The Invaders

by Keith Laumer

  “Yes. Dreadful people. But―you’re not leaving?” he said, as David moved away. “You must stay! If a few sane, responsible people like you and myself don’t attend these gatherings, monitor the proceedings―that means that they―whoever they might be―will succeed by default!”

  “They?” David raised an eyebrow.

  “Very well,” the man half-smiled, shrugged. “At the risk of sounding melodramatic, I’ll call them . . . the Invaders . . . “ His eyes flicked to David’s. For an instant they held an unreadable expression; then they became remote, opaque. “If they’re here,” he went on softly, “if this is a cover for their activities―I for one intend to learn what I can of them. Are you with me?”

  “All right,” David said, feeling the tension stir inside him. “I’ll see it through.”

  Chapter Two

  Inside the gloomy, ornate hall, inadequately lighted by yellowed luminaires spaced along the cracked, stuccoed walls, David and his new acquaintance—Winifer Thrall, as he had introduced himself—took seats in the first row, flanked by a lean, anxious-looking man with hollow cheeks and lank grey hair, and a portly Chinese gentleman, perspiring heavily in a thick wool suit.

  “No good sitting in the rear,” Thrall whispered.

  “Can’t make out the trickery from there.”

  “What trickery?” the Chinese stared accusingly at the man. “Is that all you’re here for, Jack, to find fault?”

  “I wasn’t addressing you, sir,” Thrall said smoothly “My friend and I―”

  “What you bums need is a set of Madame Chow’s guaranteed lucky joss sticks,” the Oriental continued, leaning to one side so as to extract a box from his side pocket. “Now, it just happens I got a spare set on hand. Tell your fortune, bring you success in your work, deliver the girl of your dreams, a steal at . . . “ his darting shoebutton eyes assessed David’s wardrobe. “―a buck fifty. Apiece,” he added, noticing that the clothes, though worn, were of expensive cut.

  “Please―save your superstitious nonsense for someone else,” Thrall hissed as the moth-eaten curtain across the stage twitched. A feeble spotlight winked on, hunted across warped floorboards, glinted from the toes of a pair of shoes showing under the curtain. The light moved up as the drapes parted; a woman stepped through, squinting against the glare. It was the horsey dowager with the heavy tweeds, David saw Mrs. Creel. She waited while a patter of applause died down, then in a penetrating voice said, “Fellow Isisians, guests, and yes, even the merely curious. You too are welcome, as are all who come to hear the inspired words of our enlightened leader, that clear-seeing prophet of the stirring events unfolding in our time, Mr. Alphonse Cabrito!”

  There was another spattering of handclaps as the woman turned, plucked at the curtain, became entangled in its musty folds, failed to see the preternaturally lean man who stepped through the opening, blinking owlishly both ways. At that moment the woman freed herself, only to collide with the featured speaker. The stand-mounted microphone toppled, fell with a resounding clatter. The two bumped heads bending to retrieve it. Cabrito looked definitely annoyed as the woman fought her way back through the curtain, leaving the stage to him.

  “Tonight,” he said, blinking rapidly as he spoke in a high-pitched, nasal voice, ‘1 have for you a demonstration which will bring the world of so-called science to its knees, begging and pleading for just one little look at the material I have uncovered in my researches dining the past months―months of hardship during which I labored day and night in my privately maintained physical research laboratories―the only privately endowed research institution in America, I might add, with the sole exception of the Richmond Institute of Red Owl, Pennsylvania, unless it has at last been hounded from existence by the secret government agencies devoted to the extermination of truth in this country . . . “

  As the thin, fanatical voice droned on, David surreptitiously studied the faces around him. There were old people, young people, men bearded and smooth-faced pretty girls, withered beldames, Nordics, Negroes, Italians; faces of every description, a truly integrated assemblage. But nowhere did he see the leathery skin, the pale, intent eyes, the curiously lifeless visages which he had come to associate with the Invaders. Neurotics, gullible sensation-seekers these might be―but aliens, no. It appeared, he thought ruefully, that the experiment was a failure . . . .

  “Did you catch that?” Thrall whispered, touching David’s arm. “Watch . . . he’ll do it again . . . “

  “Do what?”

