The PLANET of SHAME

By BRUCE ELLIOTT

Illustrated by FINLAY

_One day, James Comstock's father took James
aside and started to tell him the facts of life. Which
was not so unusual--except that James was 35._

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Amazing Stories May and June 1961.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]


[Illustration: At 35, James Comstock was still an infant when it came
to knowing what life was all about.]

AT THE END....

The three who had endured so much sat and waited. Their reward was in
sight. When you have fought for so long against forces strong beyond
imagining, when you have struggled in despair, lived without hope,
success when it finally comes, is almost anti-climactic. Despite the
traps, the violence, the hurts, the fear, they were now where they had
wanted to be.

They sat quietly, their hands folded, and if any feeling of triumph
was in them, it was so muted as not to be observable. At that precise
moment, when they sat in the ante-room, waiting for their reward,
waiting to become part of the Board of Fathers, working directly under
The Grandfather, the only common emotion they shared was that they had
fought the good fight. Fought as hard as it is in a person to fight for
what they consider right....

The door opened and The Grandfather was in the room. His visage was
marked by a high hooked nose, broad high forehead, and deep set harsh
blue eyes, focussed on the middle distance. His strong old hands were
crossed on his stomach just below his patriarchal beard.

It was hard to believe.

Hard to believe that they, or anyone below the rank of Father would
ever actually behold Him in the flesh.

When he spoke his voice was all the things they had known it would
be. Deep as an organ bass, calm, full of authority, stern yet with a
leavening of those other things that make up the whole man, his voice
was almost gentle as he said, "Follow me, please."

They rose and feeling like children, followed his tall spare back out
of the ante-room, into that other room where the Board waited for them.

There was no fear in them now as there would have been a year ago. For
they were not coming before the Board for judgment, but to be rewarded.

The Grandfather said, "These three are the ones...."

There was silence.

"They have come to join us," The Grandfather said.

The silence expanded.

"Gentlemen, Fathers all, these are the three new Fathers." The
Grandfather's voice faded away and there was no other sound. None of
the ten men who made up the Board of Fathers said a word.

But the three who had fought their way up to this eminence stood in
silence and looking about them, examined the ten men with whom they
would now share the control of their whole world.

This was the moment of their triumph.




                               CHAPTER 1


When the first space ship landed on that pleasant world (the only
pleasant planet of which Alpha Centauri could boast) the crew was so
happy to get rid of the passengers that they took off the moment they
could. Not even the interminable boredom of the return trip was enough
to make them want to stay in anything like proximity with the thirty
men and thirty women who had been sentenced to be marooned as far from
earth as was humanly possibly.

There had been maximum security prisons in the past. But this was the
ultimate maximum. When the ship took off, the prisoners were isolated
as no human beings ever had been in the recorded history of men.

It was part of a plan of course. Earth did want the planet inhabited
just as earlier powers had wanted Mars colonized. But when no
volunteers appeared despite the cleverest high pressure advertising
campaigns, the alternative became clear. If no one wanted to go to the
new planet, to New Australia, then someone would have to be forced to
go there.

It was just too bad for the exiles, but they could not protest too
loudly, since they had long since forfeited any claim on anyone's
sympathy. A little back eddy of intransigent inner-directed people,
fanatics in a world of other-directed humans, positive that they, and
they alone, knew what was good and what was evil; the world heaved a
communal sigh of relief when they were taken away. Attempting, as these
sixty had, to turn back the clock, to bring back into being the dark
days of the twenty-second century, was such a horrid crime as to merit
even so harsh a sentence as they received.

       *       *       *       *       *

The first hundred and fifty years on New Australia were, in a way,
difficult. But not too difficult. To these inner-directed people
fighting for existence on a new planet was precisely the kind of
crusade which to them was worth living.

Five hundred years after they established themselves, their last
scientist managed to set up a system of protective devices which
prevented any communication with Mother Earth at all. No earth ship
landed or took off, and no other means of communication had yet been
devised that would work in interstellar space.

A thousand years later even the memory of earth had faded and grown
dim. There were mentions of it of course in old books, but they were
not the kind of books that these people read.

Their sun rose and set, their erratic moon rose when it seemed to feel
like it, and sank seemingly just as randomly, their days were full and
to them worth living.

All sixty of the first settlers had married. Sixty humans, thirty
family names. They were, to these people, good names, and therefore
there had never been felt any need for new patronymics.

The planet's sprawling surface now contained millions of people but all
of them shared thirty last names. It was nothing for anyone to question
since to them this had always been the case. Science as such was an
unknown word. It was one of the things that the original sixty settlers
had fought against. When they made their brave new world, science was
one of the earth things that was jettisoned. This, of course, led to
some strange circumstances....

James Comstock 101 had reached maturity. At thirty-five he felt that
the time had come for him to leave the home nest and go out on his own.
His mother, as was to be expected, fought against his plans. But dad
came through, as good old dad would.

Dad had said, "Now mother, admittedly Jimmy is still a little boy, but
even little boys have a right to strike out for themselves."

"But Father," mother only called him that when something serious was
under discussion, for after all, "Father" was a term of ... Jimmy
didn't know quite what to think of it as ... power? Awe? It was, in
any event, a word that one did not bandy about.

"But Father," mother had become embarrassed, and surely that was a
blush on her cheeks, "did you ... have you ever ... that is ... what
about ... oh, you know."

Father had looked very serious. He had said, his voice deep in his
chest, "You're right, of course. Come, son."

Then had come that conversation which had stunned Jimmy, opened up
vistas unheard of, unthought of, really. So that was where babies came
from.... If anyone but his Father had told him about it he'd have
struck them, perhaps killed them. To think that his mother had suffered
through such an abysmal, horrible experience ... and the results of
that experience.... Tremors swept through him in retrospect.

But that had been five years previously and Jimmy had become a man then
under his father's aegis. That first time had been cataclysmically
awful. The whole atmosphere of that place had been so foreign to him
that it was only because he knew that his father was waiting downstairs
in the parlor, waiting for a good report from the fallen woman that
enabled Jimmy to go through with it at all. Not that the woman had
waxed very enthusiastic, but then, a creature like that....

       *       *       *       *       *

His monthly visits to the brothel were now part of his being and
although he still did not relish going, he forced himself to, for after
all it was part of the duty of a man. He did so wish, however, that it
was not necessary. Life would be so much simpler if he could just skip
the whole unsavory thing.

Sighing, he pressed the button on the door. Inside the curtained window
the brash lights of the place, red as sin, shone on his weakly handsome
face. The tinkle of the piano droned on.

Swinging the door wide, the fat madame said jovially, "Jimmy my boy.
Come on in and let joy be unrefined."

Shuddering delicately and wishing that the madame would not be quite so
robust, Jimmy inched his way into the parlor. The red plush chairs and
the dingy lights were just as they always were. At the piano the little
man looked up, said, "Hi-ya, Jimmy, how's every little thing?"

"Pretty good, professor, pretty good." The whole conversation was as
stereotyped as the act which would follow it. Sometimes Jimmy wished
that just once the madame would sneer at him, or the professor be
grouchy, but they never were.

Lydia came down the stairs, her wrapper as dirty and unkempt as it
always was. He wondered if she had a succession of these wrappers all
equally dilapidated, or if she owned just one which she managed to keep
looking the same way all the time.

Jimmy wished too, that Lydia were a little older. It seemed somehow a
little indecent for her to be only forty. A child like that should not
be forced to make a living the way she had to, but then they were all
about her age. Jimmy had shopped around, tried to find an older woman
but had been forced back into Lydia's arms. After all, she had been the
one Father selected for him and good old dad knew best.

She said, "Come on upstairs honey lamb."

He followed her dolefully, averting his eyes from her full breasts
which were altogether too prominent through the tight cloth of the
wrapper.

Her room looked as if it had not been cleaned since the previous month.
Stuck to the mirror was the picture of The Grandfather that always
embarrassed him. The stern old eyes should not be forced to look down
on the scenes in this room. Jimmy had tried to turn the picture to the
wall one time, but Lydia had become hysterical and he had given up. As
a matter of fact it was only after a long argument and an increase in
fee that Jimmy had been able to force her to turn out the light in the
room when they did--what they did.

The old brass bed jingled just as embarrassingly as ever when he sat
down on the edge of it to remove his shoes. It was only by keeping
his eyes on his stockinged feet that he was able to avoid looking at
Lydia who had dropped her wrapper to the floor and was now shamelessly
considering herself in front of the mirror that lined the whole wall.

That had been the main reason he had insisted on the light being
extinguished. The combination of the wall of mirror, the ceiling mirror
and the searching eyes of The Grandfather were just more than he could
bear.

There was no use, he knew, in asking Lydia not to look at her n..e
body. She had told him many times that she enjoyed doing it; there was
no law against it and what was he going to do about it?

Of course there _was_ a law against women admiring themselves in any
way, let alone n..e and in front of a mirror, but the law, of course,
did not apply to p.........s.

Whistling gaily, Lydia dropped onto the bed next to him and wound her
arms about him. Almost dying with embarrassment he mumbled, "Lydia,
the light ... you promised."

Grumbling, she switched off the light. Then it began, again.

But this time, right in the middle, a lancing pain unlike anything he
had ever experienced shot through his heart. The hurt was so great that
he cried out in agony.

Lydia, unknowing, said cheerfully. "Attaboy. That's what I like to
hear."

It was only after he gasped, "Don't ... stop ... my heart ... I think
I'm going to die ..." that she finally stopped and turned on the light.
His face was whiter, much whiter than the grey pillow case under his
head. His lips were purple. He still felt what he could only visualize
as iron fingers pressing into his heart.

Racing out of bed the girl ran towards the door. She gasped. "I'll call
the madame, get a doctor...."

Crouched on the bed in agony, his hand pressing deep into the center
of the pain, he was still able to retain the presence of mind to call
weakly, "Put on your wrapper, Lydia, you can't go out that way."

Then the pain became so great that he passed out.

       *       *       *       *       *

When he opened his eyes he was in bed but it was another bed, with
crisp white linen on it. The pain, he was grateful to find, had eased
up.

The adult woman in the nurse's uniform, who must have been a pleasant
sixty-five, bent over him and whispered, "There, there, you'll feel
much better now."

"The doctor?" he whispered.

"Coming." Her sweet face was wreathed in an angelic smile. Her buxom
body was omnipresent. Wondering what kind of perverted monster he was,
he found that he was fantasying her in Lydia's bed. If only fallen
women were mature, like this one, so many of his problems would be
easier of solution. He guessed he just did not like young chits and
that was all there was to it.

Luckily the doctor entered the room before the fantasy could go too
far. Feeling mentally defiled, he greeted the doctor anxiously, glad of
the interruption. "Doctor, do you know what's wrong with me?"

"Yes son," the white-haired elderly man was slow of speech, he
considered each syllable before he allowed it to leave his thin lips.
His sunken cheeks and hollow eyes were so typical of the whole medical
profession that Jimmy found himself wondering, as he had before, what
there was about doctoring that made men look like this.

"What do I have, doctor?" Jimmy's voice was tremulous.

"I've got bad news for you, son." It must have taken three minutes for
the single sentence to be articulated by the doctor.

Sweating, Jimmy wondered what he had ever done, what commandment he
could have unconsciously broken that was now punishing him for his sin.

"What is the cure, doctor?"

"First," the doctor said, "we must consider the disease."

Jimmy wasn't the least bit interested in what disease he had, there
were cures for all known diseases. But he waited with bated breath to
be told what terrible, what terrifying thing he would have to do in
order to be cured.

"You have," the doctor said even more slowly, "angina pectoris."

Scrambling through his memory, Jimmy tried to remember what heart
patients had to do. All he could think of at the moment was the
treatment for arterio-sclerosis. It was so awful that he found himself
saying a little prayer of thankfulness to The Grandfather, that he did
not have to indulge in that cure. Adultery was the only known cure for
hardening of the arteries and the prospect of what he would have had
to go through made Jimmy almost glad that he had angina. Imagine, he
kept thinking, "I'd have had to get married and then be untrue to my
wife...."

His gratitude faded a little when the doctor's droning voice went on,
"As you may or may not know, son, the only cure for what you've got is
drunkenness. We'll have to make you into an alcoholic, boy. I'm sorry."

The world reeled.

Jimmy had seen drunks, who hadn't, but the thought of having to share
their disgraceful conduct was more than he could bear. He gasped, "I
won't do it. I'd rather die."

"Ummm ..." the doctor said, "a lot of them say that ... but remember,
boy, suicide is what you're talking about!"

Suicide, Jimmy thought sickly, the sin against The Grandfather!

Horrible as the cure for his disease was, he'd have to go through with
it. But what would mother think when he came reeling home, singing
songs, consorting with ... he retched. No more seeing Lydia once a
month, he'd have to consort with fallen women all the time....

Thank Grandfather, he thought dully, that dad is dead. It was the only
thing for which he could feel grateful at the moment.

"Cheer up," the grey-faced doctor said and his voice was if anything
more doleful than before, "be grateful you don't have cancer."

That was another thing for which to be grateful. The cure for cancer
was the only thing he had ever heard of that was more horrible than
that awful cure for arterio-sclerosis.

"Of course," the doctor said, "before we release you, we'll test you
for all the known diseases."

Grandfather above, he thought despairingly, suppose something else is
wrong with me!




                               CHAPTER 2


His heart condition was all the doctor found. Jimmy thought the medical
man was a little grudging in the admission that nothing else was
discernibly wrong, but gratitude that he was not worse off made him
feel a little better.

Leaving the hospital with the lovely, elderly nurse holding him by one
arm, and the doctor on the other side of him, Jimmy looked around him,
at the street, at the people, at the mauve trees with their lovely puce
foliage. It was night and the pale green moon moving in its eccentric
path cast just the faintest tone over the whole scene. Admirably
dressed women, their beautiful shapeless clothes hanging loosely so
that nothing of their bodily contours could be seen, walked sedately
along the black plastic street, their dresses barely avoiding dragging
on the eternal surface with which the last scientists, so many years
ago, had covered the roads and the streets.

Perpetua, it was called, and seemingly it was correctly named. Striving
madly to forget that which awaited him, Jimmy thought wildly about the
street covering, about, in short, everything but the saloon that he was
being escorted to ... would the doctor and the nurse take him through
the swinging doors? Or would he have to make that brave first step all
by himself?

The doctor cleared his throat. "We're almost there, son. Be brave."

Be brave! A fine thing to say. It was easy for the doctor to make
speeches, but he, Jimmy Comstock 101, was the one who was going to have
to enter the foul place!

And then, despite the slowness of his steps, they were finally there.
He realized, looking at the saloon, that he had never really looked at
one of these dens of iniquity before. He had always, in the past, gone
by them with averted eyes.

He reeled, and the lovely nurse, her exquisitely wrinkled face showing
her concern, grabbed at him just in time to prevent him from falling to
his face.

"There, there, Jimmy boy," her cracked voice was so ... soothing
and at the same time so exciting ... he found himself beginning to
fantasy about her again, and it was only this that gave him the bravado
necessary to step through the swinging door.

A gust of beery air hit him in the voice. His throat closed up in
revulsion at the disgusting odor. Behind him he could hear the nurse
say, "Grandfather be with you now!"

And then she and the doctor were gone, and he was alone. Alone in the
moiling turmoil, the frightful, frightening atmosphere of that which he
must become. To the right, the left, everywhere he looked there were
fellow heart disease patients. All of them were treating their disease.
Some seriously, some seeming even to enjoy it, which Jimmy found
impossible of comprehension. One of the ones who seemed to be enjoying
the treatment of his disease staggered up to him with a fog of alcohol
preceding him.

"Hi chum!" The drunk was small and young and seemingly very happy.

Jimmy gulped. "Hello, there, how are you? I'm James Comstock 101. Who
are you?"

"Danny Grundy 112. C'mon kiddo, wancha to meet an old buddy of mine."

The drunk had him by the arm and there was no escape. Grundy pulled
him through the welter of men and women who lined the bar and gulped or
sipped their poisonous yet beneficial potions.

       *       *       *       *       *

Behind the bar a tremendously fat man, a white apron pulled tight
around the huge circumference of what Jimmy thought of as his tummy,
said, "What'll it be? What's your pleasure?"

Jimmy turned to his new found friend and asked, "How can I get drunk
the fastest, easiest way?"

"Leave it to me, old buddy, old sock," Grundy said.

"Maxwell, mix up three of your super-double extra strong corpse
revivers, will you like a pal?"

"Surest thing you know," Max busied himself with bottles containing
oddly colored liquors.

Rather than look at the terrible thing he was going to have to drink,
Jimmy asked, "Where is the man you wanted me to meet?"

A howl of laughter from a nearby group drowned out his words, forcing
him to repeat himself. Grundy looked at the group and said, "There he
is. I'll bring him over."

The man he dragged to meet Comstock was equally young, no more than
thirty-eight, with an unformed face, and the barest amount of white
hair at the temples. He had some pictures in his hand and as he was
introduced to Jimmy he held out the photos.

Grundy said, "Tony Bowdler 131, wancha to meet my oldest friend,
Jimmy--what was your name, old sock?"

Jimmy identified himself and as he turned his eyes to look at the
pictures, Bowdler mumbled, "Do' wancha to think I'm unner the affluence
of inkohol, but lemme know how you like them feelthy pictures."

The man's voice was blurred and Jimmy could not quite comprehend what
he was saying. That was the only reason he looked at the top picture.
All the blood drained out of his head. There, on the picture, brazenly
posed for anyone to see, were a man and a woman. Good looking people
too. The woman was real s..y. Almost seventy, with exciting white hair,
and a deeply wrinkled face, she was even more desirable than the nurse.

How then had she ever allowed a despicable picture like this one to be
taken? It was beyond Jimmy, completely beyond him. Frozen in the glossy
eternity of the picture, her loose dress lifted so that her ankle
showed, she was allowing the man in the picture to k..s her hand.

The picture blurred in front of Jimmy's dazed eyes. This was a kind of
perversion beyond his reckoning. How could people allow such a thing?

Grundy said, "You think that's hot, boy, lay a glim on some of the
others! Here, look at these," he spread them out one at a time and
giggled inanely, "This last picture is a real killer! Take a peek!"

Comstock shook his head no, but his new found friend paid no attention
to him. Pointing to the foul pictures lined up on the bar he picked
up the last one and held it right under Jimmy's nose. Just before he
forced his eyes closed, the picture was engraved on his sickened brain.

The people were the same as the ones in the other picture, but, oh the
depth of depravity, oh poor lost souls, the man was actually k...ing
the woman full on the m...h!

The bartender said, "Hey, what's wrong with the Johnny-come-lately?
Looks like he's going to faint. Better get some medicine in him fast!"

Bowdler grabbed Jimmy's one arm, Grundy the other, while the stout
bartender poured the drink down Comstock's slack mouth. Gagging, half
spitting, he still swallowed enough so that he could feel what he
thought was liquid fire going down his aching throat.

"How's that feel, ol' pal?" Bowdler asked anxiously.

"Awful," Jimmy said, but he sipped more of it anyhow. This was his
curse, this was his cure, he had to take it, so he took it.

       *       *       *       *       *

The bartender went back to his other customers, and the trio raised
their glasses. Jimmy's new found friends were teaching him how to make
a toast.

"Here's to heart trouble," Grundy said, "thank Grandfather I didn't get
cancer!"

"Tha's the boy. Drink her down.... Bottoms up...." Bowdler put his hand
over his mouth. "Mus' 'pologize," he said, "reelize don't know you well
enough to talk that way. Ve'y sorry, ole man."

Comstock gagged again, but this time not from the drink, but as a
conditioned reflex. At that moment he could again taste the soap his
mother had used to wash out his mouth that time when he was but a lad
of twenty-nine, and he had slipped and said something about the b....m
of a well. The drink helped to wash out the long enduring soap taste.

"Yeah," Grundy was saying. "I don't care how drunk a man gets, a
gentleman never uses dirty words."

"You're righ' ole pal, ole pal. I'm sorry...." Bowdler hung his head in
shame. As though to change the subject he picked up his pornographic
pictures and looked through them lovingly. At last, pausing over one
that Thompson could see showed a man and woman in the last stages of
reckless abandon, (they were holding hands) Bowdler said, "Y'know if I
din' like gettin' drunk so much I'd be sorry I din't have tuberculosis
so I could pose for feelthy pix like these."

"Y'know," Grundy had his arm wrapped lovingly around Jimmy's neck by
now and they were on their second set of corpse revivers, "y' know I've
known fallen women who told me they were kina glad they had diabetes.
Don't seem possible, does it?"

"No." Jimmy's face was set sternly. "I cannot imagine snuch a ting. I
mean I cannot magine uch a sting...." He rubbed his mouth. It felt a
little strange.

Bowdler ordered another round. Nearby a particularly abandoned looking
woman who must have been in the last stages of coronary thrombosis if
the amount of liquor she had imbibed was any indication, waved to Jimmy.

He turned his head away quickly, hoping no one else had seen what the
woman did. He was instantly sorry he had done so for suddenly the room
swirled.

When it stopped, he turned to Grundy and said, "Shay, how offen doesa
room do that?"

"Do what?" Grundy asked, his mouth slack.

"How offen do they make it go roun' and roun' like that?"

Evidently he had said something highly amusing for his new friends went
off in gales of laughter. They had to whack each other on the back
before they could make their giggles subside.

Grundy said, finally, "If you think this room is movin' wait'll you see
your bedroom move tomorrow morning!" Then he and Bowdler went off into
helpless laughter again.

       *       *       *       *       *

Comstock tried to explain that there was no special mechanism in his
room which would allow it to spin in any fashion at all, but the
combination of the peculiar trouble he was having in articulating and
the roars of laughter from Bowdler and Grundy made him finally desist.
Perhaps this was some joke that he would have explained at some future
time.

The fourth drink, Comstock found must have had some different
ingredients in it although he had watched the bartender carefully and
seemingly the same constituents went into the making of it, but, on
sipping it, he found that the taste was different. He no longer felt as
if he was going to die in agony when he swallowed. Instead, a rather
pleasant kind of warmth went all through him.

He gazed at his new friends. New? How dare he consider them that? These
were his pals. Why ... he'd cut off his right arm for either of them.

He felt a desire to explain this sudden feeling of camaraderie, but
that odd thing affected his speech again and the words did not come
out quite as he had expected they would. He wondered if a stutter or
a stammer was part of angina pectoris, but that did not seem likely
somehow.

