I felt a surge of sympathy, and once again I tried to shake it off.
“Nothing seems to have worked out for you, has it, Mr. Beelzebub,” I said. “What kind of an alien are you, anyway? You’re just a crook. A rich, exceedingly impudent crook. Not to mention a drunk …”
Moses took a sip from his mug.
“And as for your robots …” I continued. “The socialite hen … the Viking strongman … Did you think that I would believe for a second that they were robots?”
“What you’re trying to say is that our robots look too much like humans?” Moses asked. “But you have to admit, it would be impossible for us to do otherwise. They are very close copies of people who exist in real life. Near doubles …” He took another sip from his mug. “As for me, Inspector, I am unfortunately unable to appear to you in my true form. Unfortunately, because then you would believe me immediately.”
“Take a chance,” I said. “Try it. I’ll survive, somehow.”
He shook his head.
“First, I doubt you would survive it so easily,” he said dismally. “Second, I doubt I would survive it. The Mr. Moses that you see before you is a suit. The Mr. Moses that you’re listening to is the result of a transmitting device. Still, it’s possible that I’ll have to risk it—but I’ll leave that as the very last resort. If it turns out that it’s completely impossible to convince you in any other way, I will risk it. For me it would mean almost certain death, but then at least you might release Luarvik. He shouldn’t be here …”
At that point, at last, I got angry.
“Release him where?” I shouted. “How am I keeping you here? Why are you still lying to me? If you needed to leave, you would have left a long time ago! Stop lying and tell me the truth: what is in the suitcase? What’s it for? You’re trying to convince me that you’re extraterrestrials. But I’m inclined to believe that you’re just a band of foreign spies who have stolen a valuable piece of machinery …”
“No!…” Moses said. “No! It’s not like that at all. Our station has been destroyed, the only one who can fix it is Olaf. He’s the robot caretaker of that station—do you understand? Of course we would have left a long time ago, but where would we have gone? Without Olaf we are completely helpless, and Olaf has been deactivated, and you won’t give us the accumulator!”
“You’re lying again!” I said. “Mrs. Moses is also a robot, isn’t she? And as far as I can see, she also has an accumulator …”
He closed his eyes and shook his head, causing his ruddy cheeks to quiver.
“Olga is a simple working unit. She’s a porter, a digger, a bodyguard … How can you not understand that you can’t use the same power source … for, I don’t know … a heavy tractor, for example, and a television … They’re fundamentally different systems …”
“You’ve got an answer for everything,” I said gloomily. “But I’m not an expert: I’m just a police officer. I don’t have the clearance to carry on conversations with ghouls and aliens. I’m required to hand you over to the law, that’s it. Whoever you are really, you’re in my country and subject to its laws.” I stood up. “From this moment on, consider yourself under arrest, Moses. I don’t intend to lock you up, I suppose there’s no point. But if you attempt to run away, I will shoot you. And remember: anything that you say from this point on may be used against you in a court of law.”
“All right,” he said, after a pause. “You’ve made up your mind about me. So be it.” He took a sip from his mug. “But what about Luarvik, what has he done? You can’t have anything against him … Lock me up and give the suitcase to Luarvik. At least let him save himself …”
I sat down again.
“Save himself … What does he need saving from here? Why are you so sure that Champ is going to get you? Maybe he was buried in the avalanche … Maybe they’ve picked him up already … It’s not so easy to commandeer an airplane … If you really are innocent, then why are you so scared? Wait a day or two. The police will get here, I will hand you over to the authorities, the authorities will get the experts together, the specialists …”
His cheeks shook.
“That’s terrible, that won’t do. First of all, we don’t have permission to establish organized contact. I am here merely as an observer. I made mistakes, but they’re mistakes I can fix … Unprepared-for contact between your and my worlds could have the most terrible consequences … But that isn’t even the worst of it, Inspector. I’m afraid for Luarvik. He hasn’t been trained for your conditions, we never expected him to have to spend more than a day on your planet. Plus his suit has been damaged, you can see for yourself: it doesn’t have a hand … He’s already been poisoned … He’s growing weaker by the hour …”
I gritted my teeth. He had an answer for everything, all right. I couldn’t trip him up. He hadn’t made a single mistake. It was all impeccably logical. I was forced to admit that if it wasn’t for all this talk of spacesuits, first contact and pseudo-muscles, I would be completely satisfied by his testimony. I felt pity for him and was inclined to meet him halfway; I was losing my sense of detachment …
Realistically speaking, the only legal claim I had was against Moses. Luarvik was c
lean, officially. Of course, he could be an accomplice, but … Real criminals never offer themselves as hostages. Moses had. Well, all right, I’d lock up Moses and … and what? Give Luarvik the apparatus? What did I know about this apparatus? Only what Moses had told me. Yes, everything that Moses had said sounded true. And if it was just a very consistent picture of something whose truth was completely different? If I had only been unable to find the question that would have shattered this picture’s surface.
