“Fine.” He walked a little way off to have a good view of her. Under his gaze she faltered visibly; she shrank back against the wall, half-lifted her fingers to her throat, smiled, gazed appealingly up at him like an animal that had failed to show up for its dinner.
“Can I come back?” she asked, in a whisper.
“Back?” He was afraid to imagine what she meant.
Tears filled her eyes. “Guess not.”
“Of course you can come back.” He moved up and took hold of her. “You know you can come back. Any time. Any time you want.”
“You better let go of me,” she whispered. “I’m going to start weeping. Let me get out my handkerchief.”
He let go reluctantly; with awkward fingers she got out her bit of handkerchief and blew her nose. For a moment she stood dabbing at her eyes, red lips twitching, not speaking or looking at him, just standing there in her gray organization uniform, trying not to cry.
“The son of a bitch,” she said finally, in a thin, weak voice.
“Jones?”
“I’ll tell you . . . when I can.” Balling her handkerchief up, she began striding around the room, arms folded, chin up, face quivering. “Well, it’s a long and not very pleasant story. I’ve been with the organization—I guess over two years, now.”
“Twenty-eight months,” he informed her.
“That sounds right.” She turned suddenly to him. “It’s over. I’m through.”
“What happened?”
Nina felt in her pockets. “Cigarette?”
He got out his pack, lit a cigarette for her, and put it between her trembling lips.
“Thanks,” she said, breathing swift jets of gray-blue smoke out into the room. “First, I think we better get out of here. He may pick you up—he’s picking everybody up.”
“But I’ve been cleared,” Cussick protested.
“Darling, that makes no damn difference. You’ve heard what he did to Pearson? No, I suppose not.” Briskly taking hold of his arm she propelled him toward the door. “We’d be a lot safer out of here; take me somewhere, anywhere.” Shivering, she stood up on her toes to kiss him briefly. “Something has happened. We—the organization—know it, now; Jones told us. Tomorrow morning the public will know.”
“What is it?”
“The great Crusade is over. The ships are coming back. It’s the end of Jones, the end of the organization. Movement, I mean. Now that we’re in, we’re supposed to call—”
Cussick found the doorknob. “That’s wonderful,” he managed.
“Wonderful?” She laughed brittlely. “It’s terrible, darling. As soon as we’re out of here, I’ll tell you why.”
He found an all-night beanery on a side street, two miles from his apartment. At the counter, a pair of drowsy patrons sat slumped over their coffee, listlessly reading newspapers. The waitress was perched in the back by the cooking controls, staring out at the night. In the corner a tune-maker ground out cadences to itself.
“Fine,” Nina said, sliding into a booth at the rear of the cafe. “There’s a back door, isn’t there?”
Cussick located a back door behind the cooking equipment: the service and maintenance entrance. “What do you want to chew on?”
“Just coffee.”
He got the two coffees, and for a time they sat stirring and meditating, glancing furtively at each other.
“You’re looking pretty nice,” he told her haltingly.
“Thank you. I sort of hoped I’d lost a pound or two.”
“Do you mean this? You’re going to stay?” He had to be sure. “You’re not going off again?”
“I mean it,” she answered simply, her eyes blue and direct. “Tomorrow morning I want to go and get Jackie.” She added: “I’ve been seeing him every once in a while. I’ve kept sort of control over him.”
“Me, too,” Cussick said.
As she sipped her coffee, Nina explained to him what had happened. In short, terse words she outlined the background on the drifters, and the situation with the mobile war units.
“The ring is up, now,” she told him. “The ships are turning back, returning to Earth. Why not? There’s nothing else they can do. Commander Ascott’s flagship, that great big thing, will be the first one to land. Right now they’re clearing the New York field.”
“Pollen,” Cussick said, stricken. “That explains their incompleteness. He had begun to sweat cold, apprehensive drops. “We really are tangled up with something, then.”