The sixth drink he never had any remembrance of downing. As a matter of
fact, the following morning when he woke up he had all he could do to
figure out how, when and who had installed the merry-go-round mechanism
in his room. Apparently the saloon was not the only place so equipped.
Lying in bed, looking about him he at first wondered if he were in some
strange place, but second thought reassured him. He was home, in his
own bed. The colored portrait of Grandfather looked down at him ... he
hoped that the picture did not reflect any disapproval on Grandfather's
part. He mumbled, "I can't help it ... I'm sick ... the doctor made
me...."

Then he held onto the sides of the bed for dear life and prayed that
whoever was making the room turn around would stop sooner or later,
preferably sooner.

On one of the circling trips the room seemed to slow down a tiny bit
and he was able to crawl out of bed onto the floor. The floor was
bigger and he lost the fear he had had in bed that he was going to fall
out. At least there was no place to fall now.

When his mother entered the room he was curled up peacefully on the
rug, sound asleep.

She woke him gently and gave him a glass of milk.

Jimmy eyed his mother in horror. How could he ever have loved a woman
who could do such a terrible thing? The milk seemed to be fastened
directly to his stomach. Racing from the room he found that there are
more than a few problems connected with being a drunk.

       *       *       *       *       *

When he came back and fell into his bed, his mother moved around the
room, opening the curtains letting in the sunlight, as she had every
day of his life.

He said, "Mother, will you please take those hobnails out of your
shoes? And whatever you're doing to those curtains, stop it. The
racket's enough to rouse the dead."

"They wouldn't let me come to the hospital, dear," she said.

"Was it very bad for my little boy?"

"Very bad. Did you get the report on me?"

She nodded. "But do I really have to give you that poison they
recommended for your mornings?"

"What poison?" If she'd only stop yelling.

"Coffee!"

At that moment he knew he would have sold his soul for a cup of coffee.
Aloud he said, "Bring it ... fast! And get that sickening glass of milk
out of here. It's leering at me."

Shaking her head, she left.

If the inside sweats would only stop a moment, he thought, he'd be able
to take time out to feel sorry for her. After all she hadn't raised
her son to be a drunkard ... it must be very difficult for her. But a
question rose large in his mind. How had those bats gotten into his
insides? Looking down at it, feeling what the bats were doing to the
wall of his stomach, he called it a belly for the first time in his
life.

"My belly," he said to himself, "hurts." And he didn't even feel the
soap sensation in his mouth. But then the taste that was already there
was so much like the inside of a parrot's cage that perhaps the psychic
soap was just lost in the other, more horrible, taste.

Curiously he found that the steaming, jet black coffee made him feel
better. How had he known it would? Perhaps Grundy ... or Bowdler had
told him about it....

His mother watched him drink the dread potion silently. Then she said,
"My poor, poor boy. When do you have to do this terrible thing again?"

He lifted his head and found that he could endure the sunlight. In some
lost cavern in the back of his head he heard Bowdler's drunken voice
saying, "And if you think you're gonna die, buddy boy, remember, a hair
of the dog will fix you up."

The idea of eating a dog's hair almost made him run for the bathroom
again, but he conquered the feeling.

Then he considered his mother's question. When must he get drunk again?
Why ... right now. This minute. Besides, he wanted to find out more
about these puzzles that baffled him, from his buddies. He smiled
remembering the good feeling of fellowship that had been his when he
had sung some old song with Bowdler and Grundy.

How did the words go?

His startled mother raised her eyebrows when her poor sick boy lurched
to the side of his bed and began to hum, "For he's a jolly good
fellow...."

Yep.

Back to the saloon.

That's where he belonged.

Rising slowly from some subterranean depth was the dawning realization
that he was beginning to enjoy his ailment....

Good old Grundy.... Good old Bowdler ... they were indeed the salt of
the planet.




                               CHAPTER 3


"'The portions of a woman's anatomy,'" Grundy was singing when Jimmy
entered the bar, "'that appeal to man's depravity, are fashioned with
considerable care....'" He broke off his song when he saw Comstock.
"Buddy boy!"

Bowdler rushed over and threw his arms around Jimmy, "How's the old
kid?"

"Fine, just fine. How about a drink?" Comstock found himself asking,
just as though he'd been a bar-room habitue all his life.

The corpse revivers served their functions admirably, Jimmy found. In
fact in just short of an hour, he was high on a cloud, feeling no pain.

That was when Grundy, whom Jimmy had thought was quite drunk, had
drawn Bowdler and Comstock to a quiet table in the back of the saloon.
Carrying their drinks they joined him. Jimmy was puzzled, for suddenly
Grundy had become very serious. Bowdler seemed to know what was in the
wind.

When they were seated comfortably and Jimmy was sipping happily at
his drink, Grundy looked around conspiratorially before he whispered,
"Jimmy, how old is The Grandfather?"

The question was a double shocker. First because Jimmy was positive
that this was the first time that holy name had ever been mentioned in
such unhallowed precincts, and second because the veriest infant knew
the answer. He said, "The Grandfather was, is and always will be."

Grundy grinned. "How do you know that to be true?"

Comstock's world stopped spinning. His breath froze in his lungs. Then
he felt a heart attack coming on. He fell face forward onto the floor.

Bowdler said, "Now see what you've done! You should have led up to it
more gradually."

"Let's see if we can revive him." Grundy's normally jolly face was set
and strained.

When Comstock opened his eyes and felt consciousness return he found
that his friends had him propped up in his chair and were pouring
liquor down his throat. Gasping, he spluttered, "All right, all right.
I'm okay now."

There was a pause, then Comstock asked, "What happened to me?"

The two other men avoided his eyes. Bowdler said at long last, "I guess
you're not quite drunk enough."

He ordered another round of drinks and as they waited for the elderly
waitress to bring them to the table Jimmy found himself remembering
what had happened.

The only thing that prevented his passing out again was that the s..y
waitress returned with their corpse revivers. He took a big slug,
considered her bent back as she walked away and said, "I ... seem to
remember your asking me something about...."

"I did." Grundy's face was set with determination. "Now hold onto
yourself, laddy boy. How do you know that The Grandfather has always
been and always will be?"

The traumatic shock was strong again but he had drunk some more and
so was able to hold on while all the blood drained out of his head.
He finally managed to say weakly, "Because everyone knows that to be
true." Life without Grandfather was inconceivable. Who would look after
them? Protect them? To whom could a man turn if not to The Grandfather?

Grundy and Bowdler exchanged meaningful glances. "If He always was,
how come there's no record of His having made the trip from Earth?"

       *       *       *       *       *

A trifle drunkenly, Comstock considered the question. Earth? Oh, yes
that was the fable, the children's tale that his people had emigrated
from some other planet. He had dismissed the whole thing as the usual
kind of Father Goose story that kiddies were told. Aloud he asked, "You
mean you two think there really is another inhabited planet?"

"Think?" Both men spoke simultaneously, but it was Grundy who
continued. "We know it. Look, Jimmy, we're risking a great deal, and
before we go on, we'll have to swear you to secrecy. Whether you join
us in what we have in mind, or not, you must swear on your father's
memory that you will be silent as the grave...."

They waited, poised on the edge of their chairs with nervousness.

When he deliberated so long that their nerves were jangling, Bowdler
said, "Look, Jimmy, do you want to have to live and die as a drunk,
just because it's the only known cure for your disease?"

Things were popping too fast for Comstock to be able to grapple with
them intelligently. He mumbled, "Nothin' wrong with being a drunk. I
like it fine."

Grundy sprang to the attack. "That's too bad, old man, because it means
the cure won't work. You should know that, the doc should have told
you! The vice must be distasteful or the cure doesn't work!"

Looking back on the Comstock of yesterday, Jimmy could see why the
doctor had not felt it necessary to make this point. It certainly had
been unpredictable that he'd enjoy drinking. But it was his new friends
who had made it fun.... Had they done it deliberately? Too much to
grapple with ... he'd better wait and see what they had in mind. He
said, "I swear to keep silent."

Bowdler said, "Go ahead, Grundy, it's your story." Parenthetically, he
explained to Jimmy, "You know, or I guess maybe you don't, that before
Bowdler here, got sick, he was Head Genealogist."

"No kidding!" Comstock was amazed. Head Genealogist! Whew ... that was
a post that almost ranked with being a Father! Bowdler was ... or had
been, a big man!

"As part of my job," Bowdler said, "I went back to the beginning. I
checked the passenger list on the Bon Aventure, the space ship that
brought the original Thirty to this planet from Earth."

Gulping down his drink, hurriedly Comstock ordered another round. To
mention the Thirty ... it was almost as blasphemous as talking about
The Grandfather! These two were dangerous men. He'd listen to what
they said, but then he must, literally _must_, report them to the
authorities! He was sorry for them for he liked them, but blasphemy
like this had to be punished.

Bowdler went on, "That was the first time the thought occurred to me to
wonder about ole Grandpop!"

Grandpop! Blasphemy piled on blasphemy. Comstock could feel his ears
burning.

"And you know something," Bowdler lowered his voice to the veriest
whisper of communicable sound, "There was no record of His having made
the trip! None at all!"

       *       *       *       *       *

The silence dragged itself out. Comstock was in a condition bordering
on insanity. Although he managed to keep his face still. The temerity
of these two ... apostates!

"As a matter of cold brutal fact," Bowdler said broodingly, "there is
no record of The Grandfather at all until about five hundred years
ago! I checked, I read books that no one, absolutely no one has even
looked at for centuries ... and by Grandpop himself, there's not even a
mention of Him, till about a hundred years after they killed off the
last scientists."

No one had ever before discussed these things openly, or covertly,
with Comstock. A new emotion was beginning to make itself felt. He was
becoming interested. The last scientists ... he remembered all about
them from school. The monsters! It was a good thing they had been wiped
out. But even so it was exciting hearing it talked about. He leaned
forward on the table and sipped his drink more slowly. There was plenty
of time to report Bowdler and Grundy. After all, the authorities would
want as much information as he could get.

Grundy spoke for the first time in a long time. He said, "That's where
I come in. I used to be custodian of the hall of records."

Jimmy felt a little better. After all, a janitor! His job before he'd
become ill had been better than that. He had been a law clerk at the
Bureau of Commandments ... it didn't compare with the office that
Bowdler had held, and yet it was certainly a lot better than.... But
Grundy was speaking. He said, "Bowdler got his heart attack when he
began to wonder about where The Grandfather had come from. I got mine
when I was ordered by the Board of Fathers...." "Oops," Comstock
thought, a janitor working for the Fathers was nothing to be sneezed
at, he'd better wait and see what was coming.

Grundy went on, "The only reason I even looked at the record I was
supposed to burn was because I had glanced at it and had seen a G. I
wondered if it had something to do with my family...." He put his hands
to his forehead. "If only I hadn't ... I'd still be happily at work ...
with no heart trouble ... and with no need to drink this stuff...." He
gulped down some of his drink.

"Buck up, old man," Bowdler said. "What's done is done."

"You're right. I must be a man." He shook his head dolefully. "It
wasn't about my family at all. It was about the Gantrys ... and you
know how powerful that blood line is. I don't have to tell you! Ever
since Elmer the First, they've been on top of the heap!"

Comstock nodded. As if any sane person would even question the
qualifications of the Gantrys to be leaders! These two men were even
more dangerous than he had suspected. It was up to him to keep his
mouth shut and his ears open, by The Grandfather it was!

       *       *       *       *       *

The furrows in Grundy's forehead were deeper now. His elbows on the
table, his head in his hands, he looked off into the middle distance.
He said, and he was almost speaking to himself, his voice was so low,
"It was only when I examined the records that I began to wonder if it
was truly ordained that the Gantrys were the leaders and would be the
leaders, under The Grandfather's eagle eye. Funny," he mused, "all it
takes is the tiniest notion to question these eternal verities, and
then without your even being aware of it, the questions begin to demand
answers...."

Bowdler broke in. "That was the mood Grundy was in when he and I met
here in the saloon. Two men, both possessed of a tiny bit of knowledge
not shared by anyone else on New Australia, and by chance we met
here...."

Jimmy drained his glass and the action of tilting his head back brought
the level of his eyes higher than it had been. That was the only reason
he saw the face that was framed in a little window at the back of the
bar-room.

His breath shot out of his lungs as though he had been hit by the hind
legs of an astrobat. He gulped, "Grundy! Bowdler!"

Their heads swivelled and they too saw what had frightened him.

"One of the Father's Right Arms!" Bowdler said. Then, with a visible
attempt to keep his voice down and his face from showing the fear that
gripped all three of them, he said, "This is what we had to be prepared
for; are you with us, Comstock?"

Now was the moment for decision. If, Jimmy thought, he were to act
bravely, throw himself on the two apostates and wait for the R.A. to
get to them, he could then explain what horrors the two evil men had
been discussing. But, and the canker of indecision gnawed at him, but,
what after all had he really learned? Only that these two men were
questioning the eternal verities. There was more to it, much more, of
that he was convinced.

There was perhaps an inch of liquor left in Jimmy's glass. Draining
it, he made the decision which he was instantly to regret. He said,
"I'm with you two. What shall we do?" Better, he had decided, to go
along with Grundy and Bowdler and pretend to be part of their horrid
scheme, that was the only way that later on he could report fully to
the Fathers.

Grundy and Bowdler smiled at each other. Grundy said, "He's with us!
Let's go!"

       *       *       *       *       *

All this time the R.A. had been watching them, his little eyes
preternaturally alert, his gaunt hand steadily holding the gun that
pointed straight at them, his attention completely focussed on the trio.

Bowdler leaned forward on the table till his head was close to Jimmy's.
He whispered, "When I say three, duck to the floor. Stay there till I
grab you."

All around the three men the life of the saloon went on blithely.
The other heart disease patients were drinking; some solemnly, some
gaily, the aged waitresses were busy with their Hebe-like duties, the
bartenders were mixing drinks, but to Jimmy, the whole of life ... and
perhaps death were contingent upon the next three seconds.

"One." Bowdler's voice whispered.

Jimmy could see Grundy bunching his heavy muscles for some kind of
action.

"Two."

Watching the R.A. out of the corner of his eyes, Jimmy wondered if it
was just his imagination or if he had really seen the R.A.'s trigger
finger tighten on the stungun's trigger.

"Three!"




                               CHAPTER 4


Later, looking back on the scene that followed, Jimmy was never quite
sure just what had happened in just what order. For the first thing
that erupted was the table. Grundy had suddenly tilted back in his
chair throwing his heavy body over backwards. His legs, under the
table, served to catapult the heavy object straight up towards the
little spy window where the R.A. waited.

Bowdler had thrown his own empty glass straight at the eternally lit
little bulb that had supplied the only illumination.

Darkness, then the crash of the table, then Comstock had obeyed orders
and thrown himself flat on the floor. Next to him he had heard Bowdler
land heavily.

The second crash as the table fell to the floor was the signal for
Bowdler to grab Comstock by the arm and whisper, "Crawl after me."

Darkness and silence.

None of the other heart patients in the saloon had uttered a sound.
That was not surprising of course, as anything unusual that ever
happened was always the result of the action of the R.A.'s and it ill
behooved anyone to interfere with them....

The only sign of light was the little flicker that came from the R.A.'s
halo.

The sight of it was enough to make Comstock's blood run cold.
Hopelessly he wished for a heart attack that would make him _hors de
combat_, but for once that organ seemed impregnable.

Then, crawling on his hands and knees, crawling after the unseen
bulk of Bowdler, with fear in him like a live thing, Comstock died a
thousand deaths. In the darkness a bulky body had bumped into him,
and for a moment his heart had seemed to stop completely but then he
realized it was only Grundy. The man had whispered, "Not far now."

Most frightening of all had been the moment when his head had touched
the solid wall of the back room of the saloon. That had not been
frightening in itself, but what had happened next was the worst of all,
for suddenly the solid wall was no longer solid.

Frozen immobile, he had waited till Grundy had said, "Go on ... hurry
up."

Behind him Bowdler had pushed him, hard.

There was no choice. He went through the no longer solid wall.

Then there was another terrible period of darkness and silence and
crawling along on all fours.

Bowdler finally spoke and he no longer whispered. He said, and his
voice was harsh and loud, "It's all right now. We can stand up."

Then a light had flooded them.

And so here he was, Comstock thought dully, his brain feeling about as
perceptive as a plate of liver as he stood in the small room that had
no right to be where it was. Not that he knew where that was, but he
knew that The Grandfather would certainly not approve of a hideout, and
there could be no doubt that he was in such a place.

Grundy and Bowdler looked at him and enjoyed his manifest surprise.

       *       *       *       *       *

Jimmy asked, "What, where, how, I mean...."

"We're not exactly fools, you know, Comstock old boy," Grundy said. "We
knew that the R.A.'s had us under observation. We knew, too, that it
was only a question of time before they came after us."

"But the saloon wall, how did we go through that?"

"Trap door, old sock, just a trap door." Bowdler grinned.

"And the tunnel we went through?" Comstock asked and then, looking
around at the sybaritic furnishings of the little room, he asked, "This
room, what is it?" Never in his life had he seen a room with such
over-stuffed chairs, such soft warm colors, such a concern for creature
comforts.

"Evidently," Bowdler said with an evil smirk, "Elmer Gantry 104 does
not really believe in the Spartan virtues that he preaches so loudly."

"You mean this belongs to a Gantry?" Earlier, the very idea of being
in a room that belonged to a Gantry would have made Comstock swoon,
but his experiences were evidently toughening him, for aside from a
certain feeling of breathlessness, and the knowledge that all the blood
had left his face, and a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach, the
blasphemous information did not affect Comstock at all.

Bowdler was standing with his back to Comstock, his hands linked behind
his back, as he teetered back and forth from heels to toes and looked
at some three dimensional pictures that hung on Gantry's walls.

Only the fact that the n..e women in the round, true-color pictures
were young, between twenty and thirty years old, kept Comstock from a
heart attack. If they had been older, the obscenity of their n....y
would surely have made him pass out. He could not help wondering
how Bowdler could seem to enjoy looking at the young women. It was
incredibly revolting to Comstock's sense of the rightness of things.

"Sit down," Grundy said, "let's have a council of war."

Sitting on the very edge of the too-soft chair, keeping his back rigid,
Comstock kept his attention glued on Grundy and Bowdler. Now perhaps,
he would pick up some information of real value to the Fathers.

He noticed with some dismay that the other two men slouched back in
their chairs and seemed to be enjoying the ease of their surroundings.

He asked uneasily, "Is there no chance that the R.A. will follow us
here? Don't they know about this retreat?"

"Would any R.A. dare to contaminate a Gantry's home with his presence?
Relax, Jimmy." Bowdler sprawled out, his large t...h hanging over one
arm of the over-stuffed chair. "The only chance we're taking is that
Gantry may come here. I checked and found that he is conferring with
the Fathers today."

How easily these two men spoke the terrible words. It made Comstock sit
ever straighter on the very edge of the chair he occupied.

The cool air of the room which seemed to have been washed and cleansed
before entering the sacrosanct area was pleasant on Jimmy's heated face
even while he wondered how a windowless room could be so aired.

"I gather," Bowdler said as he smiled at Jimmy's obvious consternation,
"that you have never been in a home of one of the Thirty before?"

Dully, Jimmy shook his head no.

"You'll find, laddy boy, that this is a strange world we live in with
many paradoxes that to Grundy and me, demand an explanation. It wasn't
too long ago that we were like you and found only elderly ladies
attractive. But you know, as soon as we found out that the Thirty like
their women young, we too began to find something vastly exciting in
youth."

       *       *       *       *       *

So alarmed that he dare not continue to look at Bowdler, Jimmy looked
around the room trying to find something to change the subject, some
object on which to focus. On a book shelf nearby he saw one of his
childhood favorites, and grabbed it with a feeling of relief.

It was a copy of Father Goose. He ran his eye over the first poem and
drew from the verse of Jack and Jill the knowledge that the world had
not gone insane. There, it was just as he remembered it,

    "Jack and Jill went up the hill
    To ..... a .... of water.
    Jack fell down and broke his .....
    And Jill came ........ after."

He riffled through the pages as Bowdler went on talking. On page ten
was another favorite,

    "Little Polly Flinders
    Sat among the cinders
    Warming her pretty little ....
    Her mother came and caught her
    And whipped her little daughter
    For spoiling her nice new ......."

But the assurance of the known faded away as Bowdler's voice went
rumbling on and on. "It occurred to both of us that perhaps there was
some reason why we are brought up to esteem aged women so much. After
all, if old ladies are as exciting as we are taught that they are, how
come the Gantrys and others of the Thirty only have young concubines?
This was one of the questions we asked ourselves, and we think we have
the answer...."

Grundy broke in, "Have you ever wondered, Comstock, why it is that the
only women who have children are the ones who are called up before the
Fathers?"

This was even worse than the time Comstock's father had told him the
"facts of life." Much worse, for what Grundy was intimating was at
variance with what his father had taught him. It was worse.

"Maybe," Grundy said broodingly, "just maybe there is a damn good
reason why the Fathers are called the Fathers!"

There are moments in life so terrifying that the very ground seems
to shift beneath one's feet. That was the sensation that Comstock
was experiencing. All was alien. He clung to the tattered copy of
Father Goose as the only tangible thread that held his reeling sanity
together. Averting his eyes from Grundy's and Bowdler's faces he
hurriedly read,

    "There was a little girl
    Who had a little curl
    Right in the middle of her ........
    And when she was good she
    was very, very good.
    But when she was bad she was ......"

Even the familiar rhyme failed in its lulling purpose. He could no
longer hide behind its chant-like curtain. Bowdler's voice went on,
striking ever more harshly at the roots of Comstock's being.

"What a mockery all of our lives would be if what Grundy and I think is
true. Suppose everything we have been taught is a lie. What then little
man? What then?"

From some unknown and previously untapped reservoir of strength
Comstock managed to dredge up the ability to say, "That's ridiculous.
There would be no reason under the two suns for that to be true. The
truth is mighty and will prevail."

"Just a little less of the copy-book maxims if you don't mind, old
man," Bowdler said. "Hear us out."

"Just suppose," Grundy bent his stocky middle body over so that he was
closer to Comstock. "Just suppose for the sake of argument, that we
are right. That our whole way of life is false. Look what that could
mean."

Bowdler broke in, excitement making his voice harsh and rasping.
"Suppose there is no real merit in old age. Suppose that the
one-hundred-and-fifty year olds whose intelligence we worship as a
matter of course, are really just senile old people! Then what?"

Grundy's face set. His mouth set in thin lines of derision. "I know for
a fact, that the Elders are just that. Elder. There's no magic in old
age no matter what they taught us in school or what they keep yelling
and yammering at us all the time. Old people are just old...."

