“Let’s get some air. I ate too much, I’m about to fall asleep.” Once we hit the open terrace and were free of the hazard of eye and ear he cursed me out in low, dispassionate tones. “You’ll never make a conspirator. Half the mess must know that you found something in your napkin. Why in God’s name did you gulp your food and rush off? Then to top it off you handed it to me upstairs. For all you know the eye read it and photostated it for evidence. Where in the world were you when they were passing out brains?”
I protested but he cut me off. “Forget it! I know you didn’t mean to put both of our necks in a bight-but good intentions are no good when the trial judge-advocate reads the charges. Now get this through your head: the first principle of intrigue is never to be seen doing anything unusual, no matter how harmless it may seem. You wouldn’t believe how small a deviation from pattern looks significant to a trained analyst. You should have stayed in the refectory the usual time, hung around and gossiped as usual afterwards, then waited until you were safe to read it. Now where is it?”
“In the pocket of my corselet,” I answered humbly. “don’t worry, I’ll chew it up and swallow it.”
“Not so fast. Wait here.” Zeb left and was back in a few minutes. “I have a piece of paper the same size and shape; I’ll pass it to you quietly. Swap the two, and then you can eat the real note-but don’t be seen making the swap or chewing up the real one.”
“All right. But what is the second sheet of paper?”
“Some notes on a system for winning at dice.”
“Huh? But that’s non-reg, too!”
“Of course, you hammer head. If they catch you with evidence of gambling, they won’t suspect you of a much more serious sin. At worst, the skipper will eat you out and fine you a few days pay and a few hours contrition. Get this, John: if you are ever suspected of something, try to make the evidence point to a lesser offence. Never try to prove lily-white innocence. Human nature being what it is, your chances are better.”
I guess Zeb was right; my pockets must have been searched and the evidence photographed right after I changed uniforms for parade, for half an hour afterwards I was called into the Executive Officer’s office. He asked me to keep my eyes open for indications of gambling among the junior officers. It was a sin, he said, that he hated to have his younger officers fall into. He clapped me on the shoulder as I was leaving. “You’re a good boy, John Lyle. A word to the wise, eh?”
Zeb and I had the midwatch at the south Palace portal that night. Half the watch passed with no sign of Judith and I was as nervous as a cat in a strange house, though Zeb tried to keep me calmed down by keeping me strictly to routine. At long last there were soft footfalls in the inner corridor and a shape appeared in the doorway. Zebadiah motioned me to remain on tour and went to check. He returned almost at once and motioned me to join him, while putting a finger to his lips. Trembling, I went in. It was not Judith but some woman strange to me who waited there in the darkness. I started to speak but Zeb put his hand over my mouth.
The woman took my arm and urged me down the corridor. I glanced back and saw Zeb silhouetted in the portal, covering our rear. My guide paused and pushed me into an almost pitch-black alcove, then she took from the folds of her robes a small object which I took to be a pocket ferretscope, from the small dial that glowed faintly on its side. She ran it up and down and around, snapped it off and returned it to her person. “Now you can talk,” she said softly. “It’s safe.” She slipped away.
I felt a gentle touch at my sleeve. “Judith?” I whispered.
“Yes,” she answered, so softly that I could hardly hear her.
Then my arms were around her. She gave a little startled cry, then her own arms went around my neck and I could feel her breath against my face. We kissed clumsily but with almost frantic eagerness.
It is no one’s business what we talked about then, nor could I give a coherent account if I tried. Call our behavior romantic nonsense, call it delayed puppy love touched off by ignorance and unnatural lives-do puppies hurt less than grown dogs? Call it what you like and laugh at us, but at that moment we were engulfed in that dear madness more precious than rubies and fine gold, more to be desired than sanity. If you have never experienced it and do not know what I am talking about, I am sorry for you.
Presently we quieted down somewhat and talked more reasonably. When she tried to tell me about the night her lot had been drawn she began to cry. I shook her and said, “stop it, my darling. You don’t have to tell me about it. I know.”
She gulped and said, “But you don’t know. You can’t know. I . . . he . . .”
I shook her again. “stop it. Stop it at once. No more tears. I do know, exactly. And I know what you are in for still—unless we get you out of here. So there is no time for tears or nerves; we have to make plans.”
She was dead silent for a long moment, then she said slowly, “You mean for me to . . . desert? I’ve thought of that. Merciful God, how I’ve thought about it! But how can I?”
“I don’t know-yet. But we will figure out a way. We’ve got to.” We discussed possibilities. Canada was a bare three hundred miles away and she knew the upstate New York country; in fact it was the only area she did know. But the border there was more tightly closed than it was anywhere else, patrol boats and radar walls by water, barbed wire and sentries by land . and sentry dogs. I had trained with such dogs; I wouldn’t urge my worst enemy to go up against them.
But Mexico was simply impossibly far away. If she headed south she would probably be arrested in twenty-four hours. No one would knowingly give shelter to an unveiled Virgin; under the inexorable rule of associative guilt any such good Samaritan would be as guilty as she of the same personal treason against the Prophet and would die the same death. Going north would be shorter at least, though it meant the same business of traveling by night, hiding by day, stealing food or going hungry. Near Albany lived an aunt of Judith’s; she felt sure that her aunt would risk hiding her until some way could be worked out to cross the border. “she’ll keep us safe. I know it.”
“Us?” I must have sounded stupid. Until she spoke I had had my nose so close to the single problem of how she was to escape that it had not yet occurred to me that she would expect both of us to go.
“Did you mean to send me alone?”
“Why . . . I guess I hadn’t thought about it any other way.”
“No!”
“But-look, Judith, the urgent thing, the thing that must be done at once, is to get you out of here. Two people trying to travel and hide are many times more likely to be spotted than one. It just doesn’t make sense to—”
“No! I won’t go.”
I thought about it, hurriedly. I still hadn’t realized that “A” implies “B” and that I myself in urging her to desert her service was as much a deserter in my heart as she was. I said, “We’ll get you out first, that’s the important thing. You tell me where your aunt lives-then wait for me.”
“Not without you.”
“But you must. The Prophet,”
“Better that than to lose you now!”
I did not then understand women—and I still don’t. Two minutes before she had been quietly planning to risk death by ordeal rather than submit her body to the Holy One. Now she was almost casually willing to accept it rather than put up with even a temporary separation. I don’t understand women; I sometimes think there is no logic in them at all.
I said, “Look, my dear one, we have not yet even figured out how we are to get you out of the Palace. It’s likely to be utterly impossible for us both to escape the same instant. You see that, don’t you?”
She answered stubbornly, “Maybe. But I don’t like it. Well, how do I get out? And when?”
I had to admit again that I did not know. I intended to consult Zeb as soon as possible, but I had no other notion.
But Judith had a suggestion. “John, you know the Virgin who guided you here? No? Sister Magdalene. I know it is safe to tell her and she might be willing to help us. She’s very clever.”