The distant roar of a car starting up. The snarl of its going around the ramps to exit. The unmistakable mad driving of Ker! They were gone.
Jonnie finished dressing, packed the kit, especially Stormalong’s favorite coat and scarf and goggles, and bundled it all up.
“You will be sure this gets to Stormalong,” said Jonnie. But as Lars said nothing, Jonnie decided to take it along.
They had done it!
How he would get himself out of this mess he didn’t know. He was a little puzzled as to why the other two had driven off when the battle plane must still be down there. But he was grateful they were out of it.
“Let’s go,” he said.
5
They exited from a different ground-level door, one that was usually locked. Jonnie glanced around for a cadet to give Stormalong’s kit to and saw no one.
“I’ll see that it’s taken to the Academy,” said Lars, divining his purpose. He must not see too deeply into the dispositions Lars had made, most of which prevented them from being seen by anyone lest Lars find himself with a battle on his hands from cadets or Russians, some of whom had just arrived at the underground base in the mountains and were a considerable force.
A storm was coming in from over the mountains, rolling black clouds, studded with lightning around the distant Highpeak. The wind was picking up and bending the tall brown grass. A few dead leaves fled through the air. Autumn was here. There was a chill in the air on this mile-high plateau.
It gave Jonnie an eerie feeling, almost a premonition. He had left Africa in a storm and here was a storm again. He threw the kit in the back and got in. The windows were darkened so no one could see in. With submachine guns trained upon him, they drove toward the capitol.
Lars was a bad driver and Jonnie could see how he must have gotten the cracked neck the plaster cast advertised. Jonnie despised him. Jonnie had known lots of Swedes and they were good people; he had even gathered from Lars’s conversation that they despised him too.
The man tried to chatter on about the ancient military leader but Jonnie had had enough. “Shut up,” he said from the back. “You’re nothing but a turncoat traitor. I don’t see how you can stand yourself. So shut up.” It was unwise but he couldn’t go on listening to this insanity.
Lars shut up but his eyes slitted. He suddenly enjoyed the fact that this criminal would be dead in a few hours.
The ground car squatted down at a side entrance to the capitol, never used. There were no people to be seen. There were no people in the corridor either. Lars had seen to that.
They thrust him toward a door. Unseen Brigantes in the shadows kept their guns trained upon him. Two more were in the courtroom, in the corners, Thompsons cocked and ready.
And there sat Brown Limper.
He was at a high desk on a dais. He was in a black robe. Ancient law books flanked him on either side. His face had an unhealthy sheen. His eyes were too bright. He loomed like a vulture about to attack a corpse. Just himself, the Brigante guards, and this Tyler in an otherwise empty room.
It was Tyler! He had recognized that the moment the fellow strode through the door. There was an air about this Tyler one couldn’t miss. He had hated it since they were children. Hated that easy confident walk, hated that set of even features, hated those light blue eyes. He had hated everything Tyler was and he could never be. But who had the power now? He, Brown Limper! How he had daydreamed of this moment.
“Tyler?” said Brown Limper. “Come stand in front of the court bench! Answer me: is your name Jonnie Goodboy Tyler?” Brown Limper had a recorder running. Such proceedings must be regular and legal.
Jonnie came to a bored stand in front of the bench. “What is this farce, Brown Limper? You know my name well enough.”
“Silence!” said Brown Limper, hoping his voice was resonant and deep. “The prisoner will answer correctly and properly or become guilty of contempt of court!”
“I see no court,” said Jonnie. “What are you doing in that funny dress?”
“Tyler, I am adding contempt of court to these charges.”
“Add what you please,” said Jonnie, bored with it.
“You will not consider this lightly when I read you what you are charged with! This at present is just a hearing. In a week or two, a world court will be established and the trial will take place at that time. But as a felon and criminal you have the right to hear the charges so that you can organize your defense when tried!
“‘Now hear ye, hear ye. You are charged with a count of murder in the first degree, the victims being the Chamco brothers, loyal employees of the state, feloniously assaulted with intent to kill and later dying by their own hand due to pain of their wounds.
“‘Kidnapping in the first degree, the said Tyler assaulting and feloniously seizing the persons of two coordinators going about their legal duties as agents of the council.
“‘Murder and felonious assault upon a peace-loving and unoffending tribe called the Brigantes including the slaughter of half a commando.
“‘Massacre of a convoy of peaceful commercial people going about their business and viciously and maliciously slaughtering them to the last man.’”
“Psychlos,” said Jonnie. “They were Psychlos organizing an attack upon this capital.”
“That’s stricken from the records!” said Brown Limper. Indeed, he would have to erase it from this disk. “You are not on trial. These are just the charges that have been brought against you by decent and deserving citizens of this planet. Remain silent and hear the charges!
“‘It is noted by the court,’” continued Brown Limper—how he had slaved over this parlance from ancient books; he hoped he had it all right and legal—“‘that numerous other charges could be brought, but at this time have not been brought.’”
“Such as?” said Jonnie, indifferent to this clown.
