We the Underpeople (51 page)

The bear-woman fled with a rustle of her starched skirts.

When Crudelta looked directly at him, Jestocost gave him a very deep bow. In lifting his eyes he looked directly into the face of the old, old man and said, with something near pride in his voice,

"Still up to your old tricks, my Lord and Colleague Crudelta!"

"And you to yours, Jestocost. How are you going to get that boy out of the sewers?"

"What boy? What sewers?"

"Our sewers. The boy you sold this tower to."

For once, Jestocost was flabbergasted. His jaw dropped. Then he collected himself and said, "You're a knowledgeable man, my Lord Crudelta."

"That I am," said Crudelta, "and a thousand years older than you, to boot. That was my reward for coming back from the Nothing-at-all."

"I know that, sir." Jestocost's full, pleasant face did not show worry, but he studied the old man across from him with extreme care. In his prime, the Lord Crudelta had been the greatest of the Lords of the Instrumentality, a telepath of whom the other Lords were always a little afraid, because he picked minds so deftly and quickly that he was the best mental pickpocket who had ever lived. A strong conservative, he had never opposed a specific policy because it ran counter to his general appetites. He had, for example, carried the vote for the Rediscovery of Man by coming out of retirement and tongue-lashing the whole Council into a corner with his vehement support for reform. Jestocost had never liked him—who could like a rapier tongue, a mind of unfathomable brilliance, a cold old ego which neither offered nor asked companionship? Jestocost knew that if the old man had caught on to the Rod McBan adventure, he might be on the trail of Jestocost's earlier deal with—no, no, no! don't think it here, not with those eyes watching.

"I know about that, too," said the old old man.

"What?"

"The secret you are trying most of all to hide."

Jestocost stood submissive, waiting for the blow to fall.

The old man laughed. Most people would have expected a cackle from that handsome fresh young face with the withered spidery body. They would have been fooled. The laugh was full-bodied, genuine and warm.

"Redlady's a fool," said Crudelta.

"I think so too," said Jestocost, "but what are your reasons, my Lord and Master?"

"Sending that young man off his own planet when he has so much wealth and so little experience."

Jestocost nodded, not wanting to say anything until the old man had made his line of attack plain.

"I like your idea, however," said the Lord Crudelta. "Sell him the Earth and then tax him for it. But what is your ultimate aim? Making him Emperor of the Planet Earth, in the old style? Murdering him? Driving him mad? Having the cat-girl of yours seduce him and then send him home a bankrupt? I admit I have thought of all these too, but I didn't see how any of them would fit in with your passion for justice. But there's one thing you can't do, Jestocost. You can't sell him the planet Earth and then have him stay here and manage it. He might want to use this tower for his residence. That would be too much. I am too old to move out. And he mustn't roll up that ocean out there and take it home for a souvenir. You've all been very clever, my Lord—clever enough to be fools. You have created an unnecessary crisis. What are you going to get out of it?"

Jestocost plunged. The old man must have picked his own mind. Nowhere else could he have put all the threads of the case together. Jestocost decided on the truth and the whole truth. He started with the day that the Big Blink rang in the enormous transactions in stroon futures, financial gambles which soon reached out of the commodity markets of Old North Australia and began to unbalance the economy of all the civilized worlds. He started to explain who Redlady was—

"Don't tell me that," cried the Lord Crudelta. "It was I who caught him, sentenced him to death, and then argued to have the sentence set aside. He's not a bad man, but he's a sly one, that he is. He's smart enough to be an utter and complete fool when he gets wound up in his logical plots. I'll wager you a minicredit to a credit that he has already murdered somebody by now. He always does. He has a taste for theatrical violence. But go back to your story. Tell me what you plan to do. If I like it, I will help you. If I don't like it, I will have the whole story before a plenum of the Council this very morning, and you know that they will tear your bright idea to shreds. They will probably seize the boy's property, send him to a hospital, and have him come out speaking Basque as a flamenco player. You know as well as I do that the Instrumentality is very generous with other people's property, but pretty ruthless when it comes to any threat directed against itself. After all, I was one of the men who wiped out Raumsog."

