by E. C. Tubb
“Lucy Denby,” Clem answered, thinking, “and she was married round about 2007 to a Reginald Denby, salesman, or something.”
“I will see what I can trace.”
Obviously disturbed by this new possibility the Master reached out to a switch, and then he paused, looking at his hand. Normally it was a tanned and thin, but now it was a deathly white with the veins etched in a vivid blue tracery. He looked at his other hand sharply and found it similarly afflicted.
“Strange,” he murmured, preoccupied with this metamorphosis. “Very strange.”
Buck gripped Clem’s arm tightly, but Clem had no need of this to apprehend the sudden change that had come over the Master. His face was dissolving into a mass of seams and lines. He seemed now to be unable to move, held in the grip of the astounding metabolism suddenly coursing through him. Heat was spreading from him as his life-energy took a mighty surge forward. With the passing seconds his iron-gray hair became white: then he was bald!
“Great cosmos,” Buck whispered, transfixed.
“Must—trace—records—” the Master whispered; then his face caved in and his hands shrank to bony claws. He spoke no more words, but the look in his dying eyes was of one who tries to understand and cannot. They dimmed to burned-out coals. His skinny, fleshless frame flopped to the desk. Nor did it stay there. Vast age crumbled his bones to dust and an empty suit of clothes dropped to the floor.
“He’s—gone,” Clem gulped, his jaw lolling in stupour.
Buck could not find any words for the moment—then the private loudspeaker on the late Master’s desk suddenly burst into life.
“Emergency Communication to the Master! An unexpected wave of senility is sweeping the world! Particularly severe within a hundred miles’ radius. Isolated instances in remoter areas. Please advise.”
Clem jumped up, then in a passable imitation of the Master’s voice he said briefly: “Later!” Switching off again he turned a scared face to Buck.
“Naturally you’ve grasped what’s happened?” he asked. “Presumably the very thing the Master was discussing has happened! Lucy’s entropy is beginning to work through her line of descendants. We certainly don’t need to hunt through the records to see if her son married and had children. The Master must have been a descendant, too, however remotely. Come to think of it, in a thousand years, the descendants of one person might run into tens of thousands—”
“No might about it,” Clem snapped. “The fact that people in all walks of life have suddenly started dying is proof of it. What’s worrying me is whether we’ll find Lucy herself alive anymore! Maybe she’s vanished like the things she was wearing.”
“To me there’s a bigger worry,” Buck retorted. “How do we explain the disappearance of the Master? We are known to be the last people to see him alive—the guard will verify that—and I’m getting cold all over thinking what the law will do when it investigates.”
Clem got to his feet and looked at the clothes on the floor.
“For the moment,” he said, “those clothes will, I hope baffle those who find them. Our only chance is to walk out of here as though nothing had happened and get back quick to the underground where we’ll think up what comes next. Come on.”
CHAPTER SIX: THE PAST IS PRESENT
To get safely out of the official building was not particularly difficult since it was assumed by the guards, number sixty-seven amongst them, that the Master had released Clem and Buck from audience and allowed them to go on their way, and they reached the underground workings safely and, to Clem’s intense relief, Lucy was still where she had been left, high up amidst the rockery and effectively screened. She listened in silent amazement to the story Clem had to tell.
“Then what happens now?” she asked anxiously.
“I don’t dare to think,” Clem groaned. “Once the disappearance of the Master is discovered trouble is going to come our way with a capital T. That guard, number sixty-seven, is a particularly vindictive specimen who’ll shift heaven and earth to make capital out of this.”
“It all seems so queer,” Lucy mused. “That so many people are dying because of me. Even queerer that the Master of this amazing world should be a descendant of mine! I don’t know whether to feel proud or—or revolted! Queer too that steel and all the rest of it should be wiped out in so many places because I happened to be wearing them at the time. Why don’t I disappear then? I should, surely, if everything is to hang together?”
“That is a possibility even yet,” Clem said quietly, and searched her face. He read no fear there: only that same look of bewilderment that had been hers ever since the rescue from the entropy globe.
“Well, if it comes to it,” she said seriously, “I shan’t even have the chance to thank you for all you’ve done—you and Buck and Eva, so I’ll thank you now, just in case. I also apologize most sincerely for having thrown a good-sized spanner into the works of 3004.”
Clem gave a fleeting smile as he patted her hand, and then he became serious again. “I only hope this entropy business doesn’t work out to its logical conclusion in your case, Lucy, because I’ve more than a liking for you—as you may have noticed.”
“I’ve noticed,” she assented, smiling. “But you’ve forgotten, surely, that I’m a misfit? The odd girl out? And, anyway, I’m a thousand years behind the times.”
“That doesn’t signify to me. What I want to do, if some scientific miracle spares your dissolution, is to prove to the world what I proved to the Master—that you are a helpless victim in need of assistance and not condemnation. I did prove it to him, and he accepted the theory. Then he had to die before he could speak! It’s damnable. It puts us right back where we started, but with the added burden of knowing that the Master is dead—”
“Hey, listen to that radio,” Buck interrupted, making his way amidst the rockery. “If it doesn’t smell like trouble I don’t know what does!”