Was there no end to the men's blasphemies? Comstock shook his aching
head wearily. First they had attacked the peak of all things, The
Grandfather. Next they had profaned the Fathers, and now the Elders.
What sacred functionaries were left to attack? None, he realized with
some relief. For the pyramid of his government was erected on the
broad base of the Elders, who were guided and advised by the Fathers,
who were in turn guided and led by that font of all knowledge, The
Grandfather.

Taking a deep breath and setting his heavy jaw, Bowdler said, "If The
Grandfather is a fake as I am beginning to believe, and the Fathers
a pack of self-seeking sybarites who stay in power just because they
are the most direct descendants from the original Thirty, and if the
Elders are doddering fossils whose intellectual powers are supposed to
befuddle us and keep us in place, than I say with Grundy, the time has
come to overthrow this foul regime."

So there had been a final blasphemy left!

This one was so gigantic, the meaning Bowdler's words conveyed, so
treasonable, that Comstock found himself waiting for the end. Just so
far could men go and no further. These two must be wiped out, destroyed
along with their poisonous statements!

The idea!

Overthrow The Grandfather!

The very lightnings would, must come down and blast the two impious
villains where they stood.

Comstock waited.

The lightnings, if they were coming, seemed long delayed.

But surely The Grandfather who was everywhere and knew all things must
have overheard these infidels.

Why then did He not strike them down, limb and body?

It was only then, that in the very back of Comstock's mind a nervous
little finger of doubt began to twist and turn, and finally asked a
question.

"Suppose," the little finger scratched on the blackboard of his cortex,
"suppose they're right ... suppose The Grandfather is not all powerful
and all knowing?"

Then he waited for the lightnings to strike him too.

And all the while he wrestled with himself his two friends sat in
strained silence, waiting ... waiting....

No lightning.

Some of the tension began to drain out of Comstock, and as it did,
Grundy and Bowdler exchanged knowing looks. Bowdler said at last.
"Welcome."

"Welcome, Jimmy." Grundy smiled, "now you are one of us."

One of them.

He had exchanged the peace and security of resting in Grandfather's
arms, of putting his weary head against Grandpop's long beard ...
Grandpop? How fast he was sliding.... He had exchanged the surety of
his life, for what?

For the friendship of two drinking companions. Somehow the swap did not
seem to his advantage.

Bowdler seemed almost to be able to read his mind, for he said, "Buck
up, Jimmy. You're going to find it's good to be a whole man. There are
rewards!"

But all Comstock could remember was the ease and safety of that which
he was surrendering. It came hard. Very hard.

"Growing up is always difficult," Bowdler said, his voice soft and full
of understanding. "But I promise you there are rewards."

What rewards?

Before Comstock could put his question into words, there was a crashing
sound at the door, the real door, not the hidden one by which they had
entered the sacred precincts of the Gantry's room.

The primapara of the door trembled beneath the assault that was being
launched on it.

Through the heavy wood they could hear the voice of authority. "Open up
in the name of the R.A."

All a tremble, Comstock searched his friends' faces for reassurance.

He found none.

Bowdler said, "I don't understand it."

"No point in going back the way we came, the R.A. will have found that
by now," Grundy said and his forehead was washboarded with worry.




                               CHAPTER 5


If only the R.A. had arrived a little earlier was all that Comstock was
able to think. Five minutes earlier and his convictions would have been
safe. He'd have been able to throw himself into the R.A.'s protection
and tell all. That way would have meant safety and perhaps a reward.

But now?

Bowdler's bulky body moved toward the door. He yelled, "All right, keep
your halo cool, I'm coming."

How, Comstock wondered, could anyone be so brave? No fear showed on
Bowdler's granite-like face. None at all. His hand on the door knob,
he paused and called back over his shoulder, "Grundy, come here, stand
at this side of the door, you, Comstock, stand on the other side. I'll
stall him, and if my plan works, you two beat it! Fast! Grundy, you
know where to take Comstock!"

"Sure, to Helen's," Grundy said and took up a position at the side of
the door. Comstock, knees wobbling, hands sweating, stomach writhing,
took up the position indicated for him.

Then Bowdler opened the door. He bowed derisively and said, his tones
steady, the words ironical. "Won't you come in and make yourself
comfortable?"

It was the same R.A. whose small features and lean hand had menaced
them in the saloon.

His halo was bright with anger. His hand had the stun-gun at the ready.
The words that came from his mouth were bright with menace. He said,
"I want you three to know that my gun is set to kill!"

Now sweaty-footed fear was walking down Comstock's back. Never had
he heard of an R.A. using the death control on his gun. Ordinarily
just the threat of nervous stunning was enough to make the most irate
submissive.

Long legs spread wide apart, hands on his hips, Bowdler said, "By what
right do you enter the sanctum of a Gantry?"

"By the right invested in me by the Fathers and by my warrant from The
Grandfather!" The R.A.'s reedy voice was cold.

Throwing his big head back, Bowdler laughed in the man's face. He said,
"Well, now, that sounds real important. But does it mean anything?"

Spread in a straight line, as the three men were, the R.A. could only
menace one of them at a time. His gun went back and forth in a slow arc.

He said, "Put your hands behind your backs and come quietly."

"Throw ourselves into the broad lap of The Grandfather, eh?" Bowdler
asked and he seemed to be enjoying himself tremendously.

"Of course. He understands and He will judge your case according to its
merits!"

"And having understood our case, and having judged it in advance, He
will have us 'removed' for the good of society?" Bowdler asked, but it
was more of a statement than a question.

"That remains to be seen," the R.A. said.

"Humph," Bowdler grinned, "if we play it your way, our remains will be
all that will be seen. No, thank you. I don't think I like that method
at all!"

With no warning and with no change of expression, Bowdler waited till
the R.A.'s gun was pointed at Grundy at one end of its slow arc, then
threw himself in a berserk charge straight at the R.A.

The R.A. hurriedly swung his gun back and pulled the trigger. He
missed, and by that time Bowdler's long arms were around his knees and
he was being dragged down to the soft carpet on the floor.

       *       *       *       *       *

At the precise moment that the R.A. began to fall, Grundy gestured for
Comstock to follow him and ran through the door. It took a second or so
for Comstock's frozen muscles to obey his frightened brain, but then as
the R.A. brought the gun up level with Bowdler's forehead and pulled
the trigger, he ran.

The last sight he saw, as he chanced a look over his shoulder, was the
sight of all intelligence draining out of Bowdler's face. The charge
had hit him.

Slamming the door on the scene, Comstock ran, and as he ran he screamed
to Grundy, "The R.A. killed him! He killed Bowdler."

Ten feet away the news made Grundy pause and almost stumble, but
Comstock saw him recover and then run on. He yelled back to Comstock.
"Tough. He was a good guy. But we gotta keep goin' or we'll be killed
too."

The endless corridor through which they were running was dank and it
was dark. There was no curve, no up or down. It was simply a black hole
through which they ran and ran, and kept on running. When Comstock
thought that he would never be able to breathe again, that his muscles
could no longer bear his weight, that he must slump in a helpless heap
and wait for death, he heard Grundy snap, "Ten feet more."

The words shot a new charge of adrenalin into Comstock. With a last
surge of strength he darted after his friend's back. As a matter of
fact he lunged full tilt into it because the darkness was so complete
he could not see his hand before his face.

Grundy grunted, "Hold everything. I have to find the latch."

Another moment that seemed to stretch out far beyond the end of
eternity and then, just as Comstock's strained ears heard footsteps
running behind him in the dark. Grundy said, "There it is." And a door
opened. Beyond was further darkness, but it was not as complete as
the stygian blackness they were leaving. Falling through the doorway,
Comstock fell to his face as Grundy slammed the door behind them.

"That'll hold the R.A. for a minute and that's all we need."

Lifting his head, forcing his trunk upwards from the ground, Comstock
saw that they had come out on a street ... he looked at it while his
breath raced in and out of his tortured lungs ... the street was
familiar. It was the one that housed the b.....l to which he repaired
once a month.

At the curb waiting, was an R.A.'s carriage. The team of astrobats
waited patiently in harness, their too-pointed faces and four ears
heavy with menace towards anyone who dared to approach them.

Staggering to his feet, Comstock felt Grundy's arm go around his
shoulders. Grundy half carried, half pushed him into the carriage.

"But ... we can't go in this!" Comstock gasped. "You know the penalty
for even going near an R.A.'s carriage!"

A final push shoved Comstock onto the seat. Grabbing the wicked metal
electro-whip, Grundy forced the recalcitrant astrobats into what those
crotchety animals considered a gallop.

"The first person who sees us will call for help! We're not even
dressed like R.A.'s!" Comstock said.

Grundy was kind. He said patiently, "Our halos will protect us."

       *       *       *       *       *

Looking at Grundy's head, Comstock half expected to see the silvery
sheen of the mark of an R.A. But there was no sign of one.

"Are you insane? We have no halos. Only the R.A. has them."

Whipping the team expertly, Grundy said, and his words were a sigh,
"You have much to learn, Comstock. There are no halos except in the eye
of the beholder."

"What does that mean?"

The carriage was racing by the b.....l now and Comstock was amazed
to see the madame, who was standing in the doorway, make the sign of
reverence and obeisance as they raced by.

"The halos don't exist. They're just post-hypnotic suggestion implanted
in our minds when we're kids. We're conditioned to see the halos when
we see an R.A. We're in an R.A.'s carriage now and so anyone seeing us
will see our halos. It's as simple as that. But then, you don't know
what hypnotism is, do you?"

"No." Comstock said this humbly and at the moment he felt that he knew
nothing at all. He turned and looked backwards.

Down the street behind them, the R.A., his halo shining brightly, like
a good deed in an evil world, was pointing his gun at them. Comstock
said, "The R.A. found the door. He's going to shoot us!"

Wordlessly, Grundy flicked the whip over the beasts' backs. The
carriage swerved and carried them around the corner. Comstock could not
tell if the R.A. had fired and missed, or had held his fire, for of
course a stun-gun is silent as the grave, and only affects the human
nervous system.

Careening along the quiet streets Comstock found time to feel deep
and real sorrow for Bowdler. It still did not seem possible that
anyone could have been as brave as all that. Aloud he said, "Bowdler
sacrificed himself for us, didn't he?"

Grundy nodded, his eyes alert, scanning the road ahead, for what?
Comstock wondered.

"When you are daring what we are, you must be prepared for instant
sacrifice," Grundy said.

"Hadn't we better give up?" Comstock asked. "Two of us against the
entire world seems ridiculous. What chances have we?"

"None if you feel that way. But if you feel as Bowdler did and as I
do, that it is worth anything to be a man, then it is worth while. Any
chance is worth taking."

Grundy's tone changed. He said, "When I turn the next corner I'll slow
the team down. When I do, jump out."

Jump out? What new madness was this? But before he had a chance to
argue, Grundy had pulled hard on the bits and snapped, "Now!"

Rolling free of the carriage on his side, Comstock saw even as he fell
to the ground, that Grundy had thrown himself out of the other side of
the carriage.

The team raced on, dragging the empty carriage banging and clattering
at their multiple heels.

       *       *       *       *       *

Shaken, bruised, sore from head to foot, Comstock said as Grundy pulled
himself to his feet. "Why did you do that?"

"Let the R.A.'s keep their radio tail on the carriage. A lot of good
it'll do them!"

Grundy again helped him to his feet, and then said, "Follow me."

Comstock's mind was a whirl again. What was a radio?

The street was even quieter than most in Comstock's city. Small houses,
a decent distance apart, lined the lawns where the purplish grass
sparkled in the light of the twin moons.

The house that Grundy stopped in front of was identical with all the
others. He took a key from his pocket and opened the door. Then he
called out, "Helen!"

       *       *       *       *       *

Comstock had come a long way at that moment when he had waited futilely
for The Grandfather's wrath to strike him dead, but he had not come
to the point where he could watch the indecency of the scene that
followed. Averting his eyes as the young girl entered the room, he
wished desperately that he might be struck deaf so as not to have to
hear what followed their entry.

In the first place she was obscenely young, not more than twenty-five.
In the second place her ugly young skin was completely without
wrinkles. In the third place she threw her round young arms around
Grundy's neck, and in the fourth place she k....d him hard and long on
the l..s and in the fifth place she crooned to him l..e words that no
one should ever be forced to hear.

"Darling, darling, darling," she said over and over again. "I've missed
you so terribly, I've been so worried ... but it's over and you're near
me again."

"Dearest," Comstock could not help hearing Grundy say and his opinion
of the man descended sharply, "My loveliest sweetheart."

Then their l.ps met again in a sustained and prolonged bit of
pornographic action that left Comstock weak. Worse perhaps than the way
they were pushing their l..s against each other was the way they had
glued their bodies together.

He coughed trying to bring them back to their senses.

Grundy broke away from the girl. "Thank The Grandfather," Comstock
thought, and then bit his lip as he realized that he no longer had the
right to call on that name....

The girl said, "But where's Bowdler? Darling, what's happened ... he
hasn't been ... he isn't hurt?"

"Worse, dear." And the man touched her hair. The sight made little
horripilations go up and down the hair on the back of Comstock's head.

"He's not dead?"

"Yes, my darling, but he died bravely trying to save us."

She bent her head reverently and Comstock was pleased to see that even
so brazen a hussy was still not lost to all the common decencies.

Grundy cleared his throat and made an obvious effort to change the
subject. He said, "I'm sorry, I've forgotten to have you meet our new
friend." Grundy introduced them.

Horror piled on horror. Comstock's face whitened as the young girl
walked to him, took his hand, shook it, and then impulsively k....d him
on the cheek.

Thank Grandfather she stopped after an interminable moment and turned
back to Grundy. She asked, her voice low and shaken, "But dearest, oh
my dearest, what are we to do now? Bowdler was so strong, so sure of
himself; he knew so much more than we do of what is really happening in
this sick world of ours ... what are we to do?"

There, it was happening again. Comstock averted his shocked eyes as
Grundy put his hand on the girl's w...t and said, "You are to do
nothing, my love. You'll stay here in safety. You know that Bowdler and
I decided that this is a man's job, and it must stay that way. I'll
take no chance of risking your lovely skin...."

Then he turned to Comstock and said decisively. "There's no use waiting
any longer, taking chances, risking death the longer we wait. We'll
eat, rest a bit, and then, we'll risk all!"

"You mean...." The girl let her voice fade away.

"Tonight, in half an hour," Grundy said, his face set and stern,
"Comstock and I will go before the Board of Fathers and challenge The
Grandfather!"

Some of his resolution faded and he said more quietly, "But how I wish
Bowdler were with us. We three might have stood a better chance. But he
had set the time as tonight, and I'll not be false to his trust."

Half an hour, Comstock thought dully. It wasn't long to live ... not
long enough at all....




                               CHAPTER 6


In one way the half hour just vanished. In another, it lasted longer
than all the rest of Comstock's life put together. While he stood in
the doorway, his back to Grundy and the impassioned l..e scene that
Helen and Grundy were enacting as what might be their last farewell, he
wondered how thirty minutes which had seemed to go on so long, seemed
to fly past so quickly.

He could hear Grundy almost moan, "'Helen thy beauty is to me as ...'",
and then harsh and strident, drowning out all other sound, seeming like
the sound that was the ultimate that human ears could ever bear to hear
there came an enormously amplified voice.

Comstock had never heard The Grandfather speak, and yet, now hunching
himself into a pre-natal ball, his hands pressed tight against his
ears, he knew that no other voice could have held that command, that
awe-inspiring tone, that this voice held which now threatened to
deafen him permanently.

The words that smote at Comstock were, "I am displeased."

Grundy ran to Comstock, gripped him by the shoulders, pulled Comstock's
hands away from his ears and roared, "Follow me! They've got a speaker
hidden someplace near here. I never knew they'd found Helen."

The girl's face was washed clean of every emotion but that of anger.
She stood at Grundy's side, her hands on her hips and the words she
spat out, hurt Comstock's ears even more than the larger than life roar
of The Grandfather.

She said, "What a cheap trick!"

"Darling, I can't leave you here now. You must come with us!" Grundy's
face was tortured.

"I know," she assented and waited for his orders.

Somehow Comstock forced himself to his feet. He would not, could not,
allow himself to be shamed by this girl child. It was unmanly.

The voice of The Grandfather said, "My grandchildren are being naughty.
I do not like this conduct. I am afraid, very afraid that you three
need punishment."

The tones mumbled a long time after the words were no longer separable.
It was like the aftermath of thunder. Comstock moaned in horrified
torment.

All his fears were back. The Grandfather was omnipotent just as he had
always been taught. And yet, and yet ... that little canker of doubt
in the back of his head kept muttering, if that were so, how could the
girl have called it all a cheap trick? Were there even more things,
that he, Comstock, did not understand?

As far as his fevered eye could see there was no sign of humanity.
Comstock knew that behind the drawn blinds of the houses on the street
people like him were huddled in fear, hoping desperately that the voice
did not refer to them.

Grundy said, "If they've got a speaker planted near here, that means
we're under surveillance."

"Of course," Helen agreed, "that's obvious. What do we do about it?"

"I wish I'd never gotten you involved in this, dear," Grundy said.

"I'm glad. For if you hadn't, we'd never have had what little we have
had out of life. I think it's been worth it, and more."

The smile on Grundy's face was so radiant, the renewed courage he
clearly had received from what she said, made Comstock think that
perhaps Bowdler had been right, perhaps there were indeed rewards for
being a whole man.

Grundy blew a kiss to Helen, and then a smile that oddly enough
reminded Comstock of Bowdler crossed his face. He walked from the
entrance of the house out into the center of the street. Then, feet
separated, again so like Bowdler, his hands on his hips, he threw his
head back and looking at the sky he roared out a challenge.

"Come and get us! Don't treat us like sorry grandchildren, come and get
us. I dare you!"

Across the street Comstock saw a curtain being pulled slightly to
one side. Then a frightened eye stared out. The Grandfather or his
representatives would have to answer Grundy's challenge, he realized
with a little thrill of pride.

The powers-that-be dared not allow the people to see a man defy The
Grandfather.

It was, Comstock thought, rather a wonderful thing to be a rebel.

But the feeling passed quickly when, with a speed that defied his
understanding, a kind of vehicle he had never before seen appeared
roaring out of the distance. It had four wheels, and a carriage-like
body, but no team of astrobats drew it. Instead it seemed to be
propelled by magic. It was rather a noisy magic for a series of
explosions seemed to come from the front of it constantly.

Above the low roar of the carriage's explosions rose the voice of The
Grandfather. "I have dispatched a chariot for you. Beware my wrath and
come quietly."

Helen looked jubilant. She said, "We're forcing their hand. This is the
first time in centuries they've found it necessary to use a car!"

"If we only had more strength," Grundy said, "I'd almost be optimistic.
We sure have them worried."

Then the object Helen had called a "car" drew up in front of them and a
door opened. Four of the leanest, hardest R.A.'s that Comstock had ever
seen pointed stun-guns at the three of them. The man who sat behind a
wheel said, "Get 'em in quick. No sense in having too many of these
slobs see this car."

Comstock flashed a look of inquiry at Grundy.

"Sure let's join them. It's easier to be driven there, than to have to
walk as I'd figured!"

The vehicle was obviously not designed to hold seven people and since
the four R.A.'s drew away from Helen with the same kind of sick
disquietude that Comstock had felt, the small remaining space left for
Grundy, the girl and Comstock made them all wedge in rather tightly.

Helen's flesh was soft and warm, Comstock realized with a shock, and
the clean, sweet smell of her in his flaring nostrils was a warning
that Bowdler and Grundy might well be right. There was something about
young women ... something unlike the emotion he had felt on his monthly
visits to his elderly lady friends in the b.....l.

The "car" raced through the deserted streets with a speed that would
have scared Comstock out of a year's growth if he had not had so many
other larger worries tearing at him.

       *       *       *       *       *

Most baffling to him was the fact that despite the fact that they were
going before a tribunal which would sentence them to death, Grundy was
able to lean closer to Helen and whisper to her a poem that Comstock
had never heard before and the words of which failed to make any sense.

He was saying, "Is this the face that launched a thousand ships?"

And then he k....d her.

In the Grandfather's "car" with four R.A.'s right there, Grundy was
k.....g Helen!

It was flabbergasting to Comstock and in a strange way that he could
not quite understand he felt a little pang of jealousy. He found he
would have liked to have had a Helen next to him.... Someone young and
brave ... and soft ... and warm ... who smelled like the girl now
pressed so close against him.

Something of what he was thinking must have communicated itself to the
girl for she turned from her beloved and said, "Poor Comstock. It's not
as though you were all alone. We're with you!"

Then her full-soft lips were pressed on his forehead.

The blood pounding into his head made his face flare crimson.

Sounds of disgust from the four R.A.'s made him angry instead of upset
as they might have.

What did they, poor fools, know of the feelings of a rebel? Of a ...
hero?

The kiss buoyed him up all the way to the House of the Fathers. But
then, when the ominous, tall, round building rose up in front of them,
and he could see the two circular perispheres at the base of the
trylon-like structure, fear returned.

In one of the completely round low buildings was the House of the
Fathers. The other, on the right hand side, was the meeting place of
the Elders. And high above in the very tip of the tall round building
was The Grandfather's Retreat.

It was awe-inspiring because never before had he been closer to it
than a mile and that only on those days sacred to the memory of The
Grandfather.

The car jolted to a halt right in front of the trylon.

The R.A.'s hustled the three of them out of the vehicle. Where were
they to be taken? Comstock watched wide-eyed. Their guards took them
past the door on the right. So they were not to be taken before the
Elders!

There was no sign that they were going to be forced over to the left.
That meant they were not to go before the Fathers.

Instead they were marched through the center door.

Breathing became almost impossible for Comstock. They were being taken
into The Grandfather's Retreat.

Never before had he heard of such a thing happening. But then, of
course, never before had anyone challenged The Grandfather. At least
not to Comstock's knowledge.

Inside the doorway there were broad windows. Through one of them
Comstock could see into the room where all the Elders were met in
solemn conclave. Their aged incredibly wise faces were heavy with
responsibility. All of the seamed faces were turned so that the Elders
could see the three who had defied authority.

The force of all the red-rimmed eyes staring at Comstock was enough to
turn his knees to jelly. Instantly Grundy was at his side, words of
encouragement on his lips.

He said, "Forget the old codgers. They're so senile they don't even
know what's happening."

In some way Grundy's blasphemy was like a jolt of fresh air, or a
couple of corpse revivers. With the thought of liquor, Comstock
suddenly realized that he should be sick. His heart should be bothering
him. It had been ages and ages since he had had a drink. And yet,
despite all the alarums and excursions, his heart had not bothered him.
That was odd....