Two indubitable facts remained, regardless of all this talk. The law said that I had to continue to hold these people until it became clear what had happened. That was fact number one. And here was fact number two: these people wanted to leave. Why they wanted to leave—because of the law, because of gangsters, because of the fear of unprepared-for contact between worlds or something else—wasn’t important. They wanted to leave.
Two facts, which were absolutely opposed to one another.
“What happened between you and Champ?” I asked grimly.
He twisted his face up and gave me a dark glance. Then his eyes dropped and he told me.
Setting aside the pseudo-joints and zombie mumbo-jumbo, it was an utterly banal story of completely ordinary blackmail. Around two months ago, Mr. Moses, who had a very good reason to hide not only his true occupation, but also the very fact of his existence from the authorities, began to notice signs that he had been placed under continual surveillance, and was being followed. He tried changing where he lived. It didn’t help. He tried to scare off his tails. That didn’t work either. Finally, as always happens with these sorts of things, they came to him and offered him a deal. He would help them rob the Second National Bank to the best of his ability, they would pay him for it in silence. Of course they assured him that this would be the first and last time they ever bothered him. As usual, he refused. As usual, they insisted. As usual, he ended up agreeing.
Moses insisted that there had been no other way out of it. He wasn’t afraid of death itself: where he came from everyone had overcome the fear of death. At that point, he wasn’t even that afraid of being exposed: it wouldn’t cost him anything to strip back his operations and remain a simple idle rich man, and the testimony of Champ’s agents about their injuries sustained fighting robots wouldn’t be taken seriously. But death and exposure might threaten to suspend the great work that had been successfully begun a few years earlier. To make a long story short, he decided to risk going along with Champ, since it would not be difficult to pay back any losses incurred during the Second National Bank robbery in pure gold later.
They completed their little caper, and Champ really did fall out of sight. However, that lasted for only a month. After that month he reappeared. This time, it was an armored car full of gold. But the situation had changed. In order to rob Moses of any possibility of an alibi, Champ had wisely stashed away the testimony of eight eyewitnesses, plus he had filmed the whole robbery from start to finish—not just the three or four gangsters preparing to go in and rob it, but Olga with the safe under her arm, and Moses himself holding some sort of device (a “Force Generator”). Now, if he refused, Moses wasn’t just being threatened with a little tabloid talk. Now he was being threatened with formal legal charges, which meant premature contact under terribly unfavorable conditions. Like many other victims of blackmail, Moses had not foreseen this when he had said yes the first time.
It was a terrible situation. To refuse would have been a crime against his own people. To agree wouldn’t change his position, since now he understood what kind of iron grip had him by the throat. To flee to another city or country didn’t make any sense: he was convinced by this point that Champion’s grip was not just iron, but broad. To immediately leave Earth was also impossible: preparations for transport demanded ten to twelve days. He contacted his people and demanded evacuation in the shortest possible amount of time. Yes, he was forced to commit yet another crime, but at this point that only meant an increase in his debt, an extra three hundred thirty-five kilograms of gold, the price of the necessary delay. When the time came, he fled, having fooled Champion’s agents with his double. He knew that they would come after him; he knew that sooner or later one Hinkus or another would pick up his trail—he only hoped that he would be able to evade them long enough …
“You can believe this or not, Inspector,” Moses concluded. “But I want you to understand that there are only two possibilities. Either you give us the accumulator, and we try and escape—in which case, I repeat, all that we have cost your citizens will be repaid. Or …” He took a sip from his mug. “Please try to understand this, Inspector. I have no right to allow myself to be captured alive by the authorities. It’s my duty, you understand. I cannot risk the future of our worlds. This future is still just beginning. I have failed, but I am after all only the first, and not the last, observer on your Earth. Do you understand, Inspector?”
The only thing I understood was that this was a mess.
“What, really, are you doing here?” I asked.
Moses shook his head.
