“Cartee is the direct lineal descendant of twelve Director ancestors. All were strong men—as is Cartee; all were brilliant and shrewd—as is Cartee. All were oppressive. There is no slightest reason to expect that Cartee will be different. If we trust him now we will be assigning many of our Brothers to death, in addition to choking off our ripening efforts to overthrow him.
“This noon we received a communication from our most reliable contact within the Palace grounds. A Brother was seen during the past ten hours leaving Cartee’s personal quarters! The contact was unable to identify him. We are forced to the conclusion that there is a traitor among ns. For the next twenty hours you will devote your entire effort to uncovering him. If he is not found by then you will proceed with Project Cartee.”
“Project Cartee!” The Brother next to Srock let his breath out in a long sigh. “Assassination of the Director!”
Srock was one of the approximately ten percent of the Brothers who devoted their full time to the work of the Society. The remaining majority worked at normal occupations, and kept their identity secret—even from most of their own Brothers. Cohesion was maintained by means of an interlocking linear organization.
For the twenty hours following the general summons Srock worked on leads furnished by the Brotherhood in their effort to run down the spy. At the end the word came through that the search had been fruitless—and that Project Cartee began immediately.
The success of Project Cartee depended largely on the undercover Brothers stationed within the administration area. For the present there was nothing for Srock to do and he waited an impatient fourteen hours before the report came that the project had failed; Cartee had disappeared.
A heavy rain was falling as Srock left the Cradle and walked through bleak and empty streets to his quarters in the Bremner building. The rain failed to penetrate his moisture-proofed clothing, but it brough a damp and cold gloom to his spirit. For the past several hours he had been thinking of the girl, Jessica Manthe. Who was she? And what had happened during his forty hour memory lapse?
For a time he debated whether or not the girl had been an enemy agent, or whether his blanked-out period somehow tied in with some deep-seated scheme of the Director and his men. After a time he dismissed the suspicion. He, himself, while an integral part of the Society, was, after all, only a minor cog. If Cartee had decided to strike at them through one of the Brothers the chances were his attempt would have centered on a more influential member. He shrugged irritably.
Srock opened the door of his suite, stepped inside—and felt a sudden rush of alarm! He was not alone! The room was in semi-dakness, but his intuition—strong by nature, but made acute by training—sensed the presence of another person in the room.
For an instant he knew fear. The other held the advantage, and that advantage might mean his own death. The room was faintly lighted by the rays of a street lamp coming in through a pair of side windows. His visitor had very probably adjusted his vision to the gloom by this time, and knew his exact location, while Srock’s eyes registered nothing. He crouched, straining for sound, and thought swiftly. One small factor was in his favor. The other would not yet know that Srock was aware of his presence. Perhaps with immediate action he could turn that small asset into victory. He moved one hand slowly toward a side pocket.
“You won’t need that,” a voice said, and something in its tone awakened suppressed memories in Srock’s mind: Memories of beauty, pliant feminine eagerness—and danger. They added up to one person—Jessica.
“You may turn on the lights,” she said, as Srock stood with his mixed emotions.
He reached out and snapped on the light button, keeping his gaze on the spot from which her voice had come. She sat in a lounge chair, with her hands folded placidly in her lap. But all about her was the sense of leashed aliveness, and the disturbing attraction he had felt at their first meeting. She was wearing, he saw, a snow white dress, cut short, and leaving her knees bare and cool.
He walked across the room and stood in front of her. “Stand up,” he said.
With a small smile on the edges of her lips she obeyed.
Unhurriedly, expertly, he went over her body for a concealed weapon.
“All right,” he said, when he’d finished. “Now we can visit.”
She sat down again. “Satisfied?” she asked. “I assure you that I am not here to harm you. In fact, I mean to save your life—if you’ll let me.”
Srock raised his eyebrows questioningly. Then he smiled back at her and sat down in a chair at her right. “Say what you have to say,” he told her.
“Time may already be running out on us,” she said. “Do you trust me enough to leave with me—immediately? With no questions asked?”
Srock’s smile widened.
Angrily she lifted the cover from a small cedar box on one edge of the end table at her side and took out a cigaret. “I didn’t think you would,” she said, lighting up. “You have to be real smart and demand a detailed blueprint before you’ll believe me. In the meantime the noose will draw tighter around us.”
Something of the urgency in her voice communicated itself to him. He sat a bit straighter. “I don’t need a blueprint,” he said. “Just give me enough of an explanation to know what it’s all about—and that I can trust you.”
“I will.” She drew on the cigaret and let the cloud of thick smoke billow around in her mouth before breathing it deep into her lungs. “I’ll be as brief as possible. To begin with, you think you are Ted Srock. But you aren’t.” “I’m not?”
“No,” she answered. “Three days ago I tricked Srock into coming to my room with me. There I drugged him, and a couple of Cartee’s men took him away to the Palace. Earlier, Cartee’s doctors had remolded the features of another man into the likeness of Srock. They blocked out this man’s mind and planted Srock’s identity-pattern and memories in its place. You are that other man.” Quickly he considered what she had told him. The thought that he was not actually Srock he dismissed without consideration. In his own mind he was too certain of his own identity to doubt it. She was merely trying to manipulate him for some purpose of her own. His best plan would be to get all the information he could from her, before showing suspicion.
