Brandt Cardozo half turned and gazed steadily at the old man.
“There’s no use arguing,” he said coldly.
“I’m not going to argue. I assume you know what you’re doing.”
“I do. I know that these people,” he jerked a hand back toward the sleeping village, “took a look at their future and made one of the best codes man has ever dreamed up in his nine-thousand-year history. Today, these same people got scared—and the ape scampered back up the tree.”
“You know,” Hrdlicka grunted, “sometimes I think you make too many speeches.”
“Could be.” Cardozo took a step toward the shed. “Better get out of here, Anthony. There’ll be hell to pay in the morning. And when our Mr. Blair gets his mob organized, you’ll be the first one he goes after. I don’t want you bothered for my . . . crimes.”
“You’re really leaving?”
“Certainly. I’ve got to stick with the poor devil until the drug wears off. And anyway. . .” Brandt Cardozo shrugged and took another step toward the shed.
“In my time,” Hrdlicka said, moving with him, “I got a lot of things done. And I got them done by cutting my losses sometimes and starting in all over again.”
“Please get going, Anthony. I must be on my way and I don’t want to get rough with you.”
“Is it that you can’t take the idea of—of—well, executing the fellow?”
“Look, my friend!” Cardozo grabbed Hrdlicka by an arm and swung him around. They faced each other. “The first warden of the Pluto house hated executions. Whenever he could, he’d pass the dirty business on to me, as the next in rank. In my time I’ve supervised the legal killing of some thirty men and two women. Now, leave or stay, whichever you like, but don’t interfere.” He stalked over to the shed. “Come on out, Tasker,” Brandt Cardozo said. “And keep it quiet.” Hrdlicka opened his mouth, closed it, and walked away. Tasker slouched out of the shed, bundles in his arms. Brandt Cardozo stood still, listening to the sound of Hrdlicka’s feet on the rough planks of the platform. He waited until the sound changed as Hrdlicka reached the pebbled path. Then he walked into the shed and picked up another bundle. When he came out, Tasker stood at the edge of the landing, grinning.
“We’ll take the downstream raft,” Cardozo said. “Jump aboard and I’ll hand the stuff down to you.”
Tasker squatted and looked down. “It’s a big jump, pal. Better give me a hand.”
“All right, but hurry!”
“No hurry, chum. We got all the time in the world.”
Brandt Cardozo stopped, his arm half extended to the condemned man.
“Don’t you really know what we’re doing?” he asked softly.
“You said we was making a break. You seem to be taking it okay. So what?”
“But don’t you know why, really?”
Tasker shrugged.
“You’re a queer boy,” he said. “One minute you say rush it, the next you stop to do a lot of gabbing. Okay by me. Whatever you want.”
“Never mind,” Brandt Cardozo sighed. “Give me your hand.”
They clasped hands and Tasker swung his legs out over the bobbing raft. Cardozo braced, Tasker let go with his other hand and landed on the raft. Cardozo let go and saw Tasker sway, then spread his feet wide apart. In a moment Tasker had his balance and stood secure on the wobbly raft.
Brandt Cardozo picked up a bundle. He had gathered together as few essentials as possible, a rough first-aid kit, some food concentrates, a few extra clothes. He himself was armed with a handgun and two knives. Later, when the man was more his normal self, Cardozo planned to give Tasker a knife. He had not looked into the future beyond that.
Cardozo tossed one bundle down, Tasker caught it, dropped it in the center of the raft. Another bundle was passed.
“Lay them carefully, damn it!” Cardozo snapped.
“Okay, okay.”
Cardozo had picked up the last bundle when he heard a voice call softly, “Brandt! Oh, Brandt!”
He let go the bundle and drew his gun. A man came toward him across the landing and he saw it was Pierre Malory. Brandt Cardozo did not lower his gun.
“Take it easy, Malory,” he said.
Malory came closer. He was smiling.
“I’m alone, Brandt. I don’t plan to start anything, so you can put the gun away.”
Brandt Cardozo did not move.
