“Around the block again,” he told the driver.
The man gave him another grin and hunched down in his seat. Frelaine wondered if the driver would feel so happy if he knew that Frelaine was gunning for a woman.
This time there was no waiter around. The girl was lighting a cigarette, her mournful face intent on her lighter. Frelaine centered her in his sights, squarely above the eyes, and held his breath.
Then he shook his head and put the gun back in his pocket.
The idiotic girl was robbing him of the full benefit of his catharsis.
He paid the driver and started to walk.
It’s too easy, he told himself. He was used to a real chase. Most of the other six kills had been quite difficult. The Victims had tried every dodge. One had hired at least a dozen spotters. But Frelaine had reached them all by altering his tactics to meet the situation.
Once he had dressed as a milkman, another time as a bill collector. The sixth Victim he had had to chase through the Sierra Nevadas. The man had clipped him, too. But Frelaine had done better.
How could he be proud of this one? What would the Tens Club say?
That brought Frelaine up with a start. He wanted to get into the club. Even if he passed up this girl he would have to defend himself against a Hunter. If he survived, he would still be four hunts away from membership. At that rate, he might never get in.
He began to pass the cafe again, then, on impulse, stopped abruptly.
“Hello,” he said.
Janet Patzig looked at him out of sad blue eyes, but said nothing.
“Say, look,” he said, sitting down. “If I’m being fresh, just tell me and I’ll go. I’m an out-of-towner. Here on a convention. And I’d just like someone feminine to talk to. If you’d rather I didn’t—”
“I don’t care,” Janet Patzig said tonelessly.
“A brandy,” Frelaine told the waiter. Janet Patzig’s glass was still half full.
Frelaine looked at the girl and he could feel his heart throbbing against his ribs. This was more like it—having a drink with your Victim!
“My name’s Stanton Frelaine,” he said, knowing it didn’t matter.
“Janet.”
“Janet what?”
“Janet Patzig.”
“Nice to know you,” Frelaine said, in a perfectly natural voice. “Are you doing anything tonight, Janet?”
“I’m probably being killed tonight,” she said quietly.
Frelaine looked at her carefully. Did she realize who he was? For all he knew, she had a gun leveled at him under the table.
He kept his hand close to the fling-out button.
“Are you a Victim?” he asked.
“You guessed it,” she said sardonically. “If I were you, I’d stay out of the way. No sense getting hit by mistake.”
Frelaine couldn’t understand the girl’s calm. Was she a suicide? Perhaps she just didn’t care. Perhaps she wanted to die.
“Haven’t you got any spotters?” he asked, with the right expression of amazement.
“No.” She looked at him, full in the face, and Frelaine saw something he hadn’t noticed before.
She was very lovely.
“I am a bad, bad girl,” she said lightly. “I got the idea I’d like to commit a murder, so I signed for ECB. Then—I couldn’t do it”
Frelaine shook his head, sympathizing with her.
“But I’m still in, of course. Even if I didn’t shoot, I still have to be a Victim.”
“But why don’t you hire some spotters?” he asked.
“I couldn’t kill anyone,” she said. “I just couldn’t. I don’t even have a gun.”
“You’ve got a lot of courage,” Frelaine said, “coming out in the open this way.” Secretly, he was amazed at her stupidity.
“What can I do?” she asked listlessly. “You can’t hide from a Hunter. Not a real one. And I don’t have enough money to make a good disappearance.”
“Since it’s in your own defense, I should think—” Frelaine began, but she interrupted.
“No. I’ve made my mind up on that. This whole thing is wrong, the whole system. When I had my Victim in the sights—when I saw how easily I could—I could—”
She pulled herself together quickly.
“Oh, let’s forget it,” she said and smiled.
Frelaine found her smile dazzling.
After that, they talked of other things. Frelaine told her of his business, and she told him about New York. She was twenty-two, an unsuccessful actress.