  “I didn’t want to say earlier, until I was sine―but there’s no mistaking it. Look!” Thrall’s fingers tightened on David’s sleeve. “Watch his eyes! The blinking―it’s a code!”

  The speaker’s lids, as David had already noted, flickered incessantly as he talked. Blink-blink-blink, pause; bhnk-blink-blink-blink, pause, blink-blink. Cabrito’s eyes closed momentarily, resinned their fluttering.

  “Did you catch that?” Thrall whispered. “That was the dash. It’s Morse code, or something close to it. Now, if we can just spot the one he’s signalling to . . . “ Thrall turned, craning his neck toward the rear of the hall. Abruptly, his fingers dug into David’s arm.

  There-!”

  David turned. A tall, narrow-faced man moved catlike across the back of the long room, disappeared through a side door. David caught only a quick glimpse of the black-browed face. Not enough to be sure, he reminded himself as his muscles tensed involuntarily in instinctive response to the deadly threat implicit in the situation. But in the dim light, the face he had seen could have been that of the man called Dorn.

  “Where does that door lead?” David hissed the question.

  “Backstage,” Thrall replied.

  “Come on.” David rose; as Thrall started up, a hand caught his arm. The bland Chinese face turned up, catching the reflected light from the stage. Sweat glistened on the man’s meaty features.

  “Sit down, pal,” he whispered. “You want to disturb the speaker?”

  Thrall tugged, staring about him in distress. People’s heads turned. Someone hissed “Quiet!”

  David took a step, caught the Oriental’s arm just below the elbow, applied pressure to a nerve. The man jerked his hand back with a muffled yelp; Thrall sprang away. The front-row viewers muttered as the two walked quickly past them.

  “Through here!” Thrall led the way under a Moorish arch into a curved, stuccoed passage, past a chipped, waterless drinking fountain, up worn carpeted steps which twisted around an abrupt bend. He pushed open a paint-chipped door; over his shoulder David saw warped flied, hanging ropes, dusty props, waiting in the gloom.

  “He’s got to be here somewhere,” Thrall hissed. “You check this side; I’ll look over there.” He darted away. David stood where he was in the shadowy entry, listening. Beyond the curtain, hanging in heavy folds on the left, Alphonse Cabrito’s voice piped on, the words indistinct. From somewhere ahead, a soft sound came, as if something light were being dragged . . . .

  David took a step―and checked as a faint pop sounded from above. He looked up―and threw himself back as something dark and silent hurtled down from the jungle-growth of ropes, slammed the ancient stage with an echoing crash. Ropes clattered down after the fallen boom; the curtain trembled, flicked open. Cabrito’s petulant face appeared, turned toward David, past him. The angry eyes opened wide; the pursed hps parted-

  There v/as a muffled sound of impact. Cabrito clutched at the curtain, staggered, fell backward out of sight. But in the moment before he vanished, David saw the sudden gush of crimson across the narrow chest. A moment later pandemonium broke out beyond the curtain.

  Thrall reappeared, started as he saw David.

  “What.. ? he gasped. “I thought―”

  “We’ve got to get out of here, fast,” David said quickly. “Which way?”

  Thrall hesitated a moment, then he jerked his head.

  “Through here.” He brushed past David, lifted aside a cardboard cut-out of a giant flower pot, opened a
small door onto a narrow alley. They walked along to the street, heard a siren approaching as they skirted a small coupe at the curb, crossed the street.

  “My car,” Thrall indicated a well-polished sedan half-way up the block. “You’d better come along to my place. There are some things I want to show you.”

  David looked across at the average-man face, set in an expression of sober concern. Behind the pale eyes, the wariness was more pronounced now.

  “All right, Mr. Thrall, he said. “I’ll be glad to see what you have to show me.”

  For an instant, it was as if fire flashed in the depths of Thrall’s eyes. Then he nodded, opened the car door.

  “Good. Let’s be going before they cordon off the block.”

  Chapter Three

  Thrall drove silently, through the chill, empty streets of the town. Gaunt, leafless trees stood like silent guards along the route. They passed the last of the shops, followed a winding, hedge-lined avenue past vast, ancient mansions like abandoned funeral homes.