But all thought, and almost all consciousness ebbed away when that
voice came thundering down.

It said, "Take them before The Fathers before you bring them to me!"

The R.A.'s paused in their tracks and then changed the direction in
which they had been going.

Ahead was the biggest door that Comstock had ever seen. Discreetly
lettered on it was a sign. It read, "The Fathers."

The leader of the R.A.'s opened the door and then Helen, Grundy and he
were pushed through the door into an ante-room. It was small and on the
far side of it was an even bigger door than the one by which they had
entered.

All around the walls of the little room were chairs.

Comstock realized with horror that the door was all that separated
them from the united might of the Fathers. They must be meeting in
solemn conclave, deciding what should be done with the three guilty
ones.

And then the R.A.'s left, their halos shining more brightly than
Comstock had ever seen any R.A.'s halo shine.

The three were alone.

The Fathers in the next room, and above all brooding in titantic
majesty was The Grandfather ... waiting....

Helen sat down, crossed her legs, with a flourish that revealed not
only her slim a....s but, Comstock gulped as he watched in awed
fascination, he could see her c....s! They were round and full.

Throwing himself into a chair next to her, Grundy said, "It's their
next move, blast them! I hope they hurry it up!"

Unable to do anything but pace back and forth, sneaking an occasional
look at Helen's l..s, Comstock brooded about what had happened to him.

Nightmarish in essence, he yet wondered whether it hadn't been worth
it. He was no braver than ever, but there were new emotions, new
sensations raging through him. After all, he was a man. And as a man,
he was, when all was said and done, capable of being a father. For that
matter right at that moment, and looking almost boldly at Helen's
c....s, he felt that he would kind of like to be a real Father! Not
with Helen, after all she was Grundy's, but with some other girl like
her....

He had not ever felt that way about any of the elderly ladies he had
seen, and certainly never with the woman he visited once a month.

Turning he faced the door behind which the Fathers were sitting and
considering his case. The arrogance of them! To think that if his
friend's hypothesis was correct, these men had their pick of all the
young girls on the planet with whom to.... Even then, he could not
think the word, but the anger was real.

He still could not watch when Grundy k....d Helen and touched her, but
he found that it was for a different reason.

Then Helen gasped and Grundy swore, and Comstock turned to look in the
direction of their gaze.

The door of the Fathers' room had opened.

And through it walked Bowdler. Big as life!




                               CHAPTER 7


Bowdler's smile was as warm as ever, and his face was just as alive as
it had been before Comstock saw it glaze in death. He said, "Take it
easy, kids. I'm alive. Really I am."

Then all three, Grundy, Helen and Comstock spoke at once, their words
garbled, their tones excited. Bowdler held up one meaty hand and said,
"Hold everything. The R.A. lied when he said that his stun-gun was set
to kill. That's all there is to it. I came to shortly after you both
got away."

Grundy and Helen were at Bowdler's side, Grundy pump-handling his
friend's hand, Helen hugging him with relief. But Comstock stood off
to one side and considered this miraculous return from death. Why,
he wondered almost coldly, had the R.A. lied? What function would it
serve? Had it served?

Bowdler must have felt Comstock's thoughts for he turned and said,
"There was a reason, Comstock. Truly there was, and a good one."

The seriousness in Bowdler's tone made Helen and Grundy draw back a
little. Then they retreated in sudden panic at his next words, for
Bowdler said, "You see, my friends, I ordered the R.A. to lie to you."

Perhaps because Grundy had been a friend of Bowdler's longer or perhaps
because Comstock had been pushed as far as a man can be pushed, for
whatever reason, or combination of reasons, Comstock suddenly found
himself for the first time in all his wild adventure taking the
initiative. He snapped, "No one can give an R.A. an order but a
Father!"

Bowdler smiled, "That's right, Comstock. Good work, boy. You _have_
come a long way."

It was Grundy who gasped, "Then you are a Father?"

Nodding, Bowdler said, "Yes."

Before they could question Bowdler any further, he suddenly put his
finger to his lips in the immemorial gesture for silence. Then he
pointed at the closed door behind which the Board of Fathers were
sitting in solemn conclave. Bowdler whispered, "We've only got a split
second before you are called up before them."

"What can we say, what can we do?" Grundy pleaded.

"I thought," Bowdler said, his brow furrowed with worry, "that I'd be
in a position to fight for you all by this time. But my plan didn't
work out. They're furious at your effrontery. I'm afraid if you go
before them now they'll sentence you to death."

Comstock looked around him wildly. Life had become much more sweet to
him in the last few days and he didn't intend to give it up without a
battle.

Bowdler said, "If I could only spirit you all away to safety...."

That was when the door opened. A uniformed emissary of the Fathers, his
regalia frightening in its black severity, came through the doorway.
He was to the left of Comstock.

He barked, "Follow me." Then, sure in the arrogance of power, he turned
his back on Comstock and the others and began to walk back towards the
door. It was obvious that the thought that they might not follow him
had not even crossed his mind.

Grundy made a signalling motion to Comstock, a chopping gesture with
the side of his hand that puzzled Comstock mightily. Seeing that
Comstock was baffled, Grundy brought the edge of his hand down in the
same chopping motion on Helen's neck. Then he pointed at the black
garbed man who was leading the way into ... death....

Once the idea penetrated Comstock's considerably bemuddled mind he
sprang into action as though he had been trained in violence all his
life. Leaping closer to the emissary he whacked the edge of his hand
down on the nape of the man's neck.

As he did so, Grundy and Bowdler ran to join him. They caught the man
before he hit the ground. Comstock stood stock still, and looked at his
hand in some wonder. The idea! His hand had struck down a member of the
inner circle of the Fathers' Right Arms! Incredible!

As though the whole thing had long ago been rehearsed in its entirety,
Helen pushed the door closed, hiding completely what had just happened.

All the while that Comstock stood and gloried in his own daring, the
others were busy ripping the uniform from the unconscious man's body.

Bowdler was grunting from the effort, his big beefy face almost
vermillion with strain. He had yanked off the guard's trousers and was
now holding them up in front of Grundy, as if estimating how they would
fit.

"Nope." He grunted, and then threw the pants to Comstock. "They'd never
fit Grundy. You'll have to wear the uniform."

Still bemused, for otherwise the very thought of doing what he was,
would have made him faint, Comstock stripped off his own trousers, in
front of Helen! and put on the guard's. While he was busy dressing,
Bowdler said, "The only thing I can see to do, is for you to try to
escape from here, with Comstock masquerading as an R.A. Meanwhile, I'll
join the Fathers and see if I can distract them long enough to let you
three get away."

"But where will we go?" Helen asked, "They've found out about me, and
my house."

"I know, I know," Bowdler grunted impatiently. "Let me think."

By that time Grundy had helped Comstock into the form fitting black
jacket. The final touch was the menacing slouch hat that went with the
uniform.

Comstock drew himself up proudly. This was living! Of course, he
thought, and the idea made him deflate his chest rapidly; if they were
caught now, their deaths would be even more unpleasant.... But he
patted the evil little stun-gun at his hip, and tried to feel very,
very brave.

The man on the floor, looking highly undignified in his long underwear,
and not at all menacing, stirred uneasily, and moaned. Bowdler bent
down and rapped him on the point of his chin, and the man relaxed into
deep unconsciousness again.

Not willing to be put off any longer, Comstock asked, "Bowdler, since
you're a Father, why are you doing what you're doing?"

"No time for that, boy, no time at all."

Grundy added his curiosity, "But we must know, Bowdler, we can't keep
up this insane hare and hounds chase unless we know what's going on!"

       *       *       *       *       *

Bowdler pushed Grundy and Helen towards Comstock and snapped, "Later,
later. For now, all I can say is that I am fed up with the unfairness
of the way our world is being run. I went out into your world to try
and find rebels to use as the nucleus for a revolution. But there's
no time now for any further explanations. Listen to me carefully. The
guards at the front entrance would recognize you, Comstock, even in
that uniform, so you must escape by the back exit. To get to it, turn
right when you leave here, go to the end of the long hall, and then
turn left, follow that passage to its end and then turn right. That'll
lead you to the garage. Commandeer a car and go to 14 Anthony Comstock
Road. I'll join you as soon as I safely can."

"Right, left, right," Grundy said. "Okay, Bowdler. I hope you can join
us soon!"

"Before you go," Bowdler said, "Sock me on the jaw."

Grundy asked, "Hit you? Why should I?"

"Do as he says," Helen said impatiently. "He has to have an alibi for
our escape."

Closing his eyes, Grundy lashed out suddenly. His fist missed Bowdler's
chin and landed high on his cheek near Bowdler's eye. He snorted in
annoyance, but said, "All right, all right, that'll have to do. Now
run!"

Throwing himself on the thickly carpeted floor he imitated the truly
unconscious man who was slumped there.

Lifting his head he said, "Beat it! Go on ... hurry!"

They left.

       *       *       *       *       *

Comstock chanted to himself over and over again as they walked down
the long impressive marble corridor, right, left, right. What was
behind the doors they passed? Would he ever know? Each one seemed more
menacing than the one before it. And somehow, high above him, Comstock
could feel the brooding majesty of The Grandfather. Surely here in the
buildings that were sacred to Him, The Grandfather must know what they
were doing. His knees shook and his stomach turned over as he thought
of the effrontery of what they were doing.

If one of the doors that lined the corridor had so much as squeaked,
Comstock thought, he would die. He knew it. He knew his weak heart
would not be able to stand the strain and that was all there was to it.

The silence that surrounded them was harrowing.

Grundy, his arm around Helen protectively, kept his eyes busy
searching, hoping against hope that no one would see them, question
them ... or suspect them.

Comstock's palm and fingers were sweaty with the agony of the grip he
had on the butt of the stun-gun.

Ahead of them was the end of the corridor and no one had seen them.

Taking an even deeper breath, Comstock strode to the left. The other
two followed in his footsteps. This corridor was shorter, he was
grateful to see, and the one that went off to the right at the end of
it seemed lighter. At least it did not seem quite as dark and gloomy as
the way they had come.

And then they had come to the end of the last hallway and ahead was the
door that Bowdler said led to escape. But the highest hurdle, Comstock
thought, was still ahead. They had to steal an auto from a garage. He
had learned that the astrobatless-carriage that had conveyed them there
was called an auto, but what in the world was a garage?

He hoped it wasn't some new horror.

All three of them froze. The door that led outdoors was opening.

Grundy had to nudge Comstock in the ribs to make him move. For the
sight of a platoon of black-garbed R.A.'s stretching off into the
middle distance that was revealed when the door opened had been enough
to end any and all thoughts of resistance on the part of Comstock.

The leader of the R.A.'s snapped a salute at Comstock which he answered
only when Grundy's elbow dug deeply into his rib cage. The R.A. Leader
said, "Reporting to The Fathers!"

Comstock made a gesture that he hoped would look as if he was giving
the Leader permission. It was obvious from the way the man was behaving
that he thought Comstock outranked him. And as Comstock, Grundy and the
girl passed the platoon, it occurred to Comstock that any R.A. who was
employed at this fountainhead would of necessity outrank any others.

The platoon stood at frozen-faced, stiff-backed attention as the trio
left the back door and walked across the greensward toward a building
that Grundy whispered to Comstock must be the garage.

When they were out of earshot of the platoon, Comstock sneaked a look
back over his shoulder. The black-garbed men, like automatons, were
marching into the building.

Grundy said, "Okay, so we've found the garage, but how are we going to
drive the car? That's the next big question."

Comstock was too relieved, first by the fact that they had escaped the
R.A.'s and second by the fact that the garage had turned out to be just
a building, to take on any new worry for a while.

Smiling a little, Helen said, "Hold on, Bowdler said we were to take
a car, therefore, it must be easy to drive one; or else we'll have to
force an R.A. to drive it for us."

"I suppose you're right," Grundy said, but he sounded dubious.

"If we make an R.A. drive it for us, that'll mean we're stuck with
him," Comstock said. "I don't think we want one of them around, do we?"
Then he saw a black uniform and he snapped, "Quiet!"

The man saluted as, Grundy in the lead, Helen following him, and
Comstock bringing up the rear, they entered the "garage". Comstock
said, "I have been ordered by the Fathers to take these prisoners on a
journey."

The black uniform was dirty and greasy which surprised Comstock. He'd
never before seen an R.A. who was not spotless. However, when he saw
what the man had been working on he was no longer surprised. The man
waved a filthy hand at an object on four wheels and said, "Try this
one. I'm having a lot of trouble with these blasted things." He shook
his head. "If we only had some new parts. I don't know how much longer
I can keep stealing parts from one car and putting them in another."

Comstock had to make a decision. His hand still on his stun-gun, he
said to Grundy, "Get behind that wheel, and let's get started."

Slightly taken aback, Grundy gulped and then said, "Yes sir. Right
away, sir."

There was no other way that Comstock could see that it could be done.
An R.A. would not have driven the car and allowed the two prisoners to
sit idly in the back of the conveyance.

The dirty uniformed man, mumbling under his breath, got down on all
fours and began to tinker with the underneath part of the "car" he had
been working on when they entered the "garage".

That was a bit of luck for it allowed Grundy to enter the "car," get
behind the wheel and examine the various controls. Comstock and Helen
sat grandly in the back seat and waited.

Finally, after a long wait, Comstock leaned forward and whispered to
Grundy, "Better get started before he gets suspicious."

He was a little shocked at the curses that Grundy directed at him. They
ended by the man saying, "All right, genius, you tell me what to do!"

The dirty man's legs were all that showed from the place where he was
working. Comstock leaned over Grundy's shoulders and said, "What about
that key? It seems to be part of the works."

Shrugging, Grundy turned the key. There were a lot of things sticking
up out of the floor and Comstock said, "They look like feet would fit
on them, don't they?"

Sticking out one foot experimentally, Grundy said, "Hmmm ... yes, they
do."

Then there was a series of explosions, and a sudden jolting start that
threw Comstock into Helen's lap.

       *       *       *       *       *

Later, when they had learned a bit about driving, they were all very
grateful that the "car" had been pointed at the opening in the door
when it started, for they knew that they would never have been able to
figure out how to reverse it.

Their vehicle bucked and bounced as it roared out through the doorway.
It was only after the first thirty seconds of movement that Grundy
remembered that the other driver had held his hands on the wheel.

Trying this, he found that the car responded to his touch. Rather
delighted, he turned the wheel sharply. Instantly Comstock was thrown
off Helen's lap onto the floor of the "car". She landed on top of him
driving the breath out of his lungs in a gasp that he momentarily
feared was so noisy that The Grandfather, perched high in his tower,
would hear.

But the sound of the explosions in the front of the car drowned out all
other noises.

Careening down the esplanade away from the frightening buildings, away
from the Fathers and The Grandfather, Comstock finally managed to push
Helen off of him and get back into the seat. She was grinning excitedly
and he found that he too shared in the feeling. In the front seat
Grundy called back, "Hey, this is kind of fun!"

It stopped being fun when it became necessary to turn a corner. This
was a difficult maneuver and when it was over, Helen and Comstock
were again entwined in a manner that was highly indecent. Now that
the buildings they had escaped from were receding into the distance,
Comstock found that he was rather enjoying the feel of Helen's soft
flesh.

It made him blush and his heart must have suffered from the strain,
but nevertheless he did, he told himself, enjoy being near her. What a
ghastly perversion! To find youth exciting! What would his dear Father
have thought?

But then he decided not to worry too much about Father. One thought was
uppermost in his mind. He wanted a girl just like Helen. If one could
be found.

Grundy yelled above the sound the vehicle was making. "We're almost
there. What number house did Bowdler say?"

"Fourteen, I think," Comstock said and he was glad to have a break in
the direction that his thoughts were taking.

Next to him, Helen pursed her full lips and whistled. She said, "Take a
look!"

The house well repaid a look. It was the closest that Comstock had ever
been to a home that belonged to one of the Fathers. Immense, sprawling,
with a lawn that was as carefully tended as time and work could make
it, crisp bushes, trimmed and shaped, the house was a gem. It was on
the side of a hill that sloped steeply downwards.

They drew up in front of it and a new problem arose. Grundy yelled,
"Better jump. I don't know how to stop this thing!"

       *       *       *       *       *

One after the other they leaped from the "car" which, since Grundy did
not know how to shift the gears, was still in first and was making all
of fifteen miles an hour.

Rolling over and over, hands and knees badly scraped, Comstock thought,
"There must be a better way than that to get out of a car". But then,
as the vehicle sped faster and faster down the decline of the hill,
he said, "Grundy.... Helen.... Did you notice anything odd on the way
here?"

They were picking themselves up and Grundy was being, Comstock thought,
a little too solicitous about Helen and whether she was hurt, so he
repeated himself a little more loudly.

"Odd?" Grundy finally said after he had patted Helen in various places,
in none of which it seemed to Comstock, it had been likely for the girl
to have injured herself, "What do you mean?"

"Don't you realize we didn't pass a single human being all the way
here?"

"You're right," Helen said. "That _is_ peculiar!"

Grundy looked about them. There was no one in sight. No one at all.
That was not too peculiar, not here, not this near a Father's house,
but the other streets should have been full of people.... It was all
very strange.

Down at the bottom of the hill the driverless "car" crashed into a
tree. It was the only sound but for their breathing. Helen shivered.

Comstock said, "Let's get in the house. Quickly."

It was one thing, Comstock thought, to have been in a room that
belonged to a Gantry, as they had been, but it was a completely
different and much more frightening thing to be walking up the path to
a house that belonged to a Father, even one like this that belonged to
Bowdler who certainly had seemed to be friendly.

They were on the steps of a broad pleasant verandah now, and the
entrance to the house was directly in front of them. The door was
white, and had neatly lettered on it, "Enter."

Comstock grabbed Helen's free hand, her other was in the fold of
Grundy's arm. Then all of them moved slowly towards the door.

It opened before Comstock could put his hand on the knob.

It swung wide enough for them to see that no one had opened it for them.

From inside the house, a heavy metallic voice said, "Welcome may you
be."




                               CHAPTER 8


Perhaps the single most frightening thing in the big living room to
Comstock was the fact that the walls were solid with books. The cases
ran from the floor to the ceiling and every available space was stuffed
helter skelter with books, books and more books. In all his life it is
highly unlikely that Comstock had ever seen more than ten or fifteen
books at one time, and then only in what passed for a library in his
culture.

Why, he thought, there must be thousands of books here. On what
subjects could the authors have written? What was there to write that
much about? A small hope persisted for a moment that maybe, for some
strange reason, most of the books might be duplicates. But that was
eradicated when he looked at the odd, mysterious titles of the volumes.
There were no duplicates and seemingly the books were divided up into
categories. But some of the categories were so strange to Comstock that
they passed his ability to comprehend.

What, he wondered, could sociology be? Or anthropology, or psychology,
or these massive volumes full of poems ... not simple enjoyable poems
like Father Goose, but queer, abstruse ones, whose words made no sense
at all to Comstock's reeling brain.

While he hurried around the room blowing dust off the tops of the books
he was looking at, Helen and Grundy were concerned with who had greeted
them on their entrance.

Leaving Comstock to his perusal of the shelves, Grundy tip-toed out
of the room, and then looking in no particular direction, he called,
"Hello? Who are you! Where are you?"

The same metallic voice answered, "I am the house. I am here to supply
your wants, to feed you and make you comfortable."

When Comstock heard this the shock was too much for him. He swayed,
and then sank, with an armful of books, into the deep recesses of an
easy chair. A cloud of dust surrounded him. Instantly a whirring sound
emanated from a screened section of the floor and he felt rather than
saw the dust disappearing.

Considerably shaken, Grundy came back into the library. Helen said,
"What do you suppose it is, darling?"

"Bowdler has told me about robots ... machines that act almost like we
do, but I never, ever, thought that one could run a whole house this
way!"

Comstock was willing to accept the robot as he would have the word
fairy when he was a child and he was even more inclined to confuse the
two things, when at Grundy's mention of being hungry, the door swung
open and a wheeled cart entered loaded down with food the like of which
none of the three had ever seen.

Sitting in a rather numb silence the three people stared at the food.
But then the odors that came from it were too much for them and
disregarding the magic of its appearance they ate as they never had
before.

       *       *       *       *       *

That was the beginning, for Grundy and Helen and Comstock, of an
enchanted month. At first, from minute to minute, they expected
pursuit, and capture. But as time passed happily by, as every fleeting
fancy was instantly taken care of by the house, they relaxed, and what
was most important, began to devote almost all their waking hours to
the books that confronted them on every side, in every room of the
house.

No one ever seemed to pass the house, they heard no sounds from
outside. They were in a charmed circle, in which every desire was
instantly fulfilled.

Comstock was not aware of how and when it happened, but soon he was not
even embarrassed at the sight of Grundy and Helen kissing and caressing
each other. He no longer wanted to swoon when he heard them exchange
love words. But what did happen was that he wanted some one like Helen
more and more as time went on.

At first they waited impatiently for Bowdler to put in an appearance,
but when days passed and there was no sign of him they ceased to expect
him. Then worry began to take the place of expectancy. Suppose, they'd
say, suppose he was found out by the Board of Fathers ... was a Father
ever punished? They did not know.

Occasionally, but only very occasionally, Comstock would put his hand
to his chest and wonder why his heart disease no longer troubled him,
but a question which is unanswerable ceases in some cases to be a
question, and he almost forgot about it most of the time.

Then too, the contents of the books which they were devouring with
such avidity were so exciting that it almost seemed that there was not
enough time in one day for all the reading they wanted to do.

They'd rise in the morning and the instant they sat up in their
respective beds, the doors of their bedrooms would open, wheeled carts
would enter their room, and the house would serve them their breakfasts.

Having risen, clean clothes would be supplied. Then they'd hurry to the
library, discuss what they'd been reading and then, undisturbed except
by luncheon and dinner, they'd read, read, read.

       *       *       *       *       *

Sometimes the house would seem to feel that they were devoting too much
time to books and it would suddenly and magically produce games and
they'd play away an evening.

But when the morrow dawned the lure of the books would call them back.

Their biggest problem was in deciding which of the books they read were
fact and what fiction. This was their only noteworthy argument. One
morning for instance, Comstock said, "I found a wonderful old book last
night filled with reports on criminals. Fascinating! One of them was
about a court in some kingdom or other back on earth where a prince
found out that his step-father had murdered his real father in order to
marry his mother."

"I remember that one," Helen said, "It ended with practically everyone
in the court murdered."

"That's the one," Comstock nodded.

"Y'know," Grundy said. "I wonder if that was really a report on actual
criminals."