Jestocost began to talk very quietly, very calmly. He spoke with the assurance of an accountant who, books in order, is explaining an intricate point to his manager. Old himself, he was a child compared to the antiquity and wisdom of the Lord Crudelta. He went into details, including the ultimate disposition of Rod McBan. He even shared with the Lord Crudelta his sympathies for the underpeople and his own very secret, very quiet struggle to improve their position. The only thing which he did not mention was the E'telekeli and the counter-brain which the underpeople had set up in Downdeep-downdeep. If the old man knew it, he knew it, and Jestocost couldn't stop him, but if he did not know it, there was no point in telling him.

The Lord Crudelta did not respond with senile enthusiasm or childish laughter. He reverted, not to his childhood but to his maturity; with great dignity and force he said:

"I approve. I understand. You have my proxy if you need it. Call that nurse to come and get me. I thought you were a clever fool, Jestocost. You sometimes are. This time you are showing that you have a heart as well as a head. One thing more. Bring that doctor Vomact back from Mars soon, and don't torment Teadrinker too long, just for the sake of being clever. I might take it into my mind to torment you."

"And the ex-Lord Redlady?" asked Jestocost deferentially.

"Him, nothing. Nothing. Let him live his life. The Old North Australians might as well cut their political teeth on him."

The bear-woman rustled back into the room. The Lord Crudelta waved his hand. Jestocost bowed almost to the floor, and the wheelchair, heavy as a tank, creaked its way across the doorsill.

"That," said Jestocost, "could have been trouble!" He wiped his brow.

Rod, C'mell and A'gentur had had to hold the sides of the shaft several times as the traffic became heavy and large loads, going up or down, had to pass each other and them too. In one of these waits C'mell caught her breath and said something very swiftly to the little monkey. Rod, not heeding them, caught nothing but the sudden enthusiasm and happiness in her voice. The monkey's murmured answer made her plaintive and she insisted,

"But, Yeekasoose, you must! Rod's whole life could depend on it. Not just saving his life now, but having a better life for hundreds and hundreds of years."

The monkey was cross: "Don't ask me to think when I am hungry. This fast metabolism and small body just isn't enough to support real thinking."

"If it's food you want, have some raisins." She took a square of compressed seedless raisins out of one of her matching bags.

A'gentur ate them greedily but gloomily.

Rod's attention drifted away from them as he saw magnificent golden furniture, elaborately carved and inlaid with a pearlescent material, being piloted up the shaft by a whole troop of talkative dog-men. He asked them where the furniture was going. When they did not answer him, he repeated his question in a more peremptory tone of voice, as befitted the richest Old North Australian in the universe. The tone of demand brought answers, but they were not the ones he was expecting. "Meow," said one dog-man. "Shut up, cat, or I'll chase you up a tree." "Not to your house, buster. Exactly what do you think you are—people?" "Cats are always nosy. Look at that one." The dog-foreman rose into sight; with dignity and kindness he said to Rod, "Cat-fellow, if you feel like talking, you may get marked surplus. Better keep quiet in the public dropshaft!" Rod realized that to these beings he was one of them, a cat made into a man, and that the underpeople workmen who served Old Earth had been trained not to chatter while working on the business of Man.

He caught the tail of C'mell's urgent whisper to A'gentur: ". . . and don't ask him.
Tell Him.
We'll risk the people zone for a visit to the Catmaster!
Tell Him.
"

A'gentur was panting with a rapid, shallow breath. His eyes seemed to protrude from their sockets and yet he was looking at nothing. He groaned as though with some inward effort. At last he lost his grip on the wall and would have floated slowly downward if C'mell had not caught him and cuddled him like a baby. C'mell whispered, eagerly,

"You reached Him?"

"Him," gasped the little monkey.

"Who?" asked Rod.

"Aitch Eye," said C'mell. "I'll tell you later." Of A'gentur she asked, "If you got Him, what did He say?"

