The prosecutor picked up the next report. Oh, that Wanderer! That smart Wanderer, that brilliant Wanderer… That was how I should have acted—the way he did. I was certain that Mak had been killed: the South is the South. But he flooded the territory beyond the river with his agents. Fat Fank—ah, I didn’t get to him when I should have. I didn’t get my claws into him! That fat swine with the peeling skin even lost weight running around the country, nosing around, keeping his eyes open, and his agent Chicken died of a fever on Highway 6, and his Tapa the Cock was captured by the Highlanders, and then Fifty-One—I don’t know who he is—got captured by pirates way out on the coast, but still managed to report back just in time that Mak had shown up there, surrendered to the patrols, and been sent back to his penal colony… That’s the way people with brains do things: they don’t believe anything and they have pity on nobody. And that’s the way I should have acted at the time. Dropped all my other business and focused only on Mak—after all, even then I realized what a terrible force Mak is, but instead I got into a scrap with Twitcher and lost, and then I got involved with this idiotic war and lost again.
And I would have lost again now too, but I’ve finally had a stroke of luck. Mak has turned up in the capital, in Wanderer’s lair, and I’ve found out about it before Wanderer. Yes, Wanderer, with your gristly ears, yes, now you’re the one who has lost. How terrible that you just had to go away again at this precise moment! And do you know, Wanderer, I’m not even offended by the fact that once again it remains entirely unknown where you went to and what for. So you went away—fine! Of course, you relied on that Fank of yours in all of this, and your Fank brought you Mak, but then—what a disaster!—Fank collapsed after all his military adventures. He’s lying unconscious in the Palace Hospital—such an important individual, people like him are only ever put in the Palace Hospital!—and I shan’t botch things up this time around; now he’ll stay lying there for as long as I need him to. So you’re not here, and Fank isn’t here, but our Mak is, so things have turned out really well…
Noticing the onset of an incipient feeling of joy, the prosecutor immediately extinguished it. Emotions again, massaraksh. Calmly now, Egghead. You are making the acquaintance of a new individual by the name of Mak—you have to be very objective. Especially since this new Mak is nothing at all like the old one; he is very grown-up now, he knows what finance and juvenile criminality are now. Our Mak has grown wiser and sterner… Look at the way he has broken through into the underground’s Central HQ (on the recommendations of Memo Gramenu and Allu Zef), descending on them like a bolt from the blue with his proposal for counterpropaganda. And Central HQ wailed and lamented, because it meant revealing the true function of the towers to the rank-and-file membership—but Mak convinced them, didn’t he? He frightened them, entangled them in his arguments, and they accepted the idea of counterpropaganda and assigned Mak to develop it… He figured out the situation very quickly, quickly and correctly. And they understood that—they realized just who they were dealing with. Or they simply sensed it…
And here is the latest report: the faction of enlighteners invited him to participate in discussion of the program of reeducation, and he was delighted to accept. He immediately suggested a whole heap of ideas. Pretty useless ideas, but that’s not the point—reeducation is idiotic nonsense in any case—the important thing is that he is no longer a terrorist, he does not want to blow anything up, and he does not want to kill anyone; the important thing is that he has turned to political activity, that he is actively building up his authority at Central HQ, making speeches, criticizing, climbing upward; the important thing is that he has ideas and is just yearning to put them into practice, and that is precisely what we want, Mr. Egghead…
The prosecutor leaned back in his chair.
And here’s another thing that we need: reports on his way of life. He works a lot—both in the laboratory and at home—he is still pining for that woman, for Rada Gaal, he exercises, has almost no friends, doesn’t smoke, hardly drinks at all, and eats very moderately. On the other hand, he displays a clear inclination for luxury in his daily life and is well aware of his own worth: he accepted the automobile to which he is entitled by his position as an automatic given, while expressing his dissatisfaction with its low power and ugly appearance; he is also dissatisfied with his two-room apartment—he considers it too cramped and lacking in basic comforts; he has decorated his home with original paintings and antique works of art, spending almost his entire advance on them… well, and so on. Good material, very good material… And by the way, how much money does he have, what resources does he possess now? Riiight, a project coordinator in the chemical synthesis laboratory… salary paid in a blue envelope… his own car… a two-room apartment on the grounds of the Department of Special Research… They’ve set him up pretty well. And they’ve probably promised him even more.
I’d like to know how they explained what it was that Wanderer needed him for. Fank knows, the fat swine, but he won’t tell, chances are he’ll croak anyway… Ah, if only I could somehow drag everything that he knows out of him! What pleasure I would take in terminating him after that—the amount of trouble that he has caused me, that mangy brute… He stole that Rada from me too, and she would be really useful to me right now. Rada… What a weapon she is for dealing with pure, honest, courageous Mak! But then, right now perhaps it’s not really such a bad thing… I’m not the one keeping your beloved under lock and key, Mak, it’s Wanderer—it’s all that odious blackmailer’s scheming…
The prosecutor shuddered: the yellow telephone had quietly tinkled. Merely tinkled, and nothing more. Quietly, even melodically. Come to life for a split second and then frozen again, as if simply reminding him it was there… Keeping his eyes fixed on it, the prosecutor ran his trembling fingers across his forehead. No, it was a mistake. Of course, a mistake. It could have been anything—a telephone is a complicated device, some spark or other simply jumped the wires inside it…
He wiped his fingers on his robe. And the phone immediately gave a thunderous roar. Like a shot at point-blank range… Like a saber slash across the throat… Like a sudden fall from the roof to the asphalt… The prosecutor picked up the receiver. He didn’t want to pick up the receiver, he didn’t even know that he was picking up the receiver, he even imagined that he wasn’t picking up the receiver but was quickly tiptoeing into the bedroom, getting dressed, driving the car out of the garage and racing off at top speed… But where to?
“State prosecutor,” he said in a hoarse voice, and coughed to clear his throat.
“Egghead? It’s Dad speaking.”
There… This is it… Now it will be We’re expecting you in about an hour…
“I realized,” he helplessly said. “Hello, Dad.”
“Have you read the communiqué?”
“No.”
Ah, you haven’t? Well, come over, and we’ll read it to you…
“It’s over,” said Dad. “They’ve botched up the war.”
The prosecutor gulped. He needed to say something. He urgently needed to say something, best of all to crack a joke. Crack a subtle joke… Oh God, help me crack a subtle joke!
“Nothing to say? But what did I tell you? Steer clear of that mess, stick with the civilians, the civilians and not the military men! Oh, Egghead…”
“Well, you are Dad,” the prosecutor managed to force out. “And children always disobey their parents, don’t they?”