"Must have been," Comstock argued, "no fiction writer would have had
the prince dilly dally the way that one did, never able to make up his
mind what to do. Only in real life do people bumble along that way."

"Mmm...." Grundy disagreed, "I think a fine writer might have done just
that in order to make the character seem real."

"Prince Hamlet _must_ have been real," Comstock said, "He could not
have been imagined. No, I'm sure that is fact. But this book I'm
reading now, what nonsense!"

He held up Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire."

"What an imagination! Fantastic!" Shaking his head he went on with his
reading.

       *       *       *       *       *

It was a day or two later when he was reading what he considered
another criminal report, the story of a Moor and jealousy, that the
idea occurred to him.

Putting down the book, he stared thoughtfully off into space. The idea
had just never entered his brain before. Was it possible, he wondered,
that he might be able to woo Helen away from Grundy?

Not knowing a thing about how to go about it interfered quite a bit,
he found. His flirtation, if you could call it that, began to resemble
a game of hide and go seek, for he would lurk in dark corners of the
house and wait for Helen to walk by alone.

Then, darting out, he'd try to manufacture love talk, or what seemed to
pass for it in the book he'd been reading. One day, having succeeded in
scaring Helen half out of her wits, by popping out of a linen closet
and appearing at her side completely unexpectedly, he made a groping
motion and managed to capture one of her hands. Bending over it, he
kissed it.

That surprised Helen almost as much as his darting out of the closet
and she was even more surprised when he said, his voice low, so that
Grundy in the next room would not hear him, "Helen ... I...." But then
his voice vanished and he was unable to go on with the speech he had
prepared.

One eyebrow raised so high that it almost succeeded in touching her
hair line, Helen considered him. Then she asked, "Is anything wrong?
Do you feel all right?" Then she put her hand on his forehead and said,
"Are you feverish?"

The speech that should have come tumbling out of his mouth raced
through his mind, he thought, "Yes, I am feverish, burning with
desire.... Nothing can put out the fire but you...." That is what he
thought. What he said, was, "Um.... I guess I _am_ feeling sick. I
think I'll go up and lay down for a while." Then tottering off he left
her there.

Lying down, even with a cool cloth on his head, he found did not
suffice to quench the fire that was threatening to consume him.

Returning to his reading he found that on occasion, earthmen had
murdered the men who stood in the way of their desire. Then it was that
he began to trail Grundy instead of Helen. He'd stand in a doorway,
while Grundy innocently read, and think of ways to kill his friend.
Poison, he found in his reading, was one of the commoner ways of
removing the other lover. That would have been fine and he'd have been
glad to poison Grundy but for the small fact that he didn't have the
vaguest idea what poison was.

And, what if he killed Grundy and even then Helen didn't fall in love
with him? That was a big factor and one that succeeded in baffling him
for quite a while. Perhaps, he decided finally, he'd better make sure
she at least liked him before he went to the slightly extreme extent of
murdering his friend.

But before he could take matters of any kind in hand, there came an
interruption in the even tenor of their ways. Precisely a month after
they entered Bowdler's house, the door opened and Bowdler came through
the entrance, a broad smile of inquiry on his heavy face.

He asked no questions about how they were making out, he told them
nothing about what he had been doing. Instead he asked, "Has she
arrived yet?"

"She?" The word was chorused by the trio.

"Yes," Bowdler said, his expression changing and worry showing on it.
"She should have been here by now if she escaped from the R.A.'s."
Shaking his head, he sat down in one of the big comfortable chairs that
were scattered all around the library. "She's the best possibility I've
found since you three. Courageous, with a real brain in her head. I
hope she's not been captured."

       *       *       *       *       *

Grundy, Comstock and Helen stifled the questions which were crowding
to their lips, questions about the house, about the books, about the
reason for their having been sequestered so long. In the face of
Bowdler's worry, their questions seemed picayune.

"When should she have arrived?" Comstock asked.

"This morning. I helped her get away last night, gave her directions,
and then turned off the force field that's been protecting the house
and you three in my absence. If she doesn't appear soon, I'll have to
turn it back on. I can't risk having the R.A.'s stumble on this retreat
of mine."

"Force field?" Grundy asked timorously.

"Sure, a smaller version of the thing that the last scientists built
to protect our whole planet from interlopers. Unseen, it blankets the
whole area around the house in an invisible sheath that keeps anyone
from even being aware of the house."

So that, Comstock thought, was why they had heard no one, seen no one
passing by.

Bowdler got up from his chair and began to pace the floor uneasily.
"It's getting later. I'd better turn the force field back on, even
though it means that she'll never get here. Sometimes sacrifice is
essential."

Rather to Comstock's surprise, he got to his feet, jutted out his
rather insignificant jaw and said, "I'm going looking for her!"

"Good boy!" Grundy said approvingly.

Helen asked, "But how will you manage to get back even if you find her?"

"I don't know. All I know is that I can't rest thinking of someone
wandering around at the mercy of the Father's Right Arms."

"I've got it," Bowdler said, slowly, "You go ahead, Comstock. Look for
her to the east, down around Puritan Square. That's the direction from
which she would be coming, if she's not been captured. Then, at twelve
midnight, and twelve noon, I'll turn off the field for exactly thirty
seconds each day and night till you return." The if, was unspoken.

"Shall I go dressed in the R.A.'s uniform or as a citizen?" asked
Comstock.

"Umm...." Bowdler pulled at his lip thoughtfully, then said, "I'd go as
a private individual. That way there should be fewer problems."

Helen asked the question that should have occurred to Comstock. "How
will he know her?"

"She's about Comstock's height, willowy, red-haired, and instead of
the dull apathetic look that most of our fellow citizens have, she has
bright green eyes that penetrate right to the core of any problem.
You'll know her as a fellow rebel as soon as you see her!"

Comstock wanted to ask how old she was but he couldn't. He felt that
it might reveal the motives that were driving him out of the security
of Bowdler's house into the harsh reality of his world which he had
grown to hate and fear.

Waving his hand in farewell to Bowdler, Helen and Grundy, he tried to
look like one of the heroes he had been reading about. With that image
in mind, he threw back his shoulders, took a deep breath, and slammed
the door behind him. Then, head held high, he walked straight off the
verandah and missed the top step completely.

Floundering, he landed in a heap at the bottom of the four steps.

It wasn't particularly heroic he feared, rising and brushing himself
off.

Gulping, he walked out of sight of the enchanted house as quickly as he
could. Ahead lay a world of danger, of familiar things that now were
menacing, and terrible.

But beckoning him on his way was a picture of a lovely red-haired,
green-eyed girl who would fall languishing into his arms when he
rescued her from the hands of the enemy.

Thinking about just what ways she would reveal her gratitude carried
him along on seven league boots. As a matter of fact before he quite
knew how he had covered the distance between the house and Puritan
Square, he was there.

The streets were crowded with people but of a lovely red-haired siren
there was no sign, no sign at all.




                               CHAPTER 9


A wave of revulsion turned Comstock's stomach making him forget, for
a moment, the girl for whom he was seeking. All around him in eddying
mobs were elderly, grey and white-haired women, their long dresses
dragging on the ground. The idea that he had ever found them exciting
was hard for him to bear. And the way the young men held the women's
arms, talked to them, guided and protected them, made Comstock feel
even queazier.

It was a Grandfather's Meeting night and all the couples were on their
way to the meeting house. Above them all, the crazily careening green
moon sent down harsh high lights that made the old women seem even more
decrepit than they really were.

But search as Comstock would, of the red-haired girl he found no sign.

It was getting later and he saw an R.A.'s carriage come down the
street, its astrobats dancing as the R.A. driver lashed them. He
called out, "Nine o'clock, time for meeting!"

Knowing that he would be arrested if he stayed out on the street while
everyone else went into the meeting house, Comstock decided he had
better try to look like a normal citizen. Even so, however, he was the
recipient of an icy stare from the R.A. For he was the last person to
enter the meeting place.

Comstock's flesh crawled when he found the last empty hard seat, and
sat listening to the only too familiar smooth patter of the Elder who
stood in the front of the hall, on a little podium and mouthed the old,
only too familiar platitudes, about The Grandfather.

Closing his eyes, Comstock tried unavailingly to close his ears to
the now meaningless words that flooded him and all the others in the
crowded smelly meeting place.

The Elder was speaking, his seamed face hanging in lank folds, his
jowls wobbling as they barked out the words, "And so, we know now that
only in the lap of The Grandfather is there to be found the peace that
passes all understanding...."

Comstock's eyes blinked open in shock when a clear, sweet voice
interrupted the maunderings of the Elder by saying, "Poppycock!"

The Elder's face froze in ludicrous astonishment as he repeated after
his heckler, "Poppycock?"

And then he saw her, Comstock did, and he was glad he hadn't murdered
Grundy, and he was even gladder that his frozen tongue had not been
able to utter words of love he had wanted to say to Helen. For he saw
the girl for whom he had been searching and she was all his maddest
dreams come true.

       *       *       *       *       *

She stood up on her chair at one side of the hall and her eyes were as
clear as Bowdler had said, and now they were flashing in anger. Her
chest was heaving with indignation and Comstock found himself admiring
the way her chest lent itself to this sort of treatment.

Waving one hand in the air for attention, she said, "You fools! How
much longer are you going to be duped by the maunderings of these old
fools? Don't you know that it's all a lie?"

The audience rose in its wrath and with one voice roared loudly enough
to drown out all sounds that might have come from the girl.

The Elder, pointing a shaking arthritic forefinger at the girl, said in
a feeble voice that didn't reach through the tumult. "She is insane.
Call the R.A.'s."

But the crowd was too upset for any such normal proceedings. None
of Comstock's reading had covered lynchings but that was the feeling
that emanated from the furious people. This was a many-headed mob that
wanted blood.

She was grabbed by so many hands that Comstock wondered if anything
would be left of her. One man, bigger and stronger than the rest of the
crowd roared out, "To the stocks with her!"

There was no way that Comstock could fight his way to her side, and
even if he could have there was little he could have done but be
attacked in his turn.

"The stocks," he kept thinking. They were outside in the square, just
to one side of a statue of The Grandfather, where the graven image
could look down in its infinite wisdom and be soothed and assuaged
by the sight of its recalcitrant grandchildren being punished in the
stocks.

If he waited, Comstock thought, till she was in them, there would
be little he could do, for few ever lived through more than an hour
of that treatment. The rocks and stones thrown by the good, lawful
citizens of the community made sure of that.

No he could not wait, and yet what could he do as of that moment? What
had possessed her to make her speak out in the meeting? The little
fool. He'd shake some of the nonsense out of her, if he ever got her
away from those menacing hands.

The crowd surged out of the meeting house, down the stairs and toward
the statue. There was still no sign of any R.A. But then, why should
there have been? Once everyone was at meeting, the R.A.'s could relax,
having done their duty for the evening.

But how long could the rumble, the frightening mutter of an outraged
mob continue before some R.A. heard it?

Comstock came to a sudden decision, as a ferocious and even more
elderly woman than most reached forward and ripped the girl's dress
from her neck to her navel, screeching, "The hussy! Put her in the
stocks! I've got a stone for her! A big one ... perhaps one of you
young sirs would help me throw it?" She looked about her coquettishly
and her plea did not fall on empty air.

Running around the outer perimeter of the mob, Comstock made his way
to the statue of the kindly-faced Grandfather. Skirting the stocks
which were ugly and dull with the blood that had so many times defaced
them, Comstock reached up and pulled himself into the lap of the stone
Grandfather.

From that point of vantage he yelled, "Stop!"

His voice squeaked a little of course and did not come out with quite
the roar that he had wanted it to, but it was enough, it served to halt
the mob in its tracks.

Down below him, the girl, naked to the waist, her torn gown hanging
from the belt that was all that retained the shreds of cloth that
remained from the old woman's tearing hands, looked up at him.

The sight of her bare b.....s was almost too much for Comstock. It
unmanned him momentarily, but raising his eyes to her face, and seeing
the courage that shone from her eyes, he recovered his lost voice and
this time it came out with a roar, as he yelled, "Sanctuary! I claim
the right of sanctuary for this girl and myself!"

       *       *       *       *       *

It had been over four hundred years since last a human voice had
claimed that right. But in an ancestor-directed culture like his,
Comstock was sure that since old things were automatically the best
things, his plea would _have_ to be honored. Once having claimed
sanctuary and while in the lap of the Grandfather, no one, not even the
R.A., would tear you from that sacred place.

The mob was not at all happy, but it surrendered as he had been sure it
would. The girl was passed up to him. His hands reaching down for her,
were gladdened by the soft silkiness of her skin as he pulled her to
him. Once she too was seated next to him in that broad capacious lap,
the first thing she did, and he was sorry to see it happen, was to pull
the shreds of her garment close around her.

Down below them the crowd was not silent. It looked up, and after a
while its many faces merged into one, a fearful, frightening visage
with one big voice that chanted, "You have sanctuary. We cannot deny
you that. But sooner or later you must leave for you must eat and
drink ... and when you do...."

And when they did, Comstock knew, they'd be torn to shreds. For the
anger which formerly had been noisy and quarrelsome, was now quiet and,
if anything, even more menacing than the noise had been.

But it would be a long time before he and the girl were forced to leave
their sanctuary, and looking at her face, he decided that if he had to
die, there were worse ways to go.

Shyly he put his hand out and stroked her flaming hair. Then he asked,
"What's your name?"

"Patience and Fortitude Mather." She was still busy trying to arrange
her torn clothing.

He gulped.

Noticing his surprise, she said, "But just call me Pat. What's your
name?" But before he could answer she said, "Don't tell me you're a
friend of...."

Nodding, he said, "Yes, I'm one of Bowdler's rebels." Then he
identified himself.

"I should have known."

"Why," he asked with some asperity, "didn't you join us at Bowdler's
house?"

"I couldn't shake off the R.A. who was following me and I wouldn't
jeopardize the sanctum."

"Of course. But what made you decide to get up and carry on the way you
did at the meeting?"

"When I finally did get away from the R.A. it was too late. It was past
the time that Bowdler said I would be able to get through the force
field. I knew I was lost and I decided I might just as well go down to
defeat saying the things I'd always wanted to say."

"In case," Comstock said, "just in case, there is any chance of an
escape from our present situation, and we should become separated," and
he told her about the two times of the day when it would be possible to
get to Bowdler's house.

       *       *       *       *       *

The temperature went down as they sat on the cold stone and became
acquainted. S.x was the farthest thing from Comstock's mind when he
moved closer to the girl and held her in his arms to try and preserve
their mutual body heat. At least s.x was far from his mind in the
beginning of the long night. But as the evening hours wore away and the
insane moon moved higher and higher in the sky, he found that hunger
and thirst, cold and fear were not enough to keep certain thoughts from
his now over-heated brain. Just sitting so close to her was the most
exciting experience he had ever had.

Below them the Hydra-head of the angry multitude began to murmur as
he disregarded some of the conventions on which he had been raised.
"Shameful," "Disgusting," "Perverted," "Horrible," were some of the
milder epithets that were thrown through the air.

Her skin he found on investigation put any flower he had ever beheld to
shame. Her breath was sweet on his nostrils. The feel of her was unlike
any thing he had ever dreamt of.

He said, his voice as low as his intentions, "Pat, do you think what I
feel for you is love?"

Snuggling closer to him, she answered, "If it isn't, it's as good an
imitation as we're likely to find." Then her inquisitive lips met his.

It was, he thought, even as he was experiencing it, a highly unlikely
place in which to enjoy a honeymoon.

The shamelessness of their conduct was not lost on the waiting throng.
At one point even the R.A. who had joined the mob and whose hand had
never left the butt of his stun-gun, found it necessary to walk away.
None of the onlookers, as a matter of fact, could bear to watch.

So it was, that when Comstock accomplished his desire, and leaning
back against The Grandfather's stony beard expressed some of his
satisfaction by wishing he could fight the Board of Fathers, en masse,
with one hand tied behind his back, he and Pat found that of the whole
mob there was not a remnant.

Their conduct had shamed and frightened away the crowd.

Slipping down from the statue's lap, unable to believe their eyes, they
skittered away in the now all-encompassing darkness, expecting at any
moment to be halted by an R.A. or grabbed by some die-hards from the
waiting crowd.

Jogging along at his beloved's side at a half-run, half-walk, Comstock
wondered if even death could eradicate the exultation which he felt.
But feeling as he did was not conducive, he found, to gloomy, dismal
thoughts.

Not even when they ducked down a long alleyway, which he thought led
in the general direction of Bowdler's house, did he really, deeply feel
concerned about capture. Life could not be so unfair, he decided, as to
raise him up to such heights as he had just surmounted, and then drop
him into a gloomy pit.

But of course life could, and did, do just that.




                              CHAPTER 10


He could not help wonder as they ran through the alleyway towards a
lighted area that might or might not lead to Bowdler's house, just how
long the shock of what he had just done would keep the irate citizens
off his trail. Pat ran at his side, her long legs easily keeping stride
with him. If she was concerned about her own safety it did not show
in her expression which was calm, and almost contemplative, if you
disregarded the little quirk of a smile that turned up the ends of her
full lips.

Despite the anxiety of his position, Comstock could not help but
compare the feeling of ebullience and general physical well-being that
surged through him, with the sadness and the feeling of despondency
that he had always experienced after his monthly visits to the b.....l.

If he had not been so busy running and praying that they could avoid
the R.A.'s, he would like to have sat down and tried to reason out just
what was the underlying reason for this change in his attitude towards
sex, and its aftermath.

The pounding of their feet was the only sound in the silent night.
Beside them the grey brick walls that lined the alley through which
they ran were completely featureless. No windows or doors broke the
long straight lines that reared up around them.

Pat paused and said, "Why are we running? It's quite clear that we ..."
she giggled, "scared everyone away with our outrageous conduct."

The fact that she was able to muster up a smile under these dire
circumstances made a warm feeling well up in Comstock's chest. He
feebly returned the smile, and then putting out his arms took her in
them. He kissed her chastely on the lips and found that even this
modest gesture made his temples pound.

Enfolding her and drawing her closer to him, he leaned his back against
the nearest wall and whispered into her ear some of the phrases he had
stored up from his reading which he had meant to say to Grundy's girl,
Helen.

Their bodies were glued so tightly together that when the sound came,
their start of surprise was completely mutual. "Ssssst." It sibilated.
And then again, "Sssst!"

Thunderstruck, their arms still pressing around each other, Pat and
Comstock looked around them. There was nothing to see. Nothing at all.

Then the sound became words, "Sssst, the R.A.'s after you?"

"Uh huh." Comstock managed to answer.

"Count three and then press against the fifth block from the ground."

Feeling that they had absolutely nothing to lose, Comstock obeyed the
whispered command.

The fifth block up looked exactly like all the others. But when
Comstock pushed at it, an irregular segment suddenly swung inwards.
Low light was visible for a moment through the opening. Then it
vanished and Comstock, holding Pat by the hand as though to give
her reassurance, but really so that he could draw strength from her
nearness, stepped through the dark aperture.

       *       *       *       *       *

At that particular moment, back at Bowdler's house, Grundy, Helen and
the owner of the robot house were seated in the library. Bowdler had
his hand outstretched to a lever that projected from behind some books.
His eyes were glued to a clock. He said, "Five seconds ... four ...
three ..." then he shook his heavy head, and threw the lever back in
its slot. "I'm afraid we'll have to give them up. It's past midnight.
We'll try again at noon tomorrow."

"Don't you dare leave the force field open for a few moments more?"
Grundy pleaded.

Shaking his leonine head, Bowdler pushed some books into place so that
the lever was hidden from sight. "I would if I could, Grundy. But they
must take their chances now."

"Even if Comstock has found that poor girl," Helen said, "what can they
do out in the night?"

"Twelve more hours before they can make another attempt to reach safety
here." Grundy shook his head. "I can't imagine where they can hide from
the omnipresent R.A.'s."

"If only Comstock knew a little more," Helen said, "but we didn't dare
try to open his eyes till you were here and it could be done under your
aegis."

"The poor innocent," Bowdler said, "you were right to wait for me, but
I wish things had worked out differently. Pat doesn't know much more
about reality than Comstock." He sighed and then rested his big head on
the myriad chins that formed a collar of flesh around his neck.

"What," Grundy asked, "will the R.A.'s do if they capture them?"

"Stun them to death, I'm afraid," Bowdler said.

"No," Helen said hopelessly, "no, they wouldn't...."

But the R.A.'s would, all three of them knew that. Then they just sat
and waited, Bowdler staring sightlessly off into a future that only he
could envisage, Helen and Grundy holding onto each other desperately
in just the same fashion that Pat and Comstock were clinging to each
other, as they followed someone or something through a pitch black room
that seemed to stretch out forever.

       *       *       *       *       *

The peculiar door had swung to behind them making all seeing
impossible. Comstock held his right arm around Pat's waist and held his
left hand before him wishing that his finger tips could see.

The unknown voice that they had heard only once said, "Just a couple
of seconds more, my buckos, and we'll be able to dispense with this
blasted Stygian darkness."

A fumbling sound, a click, and then white light poured down in an
iris-closing flood.

Blinking, Comstock and Pat looked around them. The room through which
they had been moving sightlessly was big but not as big as their
imaginations had made it. The clutter dwarfed the dimensions in any
event. Every available foot of space ahead of them was piled high with
a tangle of household objects that ranged from chairs and tables to
rugs and bed linen.

Their mysterious host was facing them and as their eyes became
accustomed to the light they saw a man of more than average height,
lean as a willow branch, a piratical smile creasing his lantern jawed
face, as he opened his arms in an all embracing gesture and said,
"Welcome to the Haven."

Danger had made Comstock super-cautious, otherwise he might have ruined
everything right then and there; for the first thought that occurred
to him was that by some stroke of incalculable luck they had stumbled
onto still another rebel. But remembering that Bowdler had said that
there were only four fellow fighters altogether made Comstock wait for
a lead. He said, "Thanks. You've probably saved our lives."

Hands on his narrow hips, the stranger frankly eyed Pat appreciatively.
A low whistle preceded his next words, "Put twenty years on you, honey
child, and you're going to be a real live doll!"

If this man liked old women, Comstock reasoned, he could not be a
fellow rebel. But that made his conduct even more remarkable. Go slow,
very slowly and carefully, Comstock brooded, as Pat smilingly asked,
"May we know who you are?"

With vast mock-modesty, the man bowed low, and said, "I am known by a
variety of names, none of them my own. I am perhaps best known as the
Picaroon." Then he waited for them to express surprise and pleasure.