Clem and the girl listened, and so did the working crew in the great open space below. The words from the speaker came through with a powerful echo.
“Attention all listeners! The Master has disappeared! No trace of him can be found, and the only clue is his clothes on the floor of his office, obviously left there by his abductors. We need no further proof that spies are at work and this is their supreme and most audacious move. War with the East is imminent, according to private papers, which the Master had in his possession—so imminent indeed that Leslie Hurst, our ambassador, is already on his way home. The move of abducting the Master is plain. Without him, and his guiding genius we cannot possibly survive in the struggle with the East that is to come!
“Attention all listeners! To round up every spy in the Western organization here in the West is obviously impossible. We have already tried and made little headway—but it is known that one of these spies is being shielded by Clement Bradley and his partner ‘Buck’ Cardew at the foundation site of the Protection Tower—which Tower, incidentally, should have been erected by now if it is to be of service in defeating the invaders. The delay in constructing the foundations is now shown as obviously intentional. Further—a vital fact—it is known that the two last people to be present with the Master before his mysterious disappearance were Bradley and Cardew. Find them at the Protection Tower site—and find the woman with them—then we shall have the answer to many of our problems. One hostage, in the form of this woman, may do much to deter Eastern onslaught. All of you, men and women, wherever you may be, have freedom to act as you see fit in bringing these traitors to account.”
“I wouldn’t be sure of it,” Buck said, “but that sounded like the voice of Guard Sixty-Seven, taking a great deal of authority unto himself!”
“It was Sixty-Seven,” Clem confirmed. “As for him taking authority unto himself, he wouldn’t dare without the sanction of the Council over which the Master ruled. The only explanation is that he must have told them he has special knowledge regarding us, so they’ve put him in charge of the situation for the momen
t. Far as we’re concerned, the people will be out to get us—particularly as the news of imminent war has now been broken.”
“We’ll fight it out,” Buck decided. He got to his feet and called to the assembly of men gathered in the space below. “Hey, boys! You heard that broadcast? You willing to fight it out against the mob?”
The steel-helmeted heads nodded and one of them called back: “Sure thing, Buck! We’ll give them a run for their money if they come down here!”
“All right then—scatter to convenient positions and use the blast-guns as weapons,” Buck ordered. “That ought to let ’em see we mean business.”
“I think this is a waste of time,” Clem said frankly. “I know the blast-guns can wreak a tremendous amount of havoc—massacre if you like—but it won’t stop a determined people who think we’ve sold them into defeat against the East. If anything it’ll only make our case all the blacker because it will look as though we really are guilty if we try and defend ourselves.”
“That’s s right,” Lucy assented, clinging to Clem’s arm. “Honest, Buck, I think Clem’s got the right idea.”
“Then you’re both crazy!” Buck snorted. “If you’re both so chicken-hearted that you intend to let yourselves be taken without a struggle, I’m not. Don’t you realize what it will mean when the mob gets you? Law will be thrown overboard. Many will revert to type and maybe you’ll even be lynched. In fact, if Sixty-Seven is controlling things for the moment I’m more than sure you will be!”
“No.” Clem shook his head. “Even Sixty-Seven would not dare go that far: the Council would prevent it. My idea is to let ourselves be taken and then prove the truth of what did happen to the Master, and his acceptance of my theory concerning Lucy.”
“Oh, talk sense, can’t you!” Buck cried. “We can never prove what happened in that office—”
“Yes we can,” Clem interrupted. “Providing it’s still there, that is, and I’m hoping it will be. Don’t you remember that when our interview with the Master began he switched on a recording apparatus so our entire conversation could be taken down. When I’d finished he switched it off.”
“Yes, that’s true, but—” Buck scratched his neck. “But that doesn’t explain the Master’s disappearance!”
“It would to the more intelligent members of the Council, because the Master himself put forward the theory that any descendants of Lucy might be affected. The Council will couple together the disappearance of the Master with the other cases of senility sweeping the world and that will clear things up. Finally, the Master’s acceptance of Lucy as a woman of a thousand years ago will be taken as correct for it has always been said that the Master was never wrong in a scientific verdict.”
“It’s a chance, of course,” Buck admitted, “but I’d much prefer some kind of tangible action, instead of just pinning our hopes on a possibility like that. Seems too flimsy a thing to hope for, and if Sixty-Seven has destroyed that spoken record, what then? He had obviously been examining the Master’s papers and—”
“He wouldn’t,” Clem interrupted. “Damn it, man, Sixty Seven is only an officer guard: he wouldn’t dare probe that much. It would be the officiating members of the Council who’d do that, and I’m hoping that they didn’t think of starting up the recording machine. Or on the other hand, if they did—or do—our problem may be solved for us.”
Buck, clearly, was still not completely convinced, but before he could pursue the argument any further there came the gathering sound of voices in the underworld and the noise of advancing feet. Down below, the grimy, set-faced engineering crew maneuvered the powerful blast-guns into prearranged positions and crouched before the sights watching for the first appearance of the invaders.
Suddenly the first hastily armed civilians appeared and at the same moment Buck let out a mighty yell.
