His choice was clear. It would run him through a gamut of death, but there are worse things than extinction.
He looked at the clean profile of the girl beside him. He wanted to ask her what she thought, what she desired. He hardly knew her at all. But he couldn’t, with the listening mechanical ears. He would have to decide for her.
She met his gaze with calm green eyes. “I wish you’d tell me what’s going on, Edwy,” she said. “I seem to be as exposed as you in any case, and I’d like to know.”
He gave in and told her of Saris Hronna and the hunt for him. She grasped the idea at once, nodded without excitement, and refrained from asking him if he knew an answer or what he intended to do. “It is a very large thing,” she said.
“Yeah,” said Langley. “And it’s going to get a lot bigger before long.”
12
There might be eyes as well as ears in the walls. Langley went to bed shortly after sunset. Spy-beams went right through the communicator, Valti had said, but he wore his pajamas anyway; blankets were no longer in use. He lay for an hour, threshing about as if unable to get to sleep. Then he commanded loud music. The recorded caterwauling should drown out a low-pitched conversation.
He hoped the stomach-knotting tension in him didn’t show on his face.
Scratching, as if after an itch, he pressed the stud. Then he struck a cigarette and lay waiting.
The tiny voice was a vibration inside him, he thought about sonic beams heterodyned and focused on his skull-bones. It was distorted, but he’d know Valti’s phrasing anywhere:
“Ah, Captain Langley. You do me an unprecedented honor. It is a pleasure even to be routed out of a snug bed to hear you. May I advise that you speak with your lips closed? The transmission will be clear enough.”
“All right.” There was one hopeless question which had to be asked. “I’m prepared to bargain with you—but do you have Blaustein and Matsumoto?”
“I do not, captain. Will you take my word for that?”
“I... reckon so. O. K. I’ll tell you where I think Saris is -mind you, it’s only an informed guess—and I’ll help you find him if possible. In return, I want your best efforts to rescue my friends, together with the money, protection, and transportation you offered, both for myself and one other person, a slave girl who’s in this apartment with me.”
It was hard to make out whether the exultation which must be leaping through that gross form had entered the voice: “Very good, captain. I assure you you will not regret this. Now as to practical considerations, you must be removed without trace.”
“I’m not sure just how that little thing’s going to be done, Valti. I think I’m more or less under house arrest.”
“Nevertheless, you shall get out tonight. Let me think- In two hours, you and the girl will stroll out onto the balcony. For Father’s sake, make it look natural! Remain there, in plain sight from above, no matter what happens.”
“O. K. Two hours—2347 by my clock, right? See you!”
Now it was to wait. Langley got out another cigarette and lay as if listening to the music. Two hours! I’ll be one gray-haired wreck before then.
So much could go wrong. The variable-frequency radiation of the communicator was supposedly undetectable, but maybe not. The rescue attempt might go sour. Chanthavar might suddenly get fed up and haul him off for inquisition. Valti might be betrayed by spies within his own ranks. Might, might, might! Animals are luckier than man, they don’t worry.
Time crawled, it took forever to get by a minute. Langley swore, went into the living room, and dialed for a book. Basic modern physics—at the rate time was going, two hours would be enough to get a Ph. D. He grew suddenly aware that he had been staring at the same scanned page for fifteen minutes. Hastily he dialed the next. Even if it wasn’t registering he ought to look as if it were.
The text mentioned a name, Ynsen, credited with first giving Riemannian space—they called it “Sarlennian” now —a physical meaning. After a minute, he guessed the original form. Einstein! So something had survived of his own age, however corrupted. He smiled, feeling a sadness within himself, and wondered what a historical novel laid in the Twenty-first Century would read like. Probably concern the struggle between Lincoln and Stalin for control of the Lunar rocket bases—the hero would scoot around on his trusty bicycle- No, there wasn’t any such novel. His age was all but forgotten, its details long eaten away by time. A few archaeologists might be interested, no one else. Imagine a first-dynasty Egyptian brought to New Washington, 2047 a. d. He’d be a nine days” wonder, but how many people would care?
He looked at the clock, and felt his belly muscles tighten. Twenty minutes to go.
He had to get Marin outside, he couldn’t leave her in this hellhole, and he had to do it in a way that the observers would consider unremarkable. For a while he sat thinking. The only way was one he didn’t like, a far New England ancestor compressed angry lips and tried to stop him. But—
He walked over to the door of her room. It opened for him, and he stood looking down on her. She was asleep. The coppery hair spilled softly around a face which held peace., He tried not to remember Peggy, and touched her arm.
She sat up. “Oh... Edwy.” Blinking her eyes open: “What is it?”
“Sorry to wake you,” he said awkwardly. “I couldn’t sleep, Come talk to me, will you?”
She regarded him with something like compassion. “Yes,” she said at last. “Yes, of course.” Throwing a cloak over her thin nightgown, she followed him onto the balcony.
There were stars overhead. Against the remote blaze of city lights swam the black shark-form of a patrol ship. A small wind ruffled his hair. He wondered just where Lora stood—not far from the ancient site of Winnipeg, wasn’t it?
Marin leaned against his side, and he put an arm about her waist. The vague light showed a wistful, uncertain curve to her mouth.
“It’s nice out,” he said banally.
“Yes—” She was waiting for something. He knew what it was, and so did Chanthavar’s observers sitting at their screens.
He stooped and made himself kiss her. She responded gently, a little clumsily as yet. Then he looked at her for a long while, and couldn’t say anything.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled at last.
How long to go—five minutes? Ten?
“What for?” she asked.
“I’ve no right—”
“You have every right. I’m yours, you know. This is what I’m for.”
“Shut up!” he croaked. “I mean a moral right. Slavery is wrong no matter how you set it up. I’ve ancestors who died at Gettysburg, in Germany, in the Ukraine, because there was slavery.”
“You mean you don’t want to force yourself on me,” she said. “It’s good of you, but don’t worry. I’ve been conditioned —I like the idea, it’s my function.”
“Exactly. It’s still enslavement—a worse one, I think, than just putting chains on you. No!”
She laid her hands on his shoulders, and the gaze that met his was calm and serious. “Forget that,” she said. “Everybody’s conditioned—you, I, everybody, life does that one way or another. It doesn’t count. But you need me, and I... I’m very fond of you, Edwy. Every woman wants a man. Isn’t that enough?”
There was a hammering in his temples.
“Come,” she said, taking his hand, “come on back inside.”
“No... not yet,” he stammered.
She waited. And because there seemed nothing else to do, he found himself kissing her again.
Five minutes? Three? Two? One?
“Come,” she breathed, “come with me now.”
He hung back. “Wait... wait—”