This Fortress World (11 page)

—and I left there with over one thousand chronors in hard money, fifty rings, a half-dozen watches, some of them platinum, and three diamonds, the smallest as big as my little fingernail—

—now this one was noble—

—sign on with one who's going places—a leader who hasn't got much but a flame in his eyes—and you've got a chance for promotion, wealth—maybe even a barony—

—should have been at the loot of Journey's End. God! What a place! Why—

—Was I sorry to leave Arcadia! And was she sorry to see me leave—

—there we were, practically in the middle of this sun's corona, and the Captain—

—class is class, I always say—

—so I says to her, Baby, for five chronors—

—three years without touching port. Never again—

Chairs pushed back, squealing protest. A woman torn from a silver-and-black lap to stand panting and glowing-eyed and a little afraid by the side of scarlet-and-gold. Silver-and-black rising, weaving slightly, making ugly noises and waving his hands menacingly in the air. Scarlet-and-gold moving forward, fists balled, sneering. Arms reaching out behind them, pulling them down into chairs. Silver-and-black finding another woman in his lap, talking to scarlet-and-gold in a gay, friendly, ribald fashion.

The world turned around me.…It turned against a background of melody, a clear girl-voice in front of singing chords—not a great voice or even a very good one but a voice which was more than both, a friendly voice, a sincere voice. It was a good voice for what it sang; men listened and were moved to tears or laughter or passion. Occasionally, through the chaos of noise and my own dulled senses, I heard a voice come clear…

'I knew a man on Arcadee.

I knew a few on Brancusee.

And Lord! they were all men to me

No matter what men say…'

—so the Captain, he says to the Navigator, kind of slow and nasty-like, "All right, Mr. Navigator, just where do you think we—"

—wanted money, see? And I said, Baby—

—and the Navigator said, "Captain, I'll be hanged if I know where we are." And the Captain said—

'The stars are free
Though men be slaves.
Imprison me—
The stars are free.
And when the slaves
Look up, they see—
The stars are free
Though men be slaves.…'

I stared at the pale yellow stuff in my glass. I lifted it up to my lips, sipped it. It was vile, sweet, cloying-wine.

—All right, Swifty, you've had your drink, now get out and don't come back
!

The words were repeated, louder, before I realized that they were directed at me. I looked up slowly, past a swelling orange-and-blue belly; up and up to a big, unshaven face, red with anger and wine. I stared at him curiously.

"We don't like your kind, Swifty," the mercenary said. "Better leave while you can still walk."

He swayed. Or maybe it was my eyes. I started to get to my feet, slowly, undecided whether I disliked his remark and his heavy, arrogant face enough to change them. Somewhere in the back of my mind, a voice, cold and analytical, was whispering that I would never get out of the place alive if I hit him. I decided that I didn't care. I didn't like his remark. I didn't like the way his mouth moved. I disliked his face intensely. It would be a pleasure.

Something slipped between us. Beardy orange-and-blue was pushed back. I was shoved down into my seat.

"Leave him alone," a clear voice said. "Can't you see he's sick?"

"Aw, Laurie," the mercenary complained like a little boy, "you'd comfort a mad dog. But this—"

"Leave him alone!" the voice said. Clear and bell-like and angry. Orange-and-blue faded away. Something jangled as it was leaned against the edge of the table. Something yellow and flesh pink and red and blue and dark brown slipped into the seat opposite me.

"I'm not sick," I said. It sounded surly. It was surly. I focused my eyes on her. Close, she was still pretty, even prettier, maybe. Her face was young, but her eyes, as they looked into mine, were blue and deep and wise.
A man could lose his soul in eyes like those,
I thought crazily.
Laurie. Laurie.
I liked the sound of that. I kept saying it over and over in my mind.

"You
are
sick," she said. "Up here." She tapped her forehead where the dark hair swept back smoothly at the temple. "But that isn't why I said it. I had to get Mike away before he got killed. He's a friend of mine. I don't like to have my friends killed."

I studied her face, wondering what it was that made her so attractive. "I don't like to see my friends killed either. But they die, they die. And you realize that you don't really have any friends. No friends. That makes sense, doesn't it? You don't have any friends, so you don't care if they die. You think I'd have killed him?"