They had supper together. When she accepted Frelaine’s invitation to go to the Gladiatorials, he felt absurdly elated.
He called a cab—he seemed to be spending his entire time in New York in cabs—and opened the door for her. She started in. Frelaine hesitated. He could have pumped a shot into her at that moment It would have been very easy.
But he held back. Just for the moment, he told himself.
The Gladiatorials were about the same as those held anywhere else, except that the talent was a little better. There were the usual historical events, swordsmen and netmen, duels with saber and foil.
Most of these, naturally, were fought to the death.
Then bull fighting, lion fighting, and rhino fighting, followed by the more modern events. Fights from behind barricades with bow and arrow. Duelling on a high wire.
The evening passed pleasantly.
Frelaine escorted the girl home, the palms of his hands sticky with sweat. He had never found a woman he liked better. And yet she was his legitimate kill.
He didn’t know what he was going to do.
She invited him in and they sat together on the couch. The girl lighted a cigarette for herself with a large lighter, then settled back.
“Are you leaving soon?” she asked him.
“I suppose so,” Frelaine said. “The convention is only lasting another day.”
She was silent for a moment. “I’ll be sorry to see you go.”
They were quiet for a while. Then Janet went to fix him a drink. Frelaine eyed her retreating back. Now was the time. He placed his hand near the button.
But the moment had passed for him, irrevocably. He wasn’t going to kill her. You don’t kill the girl you love.
The realization that he loved her was shocking. He’d come to kill, not to find a wife.
She came back with the drink and sat down opposite him, staring at emptiness.
“Janet,” he said. “I love you.”
She sat, just looking at him. There were tears in her eyes.
“You can’t,” she protested. “I’m a Victim. I won’t live long enough to—”
“You won’t be killed. I’m your Hunter.”
She stared at him a moment, then laughed uncertainly.
“Are you going to kill me?” she asked.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said. “I’m going to marry you.”
Suddenly she was in his arms.
“Oh, Lord!” she gasped. “The waiting—I’ve been so frightened—”
“It’s all over,” he told her. “Think what a story it’ll make for our kids. How I came to murder you and left marrying you.”
She kissed him, then sat back and lighted another cigarette.
“Let’s start packing,” Frelaine said. “1 want—”
“Wait,” Janet interrupted. “You haven’t asked if I love you.”
“What?”
She was still smiling, and the cigarette lighter was pointed at him. In the bottom of it was a black hole. A hole just large enough for a .38 caliber bullet.
“Don’t kid around,” he objected, getting to his feet.
“I’m not being funny, darling,” she said.
In a fraction of a second, Frelaine had time to wonder how he could ever have thought she was not much over twenty. Looking at her now—really looking at her—he knew she couldn’t be much less than thirty. Every minute of her strained, tense existence showed on her face.
“
I don’t love you, Stanton,” she said very softly, the cigarette lighter poised.
Frelaine struggled for breath. One part of him was able to realize detachedly what a marvelous actress she really was. She must have known all along.
Frelaine pushed the button, and the gun was in his hand, cocked and ready.
The blow that struck him in the chest knocked him over a coffee table. The gun fell out of his hand. Gasping, half-conscious, he watched her take careful aim for the coup de grace.
“Now I can join the Tens,” he heard her say elatedly as she squeezed the trigger.
RITUAL
Akeenobob trotted up to Elder Singer’s hut and began dancing the important-message dance, making the appropriate sounds by slapping his tail rhythmically on the ground. Immediately, Elder Singer came to the door, arms folded on his chest, tail coiled on his shoulder in the listening position.
“A god-ship has come,” Akeenobob said, dancing the correct accompanying measure.
“Indeed?” said Elder Singer, squinting approvingly at Akeenobob’s dance step. Here was good form! None of the sloppy, simplified movements of the Alhona heresy.
“In the divine and actual metal!” Akeenobob cried.