“You work for Cartee, then?” he asked.
“Not directly; I’m not that high up. I work for others, who work for him.”
“If I’m not Srock, what was the purpose behind this assumed substitution?”
“Oh, don’t be stupid.” The girl’s impatience changed to anger. “It could have been done for any one of a dozen reasons. You can think of them yourself if you try. But the important thing right now is that you’ve got to get away.”
“Why?”
“Why. Why.” She seemed at the last frayed ends of her patience. She took a deep breath and forced herself to be calm. “Because you were seen leaving the Palace. By now the Brothers must have checked the time against the activities and whereabouts of all their members, and have narrowed the search to you.”
“That sounds a bit too pat,” £rock said. “Can you give me any proof that I’m not actually Srock?”
“I think I can,” she answered. “But will you have the good sense to accept them? Briefly, here are a few. You should know already that a man’s memory can be blocked out, and a faked memory implanted. And that it can be done cleverly enough that the man himself is unaware of the deception. But the implanting of a complete set of memories is a gigantic job that would require months of time, plus knowledge that only the original man would possess. Therefore, an imposed memory is necessarily incomplete—especially in recall of minor, relatively trivial events and experiences.
“I’ll name a few that would ordinarily be missed. Do you remember the names and faces of the children you played with when you were young? Do you remember your first date; if you ever had a pet; what sports you took part in; any spankings your parents gave you; the names of your first teachers; where you…”
�
��That’s enough!” Srock found himself stunned at the blank places she had touched. He could recall none of the past she had named. And he had tried, even as she spoke. “I don’t remember,” he said wearily. “Does that mean…” His voice faded into silence.
“Of course it does,” Jessica insisted. “They wouldn’t have put in those memories I mentioned. You wouldn’t even have noticed that they weren’t there, unless someone pointed them out to you.”
Srock recovered quickly from the momentary shock and made his decision. There was no doubt but that his mind had been tampered with, but the chance that she was telling the truth about the rest was too negligible to be considered seriously.
He’d have to take her in where she could be questioned, by men trained for that sort of thing. He hesitated, however. He knew what she would have to go through—before they finished questioning her. The few short hours of life remaining to her would not be pleasant. But he hardened himself against the pity—and was it something else—that he felt. He had no choice. It was his duty.
He rose. “I think we’d better…” he began.
Jessica had been watching him closely. As he spoke she brushed her dark hair lightly and Srock found himself staring at a small gray pencil-gun—pointed directly at him. He cursed himself for not having examined her hair. At the same time he felt an odd relief at knowing that she would get away. And an admiration at the contrast between her woman’s soft depths and her fire and spirit.
“Well, I tried,” the girl said. Her shoulders seemed weary beneath the burden of her frustration. “Your only chance now rests with my staying free. Don’t move for three minutes.”
She walked to the door, opened it, and was gone.
III
You asked to see someone as high up in the echelon of the Brotherhood as possible, Mr. Srock?” The man behind the desk was tall, pale of face, and with small, down-slanting lines of harshness at the comers of his mouth. He spoke with a low, steel-like courtesy, his voice revealing quick currents beneath its mildness. Srock had never seen the man before.
“Yes,” Srock said, as he regarded his interviewer levelly. He was seated in a chair that had been placed directly in front of the desk. “May I know to whom I speak?”
“You may call me Mr. Taneh,” the tall man answered. “And I can assure you that I hold sufficient authority to deal with any matter you may wish to discuss.”
Srock was satisfied. “I’ll start at the beginning,” he said. He spent the next several minutes going over everything—as he remembered it—that had happened to him since he met Jessica Manthe in the bar.
“And you conclude now,” Taneh said, resting his elbows on the desk and joining the tips of his fingers in front of his face, “that your mind has been tampered with. Correct?”
Srock nodded.
Taneh considered that a moment. “What do you expect us to do?” he asked.
“I didn’t think it through that far,” Srock answered. “My first thought was to get to someone in authority—and let him decide what was to be done.”
“Quite commendable,” Taneh said, clearing his throat drily. “Do you feel…That there’s any possibility that the girl may have been telling the truth—about your not being Srock?”
“I don’t believe so,” Srock answered. “I’m too certain in my own mind that I have always been Ted Srock. No pseudo-identity could be planted that firmly.”
“Hmm. What is your theory as to Cartee’s purpose in tampering with your mind?”
Srock was thoughtful for a minute. “I believe he may have gotten some information from me through hypnosis, or the use drugs,” he said, “and the tampering was done to block out my remembering having given it. Or…He may have some means of maintaining a remote control. If you asked, I would advise that you lock me up, or at least see that I have no outside contact.”
“Your theory may be the correct one,” Taneh said. “On the other hand it would be diabolically clever of Cartee to plant you merely as a distraction. He would expect us to divert quite a bit of our energy to solving the enigma of what he did to you. We might even postpone our prearranged moves against him.”
