Balmor walked in. He dropped the grip. "Oh, sir," he cried in horror, "I had no idea!"
"It's all right," said Heller. "Probably that bird at airport immigration alerted them."
"You're quite correct," said the captain. "Sergeant, do your duty."
A third MP came out of the library, putting a white-lanyarded revolver in his holster and taking some handcuffs out of his belt.
"Wait a minute," said Heller. "What's this all about?"
"You're an army deserter! You didn't report in when the president ordered general mobilization two days ago."
"I had a waiver!"
"That expired the instant a national emergency occurred," said the captain. "You're an ROTC graduate and you knew very well you were supposed to report for induction. This makes you a deserter. You'll get at least five years. Sergeant, the cuffs."
"Hold it," said Heller. "I was out of the country. I just got back a couple hours ago!"
"Hm," said the captain.
"That's true, sir," said the sergeant. "We got the tip-off from immigration."
"(Bleep)!" said the captain. "You're a barracks lawyer, Wister. I can tell that. You're going to make a case of this, aren't you?"
"I certainly am," said Heller.
"All that paper work!" said the captain. "Busy as I am, I just don't have time to make out some long report or appear at your trial either. I tell you what I'll do. Just as a favor, mind you, since you'll be a fellow officer. Get into your uniform and we'll take you down and get you inducted."
"I'll get your uniform pressed," said Balmor, hurrying into Heller's bedroom. He instantly came back out. "Sir!" he wailed. "They've got the whole staff in there, tied hand and foot!"
"Release them," said the captain to the sergeant. "This guy isn't any fighter, I can tell. But the country is going to need every man it's got. Get your uniform and get dressed, mister."
"After I'm inducted, what will happen?" said Heller, thinking very anxiously of Izzy.
"You're Intelligence, aren't you?" said the captain. "You'll get a chance to reconnoiter Camp Dix. And then maybe overseas. Who knows? I'm not G-2. But to be on the safe side, pack your kit. You're in the army now—or will be as soon as you raise your right hand."
"I've been away," said Heller. "Would you mind telling me what this war is all about?"
The captain sighed. "I don't know what use you'll be to Intelligence, not knowing that. But there isn't any war yet. This is just a presidential mobilization. This is Friday. War will be declared just as soon as Congress meets Monday. They're being real legal this time."
"Declared on whom?" said Heller.
"Maysabongo, you idiot! Those (bleepards) have got all our oil and the only way we can get it back is declaring war and seizing it under the Enemy Property Act."
Heller reeled.
He had gotten his first inkling of how Izzy was in trouble! He must be in the middle of this impending war!
And here he himself was, in the grip of the army, and couldn't help him!
And he knew he didn't dare stay on Earth more than another five weeks. To be here longer would be fatal to the Emperor and the base!
Driving to the army headquarters in jeeps, there was far less traffic than usual on the streets.
"You're awful lucky to have a ride," the captain said. "When these tanks are empty, that's it. I don't know how we're going to fight this war on no gas."
"I thought you said we'd grab the Maysabongo supplies as soon as war was declared," said Jet.
"I said 'oil,' not gas," replied the captain. "Maysabongo has nailed down all the reserves of crude oil and even though that's seized, it won't do us much good. It's got to be refined to get gasoline and kerosene and the refineries all went radioactive. Jesus, I don't know what use they're going to make of you in Intelligence. You don't seem to have even one brain cell in your head."
"Well," said Jet, "it's a good thing Maysabongo is no bigger than a postage stamp. It won't take much gas."
"It won't take any gas at all, you dumbbell. We'll use a hydrogen bomb." I
"Then why mobilize all these men?" said Jet.
"Questions, questions. It's not yours to reason why. Its just yours to do and die. Didn't they teach you anything at all in the ROTC?"
"They should have taught me to keep my mouth shut," said Heller. !
The captain seemed to find this uproariously funny. "That's the spirit. Grin and bear it. True grit. I got a feeling you'll make it after all."
Heller was very far from laughing. The thought of Maysa-bongo, which had been friendly to him, obliterated, put a new stress on his situation.
The day was very hot: New York in July can be sweltering. He hadn't noticed it before, as the Silver Spirit had been air-conditioned, as had the condo. But riding in this open jeep, the city felt like a steam bath.
They drew up and double-parked outside the armory. Jet picked up his duffel bag and they nudged him inside. They got a receipt for him from the guards and drove away to round up other deserters.
Jet found himself in an enormous hall. They had put camp desks and folding chairs all over the drill floor. The place was crammed with perspiring people and awash with fluttering paper. The place was boiling hot.
A guard shoved Jet into a corner of the room where some medical equipment was set up. He waited and waited, watching men go through a physical examination.
Suddenly somebody asked him for his papers, somebody else told him to strip, somebody else told him to stand on a scale, somebody else told him to cough, another said to jump up and down and put a cold stethoscope against his chest and somebody else told him to get dressed.
A doctor signed some papers and a guard told Jet to go over to another part of the armory. In a mob of young men he waited and waited. Then somebody lined them all up three ranks deep and started looking at their papers.
Somebody said to Jet, "You're an officer candidate. These are enlisted inductees. You're in the wrong place."
They indicated he should go to another corner of the armory. There was a colonel there, very old, apparently very deaf, sitting at a desk with lots of orders in front of him. Jet put his papers down in front of him.
"Who are you?" said the colonel.
"Wister, Jerome Terrance, it says there," said Jet.
"What do you want?" said the colonel.
A sergeant got up from his desk and looked at the papers. "He's in officer candidate, ROTC. He's supposed to be sworn in."
"I don't care what he was born in," said the colonel.
The sergeant made a sign by raising his hand.
"Oh, sworn in," said the colonel. "All right, Blister, stand in front of the desk and raise your right hand."
Heller's hair stood up. As a Royal officer, taking an oath of allegiance to some other power could get him a fast court-martial.
"Repeat after me," said the colonel. And he rattled off the oath of allegiance to the United States.
Heller rattled off the oath of allegiance to His Majesty, Emperor of Voltar, in Voltarian.
The colonel threw the papers to the sergeant and got back to his own work.
"What the hell was that?" said the sergeant. ' "The oath of allegiance," said Heller with a lisp.
"It didn't sound like you repeated it," said the sergeant.
"I have trouble with my tongue," said Heller, speaking in a muted way.
"Oh," said the sergeant. "Now go over there and get fingerprinted and things."
Heller got into another line and waited and waited. He was getting worried. Night had fallen. Time was running and he didn't know how he was going to get out of this.