"He said, 'E'ikasus, I do not say no. You are my son. Take the risk if you think it wise.' And don't ask me now, C'mell. Let me think a little. I have been all the way to Norstrilia and back. I'm still cramped in this little body. Do we have to do it now? Right now? Why can't we go to Him"—and A'gentur nodded toward the depths below—"and find out what we want Rod for, anyhow? Rod is a means, not an end. Who really knows what to do with him?"

"What are you talking about?" said Rod.

Simultaneously C'mell snapped, "I know what we are going to do with him."

"What?" said the little monkey, very tired again.

"We're going to let this boy go free, and let him find happiness, and if he wants to give us his help, we will take it and be grateful. But we are not going to rob him. Not going to hurt him. That would be a mean, dirty way to start being better creatures than we are. If he knows who he is before he meets Him, they can make sense." She turned to Rod and said with mysterious urgency,

"Don't you want to
know
who you are?"

"I'm Rod McBan to the hundred and fifty-first," said he promptly.

"Sh-h-h," said she, "no names here. I'm not talking about names. I'm talking about the deep insides of you. Life itself, as it flows through you. Do you have any idea who you are?"

"You're playing games," he said. "I know perfectly well who I am, and where I live, and what I have. I even know that right now I am supposed to be a cat-man named C'roderick. What else is there to know?"

"You men!" she sobbed at him. "You men! Even when you're people, you're so dense that you can't understand a simple question. I'm not asking you your name or your address or your label or your greatgrandfather's property. I'm asking about
you,
Rod, the only one that will ever live, no matter how many numbers your grandsons may put after their names. You're not in the world just to own a piece of property or to handle a surname with a number after it. You're
you.
There's never been another you. There will never be another one, after you. What does this 'you' want?"

Rod glanced down at the walls of the tunnel, which seemed to turn—oh, so far below—very gently to the north. He looked up at the little rhomboids of light cast on the tunnel walls by the landing doors into the various levels of Earthport. He felt his own weight tugging gently at his hand as he held to the rough surface of the vertical shaft, supported by his belt. The belt itself felt uncomfortable about his middle; after all, it was supporting most of his weight, and it squeezed him.
What do I want?
thought he.
Who am I that I should have a right to want anything? I am Rod McBan CLI, the Mister and Owner of the Station of Doom. But I'm also a poor freak with bad telepathy who can't even spiek or hier rightly.

C'mell was watching him as clinically as a surgeon, but he could tell from her expression that she was not trying to peep his mind.

He found himself speaking almost as wearily as had A'gentur, who was also called something like "Yeekasoose," and who had strange powers for a little monkey:

"I don't suppose I want anything much, C'mell, except that I should like to spiek and hier correctly, like other people on my native world."

She looked at him, her expression showing intense sympathy and the effort to make a decision.

A'gentur interrupted with his high clear monkey voice, "Say that to me, Sir and Master."

Rod repeated: "I don't really want anything. I would like to spiek and hier because other people are fussing at me about it. And I would like to get a Cape of Good Hope twopenny triangular blue stamp while I am still on Earth. But that's about all. I guess there's nothing I really want."

The monkey closed his eyes and seemed to fall asleep again; Rod suspected it was some kind of telepathic trance.

C'mell hooked A'gentur on an old rod which protruded from the surface of the shaft. Since he weighed only a few grams, there was no noticeable pull on the belt. She seized Rod's shoulder and pulled him over to her.

"Rod, listen! Do you want to know who you are?"

"I don't know," said he. "I might be miserable."

"Not if you
know
who you are!" she insisted.

"I might not like me," said Rod. "Other people don't and my parents died together when their ship went milky out in space. I'm not normal."

"For God's sake, Rod!" she cried.

"Who?" said he.

"Forgive me, father," said she, speaking to no one in sight.

"I've heard that name, before, somewhere," said Rod. "But let's get going. I want to get to this mysterious place you are taking me and then I want to find out about Eleanor."

"Who's that?"

"My servant. She's disguised as me, taking risks for me, along with eight robots. It's up to me to do what I can for her. Always."

"But she's your
servant,
" said C'mell. "She serves you. Almost like being an underperson, like me."