Cemetery World (23 page)

“Not,” said O’Gillicuddy, “if you have two war machines standing just outside, loaded for bear and ready. They’ll make all the difference.”

“But how can you be sure the war machines …”

“You asked them, didn’t you, to be at a certain place at a certain time?”

“Yes, we did,” I said.

“All right, then. You will see Maxwell Peter Bell and you will let him know that you can prove he is using Cemetery as a cache for smuggled artifacts and you will tell him …”

“But smuggling artifacts is not against the law.”

“No, of course it’s not. But can you imagine what will happen to Mother Earth’s carefully polished image if it should be known what is being done? There would be a smell not only of dishonesty but of ghoulery about it that would take them years to wipe away, if they ever could.”

“It might work,” I said, somewhat reluctant to admit it. 

“You will explain to him most carefully,” said O’Cillicuddy, “being sure he does not mistake your meaning or intent, that you might just possibly find it unnecessary to say anything about it if he should agree to certain actions.”

O’Gillicuddy counted the actions on his fingers, one by one. “Cemetery will agree to donate to Alden University all its holdings in artifacts, being very vigilant in recovering and turning over all that they have hidden, and henceforth will desist from any dealing in them. Cemetery will provide the necessary shipping to transport the artifacts to Alden and immediately will implement the establishment of regular passenger service to Earth at a rate consistent with other travel fares throughout the galaxy, providing reasonably priced accommodations for tourists and Pilgrims who may wish to visit Earth. Cemetery will establish and maintain museums to house the collection of historic artifacts collected since mankind’s beginning by a certain devoted student who is designated by the name of Ronex from the planet Abernax. Cemetery will …”

“That is the census-taker?” Cynthia asked.

“That is the census-taker,” said O’Gillicuddy, “and now if I might proceed …”

“There’s one thing,” said Cynthia, “that still bothers me a lot. What about Wolf? Why should he first be hunting us and then…”

“Wolf,” said O’Gillicuddy, “was not exactly a metal wolf. He was one of the census-taker’s robots that had been infiltrated into Cemetery’s wolf pack. The census-taker, as you must understand, was no one’s fool, and he kept a hand in almost everything transpiring on the Earth. And now if I may proceed …”

“Please do,” said Cynthia.

O’Gillicuddy went on, counting off the points on his fingers. “Cemetery is to contribute funds and all necessary resources to a research program aimed at a reliable system of temporal travel. Cemetery likewise is to contribute all necessary funds and resources to another research program aimed at discovering and developing a method by which human personalities can be transferred in their entireties to a robotic brain and once such a method is developed the first objects of such transfers shall be a group of beings known as shades now existing on the planet Earth and …”

“That’s how you …” said Cynthia.

“That’s how I came to be as you see me now. But to go on. Cemetery shall agree to the appointment of a galactic watchdog commission which will not only see to it that the provisions of this agreement are carried out, but which shall, in perpetuity, examine Cemetery’s books and actions and make recommendations for the conducting of its business.”

He came to a stop.

“And that is it?” I asked.

“That is it,” he told me. “I hope we thought of everything.”

“I believe you did,” I told him. “Now, if Cemetery will only buy it.”

“I think they already have,” said O’Gillicuddy. “You are here, aren’t you? And I am here and the museum’s here and the temporal selector is waiting for you.”

“You thought of everything,” said Cynthia, with some scorn and anger. “There is one thing you forgot. What about Fletcher’s composition? How could you have forgotten that? If it hadn’t been for his dream of making a composition, none of this would have come about. You don’t know how he worked for it and dreamed of it and …”

“I thought you might ask that,” said O’Gillicuddy. “If you’ll just step across the hall to the auditorium …”

“You mean you have it here!”

“Of course we have it here. Mr. Carson and Bronco did a splendid job of it. It is a masterpiece. It has lived all these years. It will live forever.”

I shook my head, bewildered.

“What’s the matter, Mr. Carson?” asked O’Gillicuddy. “You should be very pleased.”

“Don’t you see what you’ve done,” said Cynthia, angrily, her eyes bright with tears. “Experiencing it would spoil it all. How could you possibly suggest that he see and hear and feel a work he has not even done? You should not have told him. Now it will always be in the back of his mind that he must create a masterpiece. He wasn’t even thinking about a masterpiece. He was just planning to do a competent piece of work and now you …”

I put out a hand to stop her. “It’s all right,” I said. “I’ll know, of course. But Bronco will be there with me. He’ll keep me to the mark.”

“Well, in such a case,” said O’Gillicuddy, rising, “there is just one more thing for you to do before you go back to your time. There are some friends waiting outside to say hello to you.”

He came spidering around the table on his unhuman legs attached to his unhuman body and we followed him out the door, down the corridor, and across the foyer.

They were lined up outside the porch, the five of them, waiting there for us—the war machines, Elmer and Bronco and Wolf.

It was a little awkward. We stood on the porch, looking at them and they looked back at us.

“We’ll be waiting for you when you go back,” said Elmer. “We’ll all be waiting for you.”

“I can understand the war machines being there,” said Cynthia. “We asked them to meet us, but you …”

“Wolf came and got us,” said Bronco.

“How could he?” I asked. “You were out to get him. You’d already gotten two of his fellows and …”

“He play it cute,” said Bronco. “He make to play with us. He romp all around us, keeping out of reach. He lay down on his back and kick his legs in air. He grin at us with teeth. We figure he want us to follow him. He make it seem important.”

Wolf grinned at us—with teeth.

“It’s time to go,” said O’Gillicuddy. “We only wanted you to be sure they would be waiting for you.”

We turned and followed him back into the building.

I said to Cynthia, “It will soon be over for you. You can go back to Alden and fill Thorney in with everything that happened…”

“I’m not going back,” she said.

“But I don’t see …”

“You’ll be going on with your composition. Would you have room for an apprentice assistant?”

“I think I would,” I said.

“You remember, Fletch, what you told me when we thought we were trapped back there in time? You said that you would love me. I intend to hold you to that “

I reached out and found her hand.

I wanted to be held to it.

The End