“When you seized the remote control panel from one Terl and launched the drone against man, it has also been stated that you then and thereupon shot down said Terl when he was in the act of trying to shoot down the drone. However, there being witnesses, undoubtedly perjured and extorted by you to speak false testimony, who speak otherwise, the charges have not been included at this time, though of course they may be brought at some later date.”
“So that’s all you could come up with,” said Jonnie, with irony. “Nothing about stealing babies’ milk? I’m surprised!”
“You won’t be so arrogant when you hear the rest of this,” threatened Brown Limper. “‘I am an impartial judge and this is a legal and impartial court. In the interim time pending your trial, you are forbidden to use any more of my’ . . . I mean, ‘council property such as planes, cars, houses, equipment, or tools!’”
Brown Limper had him! Quick as a flash he pulled out the bill of sale of the Earth branch of the Intergalactic Mining Company and thrust it at Tyler.
Tyler took it and looked at it. “For a sum of two billion credits, one Terl, duly authorized representative of the party of the first part which shall hereafter be called the party of the first part, did hereby convey all lands, mines, minesites, compounds, planes, tools, machinery, cars, tanks . . . on and on . . . to the council of Earth, the duly elected and authorized government of said planet, to have and to hold forever and from this day forward.” It was signed “Terl,” but Jonnie, who knew Terl’s signature, saw that it must have been written with the wrong paw. He started to put it in his pouch.
“No, no!” shouted Brown Limper. “That is the original!” He fussed around in the papers on his desk and handed over a copy and exchanged it for the original. Jonnie put the copy in his pouch.
“And not only that,” said Brown Limper, “the whole planet was the property of Intergalactic and there is a deed for that as well!” He started to hand over the original, thought better of it, found a copy, and handed it over.
Jonnie glanced at it. Terl had actually sold these fools their planet!
“The deeds are valid,” said
Brown Limper pompously. “That is, they will be when fully recorded.”
“Where?” said Jonnie.
“On Psychlo, of course,” said Brown Limper. “Out of the goodness of his heart and in spite of the trouble, Terl himself will take these deeds there and get them fully recorded.”
“When?” said Jonnie.
“Just as soon as he can rebuild the apparatus you feloniously and maliciously destroyed, Tyler!”
“And he’s taking the money with him?”
“Of course! He has to turn it in to his company. He is an honest man!”
“Psychlo,” corrected Jonnie.
“Psychlo,” corrected Brown Limper, and then instantly became furious with himself for permitting this judicial proceeding to assume other than a judicial tone.
“‘So therefore,’” said Brown Limper, reading, “‘and as stated nothwithstanding, in accordance with the legal tribal rights of the said Jonnie Goodboy Tyler, he is hereby placed under house arrest in his own home in the meadow and is herewith and hereby not to quit said home and said vicinity until hailed before a world court, duly to be constituted under the authority of the council, said council being duly elected and invested with the total authority of total government of Earth. Hey man!’” He had thought the last religious note gave it style and he now sat proudly on the bench. “So unless the prisoner has some last request . . .”
Jonnie had been thinking hard and quickly. He had never before paid much attention to Brown Limper, and such malice, falsehood, and evil was a little surprising. There was a fueled battle plane in the hangar at the compound.
“Yes,” said Jonnie. “There is a request. If I am going to the meadow, I would like to pick up my horses first.”
“Those and your house are all the property you own now, so it is only fit that you do so. Out of courtesy and feelings for the rights of the prisoner, and possibly even out of a fatherly feeling for him as his own mayor, this request is granted so long as you go at once from there straight to the village in the meadow and into your house!”
Jonnie looked at him with contempt and strode from the room.
Brown Limper, eyes overbright, watched him go. That would be the end of Tyler! He let out a shuddering sigh. What a relief all this was! And how long sought? Twenty years. No, this was not revenge. He had to do it. Duty demanded it! The peoples of Earth would now be wholly in good hands—his, Brown Limper’s. He would do his very best for them, as he was doing now. Despite the toil it cost him.
6
The incident that would later become known as “The Murder of Bittie MacLeod,” which would bring the planet toward war, cost many men their lives, and later become the subject of ballads, romances and legend, began at noon that day with Bittie’s unfortunate spotting of Jonnie in the capitol area of Denver.
When the head of the Russian contingent had been given orders in Africa to close the American underground base, it was very plain to the Russians that neither they nor Jonnie would thereafter be resident in America, which brought up the subject of horses. Horses were wealth to the Russians; they had developed a small herd of their own in America and they were not going to abandon them.
Bittie MacLeod considered himself responsible for Jonnie’s horses. He informed Colonel Ivan in no uncertain terms that he must go along with them to bring back Jonnie’s horses. When objections were raised, he doggedly countered them: he was with the Russians and he would be safe; the horses knew him; Windsplitter, Dancer, Old Pork and Blodgett would be frightened on the long plane ride unless they had somebody soothing them they knew they could trust. After hours of this, Colonel Ivan gave in.
