The thing to do . . what the devil did you call it, riposte, slash en avant? Varris came close as Alak halted. The Patrolman thrust for his left arm. Varris blocked that one. Somehow, Alak slewed his blade around and pinked the outlaw in the chest.
Now—God help me, I have to survive the next few seconds! The enemy steel lunged for his throat. He slapped it down, clumsily, in bare time. His thigh was furrowed. Varris sprang back to get room. Alak did the same.
Watching, he saw the Caldonian's eyes begin helplessly rolling. The rapier wavered. Alak, deciding he had to make this look good, ran up and skewered Varris in the biceps—a harmless cut, but it bled with satisfactory enthusiasm. Varris dropped his sword and tottered. Alak got out of the way just as the big body fell.
The nobles were screaming. King Morlach roared. The Master of Death rushed out to shove Alak aside. "It is not lawful to smite a fallen man," he said.
"I . assure you no such intention—" Alak sat down and let the planet revolve around him.
Abbot Gulmanan and the monks stooped over Varris, examining with skilled fingers. Presently the old priest looked up and said in a low voice that somehow cut through the noise: "He is not badly hurt. He should be quite well tomorrow. Perhaps he simply fainted."
"At a few scratches like that?" bawled Morlach. "Master, check that red-haired infidel's blade! I suspect poison!" Alak pressed the retracting button and handed over his sword. While it was being inspected, Varris was borne inside the abbey and its gate closed on him. The Master of Death looked at both weapons, bowed to the king, and said puzzledly:
"There is no sign of poison, my lord. And after all, Sir Varris had first choice of glaives and these two are identical, as far as I can see . and did not the holy one say he is not really injured?"
Alak swayed erect. "Jussa better man, tha's all," he mumbled. "I won fair an' square. Lemme go get m' hurts dressed—I'll see y' all in the morning—"
He made it to his boat, and Drogs had a bottle of Scotch ready.
It took will power to be at the palace when the court convened—not that Alak was especially weakened, but the Thunsbans started their day at a hideous hour. In this case, early rising was necessary, because he didn't know when the climax of his plot would be on him.
He got a mixed welcome, on the one hand respect for having overcome the great Sir Varris—at least in the first round—on the other hand, a certain doubt as to whether he had done it fairly. King Morlach gave him a surly greeting, but not openly hostile; he must be waiting for the doctors' verdict.
Alak found a congenial earl and spent his time swapping dirty jokes. It is always astonishing how many of the classics are to be found among all mammalian species.
This is less an argument for a prehistoric Galactic Empire than for the parallelism of great minds.
Shortly before noon, Abbot Gulmanan entered. Several hooded monks followed him, bearing weapons—most unusual—and surrounding one who was unarmed. The priest lifted his hand to the king, and the room grew very quiet.
"Well," snapped Morlach, "what brings you hither?"
"I thought it best to report personally on the outcome of the duel, my lord," said Gulmanan. "It was… surprising."
"Mean you Sir Varris is dead?" Morlach's eyes flared. He could not fight his own guest, but it would be easy enough to have one of his guardsmen insult Wing Alak.
"No, my lord. He is in good health, his wounds are negligible. But—somehow the grace of the Allshaper fell on him." The abbot made a pious gesture; as he saw Alak, one eyelid drooped.
"What mean you?" Morlach dithered and clutched his sword.
"Only this. As he regained consciousness, I offered him ghostly counsel, as I always do to hurt men. I spoke of the virtues of the Temple, of sanctity, of the dedicated life. Half in jest, I mentioned the possibility that he might wish to renounce this evil world and enter the Temple as a brother. My lord, you can imagine my astonishment when he agreed nay, he insisted on deeding all his lands and treasure to the abbey and taking the vows at once." Gulmanan rolled his eyes heavenward. "Indeed, a miracle!"
"What?" It was a shriek from the king. The monk who was under guard suddenly tore off his hood. Varris' face glared out. "Help!" he croaked. "Help, my lord! I've been betrayed—"
"There are a dozen brothers who witnessed your acts and will swear to them by the mightiest oaths," said the abbot sternly. "Be still, Brother Varris. If the Evil has re-entered your soul, I shall have to set you heavy penances."