“Hrdlicka came to me,” Malory went on in a conversational tone. “When he told me your plan, I thought I’d come along and say good by.” He glanced down at the raft. “Ah, Tasker. How are you feeling?”
“Fine. How else?”
“You won’t feel that way much longer, I think. Brandt, I don’t believe you know the symptoms of withdrawal. Morbid depression accompanied by extreme fatigue. He won’t be much good to you for some time. For just how long, I don’t know.”
“Please go,” Brandt Cardozo said flatly.
“Very well. But I did want to say good by, Brandt, and wish you luck.”
“Psychology, eh!”
“Not at all. It would do you no good. When the thoughtful, contemplative type, like you, finally breaks into violent action, nothing can stop it during the period of such action.”
“I’m glad you realize that. Here you go, Tasker.”
Gun still in his right hand, he picked up the last bundle and tossed it down to the waiting Tasker. Then he went over to the mooring chain.
“Hell! I forgot this was locked!” He hesitated a moment, fingering the chain, then turned to look at Malory. “I’m going to burn this lock, Pierre. If you try anything, I’ll . . .”
“I won’t try anything!” Malory sounded exasperated. “Go ahead, burn the lock. But don’t get so wound up that you forget your manners. Hrdlicka was hurt that you had no word for him. That tough old man is very fond of you, Brandt.”
“He left before I—oh, the devil with it! Tell the old guy cheerio for me, Pierre. You too, guy.”
“I will. Mind telling me your plans?”
When Cardozo hesitated, Malory smiled and said, “I’ll tell them to Hugo Blair first thing in the morning!”
“I’m sorry. We’ll just float down the river as far as we want to, I guess. Then, fish and hunt, live as best we can. I don’t think anyone will chase us. It’s the cotton season and they’ll need the other raft. We should learn something about this planet, eh?”
“Let me know when you guys finish your gab,” Tasker remarked and sat down on the logs of the raft. “Shut up, you!” Cardozo barked. He turned back to Malory. “You don’t approve,” he challenged.
“It’s not that,” Malory said thoughtfully. “It’s something like watching another doctor treat a patient. His treatment is not what I, myself, would prescribe but, on the other hand, I realize it may work. So, it’s not for me to say anything.”
“I’m not treating anyone!”
“Oh.” Malory thrust his hands in his pockets and gazed down at the planks. “I thought you were,” he said after a while.
“What the devil do you mean?”
“I thought you were treating our community. For hysteria.”
“To hell with our community! I’m saving a man’s life!”
“Hrdlicka was right, then. You know, I’m convinced that old gentleman is never wrong. Well, cheerio.”
Hands still in his pockets, Pierre Malory turned his back to Cardozo. “Wait!” Brandt Cardozo cried. Malory paused, looked over his shoulder.
“You’d better move, Brandt. The night’s getting on.”
“Tell me what you mean first!”
“It’s simple enough. This town’s temporarily sick. I’d diagnose its ailment as an acute case of Blair poisoning. Isn’t it up to you to give it an antidote?”
“Up to me! I’m finished with that bunch of idiots! You heard them at the Council meeting!”
“I did. There were some extremists, of course.”
“Yes, indeed there were! And how about the others. I suppose you a
pprove of them?”
“I don’t. Their behavior was abnormal. It was also fairly orderly. And quite legal.”
“Legal? My dear doctor, do you consider it legal to sentence a man to death under an ex post facto law?”
“You have me there, Brandt. Yet . . . don’t forget this is a frontier, and frontier people seldom bother to make the effort our community made today. Legally, Tasker can’t die and you and I know it. But a majority of the people have condemned him, so die he must.”
“Majority! A bunch of frantic cows mooing after a mad bull!”
“You’re shouting, Brandt.”
“I—sorry.”
Brandt Cardozo drew a deep breath. He looked down at his hands. They were shaking and sweaty. He was surprised to see that he still held his gun. He quickly thrust it into his holster.
“I apologize, Pierre. Thought I’d done all my shouting this afternoon.”
A loud snore came up from the raft.
Brandt Cardozo gasped, then ran back and looked over the wharf’s edge.
“Christ!” he breathed. “He’s asleep! Tasker’s gone to sleep, Pierre!”