“Praised be the gods,” Elder Singer said formally, concealing his excitement. At last! The gods had returned! “Summon the village.”
Akeenobob went to the village square and danced the dance of assembly. Elder Singer burned a pinch of sacred snuff, rubbed sand on his tail and, thus purified, trotted out to lead the welcoming dances.
The god-ship, a great cylinder of blackened, pitted metal, was lying on a little plain. The villagers gathered a respectful distance from it, arranged in the figure of General Welcome To All Gods.
The god-ship opened, and two gods stumbled out.
Elder Singer recognized their appearance at once. In The Giant Book of Gods, written nearly five thousand years ago, all possible types of deity had been described. There were gods who were big and gods who were small, winged gods, hooved gods, one-armed, two-armed, three-armed gods, tentacled gods, scaly gods, and the many other forms that godhood was pleased to take.
Each type had to be greeted with his own, unique Welcoming Ceremony, for so it was written in The Giant Book of Gods.
Elder Singer observed at once that these were two-legged, two- armed, tailless gods. Quickly he formed the people in the correct figure.
Glat, known as Younger Singer, trotted up.
“Which are you using?” he coughed politely.
Elder Singer stared at him. “The Dance of Landing Clearance,” he said, pronouncing the ancient, meaningless words with dignity.
“Really?” Glat rubbed his tail along his neck in a gesture of casual defiance. “Alhona prescribes the feasting before anything else.”
Elder Singer made the gesture of negation and turned away. As long as he was in charge, there would be no compromise with the Alhona heresy, which had been written a mere three thousand years ago.
Glat, the Younger Singer, returned to his place in the dance. It was ridiculous, he thought, having an old conservative like Elder Singer lay down dance-policy. Utterly absurd, when it had been shown—
The two gods were moving! They balanced on their thin legs, swaying. One walked forward, stumbled, and fell on his face. The other helped him up, then fell himself. Very slowly he pulled himself to his feet
It was amazingly realistic.
“The gods dance their acceptance!” Elder Singer called. “Begin the Dance of Landing Clearance.”
The people danced, pounding their tails on the ground, coughing and barking joyously. Then, according to ceremony, the gods were placed on a platform of sacred boughs, and brought to the Sacred Mound.
“Let’s talk this over,” Glat said, catching up with Elder Singer. “Since this is the first appearance of any god in thousands of years, certainly it would be wise to use the Alhona ceremonies. Just in case—”
“No,” Elder Singer said, trotting briskly along on his six legs. “All the correct ceremonies are described in the Ancient Books of Procedure.”
“I know,” Glat said, “but it would do no harm—”
“Never,” Elder Singer said firmly. “For each god, there must be the Dance of Landing Clearance. Then comes the Dance of Field Approval, and the Dance of Customs Inspection, and the Dance of Cargo Unloading and the Dance of Medical Inspection.” Elder Singer rolled out the ancient, mysterious names with unction. “Then and only then can the feasting begin.”
On the platform of boughs, the two gods were moaning and waving their limbs listlessly. Glat knew that they were dancing an imitation of human pain and suffering, to reaffirm their kinship with their worshippers.
This was as it should be, written in the Book of Last Appearance. But Glat was amazed at how well the gods could imitate human emotions. To look at them, one would really think they were dying of thirst and hunger.
He smiled at the thought. Everyone knew that the gods could feel none of those things.
“Look at it this way,” Glat said to Elder Singer. “The important thing is to avoid the fatal mistake our ancestors made in the Days of Space Flight Right?”
“Of course,” Elder Singer said, bending his head reverently to the ritual name for the Golden Age. Five thousand years ago, his people had been rich and prosperous, and many gods had visited them. Then according to legend, a mistake had been made in the ritual, and an Avoidance was placed on the people. After that, the gods came no more.
“If the gods approve our ceremonies,” Elder Singer said, “they will lift the Avoidance. Other gods will come, as it was then.”