She nodded slowly. "Oh, yes. You don't care any more. You don't care if you live or die. That makes you the most deadly thing in the galaxy."

"Almost the deadest, too," I said bitterly. I looked away. "You're right. I think I'd have killed him. Then the others would have killed me. But a man gets tired of running away. He runs so far and then he stops, and he won't run any more."

"Killing never solves anything," she said gently.

I looked into her eyes again. They asked me to listen, to understand. I laughed harshly. "It solves the problem of who gets killed, you or the other fellow. You don't know."

"I know."

"Yesterday—yesterday I would have agreed with you. Yesterday I would have done anything to keep from killing." I felt my lip curl up at the corner. "Yesterday I was a fool. Since then I've learned that if you want to live you have to kill. Since then I've killed four men."

She reached out quickly and laid her hand over mine. There was something maternal about it, like a mother soothing a child. "It hurts, doesn't it?"

I jerked my hand away. "What do you know?" I said. "The world is ugly. The world is disease and death, torture and betrayal, cruelty and lust and hate and fear and greed—Why shouldn't I kill? I've seen the face of the world. It's a grinning skull. It wants my life. It would like to tear it out of me, agony by agony. Who can blame me if I fight back? Why shouldn't I kill?"

"Because you're a man," she said.

"I'm an Agent. They aren't men."

"Even they. But you're no Agent."

I looked up quickly. The movement made my head swim, and it was a moment before her face came back into focus. Her eyes, wide and compassionate and deep, drew mine like a promise of peace and understanding.

"You don't know that," I said weakly. But it was no use. She knew. Nothing I told her would be a surprise or a shock; to her nothing was alien; nothing would change her belief in mankind. I felt a formless sort of relief, like a storm-beaten wanderer who sees a light far off and knows that somewhere in the world there is comfort and shelter and warmth. Even if he can never reach it himself.

"Look at your hands," she said. She took my hand again and turned it palm up on the table. "No calluses. They're white and well-formed, except where the burn is. But it's more than that. You don't walk like a killer or carry yourself like one. You don't have the arrogance and the wariness. And your face—ugly as it is"—she smiled as if ugliness had a charm all its own—"you can't change the lines of a lifetime with a few days of terror and violence."

Laurie…Laurie.
I looked away. "Laurie. You're Laurie. What do you do?"

"Me? I—entertain."

"Here?"

"Here and elsewhere."

"It can't pay much."

"Oh, this is just for fun." She smiled. "I like to sing. I like to see people happy."

"These?" I swept a hand at the bawdy, drunken crowd.

"Even these." It was the second time she had used a phrase like that. It was like an affirmation of faith. I saw—in a flash of insight—that there was something between the Church and the carnivorous world. Or perhaps not between, either, but above.

It hit me like a blow. I began to shiver. "My God!" I said. It came out like a sob. "Oh God, oh God, oh God!" I could feel tears springing into my eyes. I blinked rapidly but they kept coming. My shoulders began to shake, and I couldn't stop them. "What's the matter with me?" I gasped.

"Don't hold it back," Laurie said softly. "Let go, if you feel like it."

I put my head down on the table and cried. I had one of her hands in mine, under my head, and I bathed it with tears. I wept for all the evil in the world, for all those who labored and saw no end to their labors, for all those who suffered and saw no end to their suffering, for all those who went on living because their only other choice was death. I wept because I had met kindness for the first time.

I felt a small hand on my head, smoothing my bristly hair gently. "Poor boy," she whispered. "What are you running from? Why are you running? Is it as terrible as all that?" Her voice was a soft thread of melody, weaving around and around me, insulating me in a soft cocoon of words and sympathy and gentle kindness.

Laurie! I will never tell you the answer to those questions. You must never know, for the truth is a deadly thing.
…

Her hand stiffened on my head, pressing down firmly so that I couldn't lift. Instinctively, I tried to raise up; her hand pressed down harder. The room was suddenly as silent as space.

"Don't move!" she whispered. "They're in the doorway, standing there, just like you did, searching the room. Maybe they'll go away if they don't find what they're looking for."