“I can’t tell you that, Inspector. I researched the possibilities for contact. I prepared the ground. But specifically speaking … And besides, it’s very complicated, Inspector. You aren’t a specialist.”
“Go,” I said. “And send Luarvik in.”
Moses stood up heavily and went out. I rested my elbows on the table and put my head in my hands. The cold Luger felt soothing against my right cheek. For a second I thought about how this Luger and I were joined together now, like Moses and his mug. I was ridiculous. I was pitiful. I hated myself. I hated Zgut with his friendly advice. I hated the entire gang that was gathering here. To believe or not to believe … That was the question, damn it, and the thing was, I believed. It wasn’t my first day on the job, I could tell when people were telling the truth. But that was people—people! And if I believe then they aren’t people to me anymore!… No, I had no right to believe them. To believe—that’s suicide! That would mean to assume a responsibility I have no right to, I don’t want it, I don’t want it, I don’t want it … It’ll crush me, like a bug! Well, at least I caught Hinkus. And I wasn’t letting Moses go, either. Let whatever was going to happen happen, the secret of the Second National robbery and the secret of the armored car’s gold had been uncovered. It was done. And if interplanetary politics were involved, then I—a simple police officer—would let the politicians take care of what it was their business to take care of … I wish I could just faint, I thought in despair. Let them do what they want …
The door creaked open, and I snapped out of it. But it wasn’t Luarvik. Simone came in with the owner. The owner set a cup of coffee in front of me, and Simone pulled the chair away from the wall and sat down in front of me. It seemed to me that he was looking very tired and indeed somehow yellowish.
“Well, have you made a decision, Inspector?” he asked.
“Where’s Luarvik? I asked for Luarvik.”
“Luarvik’s condition has gotten much worse,” Simone said. “Moses is treating him.” He grinned unpleasantly. “You’re going to destroy him, Glebsky, and it will be a terrible thing to do. It’s true, I’ve only known you for two days, but I would have never expected that you’d turn out to be nothing but a stuffed shirt.”
I picked up the cup with my free hand, brought it to my mouth and then put it back down. I couldn’t drink any more coffee. I was sick of it.
“Leave me. All you windbags. Alek only cares about his business, and you, Simone, are just a vacationing intellectual …”
“And what does that make you?” Simone said. “What do you care about? One more medal on your uniform?”
“Yes,” I said coldly. “A medal. I love medals.”
“You’re a small-time cop,” Simone said. “For once in your life, fate has thrown you something. For the first and last time in your life. Inspector Glebsky’s finest hour! A truly important decision is yours to make, and you’re acting like an utter idiot …”
“Shut up,” I said wearily. “Stop jabbering and think for just a minute. Let’s put aside for a minute the fact that Moses is simply a criminal. You, I see, have no understanding whatsoever about the law. You, it seems, imagine that there is one law that exists for people, and another one that exists for ghouls. But let’s forget all that for a second. Let’s say they’re aliens. Let’s say they’re victims of blackmail. The great first contact …” I waved the Luger feebly. “A friendship between worlds, and so on … Here’s a question: what are they doing here on Earth? Moses himself admitted that he was an observer. But what, actually, is he observing? What do they want here?… Don’t grin, don’t grin … We’re talking science fiction now, and in science fiction novels, so far as I remember it, aliens on Earth are usually spying in preparation for an invasion. In your opinion, how should I—a bureaucrat and stuffed shirt—behave in this situation? Should I do my duty, or not? And you, Simone, as an earthling, what do you think is your duty?”
Simone sat quietly, grinning and staring at me. The owner walked over to the window and opened the curtain. I glanced at him.
“Why did you do that?”
The owner didn’t answer immediately. He pressed his face to the glass and looked at the sky.
“I just keep looking, Peter,” he said slowly, without turning around. “I’m waiting, Peter, waiting … You should order the girl to go back to the house. There in the snow, she’s an easy target … She’s not listening to me …”
I set the Luger on the table, picked the mug up with both hands and, closing my eyes, took a few gulps. An easy target … We’re all easy targets here … Suddenly I felt strong hands grab my elbows from behind. I opened my eyes and jerked my arms. The pain in my collarbone was so sharp that I almost lost consciousness.
“Don’t worry, Peter, don’t worry,” the owner said soothingly. “Wait a second.”
Simone had already shoved the Luger into his pocket with a concerned and guilty look.
“Traitors!” I said, surprised.