“Why not? Right now Tasker is incapable of worry.”
They were quiet for a moment. The rhythmic snoring sounded over the soft murmur of the river.
“You’d better get going,” Malory said. “Somebody just might hear that.” He took a step. “Oh. By the way, Brandt. You did leave a message for the Council? Your resignation, that sort of thing?”
“No, I did not!” Brandt Cardozo said defiantly. “I owe them nothing! I’m leaving them—I’m going to save Tasker’s life and be damned to them!”
“Very well. I shall make whatever explanations I see fit.”
“When? To whom?”
“Tomorrow morning. To Blair, most likely. He’ll take over completely, for Hrdlicka and I—as your supporters—will be discredited, of course. And strongly suspected of helping Tasker escape. Ah, well . . . Anthony can handle his problems and I’ll try to manage mine.”
“You think I’m letting you down,” Cardozo muttered.
“My dear fellow, it doesn’t matter what I think.”
Brandt Cardozo licked his sweaty lips.
“Don’t go,” he said thickly.
“Why not?”
“I want you to help me get Tasker back to his cell. Will you?”
“Why?”
“I’m not sure . . .”
“It’s no good if you’re just doing it for Hrdlicka or for me. Or for yourself.”
“Well, who the hell else would I do it for!”
Malory gestured briefly.
“For all of us.”
“For Tasker, too?”
“I’m sorry—terribly sorry, but Tasker doesn’t matter any more. Really he doesn’t, Brandt.”
“Damn it, Pierre . . . all right, you’re my doctor. Help me.”
Pierre Malory searched his pockets for a cigarette, found one, and lit it. He smoked slowly as a man does who smokes solely for taste and not for nervous sustenance.
Finally he said, “I honestly can’t help you, Brandt. You are the doer now.”
“Blast it!” Cardozo strode to the edge and frowned down at the snoring Tasker. “I was doing something. Doing it for Tasker.”
“No.”
“Eh?”
“You were doing it for none other than Brandt Cardozo. The emotional, embittered, Brandt Cardozo.”
“Now, look—oh. I see . . .”
“Tasker was Blair’s scapegoat. Tasker was Brandt Cardozo’s excuse.”
“For acting the fool!”
“Not precisely the fool. Put it in reverse. Tasker was your excuse for not acting as Brandt Cardozo, the penologist, the responsible servant of the people of the New World.”
“I tried that. And lost.”
“Well, then, cut your losses.”
“The old man said that. I don’t know . . . I don’t believe in capital punishment, Pierre. It just doesn’t do any good. I told the people that. And they listened—until that damned Blair . . .”
“Tell them again.”
“A voice crying in the wilderness? Not me.”
“That’s the voice that won’t rephrase its message. Tell the people in another way.”
“Another way? What do you mean?”
“I am treating a patient. Sometimes I soothe him. Sometimes I reason with him. And once in a while I bawl the hell out of him! But all the time I am saying the same thing to him. Over and over. In different ways.”
Brandt Cardozo stood for a time, looking down at the raft where Tasker lay sprawled on his back. After a while he nodded.
“Ever see an execution, Pierre?” Cardozo’s voice was very cold. “No.”
“You will. Now—please help me get Tasker back to his cell.”
“Certainly.” Malory looked curiously at his friend. “What are you going to do now, Brandt?”
“I’m going to treat my sick community, Dr. Malory. This time, I’m going to try shock treatment . . .”
The four-man procession clumped stolidly across the floor of the warehouse, reached the big door that led to the loading yard, and stopped.
“Open the door, Vanni,” Brandt Cardozo ordered.
Tasker’s cell had been a small room in the warehouse, the one permanent structure they had completed. Vanni, a stocky machinist’s mate, stepped from where he stood by the bound Tasker, swung a clumsy lockbar out of its slot, and pushed the heavy door open.
The four men moved out into the loading yard. Their pace faltered.
“What’s the matter?” Cardozo growled. “Keep it moving. Fast!”
“Uh . . . that it?” mumbled the other guard, McCann, a one-time video scenesetter. His narrow shoulders shook a little.