“Don’t start imagining all that old scare stuff,” Nina said sharply. “Invasion of Earth—beings from outer space. They’re just not that way. They’re plants; all they care about is protecting themselves. All they want to do is neutralize us—and that’s what they’ve done.” Helplessly, she spread her hands. “It’s already happened! It’s over! We have our little area to operate in, about six star systems. And then—” She smiled frigidly. “Beyond that, the ring.”
“And Jones didn’t know?”
“When he started, no. He’s known for a year, but what could he do? The war had begun . . . by the time he found out it was too late. He gambled and lost.”
“But he didn’t admit he was gambling. He said he knew.”
“That’s right: he lied. He could see a lot of things, but he couldn’t see everything. So now he’s paying for it . . . he’s letting the fleet come back. He led us—he led the people—into a trap. He let us down; betrayed us.”
“What next?”
“Next,” Nina said, pale and subdued, “he puts up his real fight. This afternoon he called all of us together, all the officials of the organization.” She unbuttoned her gray coat and showed him the inside lapel. An elaborate emblem-badge was stitched into the fabric, a series of letters and numbers beneath a stylized ornament. “I’m a big shot, darling. I’m vice commissioner of the Women’s Defense League . . . part of the new internal security system. So I was herded in with the other very-important-people, stood up in a long row, and fed the real story, our first preview of what’s coming.”
“How’s he taking it?”
“He’s almost out of his mind.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Nina answered, sipping her coffee, “even with his power, he’s still lost. He can see defeat and death . . . he can see his awful, final struggle to keep alive—and he can see it failing. There it was, on his face. That terrible cadaverous look, like a dead thing. Fish eyes. No life, no luster. He stood there shaking all over; he could scarcely stand up. He twitched, he stammered . . . it was heartbreaking. And he told us the Crusade had failed, was coming back, that in a short while we could expect the riots to break out.”
Cussick pondered. “The riots. The betrayed followers.”
“Everybody. Except the skeleton of the organization, the real fanatics. They’ll fight like hell for him.”
“Are there many of them?”
“No, not many. Idealists, the energetic youth. After all, Jones did let us down—it’s a fact, he knows it, we know it, pretty soon everybody will know it. But there are those who will stick with him anyhow.” Without emotion she added, “Not me.”
“Why not?”
“Because,” she said slowly, softly, “he told us what he’s going to do to keep power. He’s going to use the fleet as a weapon against the mobs. He’s going to give the fleet its battle. And that means—” Her voice faltered, broke, then resumed. “Well, that means civil war. Just because he lied to us and betrayed us and led us into ruin we’ll never get out of, doesn’t mean he’s going to step down; as a matter of fact he’s just getting started. If anybody thinks—”
Cussick reached out and caught hold of her arm. “Take it easy,” he told her firmly. “Lower your voice.”
“Thanks.” She nodded tightly. “It’s so damn awful. He knows he can’t do it—he knows they’ll get to him, eventually. Six months; that’s how much time he has. But he’s going to hang on. He’s going to pull the whole world down around his ears .
. . if he’s dead he wants everybody else dead, too.”
Silence.
“And,” Nina finished wanly, “there’s nothing we can do. Remember the assassin? Remember Pearson’s attempt? It slipped right into Jones’ hands . . . it got him into power.”
“What happened to Pearson?”
“Pearson is dying. Very slowly and carefully. Not long ago Jones introduced some kind of parasite into him. It’s feeding on him; eventually it’ll lay its eggs in him. Jones is so proud of it; he never gets tired telling us about it.”
Licking his dry lips, Cussick said hoarsely: “That’s the kind of man you’ve been following?”
“We had a dream,” Nina said simply. “And he had a dream. It went sour, it went all to pieces . . . but he just won’t let go. He won’t stop. And there’s nothing that can make him stop; all we can do is sit back and watch while he goes to work. The round-ups are beginning. Everybody connected with Fedgov will be destroyed. Then—very rationally and systematically—every group even remotely capable of opposition will be smashed.”
Cussick’s fingers tore up his paper napkin and shredded the bits onto the floor. “Does Jones know you’ve crossed back?”
“I don’t think so. Not yet.”
“I thought he knew everything.”
