His tactics could be extended much farther than that. No form of life was secure from the vagaries of chance. Good fortune came along as well as bad, in any part of the cosmos. There was no reason why Eustace should not snatch the credit for both. No reason why he, Leeming, should not take unto himself the implied power to reward as well as to punish.
That wasn’t the limit, either. Good luck and bad luck are positive phases of existence. He could cross the neutral zone and confiscate the negative phases. Through Eustace he could assign to himself not only the credit for things done, good or bad, but also for things not done. In the pauses between staking claims to things that happened he could exploit those that did not happen.
The itch to make a start right now was irresistible. Rolling off the bench, he belted the door from top to bottom. The guard had just been changed for the eye that peered in was that of Kolum, a character who had bestowed a kick in the rump not so long ago. Kolum was a cut above Marsin, being able to count upon all twelve fingers if given sufficient time to cogitate.
“So it is you!” said Leeming, showing vast relief. “I am very glad of that. I befriended you in the hope that he would lay off you; that he would leave you alone for at least a little while. He is far too impetuous and much too drastic. I can see that you are more intelligent than the other guards and therefore able to change for the better. Indeed, I have pointed out to him that you are obviously too civilized to be a sergeant. He is difficult to convince but I am doing my best for you.”
“Huh?” said Kolum, half flattered, half scared.
“So he’s left you alone at least for the time being,” Leeming said, knowing that the other was in no position to deny it. “He’s done nothing to you yet.” He increased the gratification. “I’ll do my very best to keep control of him. Only the stupidly brutal deserve slow death.”
“That is true,” agreed Kolum eagerly, “but what—”
“Now,” interrupted Leeming with firmness, “it is up to you to prove that any confidence is justified and thus protect yourself against the fate that is going to visit the slower-witted. Brains were made to be used, weren’t they?”
“Yes, but—”
“Those who don’t possess brains cannot use what they haven’t got, can they?”
“No, they cannot, but—”
“All that is necessary to demonstrate your intelligence is to take a message to the Commandant.”
Kolum popped his eyes in horror. “It is impossible: I dare not disturb him at this hour. The sergeant of the guard will not permit it. He will—”
“You are not being asked to take the message to the Commandant immediately. it is to be given to him personally when he awakens in the morning.”
“That is different,” said Kolum; vastly relieved. “But I must warn you that if he disapproves of the message he will punish you and not me.”
“He will not punish me lest I in turn punish him,” assured Leeming, as though stating a demonstrable fact. “Write my message down.”
Leaning his gun against the corridor’s farther wall, Kolum dug pencil and paper out of a pocket. A strained expression came into his eyes as he prepared himself for the formidable task of inscribing a number of words.
“To the Most Exalted Lousy Screw,” began Leeming.
“What does ‘lousy screw’ mean?” asked Kolum as he struggled to put down the strange Terran words phonetically.
“It’s a title. It means your highness. Man, how high he is!” Leeming pinched his nose while the other pored over the paper. He continued to dictate, going very slowly to keep pace with Kolum’s literary talent. “The food is insufficient and very poor in quality. I am physically weak, I have lost much weight and my ribs are beginning to show. My Eustace does not like it. The thinner I get the more threatening he becomes. The time is fast approaching when I shall have to refuse all responsibility for his actions. Therefore I beg Your Most Exalted Lousy Screwship to give serious consideration to this matter.”
“There are many words and some of them long ones,” complained Kolum, managing to look like a reptilian martyr.
“I shall have to rewrite them more readably when I go off duty.”
“I know and I appreciate the trouble you are taking on my behalf.” Leeming bestowed a beam of fraternal fondness. “That’s why I feel sure you’ll live long enough to do the job.”
“I must live longer than that,” insisted Kolum, popping the eyes again. “I have the right to live, haven’t I?”
“That is precisely the argument I’ve been using,” said Leeming in the manner of one who has striven all night to establish the irrefutable but cannot yet guarantee success.
“I cannot talk to you any longer,” informed Kolum, picking up his gun. “I am not supposed to talk to you at all. If the sergeant of the guard should catch me he will—”
“The sergeant’s days are numbered,” Leeming told him in, judicial tones. “He will not live long enough to know he’s dead.”
His hand extended in readiness to close the spyhole, Kolum paused, looked as if he’d been slugged with a sockful of wet sand. Then he said, “How can anyone live long enough to know that he’s dead?”
“It depends on the method of killing,” assured Leeming. “There are some you’ve never heard of and cannot imagine.” At this point Kolum found the conversation distastefuclass="underline" He closed the spyhole. Leeming returned to the bench, sprawled upon it. The light went out. Seven stars peeped through the window-slot and they were not unattainable.
In the morning breakfast came an hour late but consisted of one full bowl of lukewarm pap, two thick slices of brown bread heavily smeared with grease and a large cup of warm liquid vaguely resembling paralysed coffee. He got through the lot with mounting triumph. By contrast with what they had been giving him this feast made the day seem like Christmas. His spirits perked up with the fullness of his belly.
No summons to a second interview came that day or the next. The Commandant made no move for more than a week. His Lousy Screwship was still awaiting a reply from the Lathian sector and did not feel inclined to take further action before he received it. However meals remained more substantial, a fact that Leeming viewed as positive evidence that someone was insuring himself against disaster.
Then early one morning the Rigellians acted up. From the cell they could be heard but not seen. Every day at about an hour after dawn the tramp of their two thousand pairs of feet sounded somewhere out of sight and died away toward the workshops. Usually that was all that could be heard, no voices, no desultory conversation, just the weary trudge of feet and an occasional bellow from a guard.
This time they came out singing, their raucous voices holding a distinct touch of defiance. They were bawling in thunderous discord something about Asta Zangasta’s a dirty old geezer, got fleas on his chest and sores on his beezer. It should have sounded childish and futile. It didn’t. The corporate effect seemed to convey an unspoken threat.
Guards yelled at them. Singing rose higher, the defiance increasing along with the volume. Standing below his window-slot, Leeming listened intently. This was the first mention he’d heard of the much-abused Asta Zangasta, presumably this world’s king, emperor or leading hooligan.
The bawling of two thousand voices rose crescendo. Guards screamed frenziedly and were drowned within the din. Somewhere a warning shot was fired. In the watchtowers the guards edged their guns around, dipped them as they aimed into the yard.