"Witchcraft!" It whispered terribly down the long hall.
"All men know that witchcraft has no power inside the walls of a sacred abbey," warned Gulmanan. "Speak no heresies."
Varris looked wildly about at the spears and axes that ringed him in. "I was drugged, my lord," he gasped. "I remember what I did, yes, but I had no will of my own—I followed this old devil's words—" He saw Alak and snarled. "Hypnite!"
The Patrolman stepped forth and bowed to the king. "Your majesty," he said, "Sir Varris-that-was had first choice of blades. But if you wish to inspect them again, I have them here."
It had been easy enough, after all: two swords with retractible hypodermic needles, only they wouldn't do you any good unless you knew of them and knew where to press. The flitter's machine shop could turn one out in a couple of hours.
Alak handed them to the king from beneath his cloak. Morlach stared at the metal, called for a pair of gauntlets, and broke the blades in his hands. The mechanism lay blatant before him.
"Do you see?" cried Varris. "Do you see the poisoned darts? Burn that rogue alive!"
Morlach smiled grimly. "It shall be done," he said.
Alak grinned, and inwardly his muscles tightened. This was the tricky point. If he couldn't carry it off, it meant a pretty agonizing death. "My lord," he answered, "that were unjust. The weapons are identical, and Sir Varris-that-was had first choice. It is permitted to use concealed extra parts, and not to warn of them."
"Poison—" began Morlach.
"But this was not poison. Does not Varris stand hale before you all?"
"Yes—" Morlach scratched his head. "But when the next engagement is fought, I shall provide the swords."
"A monk," said Gulmanan, "may not have private quarrels. This novice is to be returned to his cell for fasting and prayer."
"A monk may be released from his vows under certain conditions," argued Morlach. "I shall see to it that he is."
"Now hold!" shouted Wing Alak in his best Shakespearean manner. "My lord, I have won the duel. It were unlawful to speak of renewing it—for who can fight a dead man?"
"Won it?" Varris wrestled with the sturdy monks gripping his arms. "Here I stand, alive, ready to take you—"
"My lord king," said Alak, "May I state my case?"
The royal brow knotted, but: "Do so," clipped Morlach.
"Very well." Alak cleared his throat. "First, then, I fought lawfully. Granted, there was a needle in each sword of which Sir Varris had not been warned, but that is allowable under the code. It might be said that I poisoned him, but that is a canard, for as you all see he stands here unharmed. The drug I used has only a temporary effect and thus is not, by definition, a poison. Therefore, it was a lawful and just combat."
"But not a completed battle," Morlach said.
"Oh, it was, my lord. What is the proper termination of a duel? Is it not that one party die as the direct result of the other's craft and skill?"
"Yes… of course—"
"Then I say that Varris, though not poisoned, died as an immediate consequence of my wounding him. He is now dead! For mark you, he has taken vows as a monk—he did this because of the drug I administered. Those oaths may not be wholly irrevocable, but they are binding on him until such time as the Council releases him from them. And . . a monk owns no property. His worldly goods revert to his heirs. His wife becomes a widow. He is beyond all civil jurisdiction. He is, in short, legally dead!"
"But I stand here!" shouted Varris.
&
nbsp; "The law is sacred," declared Alak blandly. "I insist that the law be obeyed. And by every legal definition, you are dead. You are no longer Sir Varris of Wainabog, but Brother Varris of Grimmoch—a quite different person. If this fact be not admitted, then the whole structure of Thunsban society must topple, for it rests on the total separation of civil and ecclesiastical law." Alak bowed. "Accordingly, my lord, I am the winner of the duel."
"I concede it," Morlach said at last. "Sir Wing Alak, you are the victor. You are also my guest, and I may not harm you . • . but you have till sunset to be gone from Thunsba forever." His gaze shifted to Varris. "Be not afraid. I shall send to the Council and have you absolved of your vows."
"That you may do, lord," said Gulmanan. "Of course, until that decree is passed, Brother Varris must remain a monk, living as all monks do. The law does not allow of exceptions."
"True," grumbled the king. "A few weeks only… be patient."