“He knows only what he’s going to know. He may never find out; after all, I’m only one of many: he’s got millions of people to keep tabs on. A lot of us sneaked off; the man who drove me was my boss, my superior. He was leaving, too, with his wife and family. They’re pulling out in droves, trying to find places to hide. Setting up retreats, hoping to last it out.”
“I want you to go back,” Cussick said.
Nina gave a little soundless bleat. “Back?” Quavering, she asked: “You’re going to try to talk to him? Reason with him?”
“No,” Cussick answered. “Not exactly.”
“Oh.” Nina nodded, understanding. “I see.”
“Probably I’m doing what Pearson did; the quixotic gesture has already been made once. But I can’t sit here.” He leaned toward her. “Can you? Can you sit here sipping your coffee while he gets this thing going?”
Nina couldn’t meet his gaze. “All I want to do is get out of it. I want to be back with you.” Her eyes on her coffee cup, fingers clutching convulsively, she hurried on: “I have a place. It’s in West Africa, where there’s still a lot of unclaimed land. I fixed it up months ago; everything’s arranged. The place was built by organization labor gangs; it’s all finished. I have Jackie down there now.”
“That’s not legal. It takes both of us.”
“There’s no such thing as not legal, anymore. Don’t you know that? It’s what we want—it’s what the organization orders. I’ve got it arranged; we can get down there by tomorrow morning if we leave now. An organization intercon ship will fly us to Léopoldville. From there we’ll go by surface car, up into the mountains.”
“Sounds fine,” Cussick commented. “Sounds like we could get by. We might even be alive, six months from now.”
“I’m sure of it,” Nina said emphatically. “Look at those Venusians—he doesn’t care about them. A lot of people are going to survive; he’ll have his hands full coping with the big-city riots.”
Cussick examined his wristwatch. “I want you to go back to your organization and I want you to take me along. Can you get me through the check system?”
“If we go back,” Nina said evenly, her voice low and steady, “we’ll never get out. I know it—I can feel it. We won’t get away.”
After a moment Cussick said: “One of the things Jones taught us is the importance of action. I think the time for action has come. Maybe I should have been a Jones supporter. This is the time for me to show up and volunteer as one of the Jones Boys.”
Nina’s trembling fingers slipped from her cup; the cup turned on its side and oozed lukewarm coffee across the table in an ugly brown film. Neither of them moved, neither of them noticed.
“Well?” Cussick inquired.
“I guess,” Nina said faintly, “you don’t really care about me after all. You don’t really want me back.”
Cussick didn’t answer. He sat waiting for her to agree, to begin putting the wheels into motion that would carry him inside the Jones organization and to Jones himself. And he was wondering, idly at first and then with growing hopelessness, how he could possibly kill a man who knew the topography of the future. A man who could not be taken unawares: a man for whom surprise was impossible.
“All right,” Nina said, in an almost inaudible voice.
“Can you get an organization car?”
“Sure.” Listlessly, she rose to her feet. “I’ll go phone. He can pick us up here.”
“Fine,” Cussick said, with satisfaction. “We’ll wait.”
18
DARK RAIN SWISHED down on the car as the gray-uniformed organization driver guided it conscientiously along through the heavy, slow-moving traffic. In the back, Nina and Cussick sat silently together, neither of them speaking.
Outside the car, blinding headlights loomed up, reflected from a billion raindrops streaking the plastic windows. Signal lights blinked on and off; within the dashboard, answering relays closed in response. The driver had little to do beyond steering; most of the controls were automatic circuits. He was young and blond, a humorless functionary, performing his job skillfully, dispassionately.
“Hear the rain,” Nina murmured.
The car halted for a series of rerouting lights. Cussick began shifting restlessly. He lit a cigarette, stubbed it out, then jerkily lit another. Presently Nina reached out and took hold of his hand.
“Darling,” she said wretchedly. “I wish—what the hell can I do? I wish I could do something.”
“Just get me in.”
“But how are you going to do it? It isn’t possible.”