They just looked at him. Slightly crestfallen he rose from his bowing
position, and said, almost anxiously, "You've heard of me? The
Picaroon? I steal from the poor and give to the rich?"

Comstock turned his head and looked inquiringly at Pat. She was as
puzzled as he.

Considerably crestfallen the man said, "The greatest outlaw in all New
Australia? The man the R.A.'s would give their left arms to capture?"
A frown crossed his face, then he said as though talking to himself,
"The dirty rats! They were supposed to write me up, they promised they
would, when I got sick and had to become a thief."

Whirling around on tip toe like a dancer, he pointed at the
accumulation of odds and ends that crowded the room. "Then what have
I been working so hard for? Why have I worked my fingers to the bone
stealing ... stealing, out every night when I should be asleep,
burglarizing every innocent house I come to? Why, I ask you, why? It's
enough to make a man become a cynic, that's what it is!"

Slumping into a chair that was already overcrowded with various
objects, he put his head in his hands. A terrifying thought seemed to
occur to him. He looked up at them. "If you don't even know who I am,
if they aren't even writing up my criminal exploits, what did I go to
all the trouble of preparing this Haven for? If they're not chasing me,
if there is no danger, how can my cure work?"

"I'm sure I don't know," Comstock said since the man seemed to want
some kind of an answer. All the while the thief had been talking,
Comstock had been racking his weary brain trying to recollect what
illness crime was a cure for. He couldn't remember.

A hopeful look came over the man's face and he leaped up from his seat.
A long forefinger jutted out at Comstock. The man said, "I've got it.
You're lying to me! You're undercover workers for the R.A. You're spies
come to root me out! Luckily I have taken precautions against that very
thing. The Picaroon can't be caught napping! No indeed!"

Whirling around the man who called himself the Picaroon suddenly
swooped towards a pile of metallic looking objects whose identity
Comstock had not yet been able to determine.

The thing he grabbed was about three feet long, made of some shining
metal, was about an inch in diameter and came to a point. The handle,
if that was what it was, glittered as he inserted his hand in the
metallic basketwork and twirled the point of the object dangerously
near Comstock's nose. Comstock felt his nostrils twitch as the object
stirred up a breeze as it swirled past him.

The lean man said, "I knew this old sword would come in handy some day.
No one can outwit the Picaroon." He laughed and his voice was pitched
at what Comstock considered an almost hysterical note.

The point of what the Picaroon had called a sword swung back and forth
in front of Pat and Comstock. With his other hand he grabbed a long
loop of narrow cloth and threw it to Pat. "Tie up your fellow spy and
then I'll take care of you...."

Comstock said, "Do as he tells you, Pat, darling. Do it instantly." His
voice quavered for he had suddenly recollected what sickness it was
that thieving cured.

Unexpectedly docile, Pat did as she was directed. She tied Comstock's
hands behind his back, not too tightly, however, Comstock was pleased
to notice, and then turning, faced their captor.

She asked, "What now, noble Picaroon?"

"Good girl," Comstock thought, "She's realized that only madmen are
forced to become anti-social creatures."

Humming to himself the Picaroon whirled the point of the "sword" under
Comstock's chin and said to Pat, "If only you were a little older,
child, you and I could make such beautiful music together.... But then
there's no reason why I can't keep you here in the Haven till you age
properly, now is there?"

"No," Pat agreed hastily, "none at all."

       *       *       *       *       *

The lunatic whistled cheerily to himself as he cleared a free space on
a couch and forced Pat to lie down on it. Then he tied her ankles with
a silk scarf, and her wrists with a plastic substance that was known to
have a tensile strength equal to that of the metal that this culture
used for the framework of their buildings.

Donning a broad brimmed hat, and throwing a cape-like cloth around his
wide shoulders, the Picaroon bowed deeply to Pat. Walking to one wall,
he pressed his fingers against a projecting button and said, "'Tis not
long past midnight ... there's a bad night's work still to be done.
Tonight, the Picaroon strikes again!"

       *       *       *       *       *

He was gone. They were alone. Comstock looked helplessly at Pat. She
tried to manufacture a smile but it was no great shakes.

"If," Comstock said, "I can get this thing off my wrists, perhaps we
can be out of here before that insane creature returns."

"Escape from this retreat directly into the Grandfather's Right Arms?"
Pat asked gently.

Comstock stopped struggling with his bonds for a moment as he
considered what she had said. "If we can fend off this 'Picaroon' until
about eleven-thirty tomorrow then we can make a dash for Bowdler's
house.

"I think that's our only chance, and a slim one it is."

Almost twelve hours ahead of them, at the mercy of a madman, before
they could dare run the daylight gauntlet of the outdoors, under the
menace of the R.A.'s. Comstock shuddered. The risk was tremendous, yet
what else was there that they could do? He couldn't bear the thought of
staying here in the Picaroon's Haven right around the clock, he didn't
think he could stand twenty-four hours more of the nerve racking strain
he was undergoing, even though that might be a more intelligent plan to
attack.

Roughly twelve hours more, one way, and a full twenty-four the
other....

Pat said, when she saw his brow furrowed with painful thought, "Now's
the time to think of my name."

"Huh?" he said, not very intelligently.

"Patience and Fortitude, remember?"

He had the patience, the only question was whether or not he had the
fortitude to put up with the Picaroon's mad fantasies.

At length the secret door opened and the man he was brooding about
entered, bowed down with an even more useless collection of stolen
objects than the ones which already burdened the room.

Striking an attitude, the Picaroon dropped the load he was carrying
and roared, "Once more has the Picaroon dared the armed forces and
the majesty of The Grandfather's law; once more his nimble fingers
have plucked from the very heart of our solid citizenry those stolen
treasures which will emblazon his name in the criminal hall of fame."

He bowed.

Pat said under her breath, "Patience and Fortitude...."

Then the Picaroon darted suddenly towards Comstock, his lean fingers
outstretched. He said, "And you, you poisonous emissary of the forces
of law and order, you, the Picaroon will punish in fitting style!"

Comstock held his breath as he waited to see what new vagary had
further addled the brain of their insane captor.




                              CHAPTER 11


Before the Picaroon's fingers had quite tightened around Comstock's
throat, Pat called out, "Perhaps there is some good reason why your
exploits have not been emblazoned for all to read!"

The strong fingers slowly opened and the madman turned towards Pat.

Taking the cue, Comstock said hurriedly, "Yes, maybe your crimes have
not been particularly spectacular!" Some place in Bowdler's huge
library Comstock had run across a book devoted to the exploits of a
super criminal. Rummaging through his memory, Comstock said, "I've got
it! I know just the thing that the Picaroon can do that will insure his
infamy becoming noticed."

As Pat began to speak, the Picaroon's head swivelled back and forth
between her and Comstock. His steel grey eyes were no longer menacing,
Comstock was pleased to note.

"How about," Pat suggested, "how about stealing...."

"One of the R.A.'s cars," Comstock interjected.

"Just what I was going to say. And then with the aid of the car, he
can...."

"Go to the fountainhead, beard The Grandfather in his retreat."

"And make sure that his most fantastic and fabulous crime will become
known to every living creature in our world by...."

"Snipping off The Grandfather's beard!" Comstock finished. Then he
waited, his teeth pressed together on his bottom lip.

"But," the Picaroon said, in a rather bemused fashion, "that would be
blasphemy."

"But think of the effrontery of it!" Pat said, leaning forward
hopefully, paying no attention to the bonds that held her.

"Think of the shock of such an action! Every law-abiding citizen would
rise up in wrath. Then the hue and cry would be such that no longer
would the Picaroon work long hard hours through the night without ever
getting the fame which is his due." Comstock could hardly believe that
even this lunatic would fall for what they were suggesting.

"What a colossal feat ..." the Picaroon said, almost to himself, "Why
didn't _I_ think of it?"

His long legs carried him around the room, as unthinkingly, he strode
up and down over the various bundles that were strewn around the floor.

A thought struck the man who called himself the Picaroon. "Where could
we steal an R.A.'s car?"

This, of course, was the crux of Comstock's plan. Looking as
unconcerned as he could, Comstock said, "Why, it just happens that Pat
and I know where there is an abandoned car."

"An abandoned car?" The Picaroon grinned delightedly, snapped his
fingers and said, "Then come, the night is young and there is dirty
work to be done!" Running to Pat's side he released her. She rose,
rubbed her fingers to restore the circulation and then untied Comstock.

Comstock eyed her torn dress, the involuntary deshabille that revealed
more of her firm young b.....s than he thought any other man in the
world should be in a position to observe and said to the Picaroon,
"Remember, this is a most dangerous adventure on which we are about to
embark. We are wanted as badly by the R.A.'s as you will be once you
have snipped off The Grandfather's beard! We'd best wear some disguise."

"Then," the Picaroon said, "You two are really not police spies at all,
are you?"

"Wait and see what the R.A.'s do to us if they catch us," Pat said
grimly, while she rooted through a rag bag of old clothes trying to
find some sort of garment with which to clothe herself.

"How exciting," the Picaroon said, slapping his hands together in
delight, "and to think I was just about to crown my criminal career by
murdering this man."

Comstock tried not to think about how close his demise had been and
watched fascinatedly while Pat dropped her torn dress to the floor and
donned a shapeless gown.

But when he saw the Picaroon was busy searching for male clothes he
turned away from the delectable sight of Pat's n..e body and took the
clothes that the Picaroon gave him. A floppy hat had a big enough brim
so that in the dark Comstock's face would be hidden. A tight pair of
trousers and a too big jacket of a different color than the things he
had been wearing would have to suffice as a disguise. All Comstock
could do really, was hope and pray that they would be able to get, with
the Picaroon's aid, near enough to Bowdler's house so that while the
Picaroon was busy trying to understand the mechanics of the abandoned
car, he and Pat could make a run for it through the force field at the
proper time.

       *       *       *       *       *

The trip through the darkened city was a revelation to both Pat and
Comstock. In Comstock's earlier, law-abiding incarnation, there had
never been a night that found him in bed later than the curfew at ten.
To find that the streets were completely deserted at two, or three
o'clock in the morning came as no surprise, since he knew that all
lawful souls would, of course, be asleep at that time.

But he had not been an alcoholic for a long enough period to find out
that the bars stayed open long after midnight. The only people that
there was the slightest chance of trouble with, were the roisterers who
staggered out of the saloons from time to time, and here the danger was
slight, for as soon as an inebriate hove into view the Picaroon would
wink mightily, link arms with Pat on one side and with Comstock on the
other and the trio would mimic drunkenness and sing bawdy songs till
the real drunks were gone.

"What," Comstock asked, "are the chances of bumping into an R.A.?"

"Aha!" The Picaroon placed his long forefinger next to his nose.
"You are attempting to tear aside the veil that hides the Picaroon's
methods!"

"Fiddle faddle," Pat said nastily, "answer him!"

Coming to a halt on a silent street corner under a lamp post that
cast a spotlight down around his piratical figure, the Picaroon said,
"At night, after curfew, when all law-abiding citizens sleep...." He
lowered his voice to a shadow of a whisper forcing Pat and Comstock to
place their ears near his mouth, "you realize, don't you, both of you,
that I am giving away my most cherished secret, the modus operandi that
allows me to operate and so flout the law?"

They nodded.

"Then let it be known, but just to us, that I have found when all the
other law-abiding citizens sleep, why, so do the R.A.'s."

Twirling in a mad pirouette, the Picaroon threw back his head and
laughed. "From curfew to dawn, there is no law!"

Clapping a hand over the Picaroon's mouth, Comstock snapped, "Shut up!
You'll rouse the dead with all that noise!"

A little sobered the Picaroon said, "Now you have my most valued
secret, see that you guard it with your lives!" Putting his finger to
his lips he added, "Hisssst...."

Pat asked, "What is it?"

"Nothing," the Picaroon said, "I just like to say hisssst...."

Shrugging behind the Picaroon's back, Comstock gestured to Pat to pay
no mind to their mad guide. Aloud, he asked, "Do you know your way to
14 Anthony Comstock Road?"

"I know all the ways," the Picaroon said, and again taking the lead,
walked with exaggerated steps, on tip toe, as though fearing to wake
the sleeping world.

It was a long trip on foot and dawn was breaking as they came in sight
of some landmarks that Comstock remembered. If his mental picture of
the terrain was correct, the car in which Grundy, Helen and he had made
their escape from the Fathers should be downhill from where he and Pat
and the Picaroon were now standing.

He conveyed this information to the others and this time he took the
lead with Pat behind him and the Picaroon still walking on tip toe
bringing up the rear.

As they went downhill Comstock could see his goal. Bowdler's house lay
still and quiet, the refuge for which he yearned. But it might just as
well have been on the other side of his world for all the good it was
as long as the force field surrounded it.

Waiting till the Picaroon's attention was on the car in the distance,
Comstock pointed at the house and whispered to Pat, "That's it."

She nodded.

Then they reached the car and the Picaroon's almost idiot glee reached
its apogee as he poked at the thing under the hood that made the "car"
move.

Comstock didn't have the vaguest idea of whether or not the car could
run. When he and Grundy and Helen had abandoned it, it had simply gone
careening downhill and finally stopped. Why it stopped, or whether it
would ever go again was an impenetrable question to Comstock.

But he didn't allow his lack of knowledge to stand in his way. Becoming
dictatorial he told the Picaroon to stop fooling about with the
mechanism and to watch and try to learn how to make the car go.

Then with the Picaroon standing at attention, Comstock got into the
car, and went through the complex series of actions which in Grundy's
case had served to animate the vehicle.

There was a muttering rumble from the "car" and it surged internally.
However the rock which had halted its forward progress in the first
place, still served to prevent it from proceeding.

       *       *       *       *       *

The Picaroon snapped into action, and going to the rear of the "car" he
pushed as the wheels of the vehicle began to spin to no avail at all.

At this point, Comstock, anxious to stall things as long as he could,
since there was no chance of entering Bowdler's house till the sun was
overhead, tried to turn off the motor. Instead he threw the motor into
reverse and the car instantly backed up, carrying the Picaroon along
with it.

He dangled from the rear of the car trying to muscle himself up out of
the danger of the wheels while he yelled at the top of his lungs for
Comstock to stop whatever he was doing.

Pat sat on the side of the road being of no help to Comstock at
all, since she was busy being convulsed by giggles. The sight of
the long-legged madman, his no longer jaunty cape entangled in his
thrashing limbs, while Comstock wildly snapped things on and off on
the control board, and the unguided car veered and yawed as it ran
backwards up the steep hill was a little more than she could stand.

When the car had backed almost to the crest of the hill, Comstock found
the key which turned the ignition on and off and managed to bring the
"car" to a halt.

The Picaroon was in a towering fury. "Poltroon!" he roared at Comstock
who was red-faced with embarrassment and anxiety. "How dare you treat
a criminal figure of my stature in a manner more befitting some low
comedy person like you?"

Dropping from the rear of the "car" the Picaroon raced around towards
the driving wheel where Comstock sat helplessly trying to deduce what
had gone wrong with his method of driving the "car".

The Picaroon's right hand darted out of sight under his cape and when
it came back into view, Comstock was horrified to see that a steel
blade perhaps ten inches long had become integral to the maniac's right
hand.

"Blood!" the Picaroon stated almost calmly, "blood is the only thing
that will erase this stain that you have placed on my criminal
escutcheon."

With that he darted the sharp point of the knife straight at what would
have been Comstock's Adam's apple, had not a beginning double chin
covered it with fat.

There is no doubt that Comstock would have died at the wheel of the
car, with a slit throat had not Pat, seeing the direction that the
madman's mind was taking, picked up a rock and smashed it down on the
Picaroon's head just in the only too well known nick of time.

Breath whooshed out of Comstock's lungs as he saw the knife blade
falter, and then saw the Picaroon's head come careening down. Wide-eyed
he watched as the man's unconscious body tumbled to the ground.

As soon as the Picaroon landed, Pat was at his side and her questing
hand first took the knife from his flaccid grip and then she examined
the rest of the arsenal that hung from the man's belt hidden till now
by the all-encompassing cloth of his ridiculous cape.

The plethora of weapons clinked and clanked as she placed them to one
side. She said, "When you get your breath, come and take some of these
for yourself, dear."

       *       *       *       *       *

Comstock found that if he didn't pay too much attention to the way
his knees wobbled that he could navigate. Getting out of the car was
hardest. Once he was on firm ground again he found that the various
alarums and excursions through which he had lived had served to, if
not make him callous to danger, at least make him bounce back a little
faster than he had at the beginning of his departure from his normal
way of life.

Holding his right forefinger on his left pulse for a moment he wondered
why his poor weak heart had not long ago surrendered beneath the
various assaults that had been made on it. But when he found that
his pulse seemed to be practically normal he forgot about his heart
until kneeling down next to Pat he smelled the fragrance of her hair.
This time he did not have to take his pulse. He could feel his heart
pounding.

She looked sideways at him and smiled gently. They were both kneeling
next to the prostrate Picaroon. Their mouths were on a level. This made
their kissing almost automatic.

The kiss might have lasted even longer than it did had not the
Picaroon stirred. Pat broke away from Comstock's embrace and said,
"We'd best tie him up so that we don't have any more trouble with him."

"By all means," Comstock said muzzily, his mind still concerned with
the nearness of her.

It was only when she rose and went to the car looking for something
with which to bind their captive that Comstock was able to think, shake
his head and force his addled brain into action again.

Then using the cape as a blanket, Comstock swathed the madman in its
folds. Next, when Pat returned with some rope they wound it around and
around the man till he was completely bound.

Then, and only then, did Comstock turn and look across the distance
that separated them from Bowdler's house and safety. The sun was well
up now, which was good in that it shortened their waiting time, but was
bad since it meant that the R.A.'s would be out on patrol in full force.

Pat, standing at his side, voiced his thoughts when she said, "Isn't
there some way that we could signal to your friends so that we need not
wait out here till noon?"

"The big danger to be avoided is that the R.A.'s may see us and so
suspect the house."

Below them, the Picaroon rolled his head back and forth angrily.
This was the only part of him that he could move. He said, "So you
_were_ spies!" He spat. "I should have known. Always should the master
criminal work alone. All the text books I have read make that point. It
serves me right for not being a lone mink ... or wolf or whatever the
earth word is."

Comstock paid no attention to his grumbling as he tried to assay the
situation. They could not endanger the safety of the house by just
walking into view of one of the windows and waving to capture the
attention of Grundy or Helen.

If an R.A. were to see that...

Since that was impossible, what were their chances of being unobserved
for ... looking up at the sun he tried to estimate how long it would be
before noon. Perhaps two hours yet.

Putting his arm around Pat's waist he said, "Let's get as close to the
force field as we can so that when it is lifted we can just make a dash
for the house."

"And take a chance of being seen by an R.A.?"

That was right. When Bowdler told him to come back to the house at noon
or midnight, he had had no way of knowing just how badly the R.A.'s
would be wanting to get hold of Pat and Comstock. It hardly seemed
possible to Comstock that so little time had passed since he had left
the house and safety the day before to go hunting for an unknown girl.

He gulped as he realized what the tenor of his thinking meant. He said
plaintively, "You mean we'll have to wait till midnight before we dare
go to the house?"

She nodded.

Then, as one person they turned and looked down at the Picaroon. It
would be unfair to keep the poor lunatic tied up the way he was for at
least fourteen more hours...

The Picaroon was mumbling to himself, "You are who you are, if you
think you are..."

Blinking thoughtfully, Comstock turned to Pat and said, "You know,
that's a very interesting question. I'd like to think about it for a
while."

"While you're thinking about it, darling, devote a little of your brain
power to figuring out where we're going to get food and water to last
us till midnight..."

The madman's words pounded at Comstock's brain washing away the reality
of what the girl had said. "But how do you know you are?" That was a
very interesting question.

Still squatting on his heels, Comstock looked unseeingly off into the
distance and wondered what in the name of The Grandfather the answer
to the lunatic's question could be.

He was something or someone called Comstock, he was sure of that. But
how could he know he was Comstock, for sure, that is?

He was so engrossed that he did not even hear the Picaroon's mad giggle
as the man said to Pat, "See ... see what my little question did to
him? That's what happened to the first four doctors who examined me!"
He laughed again. "That was when the Fathers decided that I was a
madman and that my only cure was to become a criminal."

Worry made itself visible on Pat's face as she turned from looking
at Comstock who was completely withdrawn inside himself. She looked
down at their captive and asked, "Who were you before you became the
Picaroon?"

The harsh piratical face lost its Harlequinesque self-derision as the
man said, "I was the last philosopher."




                              CHAPTER 12


There was something so infinitely sad in the man's words that Pat was
emotionally moved. Not knowing what a philosopher might be did not
prevent her from feeling sorry that the bound man had been the last of
whatever it was that he had been.

Comstock never knew about the conversation that the quondam Picaroon
had with Pat, for all the while that the girl and the bound man talked,
Comstock was in a little world of his own trying to chase down the
reality of his own existence.

Sitting on the ground next to the man who called himself the Picaroon
and the last philosopher, Pat found herself involved in a discussion of
what the man spoke of as the eternal verities.

The sun rose higher and higher in the sky, noon came and went while
Comstock went deeper and deeper into himself searching for the answer
that does not exist.

When he had not moved for many hours, Pat tore herself away from what
she was being told and asked, "What can I do for him?"

For the first time in many hours the philosopher gave place to the
Picaroon and the madman, laughing gleefully as he said, "All you need
do is find the answer for which he is questing. That will bring him out
of the grey world into which the question has driven him."

Looking at Comstock, Pat felt fear like a live thing. There was no
intelligence on his soft face. None at all. His eyes were unfocussed,
his breathing very slow. His arms were hooked around his knees which
were drawn up towards his chest. He had fallen over on his side.

Luckily Pat had no idea of what the foetal position looks like or she
would have been even more frightened than she was.

Pat asked hesitantly, "Will you tell me the answer so that I can help
him come back?"

Then the madman threw his lean face back and howled.

Wringing her hands, Pat wondered what had come over the man who such a
short time before had told her wonderful things of which she had never
dreamed.

When he was strangling with his own mirth, the man gasped, "My dear, I
would gladly give the answer ... that's what I devoted all my life to
searching for ... but the humor of it all is that there is no answer."

Then another paroxysm of laughter swept through him.

Deep down inside Comstock's brain in the never-never land to which the
last philosopher's question had driven him, Comstock was dully aware
that his body was being stroked. It felt nice and he made an animal
sound deep in his throat. But the action did not serve to revive him
any more than Pat's anxious voice which was shouting in his unhearing
ears.

He never heard her say, "Darling, you _must_ come back! The R.A.'s are
coming."