“Exactly. And Alhona was the last to see a god. Certainly he must know what he was talking about, when he prescribes the feasting first, and then the ceremonies.”
“The writings of Alhona are heresy,” Elder Singer said.
Younger Singer considered, for at least the hundredth time, of asserting himself, and commanding the village to provide the Water Ceremony and Feast at once. Many villagers were secret Alhona converts....
But he decided against it, for the moment. Elder Singer was still too strong. What he needed, he thought, was a sign from the gods themselves.
But the gods were still lying on the boughs, doing their marvelous twitching dance in imitation of human thirst and suffering.
The gods were placed in the middle of the Sacred Mound, and Elder Singer led the people in the dance of Landing Approval. Messengers were sent to the outlying villages, to call all men to the Dances.
In the village, the women began to prepare the feast. Some of them danced out of sheer joy, for wasn’t it written that when the gods returned the Avoidance would be ended, and there would be prosperity and riches for everyone, as in the Days of Space Flight’
On the mound, one god was lying prone. The other had raised himself to a sitting position, and was pointing into his mouth with an artfully shaking finger.
“It is the sign of good will!” cried Elder Singer.
Glat nodded, perspiration rolling down the folds of his hide as he danced. Elder Singer was strong on interpretation. He had to admit that.
Now the other god was sitting up, clutching his throat with one hand and gesturing with the other.
“Faster!” Elder Singer coughed at the dancers, responsive to every move of the gods.
One of the gods was shouting now, in a terrible, cracked voice. He shouted, and pointed at his throat, and shouted again in imitation of a suffering man.
All this was in strict accordance with the God’s Dance in the Book of Last Appearance.
Just then, a troop of young men from the next village galloped in, and took their places in the dance. Younger Singer was relieved of his position. After catching his breath, he walked over to Elder Singer.
“Are you using all the dances?” he asked.
“Of course.” Elder Singer scrutinized the dancers carefully, for there could be no mistake this time. This would be their last c
hance to redeem themselves in the eyes of the gods.
“The dances will continue for the full eight days,” Elder Singer said sternly. “If any error is made, we will begin again.”
“Alhona says that the Water Ceremony should come first,” Glat said, “followed by—”
“Get back to the dance!” Elder Singer said, making the sign of complete negation. “You have heard the gods cough their approval. Only in this way can we lift the ancient Avoidance.”
Younger Singer turned away. If only he were in charge! In the ancient days, when the gods were constantly coming and going, Elder Singer’s way had been correct. Glat remembered reading in the Book of Last Appearance how the god-ship had come down. The Field Clearance Ceremony (they didn’t call them dances then) had begun.
The gods had danced their dance of suffering and pain.
Then the Landing Approval Ceremony was performed.
The gods danced a hunger dance, and a thirst dance, as they were doing now.
And then there had been the Ceremony of Customs Inspection, and Cargo Unloading, and Medical Inspection. During all this time, food and water had been kept from the gods, as part of the ritual.
When all the ceremonies were done, one god had, for some reason, imitated a dead man. The other had taken him back to the god-ship, and the gods left for the last time.
Sometime after that, the Avoidance began.
But none of the ancient writings agreed on the reason for the Avoidance. Some maintained that an error in one of the Dances had offended the gods. Others, like Alhona, wrote that the feasting and drink should have come first, and then the ceremonies.
Alhona was not generally believed. After all, the gods knew neither hunger nor thirst. Why should the feast precede the ceremonies?
But Glat accepted Alhona’s word on faith, and hoped someday to find out the real reason for the Avoidance.
Suddenly there was an interruption. Glat hurried back to see what it was.
Some fool had left a common water jug near the Sacred Mound. One of the gods had crawled toward it. His hands were just about to grasp it.
Elder Singer snatched the jug away, and the whole village sighed in relief. It was blasphemy to leave a plain, unadorned, unpurified water jug near a god. Had he touched it, the god might have destroyed the village in his wrath.
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