  “Gatewood Heights,” Thrall said with a hint of pride. “Finest section of town. My family has lived here since the eighties. Only myself left now, of course.” He pointed. “That’s Thrall House, there at the top of the rise.” David saw the high gaunt outline silhouetted against the dim luminosity of the sky. A single light burned, high up in one Victorian tower.

  Thrall turned in between stone posts, followed a gravelled drive, pocked with washouts; rank weeds whipped against the underside of the car. He halted before a wide porte cochere from which a rotted gutter hung down in a sagging arc.

  “The place needs a little maintenance,” he said briskly as he stepped out. “My researches consume so much of my time that I haven’t given it the attention I should have . . . “

  David got out of the car, stood looking up at the looming, dapboard front, vine-grown, the paint cracked and peeling. Thrall led the way to the wide steps. At the top he halted, fussing with bunched keys―

  The sound of breaking wood warned David; he leaped back as the step on which he had started to put his weight collapsed, the tread dropping out of sight, down through a black opening. The echo told him of great depths below.

  “Oh―perhaps I should have warned you, Mr. Vincent,” Thrall said. “Some of these old timbers are somewhat rotten. One of those little matters I should have seen to.”

  “That’s all right, Mr. Thrall,” David said easily. “Now that I’ve been warned, I’ll be more careful.”

  For a moment, their eyes locked. Then Thrall turned abruptly, opened the wide door and stepped inside.

  It was a wide, high room, with water streaks on the once gaudy wallpaper, a smell of must and mould.

  The furniture was massive, antique, undusted. Thrall led the way across a tarnished rug to an open double door, switched on a light―a single bulb, burning in an immense, ornate chandelier in the center of the room beyond the entrance.

  “The library,” Thrall said, waving a hand which took in the deep, worn leather chairs, the book-lined walls, the cold fireplace. “Why don’t you have a seat here, and I’ll fetch along a bottle of brandy; perhaps I could even get a small blaze going, to take the chill off the evening.”

  “Never mind the drink,” David said. “You were going to show me something.”

  “Of course.” Thrall flashed a shallow smile. “Perhaps you’ll come along to my laboratory then.”

  “You’re a scientist?” David asked as he followed the man to the ornate staircase which curved up to a dark gallery.

  “Not in the usual sense of the word. But I’ve attempted to attack the problem in an orderly fashion. Organize my data, subject it to certain rigorous examinations―you understand.”

  “Not yet,” David said. “But I’m sure you’ll make it all very clear.”

  “I hope to,” Thrall murmured. “Soon, now . . . “

  They passed a landing where a jackal-headed Egyptian baxalt stared with blind, hostile eyes, started up a narrower flight. Thrall gripped the carved bannister, looking back over his shoulder.

  “I hope you don’t mind the climb,” he called. “You’ll find it easier coming down.’”

  “I’m enjoying it,” David said. “I have the feeling I’m getting close to something.”

  “You are, Mr. Vincent . . . indeed you are.”

  At the top, a bare, unadorned hall stretched in both directions. Thrall gestured David past him.

  “After you,” David said.

  Thr ill shot him a sharp look, brushed past, led the way along to the door at the end of the hall. He paused with his hand on the big china knob.

  “Very few people have seen what lies beyond this door, Mr. Vincent,” he said. “I hope you are prepared to be―shocked.”

  “I’m counting on it,” David said. Thrall nodded curtly. “In that case . . . “ He threw the door wide, reached in and flipped a switch that flooded the room with light. David stepped forward, looked past Thrall into the room―and froze at what he saw there: white tile walls, polished floor, a narrow, padded, six-foot table under a bank of fluorescents, beside it a stainless steel case of the same size, and another, smaller table, set with an array of glitterin~ steel instruments. At one side was a panel fitted with instruments and grilles buttons and indicator lights in rows.

  “Surprised, Mr. Vincent?” Thrall said softly.

  “It looks like an operating room.” David said.

  “I should have told you; I was trailed as a surgeon―though to be sure, I’ve never practiced. The cartel which controls such matters saw to it that I never received my license.” Thrall’s voice turned harsh on the last words. “Still, I don’t lack for experience―” He broke off. “But it’s not that about which you wish to hear, is it, Mr. Vincent?”