"Monks," said Gulmanan, "are not permitted to pamper themselves with special food. You shall eat the good bread of Thunsba, Brother Varris, and meditate on—"
"I'll die!" gasped the outlaw.
"Quite probably you will depart erelong for a better world," smiled the abbot. "But I may not set the law aside—To be sure, I could send you on a special errand, if you are willing to go. An errand to the king of the Galactics, from whom I have requested certain books. Sir Wing Alak will gladly transport you."
Morlach sat unstirring. Nobody dared move in all the court. Then something slumped in Varris. Mutely, he nodded. Armed brethren escorted him out to the space-field.
Wing Alak bade the king polite thanks for hospitality and followed them. Otherwise he spoke no word until his prisoner was safely fettered and his boat safely space-borne, with Drogs at the control panel and himself puffing on a good cigar.
Then: "Cheer up, old fellow," he urged. "It won't be so bad. You'll feel a lot better once our psychiatrists have rubbed out those kill-compulsions."
Varris gave him a bloodshot glare. "I suppose you think you're a great hero," he said.
"Lord deliver me, no!" Alak opened a cupboard and took forth the bottle of Scotch. "I'm quite willing to let you have that title. It was your big mistake, you realize. A hero should never tangle with an intelligent coward."
STILL LIFE BY ERIC FRANK RUSSELL
No matter how far away from our home world man goes to open up the Galaxy with his faster-than-light ships-of-the-future, it is Eric Russell's firmly-held belief that he will take with him one of the truly besetting sins 'of a Great Society. This is not the "sin" of corruption, as in the previous story, nor is it the sin of immorality, nor that of war, or any other "ordinary" sin in the books. No, it is the sin of—bureaucracy, of little minds piling up paper work as bastions behind which they can protect their own incompetence.
Bucking such a bureaucracy successfully is a task for a man of special genius: and that man you will find in this story.
Such a situation is meat, drink, and oxygen for Mr. Russell; and you will, I am sure, be as enraptured as I with his tale of "the smiling soothsayers." (See the last page of this story for the meaning of that reference.)
"What bums me up," said Purcell bitterly, "is the fact that one cannot get anything merely on grounds of dire necessity."
"Yeah," said Hancock, carrying on with his writing.
"If one gets it at all," continued Purcell, warming to his subject, "it is for a reason that has nothing whatever to do with need or urgency. One gets it because and only because one has carefully filled out the correct forms in the correct way, got them signed and countersigned by the proper fatheads and submitted them through the proper channels to the proper people on Terra."
"Yeah," said Hancock, the tip of his tongue moving in sympathy with his pen.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah," echoed Purcell in somewhat higher tones. "Can't you say anything but yeah?"
Hancock sighed, ceased writing, mopped his forehead with a sweaty handkerchief. "Look, let's do what we're paid for, shall we? Griping gets us nowhere."
"Well, what are we paid for?"
"Personally, I think that pilots grounded by injuries should be found employment elsewhere. They never settle down to routine work."
"That doesn't answer my question."
"We're here upon Alipan, in the newly settled system of B417," informed Hancock ponderously, "to co-ordinate the inflow of essential supplies, making the best use of cargo space available. We are also here to deal with internal demands for supplies and assign priorities to them."
"Priorities my foot," said Purcell. He snatched up a form and flourished it in midair. "What sort of priority should be given to twenty-four cases of gin?"
"If you bothered to look, you'd see," Hancock gave back. "Class B import. I stamped it myself and you initialed it."
"I must have been momentarily blind. Who says gin gets priority over high-pressure oxygen flasks, for instance?"
"Letheren." Hancock frowned, fiddled with his pen. "Mind you, I don't agree with it myself. I think it's an iniquity. But Letheren is a senior official. As a pilot you may have cocked many a snoot at senior officials and got away with it. But you're not a pilot now. You're just another desk-squatter. As such you'd better learn that it isn't wise to thwart senior officials. They get moved around and up as more senior ones die of fatty degeneration. In five, ten or fifteen years' time Letheren may be my boss. By then I'll be treading on his heels. I won't want him to turn around and kick me in the teeth."
