“The man who shot him, and the man who threw the flame bomb, were probably as equally deluded as to what they were doing as the double was. They did a perfect job, though. The impersonator was dead, and his skin was charred and blistered clear up to the chest—no fingerprints.
“The men were tried, convicted, and executed. The Chinese government sent us abject apologies. The double’s body was shipped back to the United States with full honors, but by the time it reached here, the eye-cone patterns had deteriorated to the point where they couldn’t be identified any more than the fingerprints could. And there were half a hundred reputable scientists of a dozen friendly nations who were eye-witnesses to the killing and who are all absolutely certain that it was James Ch’ien who died.”
Candron nodded. “So, while the whole world was mourning the fact that one of Earth’s greatest physicists has died, he was being held captive in the most secret and secure prison that the Red Chinese government could put him in.”
Taggert nodded. “And your job will be to get him out,” he said softly.
Candron said nothing for a moment, as he thought the problem out. Taggert said nothing to interrupt him.
Neither of them worried about being overheard or spied upon. Besides being equipped with hush devices and blanketing equipment, the building was guarded by Reeves and Donahue, whose combined senses of perception could pick up any activity for miles around which might be inimical to the Society.
“How much backing do we get from the Federal Government?” Candron asked at last.
“We can swing the cover-up afterwards all the way,” Taggert told him firmly. “We can arrange transportation back. That is, the Federal Government can. But getting over there and getting Ch’ien out of durance vile is strictly up to the Society. Senator Kerotski and Secretary Gonzales are giving us every opportunity they can, but there’s no use approaching the President until after we’ve proven our case.”
Candron gestured his understanding. The President of the United States was a shrewd, able, just, and ethical human being—but he was not yet a member of the Society, and perhaps would never be. As a consequence it was still impossible to convince him that the S.M.M.R. knew what it was talking about—and that applied to nearly ninety per cent of the Federal and State officials of the nation.
Only a very few knew that the Society was an ex officio branch of the government itself. Not until the rescue of James Ch’ien was an accomplished fact, not until there was physical, logical proof that the man was still alive would the government take official action.
“What’s the outline?” Candron wanted to know.
Taggert outlined the proposed course of action rapidly. When he was finished, Spencer Candron simply said, “All right. I can take care of my end of it.” He stood up. “I’ll see you, Brian.”
Brian Taggert lay back down on the couch, propped up his feet, and winked at Candron. “Watch and check, Spence.”
Candron went back down the stairs. Mrs. Jesser smiled up at him as he entered the reception room. “Well! That didn’t take long! Are you leaving, Mr. Candron?”
“Yes,” he said, glancing at the wall clock. “Grab and run, you know. I’ll see you soon, Mrs. Jesser. Be an angel.”
He went out the door again and headed down the street. Mrs. Jesser had been right; it hadn’t taken him long. He’d been in Taggert’s office a little over one minute, and less than half a dozen actual words had been spoken. The rest of the conversation had been on a subtler level, one which was almost completely nonverbal. Not that Spencer Candron was a telepath; if he had been, it wouldn’t have been necessary for him to come to the headquarters building. Candron’s talents simply didn’t lie along that line. His ability to probe the minds of normal human beings was spotty and unreliable at best. But when two human beings understand each other at the level that existed between members of the Society, there is no need for longwinded discourses.
The big stratoliner slowed rapidly as it approached the Peiping People’s Airfield. The pilot, a big-boned Britisher who had two jobs to do at once, watched the airspeed indicator. As the needle dropped, he came in on a conventional landing lane, aiming for the huge field below. Then, as the needle reached a certain point, just above the landing minimum, he closed his eyes for a fraction of a second and thought, with all the mental power at his command: NOW!
For a large part of a second, nothing happened, but the pilot knew his message had been received.
Then a red gleam came into being on the control board.
“What the hell?” said the co-pilot.
The pilot swore. “I told ‘em that door was weak! We’ve ripped the luggage door off her hinges. Feel her shake?”
The co-pilot looked grim. “Good thing it happened now instead of in mid-flight. At that speed, we’d been torn apart.”
“Blown to bits, you mean,” said the pilot. “Let’s bring her in.”
By that time, Spencer Candron was a long way below the ship, falling like a stone, a big suitcase clutched tightly in his arms. He knew that the Chinese radar was watching the jetliner, and that it had undoubtedly picked up two objects dropping from the craft—the door and one other. Candron had caught the pilot’s mental signal—anything that powerful could hardly be missed—and had opened the door and leaped.
But those things didn’t matter now. Without a parachute, he had flung himself from the plane toward the earth below, and his only thought was his loathing, his repugnance, for that too, too solid ground beneath.
He didn’t hate it. That would be deadly, for hate implies as much attraction as love—the attraction of destruction. Fear, too, was out of the question; there must be no such relationship as that between the threatened and the threatener. Only loathing could save him. The earth beneath was utterly repulsive to him.
And he slowed.
His mind would not accept contact with the ground, and his body was forced to follow suit. He slowed.
Minutes later, he was drifting fifty feet above the surface, his altitude held steady by the emotional force of his mind. Not until then did he release the big suitcase he had been holding. He heard it thump as it hit, breaking open and scattering clothing around it.
In the distance, he could hear the faint moan of a siren. The Chinese radar had picked up two falling objects. And they would find two: one door and one suitcase, both of which could be accounted for by the “accident.” They would know that no parachute had opened; hence, if they found no body, they would be certain that no human being could have dropped from the plane.
The only thing remaining now was to get into the city itself. In the darkness, it was a little difficult to tell exactly where he was, but the lights of Peiping weren’t far away, and a breeze was carrying him toward it. He wanted to be in just the right place before he set foot on the ground.
By morning, he would be just another one of the city’s millions.
Morning came three hours later. The sun came up quietly, as if its sole purpose in life were to make a liar out of Kipling. The venerable old Chinese gentleman who strolled quietly down Dragon Street looked as though he were merely out for a placid walk for his morning constitutional. His clothing was that of a middle-class office worker, but his dignified manner, his wrinkled brown face, his calm brown eyes, and his white hair brought respectful looks from the other passers-by on the Street of the Dragon. Not even the thirty-five years of Communism, which had transformed agrarian China into an industrial and technological nation that ranked with the best, had destroyed the ancient Chinese respect for age.