"That's not legal. It takes both of us."
"There's no such thing as not legal, any more. Don't you know that? It's what we want—it's what the organization orders. I've got it arranged; we can get down there by tomorrow morning if we leave now. An organization intercon ship will fly us to Leopoldville. From there we'll go by surface car, up into the mountains."
"Sounds fine," Cussick commented. "Sounds like we could get by. We might even be alive, six months from now."
"I'm sure of it," Nina said emphatically. "Look at those Venusians—he doesn't care about them. A lot of people are going to survive; he'll have his hands full coping with the big-city riots."
Cussick examined his wristwatch. "I want you to go back to your organization and I want you to take me along. Can you get me through the check system?"
"If we go back," Nina said evenly, her voice low and steady, "we'll never get out. I know it—I can feel it. We won't get away."
After a moment Cussick said: "One of the things Jones taught us is the importance of action. I think the time for action has come. Maybe I should have been a Jones supporter. This is the time for me to show up and volunteer as one on the Jones Boys."
Nina's trembling fingers slipped from her cup; the cup turned on its side and oozed lukewarm coffee across the table in an ugly brown film. Neither of them moved, neither of them noticed.
"Well?" Cussick inquired.
"I guess," Nina said faintly, "you don't really care about me after all. You don't really want me back."
Cussick didn't answer. He sat waiting for her to agree, to begin putting the wheels into motion that would carry him inside the Jones organization and to Jones himself. And he was wondering, idly at first and then with growing hopelessness, how he could possibly kill a man who knew the topography of the future. A man who could not be taken unawares: a man for whom surprise was impossible.
"All right," Nina said, in an almost inaudible voice.
"Can you get an organization car?"
"Sure." Listlessly, she rose to her feet. "I'll go phone. He can pick us up here."
"Fine," Cussick said, with satisfaction. "We'll wait."
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
DARK RAIN swished down on the car as the gray-uniformed organization driver guided it conscientiously along through the heavy, slow-moving traffic. In the back, Nina and Cussick sat silently together, neither of them speaking.
Outside the car, blinding headlights loomed up, reflected, from a billion raindrops streaking the plastic windows. Signal lights blinked on and off; within the dashboard, answering relays closed in response. The driver had little to do beyond steering; most of the controls were automatic circuits. He was young and blond, a humorless functionary, performing his job skillfully, dispassionately.
"Hear the rain," Nina murmured.
The car halted for a series of rerouting lights. Cussick began shifting restlessly. He lit a cigarette, stubbed it out, then jerkily lit another. Presently Nina reached out and took hold of his hand.
"Darling," she said wretchedly. "I wish—what the hell can I do? I wish I could do something."
"Just get me in."
"But how are you going to do it? It isn't possible."
Warningly, Cussick indicated the driver. "Let's not talk about it."
"He's all right," Nina said. "He's part of my staff." The car started up, and in a moment they were on the broad freeway that led directly to the Fedgov buildings, where Jones had entrenched himself. It wouldn't be long, Cussick realized. Probably another half hour. Glumly, he gazed out at the lines of speeding cars. There was a lot of traffic. Along the pedestrian ramps shuffled hunched-over citizens, commuters who had been deposited by the urban expresses, dumped off to shift for themselves in the pouring rain.
From his pocket, he got out a small glittering bauble, carefully wrapped in translucent brown fiber. He sat with his knees apart, holding the bauble cupped in his hands.
"What is it?" Nina asked. Pathetically, she reached out to touch it. "A present for me?"
"We used these all the time," Cussick said, blocking her fingers. "Until Pearson ruled against them. You've probably heard about them... the Communists developed them during the war as instruments for conversion. We picked the idea up, too. This is called a lethe-mirror."
"Oh," Nina said. "Yes." She nodded. "I've heard of them. But I didn't think there were any left."
"Everybody kept one or two." In Cussick's hands the bauble shimmered menacingly. All he had to do was remove the brown-fiber covering; it was as simple as that. The mirror was a focus that caught and trapped the attention of the higher brain centers.
The car slowed a trifle. "Are we there?" Cussick demanded instantly.
"No sir," the young driver answered. "There's some kids trying to hitch a ride. Want me to pick them up?" He added, "It's raining pretty hard."
"Sure," Cussick said. "Pick them up."
The four kids who tumbled gratefully into the car were loaded down with drenched wicker baskets and the sodden remains of pennants. "Thanks," the leader gasped, a girl in her middle teens. "You saved our lives."
"We were out selling Crusade buttons," another girl explained, mopping rain water from her face. Wet brown hair plastered over her ears, she hurried on joyfully: "And we had sold almost all of them, too, before the rain started."
The third teen-ager, a plump red-faced boy, gazed in awe at Nina and squeaked: "Are you in the organization?"
"That's right," Nina said thinly.
The girls mopped at their drenched clothes, struggled to dry their hair, exuded the smell of wet fabric and excitement. "Say," one of them noticed, "this is an official car."
The first girl, small and sharp-faced, with large interested eyes, said shyly to Cussick: "Do you have a Crusade button?"
"No," Cussick answered shortly. The irony of it hit home: this was a typical group of young fanatics, peddling buttons to raise Crusade funds. Standing on street comers, stopping cars and pedestrians, shoppers and commuters, faces flushed and alive with the fervor of their cause. In the four young faces he saw nothing but innocent excitement; for them, the Crusade was a great and noble thing; a spiritual salvation.
"Would you—" the little sharp-faced girl began, glancing up at him timidly, "would you like to buy a Crusade button?"
"Sure," Cussick said. "Why not?" He dug into his pocket. "How much?"
Nina made a strangled sound and ducked her head; he ignored her as he fished out a few crumpled bills.
"Ten dollars is the usual," the girl said, reaching quickly into her wicker basket for a button. "Anything you want... it's for a good cause."
He gave her the money; gravely, hesitantly, she pinned the button on his coat. There it hung, a small shield of bright plastic, with the raised sword of the Crusade superimposed on the familiar crossed-flasks. It gave him an unhappy and intricate feeling to sense it there. Suddenly he reached forward and lifted a second button from the wicker basket.
"Here," he said gently to Nina: "For you."
Solemnly, he pinned it on her coat. Nina smiled faintly and reached out to touch his hand.
"Now we all have one," the sharp-faced girl said shyly.
Cussick paid her for the second button, and she scrupulously put the money with the other contributions. The six people in the back seat rode on through the rain, silent and subdued, each deep in his own thoughts. Cussick wondered what the four kids would be doing and thinking in a few more days. God knew... God and Jones, the two of them knew. He certainly didn't.