"You really think that after all that time he'd hold it against you because you refused to bring in his gin?" asked Purcell incredulously.
"No, I don't. I'm bringing it in. He'll have no reason to gripe."
"What a system!" said Purcell. He glowered through the window at the B417 sun. Its greenish hue made him feel slightly sick. "I can see now what I suspected years ago; space is slowly but surely being conquered by a few crazy coots not because of Terra but in spite of Terra. It's being done by a small bunch of hotheads who like to zoom around in rocketships. They're getting results in the face of every handicap we can place upon them."
"Having been a pilot you're prejudiced in their favor," said Hancock defensively. "After all, somebody has to do the paperwork."
"I'd agree if the paperwork was necessary and made sense."
"If there wasn't any paperwork, we'd both be out of a job."
"You've got something there. So on this planet there are two thousand of us sitting on our fundaments busily making work for each other. In due time there'll be five thousand, then ten thousand."
"I'm looking forward to it," commented Hancock, brightening. "It'll mean promotion. And the more subordinates we have the higher our own status."
"That may be so. I won't take it with an easy conscience but I'll take it just the same. Frail human flesh, that's me." Purcell scowled at his desk, went on, "Guess I'm not yet old enough and cynical enough to accept the general waste of time and effort. There are moments when I could go off with a very large bang. This is one of them."
Hancock, who had picked up his pen, put it down again and asked resignedly, "Exactly what irks your reformist spirit right now?"
"There's a fellow here, a bugologist—"
"An entomologist," Hancock corrected.
"You will kindly allow me to choose my own words," Purcell suggested. "This bugologist wants a cobalt-60 irradiation outfit. It weighs three-eighty pounds."
"What for?"
"To clear the Great Forest area of a disease-carrying fly."
"How's he going to do that?"
"According to section D7 of his application form under the heading of REASONS, he says that treated male flies will effectively sterilize all female flies with whom they mate. Also that if he traps, irradiates and frees enough males he can wipe out the species. Also that several centuries ago Terra got rid of screw-worm, tsetse and other flies by precisely the same method. He claims that he can make the whole of the Great Forest area inhabitable, expl
oitable and save an unknown number of lives. Therefore he asks for top priority."
"That seems reasonable," Hancock conceded.
"You would give his dingus top priority, eh?"
"Certainly. A Class A import."
"That is real nice to know," said Purcell. "I am heartened to find sweet reasonableness sitting behind a desk and wearing oilskin pants." He slung the form across to the other. "Some bead-brained four-eyes has stamped it Class L. So this bugologist won't get his fly-killer for at least another seven years."
"It wasn't me," protested Hancock, staring at it. "I remember this one now. I got it about four months ago and passed it to Rohm for his approval."
"Why?"
"Because he's in charge of forestry."
"Holy cow!" said Purcell. "What have flies got to do with forestry?"
"The Great Forest area is the responsibility of Rohm's department. Anything pertaining to it must be passed to him."
"And he's stamped it Class L. He must be off his head."
"We cannot assume inefficiency in another department," Hancock pointed out. "There may be a thousand and one things Rohm needs more urgently. Medical supplies for instance."
"Yes, to cure people of the staggers after being bitten by flies," Purcell riposted. "If space-scouts operated the way we work, they'd still be preparing photostats of their birth and marriage certificates in readiness for an attempt on the Moon." He took the form back, eyed it with distaste. "Letheren's gin aggravates me. I have always hated the stuff. It tastes the same way a dead dog smells. If he can wangle a dollop of booze, why can't we wangle a cobalt-60 irradiator?"
"You can't buck the system," declared Hancock. "Not until you're one of the top brass."
"I'm bucking it as from now," Purcell announced. He reached for a fresh form, started filling it in. "I'm making a top priority demand for a fly-killer for Nemo."
"Nemo?" Hancock looked stupified. "What's that?"
Purcell waved a careless hand toward the window. "The newly discovered planet out there."
Shoving back his chair, Hancock waddled to the window and gazed through it a long time. He couldn't see anything. After a while he came back, puffed, mopped his forehead again, reached for the intercom phone.
Another Part of the Galaxy Page 20