Dick trudged back up the line. The faces went past him, a blur. His teeth were chattering in his clenched face.
Blashfield stepped into his path, stopped and steadied him, then maneuvered him over to the end pole, beside it and about two feet away. Over the armorer's head he saw his father and the two uncles, standing silently, with set, intent faces. "Take a deep breat'," said Blashfield.
He sucked it in, held it, let it go. "Anodder."
"Ready!" called the voice.
Blashfield gave him a final pat and stepped away. There was a long, breathless pause. Blashfield had moved back, out of sight, with his father and uncles. His heart was pounding, hard enough to hurt.
"Turn!"
He felt himself wheeling, coming to rest on the extended right foot as he had been taught. His arm swung up, heavy as a log.
"Fire!"
Over the gun barrel, Cashel's body seemed a tiny puppet-shape; his head would have fitted easily into the notch of the rear sight. He was standing edge-on, his right arm up and almost invisible in foreshortening. Fighting the tremor in his forearm, Dick brought the sights into line at a point just above and to the right of Cashel's chest.
There was a sharp popping sound near his left ear, overriding the distant bark of the gunshot. He saw Cash's hand flip and come down again. His arm was trembling again and his aim had gone wide: grimly he set to work bringing it back. Now the sights were lined up again; he squeezed the trigger gently as they wavered off, held, squeezed harder as they came back. The gun bucked and roared in his hand. His ears rang.
Cash was still there, still aiming.
Bringing the gun down, he heard the popping sound again, this time on the right.
He had perhaps a second to fire before Cash's third shot. In the hush, he saw the sights drift on target. He squeezed gently, then harder. Sights and target came together with an instinctive tightness that made him think, A hit! The gun roared.
Under his hand, he saw the tiny doll-figure of Cashel shortening -- leaning, doubling over, down in the grass.
He waited numbly, but the body did not move. The crowd flowed in on it.
As he turned away, somebody took the gun out of his hand. Somebody else tried to support him from behind, but he kept going until he bumped into a tree. Holding the rough bark, he bent over and vomited.
When he straightened, Uncle Glenn handed him a handkerchief. Blashfield was busy with the gun; he put in a new round, closed it smartly, reversed it and stuffed it back into Dick's holster.
Beyond him, down at the end of the avenue, he saw Uncle George standing erect in the dispersing crowd, with Cashel's body in his arms. Dr. Scope was beside him, talking, gesturing, but Uncle George paid no attention. Tears were shiny on his cheeks; he looked stunned and wild.
"Dead?" Dick asked, unbelievingly.
"Dead as mackerel," said Uncle Orville.
He remembered Dr. Scope giving him a sedative, and then a long, formless, black period, something between waking and sleeping. Once he had opened his eyes, and the room had, been filled with darkness; in the open window, the cold branches were skeletal against the faint star-glow. Then he must have fallen asleep again, because when he opened his eyes the second time the lights were on and his father was bending over him.
"What's the matter?" he asked dizzily.
"Get your clothes on," his father said. "Padgett, where's that coffee?"
The gray-haired tutor came forward with a silver pot in his hand. "Drink this," said the Man, shoving a filled cup at him. He gulped it; it was scalding hot.
The lights in the room seemed sickly and thin. The blinds were drawn. "What time is it?" he asked.
"Just before six," said Padgett. "If we hurry, we'll get away before dawn."
"What?" said Dick, sitting up. Sain came up with garments in his hands. He put a shirt over Dick's head, and Dick held up his arms automatically.
"We think it best for you to leave early," his father said. There were pouches under his eyes and he was wearing yesterday's linen.
Dick stood up, swaying. The image of that falling body leaped into his mind, unbidden; he said, "Oh ... "
It had rained during the night and all the lawns were slick and sodden; but now the early sun was out, golden against grayness, and the sky to the east was clear. Up behind the house, on the field leveled by Dick's grandfather, there were two planes on the runway: a slim, two-engined Lockheed passenger-fighter, and a dumpy, gray Lippisch aerodyne. To Dick's faint surprise, there was no activity around the Lockheed; Blashfield and a squad of the House Guard were standing near the open door of the dyne.
Still thinking it was a mistake, he kept walking past the dyne toward the Lockheed; but his father stopped him with a touch on the arm. "That one's going later, as a decoy," he said. "This is yours."
Dick looked with distaste at the squat shape. The aerodyne was a dependable but ungainly old boat, built to a design that had been only half developed at the time of the Turnover, when all technological work had stopped. It was stable and strong, and about as safe to operate as anything but a Cub; but it had no style at all. Dick felt rebellious; it was as if he had been given the wind-broken old mare to ride.
"Couldn't you pick something funnier-looking?" he demanded.
His father merely cocked an eyebrow at him, and motioned to Blashfield to get his men aboard.
"Well, what are we afraid of?" Dick demanded. "Uncle George? Listen, Dad, if it's all the same to you -- "
The Man turned. "Yes?"
"I'm not a baby," said Dick.
"Richard," said his father slowly, "you have led a somewhat sheltered life. I agree that you are not a baby; but being a man means more than fighting one duel. Do you understand what I mean?"
"I suppose so," said Dick.
"Meaning that you don't. You'll be on your own soon enough, and able to make your own mistakes. Perhaps you should have had that freedom earlier. But until then, you will do as I suggest. Here comes your mother now; go and say good-bye to her."
Dick looked up; she was just emerging from the covered passage. The light scent she used enveloped him; her kiss was cool and undemanding as always. "Good-bye, dear Dick."
After her came Adam, burning-eyed, with Constance and Felix breathless beside him. Ad was carrying something square wrapped in silk; he pressed it into Dick's hand. "It's a present," he said. "A memory book. Padgett helped us pick the quotations, and Litts bound it -- we thought he'd never finish in time."
"I told him what designs to make," said Constance. "Dick, I hope you like the binding, and everything. Will you send me some enamels for my collection?" Her color was high; she looked about to burst into one of her meaningless fits of tears.
The Man urged him toward the gangway. The dyne engine was warmed and idling; the wash from its underjet steamed out around them. "I know how you feel," the Man said in his ear, "better than you think. When you get to Eagles -- " he pressed a thin envelope into Dick's hand -- "give this to a man named Leon Ruell. Have you got that?"
"Ruell," Dick repeated.
"That's right. He'll explain things better to you than I can." To Dick's astonishment and discomfort, there were signs of emotion in the Man's face. They gripped hands; then the Man pushed him up the gangway. Stooping, he entered the cabin. Padgett had left room for him next to the door; Blashfield and the guards were ranked behind. The pilot, a stolid young slob named Otto, turned in his high seat to wait for orders.