“That sounds like something he might try,” Srock agreed. “Whatever else we may say about Cartee, we can’t say he’s stupid.”
Taneh made no comment. Unhurriedly he pressed a button on the comer of his desk. “Getting back to one of my earlier questions,” he said, not mentioning his action, “despite the feeling of certainty you have that you are actually Ted Srock—it’s possible that the girl told you the truth. Do you grant that?”
“I suppose so,” Srock answered. He glanced up uneasily as the door behind Taneh opened and three Brothers walked into the room. One of them carried an oblong, metal box. He set it on the desk in front of Taneh. Srock understood at once what was about to happen. His first thought was to resist. Then he forced himself to relax. This was something he would have to bear, for the greater good.
“As you mentioned,” Taneh said evenly, “Cartee is clever, and we can’t take any unnecessary chances. Our first duty must be to make certain that you are what you—knowingly or unknowingly—pretend to be. Will you pull your chair a bit closer to the desk, please?”
Srock opened his mouth to speak but let only a soft sigh escape. Any argument he offered now would sound like pleading. He’d take whatever they gave him. He was glad that he had proven to his own satisfaction that he was no coward. They might torture him, but they would never break him.
One of the Brothers opened the box and Srock placed his right forearm in the groove in the lower section. He had seen these instruments of persuasion before. The Brother closed the top over Srock’s arm and secured the clamps on its sides.
Taneh squeezed a bulb, connected to the box by a thin wire, and Srock felt the metal close tight against his flesh. A second later concealed springs bent the box in the middle, putting pressure on both ends of the arm bone while holding the center in place.
Srock set his mind to meet the anguish which he knew would soon begin shooting through his arm. His best defense, he realized, would be an attempt at disassociation.
Taneh manipulated the control until the pain in the arm grew from sharp torment to a hot, searing agony. Without changing an expression on his face Srock sat regarding the punished arm, his mind refusing to accept the pain as subjective. Moisture collected on his forehead, and rolled down his cheeks in great oily drops. He fastened hard to the thought that his body was a separate entity from his mind: indirectly connected with himself.
Finally he looked up. Taneh’s face showed a pale and damp pleasure; there was a streak of sadism in the man,
Srock decided. “One more ounce of pressure and the bone will snap/’ he said quietly.
Taneh brought his attention up from the arm with an obvious effort. He released his grip on the bulb and the pressure eased from Srock’s arm, leaving it limp and numb. “I see that pain will never force you to speak,” Taneh said. “However, it proves little. Can you suggest any other means of achieving our mutually desired clearing up of this matter?”
“We could try a lie-detector,” Srock said. “That would prove that I am telling the truth—at least as I know it.”
“That’s right,” Taneh agreed. “You know, I find myself developing a deep admiration for you, Mr. Srock. You evidently thought of the lie-detector earlier—yet you permitted yourself to be tortured, rather than suggest it. You are a brave man. You and I have much in common. I hope you can prove that you are telling the truth, so that we may become better friends.” He turned to the Brother who had brought the box. “Release his arm, Miller.”
Ten minutes later Srock had vindicated himself. Taneh rose and offered his hand. “I’m sorry for the trouble I’ve had to cause you,” he said. “But we may have gained something by all this. As you know, our big problem right now is to find Cartee. Perhaps the girl will be the lead to him. I want you to contact her again, if possible, and see what you can learn. For now, goo
dbye and good luck.” Flexing the hand of his still weak and sore right arm Srock turned and left the room. As he walked down the outer corridor he drew a long breath of relief. It had been easier than he had expected. He stopped with the breath half expelled. It had been too easy!
After Srock had gone, Taneh spoke to the men at his side. “Miller, stay here with me; you other two get out.” In deep abstraction Taneh rose from the desk and paced the length of the room three times before he spoke again. “I want to get a few things straight in my own mind.” he said. “You listen, Miller, and if you see an angle I’m missing let me know. To begin with, that man is convinced that he is Ted Srock; I’m not. Electro-micro-surgery makes the remolding of a man’s features a simple matter. And he’d be unable to judge—with a mind that had definitely been tampered with—just how effective that tampering was.”
“Personally, I thought his suggestion that we lock him up was a good one,” Miller said, when Taneh paused.
Taneh waved the suggestion aside disinterestedly. “I don’t know what Cartee’s game is,” he said. “But the last thing we can afford to do is follow any suggestion coming from Srock; there’s too much danger that it would be something put there by Cartee. We can forget that. Now. The girl seems to be the contact between Cartee and Srock. Our best bet is to let Srock go free, on the chance that he can find the girl, or that she comes to him. With Cartee so well hidden, we’ll probably have to get our hands on her before we can find him.”
“Don’t you have any other leads as to where he might be?”
“None. Despite our best efforts we haven’t a clue. But right now, I’m more concerned with Cartee’s purpose in setting this thing in motion. The man’s clever—damnably clever—and I suspect there’s more behind Srock’s memory tampering, or transfer, than we’ve been able to guess.”
“Using him for a diversion, as you suggested to Srock, sounds pretty clever to me,” Miller said.
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