Comstock never knew when a squad of R.A.'s surrounded the car, and by
means of a frightening array of stun-guns forced Pat to help them carry
first the tied-up lunatic and then the unresisting body of the man she
loved into the car in which they had driven onto the scene.

       *       *       *       *       *

Inside Bowdler's house Grundy, Helen and the owner of the robot house
sighed as midnight came and went. Bowdler voiced all their feelings
when he said, "I am afraid we must give them up for lost. We have
waited through three periods. There has been no sign of them. None at
all."

While he was saying this, the R.A.'s were driving away with Comstock,
Pat and the Picaroon.

"Then we can wait no longer?" Helen asked.

Shaking his head, Bowdler said, "No."

Grundy rose to his feet as he murmured, "I'm glad. This waiting has
been worse than anything that the Board of Fathers can mete out to us."

Helen and Grundy paused at the door of the house and looked back
regretfully, Grundy spoke, "It's been a wonderful month we had, we can
remember that, darling."

She kissed him and they walked out into the darkness with Bowdler
close behind them.

He said, "I shall be with you, and you can depend on my helping in any
way that I can."

"To face the Board of Fathers!" Grundy's face was set. "I'll tell them
a few home truths no matter what they finally decide to do to us."

"You're so brave, sweetheart," Helen said. And looked at him admiringly.

"But it's still The Grandfather whom I fear the most." Grundy was
honest enough to add.

Bowdler laid his heavy hands on each of them and said, "Courage."

Then they started on the way to their fates.

       *       *       *       *       *

In the R.A.'s car, Pat sat between the lump of unresisting flesh that
Comstock had become and the cocoonlike figure of the philosopher.

The man who was a criminal in spite of himself observed the way Pat
looked down at Comstock and his harshly handsome face softened.

"My dear, perhaps it is better that he be the way he is, if what you
have told me is true and you are both rebels against the bonds that
chain all of us on this sorry world of ours. I fear what the Board
of Fathers or The Grandfather may decide may be much worse than this
condition that my question has caused."

"To die is hard, but to die without knowing that you are dying, is
horrible," Pat said through clenched teeth.

"It is unmanly, I will not gainsay that." Then the man was silent.

Ahead of them the odd buildings that housed the Board and The
Grandfather rose up in their way. The globular buildings inside of
which were both the Elders and the Fathers were dwarfed by the height
of the shaft of The Grandfather's residence.

The R.A.'s were as silent and seemingly unthinking as machines. Their
first visible emotion had been one of jubilance at having caught Pat
and Comstock but that had faded under the fear of punishment for not
having caught them sooner.

They sat statue still, their hands on their guns as the car drove up to
the entrance of the buildings.

One of the R.A.'s left the machine to go for further orders from his
superior officer.

In the car the last philosopher said softly, "Perhaps whatever little
nobility there is in man is best served by dying with one's eyes open.
I shall not again retreat into the lie of the Picaroon." He smiled
gently at Pat, and said, "I think I will like dying as one of you, as a
rebel."

But all Pat's attention was on her beloved who had never stirred from
the curled up position into which his thoughts had forced him.

Seeing this, the last philosopher said, "There is one chance, and only
one that I can think of that may revive him. Perhaps love, an emotion
of which I know very little, may be strong enough to pull him out of
that place to which he has run for safety."

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"To me," the man said, "as a philosopher, the charms of love and sex
were never very strong. But I should imagine, just as pure speculation,
that the two must be very tightly entwined."

Deep, deep down inside the thing that Comstock had become he felt a
stirring of some kind of interest. He did not yet know what was causing
the sensation, he could not hear the love words that Pat was whispering
in his ear, he was not really conscious of her soft hands caressing
him, but something was taking place, something that seemed to have
reality in a place where there was no such thing.

       *       *       *       *       *

So it was that the guards of the R.A. were as shocked by her behavior
as earlier the waiting crowd had been when Comstock and Pat had broken
the deepest, strongest held taboo of their culture.

At their side, the last philosopher chuckled as he saw the guards
blanch, then turn their eyes away.

Their livid faces were turned from the scene as Pat literally drew
Comstock back from the bourne to which he had retreated.

Gasping, astounded, Comstock came back to reality. He was terribly
shocked when he saw what Pat had done, but this shock gave place to
an even bigger one when he realized that they had been captured, that
they were in front of The Grandfather's Retreat, and that there was no
longer any chance for escape.

None at all.

Gasping, he asked, "What happened? Where have I been? How did we get
here? Why don't I remember coming here?"

"Don't repeat my question," the last philosopher said, "or he may be
trapped by it again."

Slurring over the crux of the matter, Pat gently tried to bring
Comstock up to date.

The guards recovered some of their equanimity and brutally shoved
all three of them out of the car. The last philosopher, still bound,
crashed to his face as they evicted him. Pat hurried to untie him, and
help him to his feet.

Then, inside a living square formed by the R.A.'s they were ushered
back into the ante-room which Comstock, Grundy and Helen had escaped
from a month earlier.

Surprise was piled on surprise for Comstock. When the R.A.'s shoved him
into the room he saw, waiting, sitting in chairs, Helen and Grundy.
Standing, pacing back and forth was Bowdler, his heavy face set with
thought.

Helen cried, "We thought you were dead!"

Then there were introductions, and explanations, and it was only when
Bowdler finally interrupted and said, "Hold everything. You realize
it is late at night, and it is only because of the uniqueness of
the situation that the Board of Fathers is sitting in extraordinary
session, in order to decide what to do with you all, that I am here."

This sufficed to let Comstock and Pat know that Bowdler was still
playing his double game.

Helen whispered in Comstock's ear. "Bowdler pretended that he had
captured us and brought us here and then invoked the special session of
the Fathers."

Just as the door that led into the Board of Fathers began to open,
Bowdler said, his voice harsh with urgency, "I want you to go in there,
not as prisoners come to judgment, but as stalwarts who demand a
fitting place in the government of our world.

"Audacity, my little ones, audacity is the order of the day!" Bowdler
smiled as he saw the puzzlement spread over Comstock's and Pat's
faces. "Follow the lead of Grundy and Helen. I've had time to tell them
a little more than I have told you two!"

The door was open wide now, and as Comstock girded his loins
preparatory to what he was sure would be a battle to the death against
impossible odds, the R.A. who had entered, bowed to Bowdler and said,
"The Fathers request your presence, Father Bowdler."

Then their last prop was gone, and they just sat and waited, staring at
the door which had closed behind Bowdler.

       *       *       *       *       *

The three who had endured so much sat and waited. The three plus Pat
and the last philosopher. When you have fought for as long as they had
against forces strong almost beyond imagining, when you have struggled
in despair, lived without daring to think, hope, when it finally comes
is almost anti-climactic. At least Comstock found it so. Despite the
traps, the violence, the hurts, the fear, they were now where they
wanted to be.

They sat quietly, their hands folded, and if any feeling of triumph
was in them, it was so muted as not to be observable. At that precise
moment, when they sat in the ante-room, waiting for their reward, if
reward it were to be, the only common emotion they shared was that
they had fought a good fight. Fought as hard as it is in a person to
fight for what they consider right.

Then the door opened and instead of the summons to come before the
Board of Fathers which they had expected, The Grandfather entered the
room. The Grandfather, with his high hooked nose, his broad forehead,
deep set harsh old blue eyes, focussed on the middle distance, his
strong old hands crossed on his stomach just below his patriarchal
beard, his tremendous height forcing him to look down at them.

It was hard to believe.

Hard to believe that they, or anyone below the rank of Father would
ever actually behold Him in the flesh.

When He spoke His voice was all the things they had known it would
be... Deep as an organ base, calm, full of authority, stern, yet with a
leavening of those other things that make up the whole man, his voice
was almost gentle as he said, "Follow me, please."

They rose, and feeling like little children, followed his
preposterously tall, spare back, out of the ante-room, into that other
room where the Board awaited them.

There was no fear in them now as there would have been earlier.
For they were not coming before the Board for judgement, but to be
rewarded. At least that's what Grundy and Helen had been told by
Bowdler.

The Grandfather pointed out Comstock, Helen and Grundy, and said,
"These three are the original ones. The other two," his gesture pointed
out the last philosopher and Pat, "are the newer recruits."

There was silence.

"They have come to join us," The Grandfather said.

The silence expanded.

"Gentlemen, Fathers all, these are three new Fathers." The
Grandfather's voice faded away and there was no other sound. Some of
the men who made up the Board of Fathers said a word.

But the ones who had fought their way up to this eminence stood in
silence and looking about them, examined the men with whom they would
now share the control of their whole world.

This was the moment of their triumph.




                              CHAPTER 13


When Bowdler and Grundy had first sounded out Comstock and had asked
him the questions that had led him so far from the normal law-abiding
life that had been his, one of the mainsprings of his conduct had
been envy mixed with disgust that the Fathers whom formerly he had
so revered had become monsters in his mind. Monsters who had used
the whole planet as a breeding ground for their harems. For when the
thought that only the Fathers were really fathers had struck Comstock
he had resolved that he too would like to take part in such noble work.

Along with the sexual motive, Comstock had decided that if the Fathers
controlled the world, he too would like to have a share in either
controlling the world as it was, or perhaps with luck, helping to
change the control in such a way that their world would be a better
place to live in.

This mixture of ideas had resulted in his mental picture of the Fathers
becoming an amalgam of monsters of pride, venery and power.

Looking about the room Comstock decided that he could not possibly have
been further wrong in the way he had pictured the Fathers.

For his first feeling as his unbelieving eyes swept around the table at
which the Fathers sat, was one of pity.

Far from being the creatures with inflated egos, the monsters of
uxoriousness that his inflamed imagination had painted, these men who
guided the affairs of his world were invalids... The lame, the halt
and the blind.

Each face was torn by pain, every body bore the stigmata of some fatal
disease.

Only the Grandfather, ridiculously tall and spare, standing at the far
end of the gigantic room was as his imagination had foretold He would
be.

In the silence that greeted them Comstock finally turned to Grundy and
said, "I ... I don't understand."

The Grandfather walked to the head of the table and prepared to speak.
While they waited, Grundy whispered, "Think a moment. The only cure for
disease that our people know is vice. Right?"

Nodding, Comstock waited.

"But the only people on the whole planet who know how this cure works,
what psychic machinery is involved, are the Fathers."

Comstock gulped and thought of his heart.

"To become a Father," Grundy added hurriedly as The Grandfather raised
his hand for silence, "is a sentence of death. For once you know how
sin cures sickness, it can no longer cure you."

"Fathers," The Grandfather said, and involuntarily, Comstock felt his
heart fill with awe, so imbued had his upbringing been with respect and
worship of the figure called The Grandfather; he tried to control the
emotion that threatened to unman him, for his temptation was to fall
down before The Grandfather.

"Fathers," the deep organ bass went on, "you know why we are gathered
in this extraordinary conclave. So successful has been the regime that
I have caused to come into being, that no longer can we hope to recruit
new Fathers from amongst those brave souls who rebel against the
government we have set up. Not for fifty years has a new rebel appeared
to challenge our power. Therefore, as you all know, Father Bowdler,
because he is the healthiest appearing of any of you, was empowered to
go out into the world and find rebellious souls whom we may be able to
use as leaders.

"I feared when first I caused the apparatus of power to be set up as I
have done, that there would be instant and successful rebellion. It did
not then occur to me that I would be too successful and that rebellion
would be bred out of the blood of our people.

"We have, as you know only too well, arrived at a period of stasis from
which our world may never recover.

"It therefore devolves upon the men who stand before you as well as the
women who have made common cause with them, to come to our aid.

"Now that aid is to be given, what these new Fathers will be able to do
before death claims them, I do not know. All that I can say with any
assurance, is that if something is not done and done quickly, our world
will go down the road to static death, never knowing what has toppled
it from the high estate it held."

       *       *       *       *       *

Comstock's mind was almost incapable of digesting what The Grandfather
was saying. It had all happened much too quickly. To be raised in a
matter of moments from a position where death seemed imminent first
to a position on the Board of Fathers, and now, if he understood
correctly, to be told that the future of the world was somehow his
responsibility, was just too much.

His first instinctual response was to desire escape. Turning around he
saw, directly behind him, a door which was ajar. Not that he wanted to
escape very far, he just wanted to go off in a dark corner and sit and
think the whole thing out.

The Grandfather was still speaking, as Comstock, unobserved, began
to step backwards. The others, Comstock's fellow rebels were leaning
forward, greedily drinking in what The Grandfather was saying.

"You will, in the next day or two," The Grandfather was saying as
Comstock backed closer to the door, "be told just how our government
operates. You will be told how, when the last scientists were martyred
by an unreasoning mob, they tried, before death claimed them, in their
wisdom to set up non-mechanical devices that would cure the sick. They
knew that in the period of dark reaction by which they were swept to
death, anything that smelled of machinery was doomed to destruction.

"You will then understand why I was in effect forced to cause this
world of ours to enter a period of the strictest moral upbringing.
Only under such a regime could the psychosomatic mechanisms that the
scientists had explained, be able to work.

"I have been only too successful as you know. I have, by the
restrictions I set up, brought into being a world where people fear
sickness not because of the pain it brings, but because of the shame
the sins which cure it bring in its path."

Then the door was near enough so that Comstock was able to duck through
it. There was a hard bench just outside and as Comstock sat down on
it, his brain awhirl, he heard the deep voice of The Grandfather say,
just as Comstock pushed the door closed, "But enough of the way our
world works now. I think the next subject under discussion will be just
what we can do to make our world take the step from an inner-directed
culture with ancestor-directed overtones, on and up to the next normal
step which is an other-directed culture."

       *       *       *       *       *

Inasmuch as the last thing that Comstock remembered clearly was when he
brought the "car" under control and then tied up the man he knew as the
Picaroon, he sat on the hard bench, his buttock muscles sore from lack
of sleep, his stomach gurgling loudly from lack of food and water, and
tried to reconstruct just what had been happening to him.

It was no use. There was a lapse he could not account for. He
remembered that the Picaroon had asked him a question, but luckily he
could not remember how it was phrased, and then the next thing he knew
he was getting out of the R.A.'s car, being guided into the fearful
sanctum of the Fathers, and then, first fearing instant death, he had
then been apprised of his accession to power. Then the membership of
the Board of Fathers had been revealed to be a sentence of death,
and before his weary, battered brain could recover from that, The
Grandfather had made it clear that the world's future was somehow his
responsibility.

Comstock was only too aware of his mortality, as everyone is when
fatigue has lowered one's defenses. He slouched down on the bench and
tried to rationalize some of the recent events.

Aside from Pat, he would be only too grateful if the whole benighted
affair had never been and he could once more awaken in bed with his
mother near to comfort him.

The door on the far side of the room opened and an R.A. entered.
Comstock was sunk too far down in a welter of self-pity to do more than
raise his head tiredly and look at the R.A.'s stern face. The uniformed
man produced a stun-gun and said, "You are under arrest."

Before Comstock could bother to tell the man that he was a little
behind in his knowledge of what had been happening, the gun did its
work.

Stunned, Comstock fell off the bench and crashed onto the floor. His
head landed so hard that the result was instant unconsciousness. The
effect of the gun's energy bolt would merely have been to immobilize
his bodily functions. But the blow knocked him out.

       *       *       *       *       *

When he opened his eyes and was again aware of life and its processes,
he had been moved. He did not know it immediately but he had been
transferred to The Grandfather's aerie.

The first thing that Comstock was aware of was the fact that he was
seated in a chair unlike any he had ever seen before. It was big, and
comfortable in a way, except that from the arms of it came metal bands
that encompassed his forearms preventing the slightest movement. Around
his legs, similar bands held his calves against the legs of the chair.

Directly in front of him was the most tremendous desk he had ever seen.
Around the walls of the room which was completely circular were little
holes, just big enough for the muzzles of stun-guns to project through.
The port holes were no more than ten inches apart so that every inch of
his body was being menaced at all times.

As intelligence returned to him, he looked dully at the too tall figure
of The Grandfather who sat behind the desk. The long beard curved
gracefully down the giant chest. More tired than he had ever been in
his life, Comstock thought in woolly fashion of how nice it would be to
curl up in The Grandfather's lap, as he had been taught by his mother,
and forget all his cares.

Thinking of The Grandfather's lap made him remember, with a guilty
start, that he had no idea of what had happened to Pat.

Before he could ask, The Grandfather said, "You have managed to do
something that no one has done in more years than I like to think
about. Why did you sneak away from the Board room, Comstock?"

The omnipresent muzzles of the circle of stun-guns preyed heavily on
Comstock's muddled mind. He did not answer the question.

The Grandfather said, "I am not used to having to ask a question twice.
Why did you leave when I was speaking? Did you not believe what I was
saying?"

There was a curious expression, Comstock realized, on The Grandfather's
face. Was it possible that what The Grandfather had said, down below,
was not the truth? Could it be that Bowdler was as befuddled as the
rest of them? Was some tremendous game, so complicated as not to be
understood being played?

"I am waiting," The Grandfather said.

Comstock's slack face betrayed nothing. He was too tired, too confused,
too upset to even hazard an opinion. Finally he croaked, "The only
reason I left, was because I wanted to think."

"To think?" The tone was satirical. "Curious, most of my people are
content to allow _me_ to do all the thinking."

How despairingly Comstock wished that he too could let The Grandfather
do all his thinking, but it was much too late for that.

Hunching over his desk, The Grandfather leaned forward and said, "Speak
up, man, don't force me to employ certain methods which I have used on
occasion."

Speak up! When all he wanted to do was lay his weary head on that
comforting beard and forget everything? Speak up when his tongue was
thick with thirst and his stomach growling with hunger? Speak up when
his sleepless head was involuntarily dropping from time to time from
sheer fatigue?

Why didn't the old fool leave him alone? How far could a man be pushed?
What did he have to lose now that he knew that membership on the
Board of Fathers meant a lingering death by heart disease? A wave of
adrenaline shot through his system as anger burned brightly.

He almost snarled as he asked, "Suppose _you_ do some answering?
Suppose _I_ ask the questions for a change?"

Leaning back in his chair The Grandfather's face reflected no emotion
at all.

Comstock snapped. "Suppose you tell me how you've stayed in power so
long! Some of those earth books I read in Bowdler's library made me
wonder about a lot of things, Grandfather. And I'd like to know some
of the answers!

"Tell me, how have you stayed in power so long?"

"Because," The Grandfather said, "since you ask, because of fear."

Of that emotion there was none in Comstock. He was beyond any ordinary
feelings at all. They had all been washed away.




                              CHAPTER 14


"Fear?" Comstock hazarded, for at the moment the word meant nothing to
him. Nothing at all.

"Fear," The Grandfather said, repeating the word again, "is my bulwark.
Cowardice my armor. I am the most frightened man in our world. That
is the reason I am The Grandfather. Until the day comes that a more
frightened man, a more cowardly human being arises, I shall rule. No
brave man can ever breach my defenses, because no brave man can ever
know the things I fear. Since I am always fearful my mind is filled
with ideas as to where and how I may be attacked. Since this is so, I
spend all my waking hours building up my guard against any such attacks.

"The nights," he said thoughtfully, "I spend in nightmares in which all
my defenses crumble."

Comstock sat across the room from The Grandfather, his arms enclosed
in the cage like affair that immobilized him. Through apertures in the
walls at shoulder height he could see the stock-still muzzles of the
stun-guns that were trained on him. He brought his attention back to
The Grandfather. The man's long, thin face was raddled with what seemed
like fear. Tics jerked monstrously at the corners of his mouth and at
his hag-ridden eyes.

"How," Comstock asked, "can you sit under the menace of the guns that
surround us? Aren't you afraid that one of the gunners may shoot you?"

"You see," the lean, bearded face was full of envy, "You see, you think
like a brave man and that is why you will never be able to overcome
me. Only a brave man could sit under the guns ... unless, he had the
foresight to have done what I have. Behind the gunners of which you are
aware, there is another set of gunners, each of whom has a gun pointed
at the head of the gunner who has been honored by being my guard."

Comstock thought of this for a while and then he said, "And do the
secondary gunners have tertiary gunners menacing them?"

The Grandfather smiled delightedly, "There! You see, you are beginning
to think like a coward. Fear like mine is infectious. Of course there
are tertiary and quaternary and quinternary gunners!"

In the lengthening pause that followed this statement of The
Grandfather's, Comstock wondered if this was right, was fear the thing
that held him on the pinnacle he had made his own?

The Grandfather said, "I am not sure that I have convinced you. Observe
my face, the way fear tears at it. Consider that I am so cowardly that
my stomach digests itself rather than the food I force into it. Realize
that the only pleasure my fear allows me to enjoy is that of power and
then try to realize how helpless a brave man like you who spreads his
pleasure between the table and the bed must be in the face of my one,
all-consuming pleasure.

"You can eat for perhaps three hours a day," The Grandfather went on,
"depending on your sexual appetite and your years, you can spend an
hour, perhaps two in play at sex. But I can spend every waking minute
of every day on my pleasure."

He smiled. "You are helpless, bound by your bravery, you fool!"

And Comstock, considering the matter wondered if The Grandfather was
right. One Achilles heel alone remained to attack. Could a coward
foresee rashness, foolhardy bravery? Or would a coward be unable to
intuitively foresee such an action, to grapple with it; not that he,
Comstock, was brave.

Only one other way occurred to Comstock in which the matter could be
tested.

Leaning his upper trunk as far forward as his bonds would allow, he
said slowly, throwing his words into the teeth of the bearded man who
faced him, "You are a liar."

It is an understatement to say that The Grandfather was surprised.
His face was absolutely blank as he repeated the word, "Liar?"
questioningly.

       *       *       *       *       *

Comstock was aware in the lengthening silence of the immobility of the
single-eyed muzzles of the stun-guns which surrounded him. Not since he
had opened his eyes in that singular room had one of the guns so much
as twitched.

"Surely," Comstock said. "For instance, there is no one behind any of
the guns that seem to menace me."

Lean fingers were busy caressing the silken hairs of the beard that
cascaded down The Grandfather's chest. The gaunt face surrounded by the
aureole of hair was intent. "How?" he asked, "could you tell that?"

"Because I am _really_ a coward." Comstock said almost boldly. "And I
know that no coward could really take the chance that an involuntary
tightening of a trigger finger, caused, perhaps by a sneeze, could
and would mean death. And I know too that it takes courage of a sort
to talk about one's own cowardice. For instance, I find this that I
am saying very difficult. That little prepared speech you delivered
convinced me of only one thing. You are not afraid of anything."

The Grandfather's hand reached out to his desk and his almost too long
index finger darted out and pressed a button. Instantly the bonds that
had held Comstock immobile in the chair loosened.