“Hold your fire, boys! Hold it!”
Men and women, in twos and threes and then in groups, followed by armed members of the police, came drifting down, into the workings. There seemed to be no end to them as they congregated, filling up the tunnels that led into the great space.
Then, from amongst them, Sixty-Seven became visible. He had his gun in his hand and appeared almost disappointed that he had no occasion to use it.
“Better come down from there, Bradley!” he called. “You too, Cardew; and that woman you’ve got with you. Glad you know when you’re beaten.”
“Don’t think you’re standing there untouched because I want it!” Buck shouted. “If I’d have had my way you’d be blasted to powder by now—but my partner here is more sentimental, or crazy. I haven’t decided which.”
“Come down!” Sixty-Seven ordered. “And hurry it up.”
There was nothing else for it. Buck led the way down the rocky slope from the high niche, and Clem came after him, holding on to Lucy’s arm. Sixty-Seven eyed her fixedly as she came forward.
“Chief spy for the Easterners, eh?” he asked dryly. “I’ve been quite a while catching up on you, young woman, but I’ll make up for lost time now I’ve started. I don’t suppose there can be a lower form of life than a dirty female spy who sells herself to the East—” Sixty-Seven did not get any further. Buck lashed out with all the power of his massive right arm. The iron knuckles struck the guard clean in the mouth, splitting his lip and spinning him back against the rocks.
“Good,” Buck grinned, palming his throbbing knuckles. Now I feel better! Shoot me down if you like and I’ll die happy.”
Probably his suggestion would have been adopted had Sixty-Seven been alone—but he was not, and even he realized that ruthless shooting amongst so many witnesses would not stand him in very good stead as an officer of the law.
“All right,” he said thickly, straightening up and dabbing at his bleeding- mouth. “I’ll not forget that, Cardew! That’s the second time you’ve hit me in the course of my duty and I’ll see the Council hears of it— Now get on your way, all three of you. You’ve a lot to explain.”
In a close-knit trio the three started walking, followed and partly surrounded by the mob. The engineers were left behind since there was no legal claim against them. So at length the journey through the tunnels was ended and the march to the city center began. There was no other way of covering the distance since so many people made vehicular transportation impossible.
Then gradually it dawned on Clem at least that the route was not leading towards the great building where stood the headquarters of the Council and, at its summit, the office of the late Master. Instead the mob was moving in the direction of one of the biggest public lecture halls.
“What’s the idea?” Clem asked Sixty-Seven sharply, as he paced along, smothering his bleeding mouth. “Where are we going?”
“The City Hall, where proper justice can be meted out,” came the muffled response. “This isn’t a matter for the Council to decide, Bradley: it’s up to the people. They are the ones who have been betrayed, not the Council.”
“As a citizen I demand the Council chamber!” Clem cried in fury. “You can’t take the law into your own hands like this!”
“I’m not doing it. I’m obeying the orders of the people because I’m a public servant. If you don’t like it complain to the people who now have you in their midst.”
Clem looked about him but he said nothing. It was possible that Sixty-Seven was correct, and that he dare not cross the will of the incensed multitude. Whatever the answer the journey ended within the mighty City Hall, which was already packed to capacity. And the capture of the trio had evidently been considered a foregone conclusion for on the rostrum usually reserved for lecturers there now sat three men. Clem and Buck both recognized them as they were bundled along with Lucy in their midst. They were the three whose finances helped to build the city’s prosperity—not members of the Governing Council as such, but certainly capable of wielding a tremendous influence in public affairs.
Chairs had been roughly placed to form a ‘dock’ for the three prisoners an
d here they were directed and then left. For a long time there was the shuffle of feet and scraping of chairs as guards and public alike took their seats, the overflow of men and women straining at the doors.
“Doesn’t look too damned healthy for the recorder in the Master’s office,” Buck murmured bitterly, as Clem stood beside him. “You’d have done better to let me have my way. At least we’d have blasted about three-hundred out of existence and that would have been something.”
“It would only have condemned us all the more,” Clem muttered. “Don’t be so infernally violent in your aims!”
“In this court,” declared the centermost man suddenly, “there will be no attempt to follow the pedantry of the law because we are not a legally constituted body. We are a court of the people, convened by the people, and the decision we reach shall be that of the people.”
“If this is not a legally constituted court you have no legal right to try us,” Clem retorted. “As a citizen I therefore demand liberty—or, failing that, a proper hearing before the Council.”
“The Council is not concerned with this matter,” the impromptu ‘judge’ answered. “It is so long since a crime of any importance happened that normal courts do not exist anymore—as you should know. Hence this hastily-devised one to try you three on the serious charge of international sabotage and abduction of the Master of the West!”
“And if you arrive at the decision that we are guilty, who is going to pronounce sentence?” Clem asked. “None of you has the right to do it.”
“It is not a question of having the right, Mister Bradley. The issue is up to the people. To the most vital point first: where is the Master?”
“Dead—of old age,” Clem snapped.
A murmur went through the people and the three men on the rostrum looked at each other questioningly; then the centermost turned to face Clem again.