  “I want to hear about the aliens among us,” David said flatly, watching the other’s face.

  “I’m afraid I wasn’t completely candid with you,” Thrall said. “I told you that I had deduced that if there were intruders here on this placet, they m!”ht well give themselves away through their meddling with our organizations.”

  David nodded. “They might.”

  Thrall leaned toward him. “They have!” he hissed.

  His teeth were bared in a ferocious grin. “They were contemptuous, dismissing all Earthmen as fools-blind, credulous fools! But they were wrong, Mr. Vincent! I wasn’t fooled! Not once, not by any of them! Look for yourself!” With a swift motion, Thrall tripped a lever at the foot of the steel-cased table. Like an elongated clamshell, the two halves of the cover folded back to reveal the hollow, staring eyes, the gaunt, shrunken chest, the withered legs of a long-dead man.

  2

  Davis held his eyes steadily on the horrid spectacle, forcing his face to conceal his reaction to the dry brownish, flesh, the ghastly wounds where the thorax had been opened, the topless skull, sawed clean, the skeletal hand, a thing of rags and tatters.

  “This is the last of them who thought himself so clever,” Thrall’s voice was a gloating coo now. Across the mutilated cadaver, his eyes glinted like those of a wild animal. “He came here . . . “ Thrall broke off to let a titter escape from between his taut hps―”to trap me―in my own house, the cretin! What an opinion they must have of our intelligence, Mr. Vincent! To follow me here, into my own secret places, among my own―but there, I mustn’t say too much. Suffice it to remark that in the end he learned who was master.”

  “You picked him up at an ISIS meeting?” David asked in a casual tone.

  “Not at all. It was a convocation of the Brethren of the Celestial Light. He offered―” another chuckle “―to show me the inner significance of the constellations. I told him I had a private observatory―and the poor fool thought it was I who was being deluded!”

  “So you killed him.”

  “Of course. He was a menace to my world―”

  “And dissected him.”

  Thrall nodded. “In order to discover the anatomical differences, to aid the government
in identification after I’ve revealed my work.”

  “And was he . . . an alien?”

  “Of course! You think I’d have killed him other-wiser

  “How did you do it―kill him, I mean?”

  “With this.” Thrall’s hand came from behind the case, holding a short, blued-steel revolver aimed steadily at David’s chest.

  “And now . . . ?” David said calmly.

  “And now―it’s your turn, Mr. Vincent!” Thrall leaned forward, his hps suddenly wet. “Did you imagine I wouldn’t detect what you were―instantly? That you didn’t give yourself away in a thousand subtle fashions? Did you really think, you blockhead, that you would be able to trick me?”

  “Why would I want to trick you?” David asked mildly.

  “You may drop the pretense now, Mr. Vincent―or whatever your real name is―Bzzkflx, or Znnqrnx, for all I know! Because I see you as you really are! I see those ghostly antlers, that fanged mouth, those leathery wings! The psychic emanation is all about you! I penetrate your disguise―!”

  “What disguise?”

  “The flesh-mask you’re wearing! It’s useless―because I know! Earth has already been invaded by aliens from a distant world 1 And you―you are one of Them!”

  David nodded, holding the other’s eyes. “I see you’re too smart for us, Mr. Thrall,” he said. “If we’d known the Earthmen were as brilliant as you, we’d never have tried it.”

  For a moment, Thrall’s expression flickered. Behind the fierce smile, something else showed; something small, and frightened. Then he made a curt gesture with the gun.

  “Never mind that. Now, before I kill you―I want information.” Thrall paused to lick his hps, suddenly dry now. “Where do you come from? Why are you here? Were you―” He jabbed the gun at David, his expression intent. “Was it you who were responsible for my failure in medical school? Was it you who told Gwendolyn to refuse my offer of marriage? Were you the one who told my father of―” He broke off, his hand shaking. “But of course you were,” he said in a voice suddenly flat. “How blind I’ve been. And it was you who caused my business to fail, and raised the taxes on my property, and defeated me in the race for nomination for President on the Apple Cider Vinegar ticket I And―and―”