The Russians, just before dawn of that day, had thoroughly closed the American underground base as well as the nuclear missile store. If anyone tried to get into them now who didn’t know the way or have the keys, they would be blown to bits. Planes had been arranged for the return, any material they were taking back abroad was already loaded, and before dawn that day they had left the base in a small convoy of trucks and cars to do their last job: pick up the horses from the plains.
The way from the base led through the ancient ruins of Denver and few of the Russians had ever been there. Further, recently they had begun to get paid. They were going home, and they had sisters and wives and sweethearts, mothers and friends.
A few tiny stores had opened lately in Denver, the proprietors from other places, the customers the people of the world making pilgrimages to the minesite. The goods were salvaged and repaired items from the ruins of sprawling cities and even some new products of native tribes. Dresses, shoes, cloth, jewelry, utensils, souvenirs and relics were the main stocks in trade. The stores were few and widely scattered.
The Russians decided that since they were many hours early for their departure time that evening from the Academy field, and since they did not favor sitting around in the grass waiting, they would spend a little shopping time in Denver.
They had parked their vehicles near the capitol, for there was much space there, and its dome could be seen from all around as a landmark and gotten back to easily. They had scattered out, each on his own errands.
Bittie had been given a special guard, a strong, tough Russian who was a special friend of Bittie’s named Dmitri Tomlov, and Dmitri had been charged by Colonel Ivan to stay close to Bittie and not be careless and to carry his assault rifle and magazine pouch wherever he went. So it seemed all right.
Bittie and his guardian had found a little jewelry and trinket shop that had been opened by an old Swiss couple and their son. The old Swiss had found and repaired an engraving machine; he was also clever with repairing items found in ancient wrecked stores—where and when they had been overlooked by metal-hungry Psychlos.
The son was in a back room of the shop recovering from trying to defend the store from being robbed by the Brigantes—it seemed the Brigantes would go around telling everyone they were “police” and they carried clubs and would pick up anything that took their fancy and put it in their pockets. The council, when approached by the few people now in Denver, had admitted that yes, the Brigantes were “police,” and that law and order was vital and that it was a felony to resist “police.” Nobody really knew what “police” meant as a word, but they had come to realize it was something very bad. So the old Swiss had decided to move away and a lot of his items were for sale at very low prices.
The wife was waiting on Dmitri. He had lots of relatives. But his first purchase was a little silver-headed riding crop for Bittie. Although Bittie would have been aghast at the idea of hitting a horse, the crop looked very nice. It was about two feet long, about the length of a Brigante bow although no one noticed this at the time.
Despite all these very low prices, Bittie was having a rough time. He wanted something special for Pattie. He thought he would be seeing her shortly. He looked and looked, helped by the old man. Also Bittie did not have very much money with him: his pay was only two credits a week whereas a soldier’s was a credit a day. Pay had not been going on very long so Bittie only had four credits and the better items were as much as ten. Bittie’s problems were also complicated by the limited command of English on the part of the Swiss people, who spoke a combination of German and French. The Russian was no help—he had practically no English and nobody spoke Russian there, including Bittie. But they were making out with signs and count marks on scraps of wrapping paper and raised eyebrows and pointing fingers.
At last Bittie found it! It was a real gold-plated locket in the shape of a heart. It had a red rose, still bright red, inset on it. It opened and you could put pictures inside and it had had its hinge nicely repaired and it had a thin chain. Also it had enough space on the back to engrave something, and yes, the old Swiss would be happy to engrave it. With one credit for the engraving, it all came to six credits. It was the very thing. But six credits! He only had four.
Well, the old Swiss was selling out, and when he saw the disappointment on Bittie’s face, he relented and let him
have it, with a box thrown in, all engraved, repolished and ready to go.
When given a card to put the message on so it could be copied, Bittie fell into more difficulty. What was he going to put on the back of the locket? Jonnie and others had told him that he and Pattie were far too young to get married and that was true. So he couldn’t put “To my future wife” really, for people might smile and this was no smiling matter. He didn’t want to simply put “To Pattie, Love Bittie” as the old Swiss seemed to be suggesting. The Russian was no help at all. Then he had it! “To Pattie, my ladye faire, Bittie.” The old Swiss then said that was too long to fit on the back. So he had to come back, after all, to “To Pattie, my future wife.” The old Swiss counted that up and said he could fit that in. It wasn’t too satisfactory and people might laugh, but he couldn’t do any better and the old Swiss set up his engraving machine and had at it.
All this was taking time and Bittie was getting edgy. He might miss the Russians, and after all, Jonnie’s horses were his job as squire and that’s why he had come over to America. He hopped from one foot to the other and pushed at them all to hurry. The Swiss finally finished and put the locket in a nice box and wrapped it in some old paper, and the Russian finally got all the things he wanted and they paid it all up and went rushing out to get back to the trucks.
It was a cold day. There had been a frost and dead leaves were blowing about. A storm was rumbling over the mountains. It all seemed to tell Bittie to hurry.