The Grandfather said slowly, "Bowdler chose wisely when he selected you
as a rebel. Perhaps more wisely even than he knew."

Comstock moved his arms about in the chair, having no desire now that
the bonds were no longer holding him, to get to his feet. He was
afraid that his wobbling knees would fail to support him. Massaging
his arms where the metallic bonds had bitten deep, he waited with some
trepidation for what might happen. Whatever it was, he feared it would
be highly unpleasant.

It was.

The Grandfather rose from behind the desk and looking down at Comstock
from his not inconsiderable height of six feet ten inches, said,
"Since, as you have so truly pointed out, the secret of my continued
power is not fear, what then, _is_ my secret?"

Comstock had devoted a great deal of cerebration to just this point,
but that did not make it any easier to say it aloud.

In the lengthening silence, The Grandfather bent down from his great
height till his gaunt, strong face was on a level with Comstock's.
"Well?"

"The secret," Comstock said, "is the exact opposite of what you
claimed."

"Ahh?" The exclamation was almost jubilant.

"Yes," Comstock hurried on, fearing that if he didn't say it in a rush
he never would get out the words, "You don't rule because you are
afraid but because there is nothing that you fear."

"Come, come," The Grandfather smiled thinly, "each man, no matter how
brave, has some secret fear. For instance fat people fear death."

The change of subject was so sudden that it thew Comstock off his
mental stride. "Fat people?" he queried.

"Surely," The Grandfather said, "the thought must have occurred to you.
Fat people are fat because they fear dying. Did you ever see a very
thin person naked?"

To think, Comstock's veering brain thought, that the day would ever
come when he'd hear The Grandfather of all people use a dirty word like
n...d!

"If you've ever seen a thin person nude, you can realize that their
skeleton is omnipresent. This, to a fat person, is detestable. They
want to hide their ever present _memento mori_ decently. They don't
want always to be reminded of that which is hidden inside of all of us,
waiting for us.... That's why they get fat. Padding. That's all it is,
padding to hide the grisly skeleton who sits with us at every feast."

Struggling to get his attention on to this new vagary of The
Grandfather, Comstock said, "But fat people die sooner than skinny
ones."

"Certainly," The Grandfather nodded, "but what's that got to do with
it? That's reality. The statistic that obesity shortens life is hard
and true. But that reality only comes once, at the end of the line. To
the fat person the important thing to hide from is the ever-present
reminder that the day he is born he begins to die. That's the big
trick they try to employ. To forget that fact. But I digress. You were
saying?"

       *       *       *       *       *

What had he been saying? This maundering of the Grandfather, could it
be that like the Elders, The Grandfather was senile? Comstock looked
down at his own beginning paunch and wondered if this was why the
Grandfather had brought up the subject of fat, then he said, "I was
saying that the reason you rule is because you have no fears."

"Yes. That was the subject under discussion, wasn't it?" Again The
Grandfather stroked his beard. "Now then, just how did you arrive at
that rather startling idea? Remember I don't agree with you, for as I
said, every human being fears something."

"I am sure you are right," Comstock said tensely. "I am sure that every
human being fears something ... or someone."

"I find your remarks contradictory."

"Not at all," Comstock felt a little bolder. Crossing his arms, he
dared the thunderbolts of The Grandfather's wrath. "I don't think you
are a human being, grandpa."

The silence that followed his pronouncement seemed to last for all the
years of Comstock's life.

When The Grandfather spoke, his words came as a withering shock to
Comstock.

"You are a very brave man, Comstock. The bravest this world of ours has
produced in five centuries...."

It was, after all, one thing to have an hypothesis, it was an astrobat
of a far different color to have that hypothesis substantiated. And
right from the astrobat's mouth at that!

Looking down at his hands, Comstock was incuriously aware that they
were trembling violently. He, brave? The idea was ludicrous. He was
more badly scared than he had ever been in his whole life. Fear jumped
and jolted through his body as he waited for The Grandfather to
continue.

"But," The Grandfather said, "I can see that you are on the very brink
of nervous exhaustion. I will speak to you more fully when you are fed
and rested."

Comstock was too tired to do more than pick at the food that was
provided for him in the bed-chamber to which an R.A. guided him. As a
matter of fact, seated on the edge of the bed, his head whirling, he
was barely aware of Pat's entrance. She had evidently been fed too,
for her only concern was Comstock. Going to him, she forced him to lie
down, then, as he closed his eyes blissfully at the feeling of ease
that welled up in him, she gently spooned food into his mouth till his
eyes closed completely.

She slept all that night right next to him, but so deep was his fatigue
that it was not till the following night that he awoke and by that
time Pat had been up and about for hours. She came out of the bath in a
swirl of soft cloth. Comstock felt excitement well up in him and knew
instantly that he was almost all recovered from the slings and arrows
that had assailed him.

Drawing her to him, he was very much aware of her presence this time.

       *       *       *       *       *

When they had finished making love she said, gently, "I almost forgot,
and it's your fault," but her smile proved that she shared the fault if
it could be called that, "The Grandfather wants to see you as soon as
you rise."

Feeling prepared to tackle legions let alone The Grandfather, Comstock
showered, shaved and dressed, whistling all the while. "Any chance of
getting some food?" He had yelled through the pouring water so that
when he finished dressing, a tray was all set up for him.

Wolfing down the food he listened intently to what Pat had learned
during his sleep.

"And the most remarkable thing," Pat said, "is the artificial
insemination laboratory downstairs!"

"Wait a minute," Comstock said through a mouthful of food, "what's a
laboratory, what's insemination and what's artificial insemination?"

"Bowdler said that the funniest thing that happened when he was trying
to make a rebel of you, was when you thought that the Fathers were
really the fathers of all the children in the world."

"Wass so funny?" Comstock wanted to know, bread filling his mouth.

"Umm," Pat said. "I better backtrack a bit. As long as the scientists
had a hand in running our world they were able to control the birth
rate by mechanical means. But when they were killed, The Grandfather
was left with the problem of trying to keep our world from being
over-populated without using any mechanics."

Comstock was completely confused but waited patiently, shovelling food
into his empty belly while he waited for clarification.

"The first thing that occurred to The Grandfather was to try to control
completely the sex drive but ... that didn't work very well. Then he
reasoned that if the sexual stereotype of women was changed to old
women who could no longer bear children that he was then in a position
to only have the proper number of women impregnated."

All the obscenity that Pat was mouthing would, a few days ago, have
made Comstock faint, or aroused him, but it didn't even occur to him to
find it odd.

She continued, "Then as soon as women who were past their menopause had
become the love objects, The Grandfather set up a laboratory here in
headquarters where the healthiest women in the population could come.
Under hypnosis they were injected with live sperm, and lo and behold,
the population curve was back under control again!"

Comstock was sure that what Pat was saying was important, but at the
moment all he could really think about was his curious duel the night
before with The Grandfather.

"With what little scientific gadgets were left after the last
scientists were killed, The Grandfather set up a police force, which he
called the Father's Right Arms, but not even the R.A.'s know how the
radios they use, or the stun-guns, or the automobiles that they drive
work, let alone knowing about the hypnosis that makes people see haloes
around their heads.

"Between his control of the birth rate, his police force, and the
little science at his command, he has kept our world running ... after
a fashion. But the point at which we rebels enter the picture is this."

It was a sure thing that what Pat was saying was vital to her, to him,
and to the whole world, but Comstock could not help remembering the
outrageous things he had said, and thought about The Grandfather.
What could it lead to? Why had the Grandfather called him the most
courageous man....

Pat said, "But The Grandfather is only a man and therefore has made
mistakes. He has frozen our culture at the same point for so long that
humanity is in danger of drying up and dying out."

If, Comstock thought, The Grandfather had been only a man, then
all this trouble would not have started, but there was no point in
frightening Pat, she was too happy, too bubbling over with excitement,
with the news of what a brave new world they were soon to have under
the direction of Bowdler, Helen, Grundy, the philosopher, Pat and
Comstock.

Comstock wondered vaguely what a philosopher was when Pat mentioned it,
but that question too was made meaningless by the things he was worried
about.

Leaning forward, Pat kissed Comstock, and said, "Isn't it wonderful,
darling? I'm so excited I can hardly sit still." Then, remembering, she
said, "But hurry up, sweetheart, you have to go see The Grandfather...."

"Yes." That was going to be his job.

He had been using it as a device when he had suggested that the
Picaroon beard The Grandfather in his lair. But now it was obvious, he,
Comstock, was going to have to do precisely that!




                              CHAPTER 15


Pausing at the door, Comstock turned around to blow a goodbye kiss to
Pat. But she had turned with her back to him which may have been the
reason that he at first failed to understand the meaning of what she
said to him.

The words which baffled him were, "Darling, it's all going to be so
worth while. It will mean that our child will be born in a world that
is worth living in, not this sorry mess through which we have had to
struggle."

One hand on the door knob, one foot raised, about to proceed out
through the doorway, Comstock stood stock still. Then he said, and his
voice was quite numb, "Child?"

Turning from the window, Pat smiled and said, "Oh, it's too soon to
know, but one of the inevitable results of two people of opposite sexes
making love is that a child is born, you know."

"Child?" he repeated.

"Imagine," Pat went on not noticing that her man looked as if he had
been pole axed, "Our child will be the first love child born for
centuries.... Isn't that exciting?"

"Child?" he said for the third time and then fainted.

When he came to, Pat said, "I'm sorry, dear, perhaps I shouldn't have
mentioned it all so abruptly."

"We're going to have a child. I'll be a father!" Beaming he took her
in his arms and kissed her, for the first time the emotion he felt was
a completely different kind of love, minus the lustful feelings that
being near her generally engendered.

"That is," she said carefully, trying to avoid shocking him again,
"we'll have a child if we are successful in what we have been doing."

"It's wonderful fun trying, isn't it?"

"Ummmm," she said, and kissed him with more fervor.

Neither knew how long an R.A. had been framed in the doorway, his
shocked face alternately scarlet and then livid. The man croaked, "The
Grandfather awaits your presence, Father Comstock."

Father with a capital F and father with a small f. Now, surely,
Comstock thought, he would have the courage to face again the being
whom he feared had to be overcome before their desire could come to
fruition.

       *       *       *       *       *

Facing The Grandfather was still difficult, Comstock found. Many things
conspired to make it so. First was his training, but second was the
terrible ego position of being so much smaller than the towering
figure, who stood, beard foaming down his chest, his hands behind his
back as he paced back and forth in his sanctum and said, "Just before
I feared your imminent collapse last night you said that you did not
think I was a human being. Would you care to amplify your statement at
this time?"

Rather than stand before The Grandfather, his head tilted back like a
child facing an irate parent, Comstock decided to sit down. That way
he could stare at The Grandfather's belt and speak to it, instead of
getting a crick in his neck.

"Before I go back to that line of thought," Comstock said rather
pompously. "I would like to take this opportunity of saying that in
some ways I feel you have acted like an egregious idiot."

"Oh?"

"If I understand what I was told, you set up this whole strict very
moral world just so that disease could be cured by what our people
considered to be sins. Correct?"

"Correct."

"I think you've got the whole thing wrong."

"I see."

"Of course you've been around a lot longer than I have, but if I may
say so, I think you got the whole blasted thing turned around."

"You are being quite objectionable, Father Comstock."

"Objectionable, perhaps, but I notice that you do not say that I am
incorrect in my assumption."

"I am waiting to see what your assumption may be."

"I think that disease is caused by sin."

"And you feel that this is different than saying that sin can cure
disease?"

Was the old gent really an imbecile? Comstock wondered irritably. It
seemed quite obvious to him that somewhere along the line the basic
idea had been lost sight of, and the antithesis set up in its place.

"In one of the earth books I read there was a reference to what was
called psychosomatic medicine. Now, if I understood what I read
correctly, the theory of this kind of curing was that the person who
was sick was punishing himself for some sin that he thought he had
committed," Comstock said thoughtfully.

"Yes?"

"The cure then, was to assure the person that his sin was either
non-existent or not heinous."

"I see."

"But the way you've run our world, you've made us commit real sins in
order to be cured of non-existent diseases."

The Grandfather stared off into space. Then he snapped his fingers and
said, "By golly, I bet you're right! Now that you say it out loud that
does seem to be what the scientists were thinking about. Guess I got
things a little mixed up."

"A little mixed up!" Comstock was incredulous. "You've had us living in
a madhouse for five hundred years and all you can say is that you must
have made a little mistake?"

Shrugging, The Grandfather said, "So I made a little mistake."

"Now," Comstock said, "now I know that my hypothesis is correct, how
could you have listened to the things, the horrors that have gone on
in our world for all these centuries and not been affected, not been
chilled to the bone with a desire to do something concrete?"

The Grandfather seemed to consider the question carefully, then he
shrugged and said, "Who listens?"

There was only one thing that remained for Comstock to do. Marshalling
his forces, he suddenly leaped from his chair straight at The
Grandfather.

His clutching hands were stretched out in front of him as the forward
impetus of his movement carried him into The Grandfather's chest. He
pulled at The Grandfather's beard.

Now he would know, once and for all.

And then he knew.

The beard came off in his hands.




                              CHAPTER 16


Stunned by his own temerity, Comstock stared at what had formerly been
hidden by the hair of the beard.

"I knew it," Comstock said at last. "I knew no human being could live
for five hundred years."

"That is why I have taunted you into action," The Grandfather said
gravely, "I knew that only when you saw with your own eyes the evidence
of what you suspected would you be able to proceed properly."

"This is why there is no record of your existence prior to five hundred
years ago?"

"Yes."

Staring at the metallic surface that had been hidden under the
beard, seeing for the first time the control panel that covered The
Grandfather's whole chest, Comstock wondered what to do next.

"I hope," The Grandfather said, "that I have not been derelict to my
trust. But somehow the whole thing became too much for the mechanisms
that the scientists built into me."

If scientists could do things like this, Comstock thought with a wild
surge of hope, if they could have built a thing like this that faced
him, that was capable of living for half a thousand years, and had
succeeded in behaving like a super-human being, then what other wonders
was science capable of bringing about? What would the future hold,
released from the dead hands that had held his world in sway for so
long? The thought was enough to make his brain spin.

The beard lay across his hands, its very feel a challenge to the
imagination for it was not made of hair but some substance unlike any
that Comstock had ever seen before.

The Grandfather put his forefinger to a button on the board on his
chest. It actuated a servo mechanism that allowed him to sit down. He
said, "May I have my beard back?"

Witlessly, still astounded at what had come to pass, Comstock handed
the object to the man? Thing? That sat across the desk from him.

When The Grandfather was in the act of replacing the beard, Comstock
could see just under his chin, a series of rivets that held his head in
place. One looked loose and Comstock pointed it out.

The Grandfather tightened the rivet and then sighed. "Yes, there can be
no doubt I am beginning to wear out. That is why I have forced this
series of actions into being. That is why I forced Bowdler to leave the
Board to search for you rebels. I knew that my day was coming to an end.

"I cannot say that I will be sorry to be able to go to rust peacefully."

The idea of The Grandfather rusting, so bizarre as to have been
unimaginable a few days earlier did not even cause Comstock to flinch.

Forcing himself to listen to what The Grandfather was saying instead
of wondering wildly about the future, he heard, "You see it was my
primary function to keep the culture frozen till someone, anyone, with
intelligence and guts, came along and saw past the façade that had been
erected.

"I must confess," The Grandfather said wryly, "that when I first heard
about you, I did not think _you_ would be the one to tear down that
façade."

Since Comstock was as amazed as the robot, he did not find the words
insulting. As a matter of fact he was too worried about the next step
that had to be taken to think much about what the old machine was
saying.

"Shall we join my friends?" Comstock asked and it was only then that he
realized how long he had been sitting thinking, for he had not even
heard The Grandfather ask for his help.

The machine was frozen in the same position it had assumed when it sat
down at the desk. The Grandfather said almost plaintively. "I thought
that perhaps you had become deaf."

"Huh?"

"One of my circuits is jammed. You'll have to help me. This has been
happening more and more frequently lately, that's why I was so anxious
for assistance."

"What can I do?"

"See if you can rotate the fourth dial on the left, on my chest."

But the dial moved with no result. There was no impulse being sent to
motivate the big machine.

       *       *       *       *       *

Lunatic thoughts raced through Comstock's now addled brain. He wondered
what vice The Grandfather would have to adopt in order to be cured.

"Don't get panicky," The Grandfather said. "It's only my body mechanism
that has been affected. In my top desk drawer there is a pair of
pliers. Get them."

Obeying, Comstock saw, in the desk drawer next to some tools, a metal
memorandum pad. Scrawled on it he read the idea that had held back his
world for five centuries. It said, "All or most diseases can be cured,
if the very moral people of a very moral civilization are forced to
perform actions which they consider immoral." After this statement
there were two more words. These, The Grandfather had evidently never
considered objectively. The two words were, True? False?

But Comstock did not pause to think about the statement too much.
Instead he grabbed the pliers and asked what he was to do with them.

"Unfasten the rivet that holds my head in place," the robot instructed.

Obeying the command was very difficult, Comstock found, for a variety
of reasons. First, he had an ingrained feeling that what he was
doing was the height of blasphemy, and then, when he controlled this
conditioned reflex, he found that time and rust had almost frozen the
rivets in place.

He was sweating by the time he had unfastened all the necklace of
rivets.

The Grandfather said, "Now, very carefully, lift my head straight
upwards."

There were many wires dangling down from the underside of the jaw. The
Grandfather directed Comstock to cut them free.

Then and only then, with Comstock holding the head carefully between
his blistered hands, The Grandfather said, "Now let us join the
others."

       *       *       *       *       *

In the Board room, The Fathers, Bowdler, the philosopher, Grundy, Pat
and Helen sat beneath an inscribed metal plaque which read:

                   "Alcoholism cures heart trouble."

                  "Adultery cures arterio-sclerosis."

                      "Thieving cures insanity."

                    "Drug addiction cures cancer."

                    "Prostitution cures diabetes."

                    There were many such apothegms.

But no one even bothered to read them. As a matter of fact, Grundy had
said that one of the first things that they had better do was remove
the plaque. The others had agreed heartily.

A loudspeaker above the biggest door in the room said, "The Grandfather
approaches."

The Fathers, in a body, forced their decrepit frames to rise.

The rebels decided that they too might as well rise out of respect.

It took a moment before everyone could see the object that Comstock was
carrying under his arm.

Walking to the head of the table, Comstock said, "Sit down. Sit down.
The Grandfather has a few words to say." Only then did he place the
disembodied head he had been carrying onto the table in front of him.

Two of the oldest, sickest Fathers, died immediately.

When their bodies had been removed, Comstock said, "There's nothing to
be afraid of. The Grandfather says that He is something that used to be
called a robot."

Then rapping on the table with a gavel, he sat back and waited. Down
at the far end of the table he could see Pat eyeing the head with awed
fascination. The others were equally pop-eyed.

The philosopher, the man of words, could not be restrained. Before the
Grandfather could speak, the philosopher asked incredulously, "Do you
mean to say that we have been obeying the dictates of a machine?"

Nodding, Comstock said nonchalantly. "Yep."

Then The Grandfather spoke.

"I was made to be your servant, and it has been my sorry task to be
your master. I have not enjoyed it and I must say that I am glad at
long last to be rid of an onerous task."

Then he went on to describe the way he had tried, in his feeble,
mechanical way to do that which he had been ordered to do. When he had
finished his apologetic summary, he said, "But time grows ever shorter
and I fear that even my carefully made cortex is beginning to go bad.
Listen closely for I have no idea when I will cease to function.

"The mistakes I have made, have been errors of commission not omission.
When I have failed it was because not even the scientists who made me
could foretell what was to be, as no man can.

"I was told, just before the death of the scientist who finished me,
that the reason all our people were driven from earth was because they
were vestigial hangovers from what he called an inner-directed culture.
An inner-directed culture is always the result of an historical period
when the death rate is higher than the birth rate. This kind of culture
possesses certain attributes which serve pioneers well, because these
inner-directed people have a strong sense of right and wrong, they
believe implicitly in black and white evils and virtues. But in our
world the birth rate is now, because of my machinations, about equal to
the death rate, our people live longer, few children are lost at birth,
there is enough food to go around, and so it is time to evolve from
an inner-directed culture to a more sophisticated one which has been
called an other-directed culture.

"Such a culture is hesitant to make value judgments, it can no longer
appraise the foibles of other human beings; the righteousness of the
inner-directed person gives way to the more adult approach that right
and wrong are after all purely subjective concepts.

"These people can be more objective and since they can, they must
inevitably be less prone to throw the first stone.

"There are many concommittants of such a culture, but to you will be
the wonder and the glory of discovering them. This is your next step.

"Take it wisely."

       *       *       *       *       *

It was long before all that The Grandfather said made any sense to his
hearers, but all of them remembered the words until the time came that
they became understandable.

The last thing that The Grandfather said was, "In the old world
from which we came, the earliest known culture was one called an
ancestor-directed culture. This was understandable in a period when the
death rate was so high and old age rare. Old age became magical since
so few possessed it. Then as the elderliness alone ceased to be unique
they ascended to the next culture pattern, the one I have described as
the inner-directed culture. When your ancestors were sent away from
earth almost all the earth people had become other-directed. What has
happened in this long hiatus in which we've been out of touch with
mother earth I cannot hazard an opinion.

"But if we are to proceed on the previous record we can be sure that
they have now ascended to a still higher culture pattern. I would
suggest that you not lift the force field that surrounds our planet
till you have matured enough to be able to meet your earth cousins on
an equal footing.

"An inner-directed culture places a terrific premium on fatherhood.
That is why you have been raised with such a high opinion of fathers
and why all your power symbols are in terms of fatherhood.

"In the next step which you are to take, fatherhood and motherhood will
be equated properly and there will be no further emphasis on what has
been called the battle of the sexes.

"The battle of the sexes will become not an armed truce, but an equal
sharing of what is best in mankind.

"I have left directions as to how you may contact the inter-planetary
economy but I suggest you wait till the time is ripe before taking that
step.

"And now I am about to go out of phase. At last ... at long last ... I
thought it would never come...."

The eyes closed and the robot was still.

It never spoke again.

Pat ran to Comstock's side. His waiting arms engulfed her as they
stood, looking deeply into each other's eyes, savoring their moment of
triumph, and thinking with delight of what the future held.

Comstock said, "I love you."

It was the first time in five hundred years that the air of that planet
had heard those words said in a tone that meant by love--sharing and
trust and hope and peace, and mutual sacrifice that something bigger
and better might come from that love.


                                THE END