"Who?" I whispered. "Who are they? Tell me!"

"Agents," she breathed. "Three of them. Not imitations like you. They're the real thing, as deadly as coiled snakes. They haven't moved yet. Now they're looking this way." I felt her hand tremble. "What cold, black eyes!"

"Who?" My voice was harsh and low. "Who is it? What does he look like?"

"Dark—amused—cold. He has a big nose. Not a funny nose. A terrible nose."

Sabatini
! I shivered.

"Don't move!" There was terror in her voice. Then she sighed. "They looked away. They're going to leave. No! The dark one has called them back. They're coming into the room!"

I struggled to raise my head, but she would not let it come up. She lowered her face close to mine. I felt the silken touch of hair against my cheek. I felt the whisper of breath against my ear, sweet breath, breath coming fast.

"Listen carefully. There's a door straight back from here. It opens into an alley. When you get a chance, go there quickly. Wait there for me, in the alley. I'm going to get Mike to come over here. Hit him! Hit him hard! But please—don't hurt him any more than you have to. Understand?"

"Don't!" I said. "Don't get.…"

She screamed. It was indignation and outrage. As she lifted her hand, my head came up. She slapped my face viciously. The new pain on the old burn brought tears back to my eyes. My teeth grated together.

I felt a steel grip on my shoulder. Orange-and-blue was there, to my left. Here and there in the room, men were standing, looking toward us. Beyond them I caught a glimpse of black clothing.

"You slimy sewer rat," Orange-and-blue said savagely. "You foul everything you touch. Why don't you stay with your own kind, where we won't be bothered by the smell of you? Now I'm going to break you in two with my bare hands." His hand tightened.

As if moved by a volition of its own, my hand flicked the glass resting on the table. The dregs of the yellow wine splattered in his face. I stood up, tearing the table from the floor with my straightening legs, swinging my fist as I rose. It disappeared into the orange-and-blue belly with a solid, splatting sound. He folded in the middle, and his face looked pained and unhappy. His hand released my shoulder. I started to swing again, for his face, but I remembered Laurie and opened my fist and shoved him hard. He staggered back across the room, splintering the tables and chairs in his path, scattering men to either side.

In a second the room was a melee of crunching fists and arms and feet. Women's screams split the air, the hoarse shouts and grunts of fighting men knit it heavily together again, the shattering of bottles and glasses was a kind of music. The thin, pungent odor of alcohol fumed up.

I turned toward Laurie. Her blue eyes begged me. Her mouth shaped a single, silent syllable: Go.

I turned. I went. For a moment a narrow aisle opened between struggling bodies, an aisle that led to the rear. I plunged through it, one shoulder thrust forward. Men bounced off the shoulder, back into the crazy montage of fists and flashes of color and torn, bleeding faces. I reached the door. I struggled with the lock for a moment, gave up, pulled. Wood splintered. The door swung open. I stepped out into the cool, quiet night and shut the door behind me on carnage and man's brutality.

I breathed deeply for a moment, my back against the door.

"Wait for me," Laurie had said.
Wait? Wait here to bring death to you? Wait here like death to draw you close with bony arms and press your face with fleshless lips? Wait? No, Laurie. There may be peace and quiet here, but you are better off back there. Death is peace, too; death is quietness.

The end of the alley was framed with lights. I started walking toward the lights, feeling cold and lonely and lost.

Good-by, Laurie. Good-by.

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The dream was upon me like a smothering blanket. I writhed under it, helpless to change it, unable to wake. I dreamed about the running, the dark, the silence, and the fear, the feet that chased me, the burning of my hand, and the dropping of the coal and the shame and the emptiness…

Both of them were there, Frieda and Laurie, first one and then the other, and sometimes fading together into one person who was both of them. Frieda would give me the egg-shaped crystal pebble, and I would try to hold it, tightly, but it would vanish and Laurie would give it to me again. And sometimes they would be together, friendly, and seem to whisper although I couldn't hear a sound, and they would look at me and smile or shake their heads or laugh. And Frieda faded away and then there was only Laurie.