Warningly, Cussick indicated the driver. “Let’s not talk about it.”
“He’s all right,” Nina said. “He’s part of my staff.”
The car started up, and in a moment they were on the broad freeway that led directly to the Fedgov buildings, where Jones had entrenched himself. It wouldn’t be long, Cussick realized. Probably another half hour. Glumly, he gazed out at the lines of speeding cars. There was a lot of traffic. Along the pedestrian ramps shuffled hunched-over citizens, commuters who had been deposited by the urban expresses, dumped off to shift for themselves in the pouring rain.
From his pocket, he got out a small glittering bauble, carefully wrapped in translucent brown fiber. He sat with his knees apart, holding the bauble cupped in his hands.
“What is it?” Nina asked. Pathetically, she reached out to touch it. “A present for me?”
“We used these all the time,” Cussick said, blocking her fingers. “Until Pearson ruled against them. You’ve probably heard about them . . . the Communists developed them during the war as instruments for conversion. We picked the idea up, too. This is called a lethe-mirror.”
“Oh,” Nina said. “Yes.” She nodded. “I’ve heard of them. But I didn’t think there were any left.”
“Everybody kept one or two.” In Cussick’s hands the bauble shimmered menacingly. All he had to do was remove the brown-fiber covering; it was as simple as that. The mirror was a focus that caught and trapped the attention of the higher brain centers.
The car slowed a trifle. “Are we there?’’ Cussick demanded instantly.
“No sir,” the young driver answered. “There’s some kids trying to hitch a ride. Want me to pick them up?” He added, “It’s raining pretty hard.”
“Sure,” Cussick said. “Pick them up.”
The four kids who tumbled gratefully into the car were loaded down with drenched wicker baskets and the sodden remains of pennants. “Thanks,” the leader gasped, a girl in her middle teens. “You saved our lives.”
“We were out selling Crusade buttons,” another girl explained, mopping rainwater from her face. Wet brown hair
plastered over her ears, she hurried on joyfully: “And we had sold almost all of them, too, before the rain started.”
The third teenager, a plump red-faced boy, gazed in awe at Nina and squeaked: “Are you in the organization?”
“That’s right,” Nina said thinly.
The girls mopped at their drenched clothes, struggled to dry their hair, exuded the smell of wet fabric and excitement. “Say,” one of them noticed, “this is an official car.”
The first girl, small and sharp-faced, with large interested eyes, said shyly to Cussick: “Do you have a Crusade button?”
“No,” Cussick answered shortly. The irony of it hit home: this was a typical group of young fanatics, peddling buttons to raise Crusade funds. Standing on street corners, stopping cars and pedestrians, shoppers and commuters, faces flushed and alive with the fervor of their cause. In the four young faces he saw nothing but innocent excitement; for them, the Crusade was a great and noble thing; a spiritual salvation.
“Would you—” the little sharp-faced girl began, glancing up at him timidly, “would you like to buy a Crusade button?”
“Sure,” Cussick said. “Why not?” He dug into his pocket. “How much?”
Nina made a strangled sound and ducked her head; he ignored her as he fished out a few crumpled bills.
“Ten dollars is the usual,” the girl said, reaching quickly into her wicker basket for a button. “Anything you want . . . it’s for a good cause.”
He gave her the money; gravely, hesitantly, she pinned the button on his coat. There it hung, a small shield of bright plastic, with the raised sword of the Crusade superimposed on the familiar crossed-flasks. It gave him an unhappy and intricate feeling to sense it there. Suddenly he reached forward and lifted a second button from the wicker basket.
“Here,” he said gently to Nina. “For you.”
Solemnly, he pinned it on her coat. Nina smiled faintly and reached out to touch his hand.
“Now we all have one,” the sharp-faced girl said shyly.
Cussick paid her for the second button, and she scrupulously put the money with the other contributions. The six people in the back seat rode on through the rain, silent and subdued, each deep in his own thoughts. Cussick wondered what the four kids would be doing and thinking in a few more days. God knew . . . God and Jones, the two of them knew. He certainly didn’t.