“That’s it. And the sooner we get there, the sooner it will be over.”
At the far end of the yard stood a bark-covered, newly sawed post about eight feet high. Ten feet from it stood five men, four with flame rifles. The fifth, medical bag in hand, was Dr. Malory. Several yards be; hind them, in four ragged rows, stood some fifty-odd members of the community.
As they marched to the post, Brandt Cardozo checked the silent witnesses. Hrdlicka stood calm—, by Cardozo’s request in the first row—the sandy-haired jury foreman beside him. Arrayed on either side of those two were members of the jury and at the extreme end of the line, away from the post, stood Lisa Giovannetti.
At that moment an unidentified man slipped furtively into the first row and stood, eager eyes flickering from Tasker to the post and back again. Brandt Cardozo sighed. There was always at least one of those . . . Always a twisted sadist, savoring another human being’s terror and death.
He shrugged. Perhaps even that would help. Make it even worse for the others.
For this was his shock treatment . . . a public execution.
After the Council had revoked the law forbidding the death penalty and instituted capital punishment, it had hurriedly decreed that all details of an execution be left to the discretion of the penologist.
So Brandt Cardozo had ordered that all officials of the sentencing court should be present at any execution . . . as well as no less than 35 members of the public. He further stipulated that any other adult resident of the community could attend if he or she so desired.
Cardozo checked them off in his mind . . . no women . . . a good sign. He scowled suddenly.
“Halt!” he barked.
Tasker’s escort stopped. They were very near the post. Cardozo strode over and ranged himself in front of .the witnesses. “Where’s Citizens’ Counsel Blair?” he snapped.
Heads turned. There were a few whispers. Feet shuffled. The whispering grew into an audible murmur.
“I requested all court officers to be assembled at least twenty minutes before the time for execution.”
“Um. Blair doesn’t seem to be present,” Hrdlicka murmured.
Cardozo forced all expression from his voice. “The Cit
izens’ Counsel cannot evade the responsibilities of his office. Nor will this execution proceed without him.”
He turned toward the firing squad.
“Grover!” he called. A rifleman left the line and trotted up to him.
“Yes, sir?”
“Go out in the town, locate Counselor Blair, bring him here. On the double! You are to use force if necessary.”
Grover saluted and ran off.
Brandt Cardozo turned back and stared hard at the witnesses. It was apparent that the resentment on their faces was not toward him. But . . . it couldn’t matter, now.
“I am sorry,” he told them formally. “The execution of David Tasker, if it proceeds according to law, must be delayed for a few moments.”
He turned his back on them and walked stiffly over to the little cluster of men that was the condemned and his killers.
Tasker jerked his head up and looked about him. Then he seemed to notice, for the first time, that his arms were bound.
“Hey!” His voice was uncertain, worried. “What’s going on here?” Malory cleared his throat. “What’s going on, I said!”
“You are about to die by shooting for the murder of Leon Jacoby,” Cardozo said quietly. “If you can understand spiritual counsel, Tasker, ask for it now. As soon as Citizens’ Counsel Blair gets here, I’ll read you the death warrant and—”
“Death warrant!”
Tasker screamed.
Then he struggled so violently that, for a moment, he broke loose from Vanni’s grip. Dragging McCann with him, he staggered toward Cardozo.
“You said . . .” he screamed. “You said—they wasn’t gonna be no pill-box—no gas!”
Malory moved, but Vanni was faster. The guard regained his grip on Tasker’s writhing arm and helped McCann pull the twisting, gasping killer to a stop.
“Take it easy, Dave,” Vanni panted. “This is no good, fella—”
“Don’t kill me!” Tasker babbled. “You said they was no killings—I remember—the girl told me—now, please, please—get my mouthpiece, I gotta right to an appeal—it’s against the law—”
“I told you yesterday that the law had been changed. Made retroactive . . . not that you know what that big word means. I told you there was no hope, Tasker.”
“I was doped. Oh, my God . . .”
“Jesus Christ,” muttered McCann.
Complete Fiction (Jerry eBooks) Page 10