CHAPTER IV
It was some time before I remembered to kiss my bride. When I did remember, the twentieth century landscape spread out around me and I had the distinct impression that the world had stirred beneath my feet, had hesitated, for a fraction of a second, on its gargantuan journey around the sun.
The voice of the Marriage Administrator was deafening, his face purple. "There will be no osculating in the chapels! The chapels will be cleared immediately for the next applicants. There will be no—"
Neither of us had known that the screen was a transmitter as well as a receiver, and we moved apart guiltily. A shower of plastic rice poured down on us as we stepped through the doorway. We ran laughing down the corridor, picked up our marriage contract at the vestibule window, and stepped out into the Cathedral court.
The afternoon sun was bright in the coppery sky but the shadow of the pulpit platform lay cool and dark across the eastern flagstones. We walked across the congregation area to the vaulted entrance that led to the street. I hailed a double rickshaw and we rode to the YWCA and picked up Julia's things. Then we headed for the hives.
I'd called in the converters, of course. They'd done their work rapidly and well. I noticed the changes the moment I opened the door.
There were two chairs in the parlorette now, both smaller than the old one had been, but charming in their identical design. A table had replaced the table-ette in the kitchenette and an extra stool now stood by the enlarged cupboard. Through the bedroomette doorway I could see one of the corners of the new double bed.
I stepped into the parlorette, waited for Julia to follow me. When she did not, I returned to the passageway. She was standing there quietly, her eyes downcast, her hands folded at the waist of her new blue dress. It struck me abruptly that she was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen and simultaneously it dawned on me why she hadn't followed me in.
The custom was so old—so absurd. It was almost a part of folklore, a tattered remnant of the early years of the twentieth century when newlyweds had tried to insure by fetish the conjugal permanence that was now enforced by law.
And yet, in a way, it was beautiful.
I stood for a moment, memorizing Julia's pale fresh loveliness. Then I lifted her into my arms and carried her across the threshold.
Guarding interred Cadillacs was far from being an ideal way to spend my wedding night, but after the way things had been going I hadn't dared to ask the Sexton for an extra night off. I donned my sentry suit in the darkness, moving quietly so as not to awaken Julia, then I descended to the street and hailed a rickshaw. It was past 2300 and I had to ride all the way to the cemetery in order to get there on time.
After posting the other sentries, I relieved the 1600-2400 senior sentry in the ganglion tower. He had nothing of interest to report and I sent him on his way. Standing beneath the big rotating searchlight, watching him descend the ladder, I envied him his night's freedom.
The searchlight threw a moving swath of radiance over artificial hill and dale, shone like an ephemeral sun on arborvitae patterns, blazed on the green curtains of lombardy stands. I cursed those noncommittal curtains for the thousandth time, deplored my inability to do anything about them.
The size of the cemetery precluded any practical patrol of the grounds. All I could do was hope that I, or one of the other sentries in the strategically located towers, would spot any unusual movement, hear any unusual sound.
I touched the cold barrel of the tower blaster. My fingers were eager for the feel of the trigger, my eyes hungry for the spiderweb of the sight. I had never brought down a ghoul 'copter—for the simple reason that I had never had a good shot at one. But I was looking forward to the experience.
It was a cool night for June. The wind had shifted to the northeast, washing the haze of the western dust storms from the atmosphere, and the stars stood out, bold and clear. Mars was no longer an inflamed red eye but a glowing pinpoint of pure orange. Deucalionis Regio, however, was as much of an enigma as ever.
An hour passed. The sentries phoned in their reports and I recorded them on the blotter.
0100—all quiet on the Cadillac Front.
My thoughts shifted to Julia, and the magic of the night deepened around me. I pictured her sleeping, her hair dark against the pillow, the delicate crescents of her lashes accentuating the whiteness of her cheeks; her supple body curved in relaxed grace beneath the sheets. I listened to the soft sound of her breathing—
Soft? No, not soft. My Julia breathed loudly. Moreover, she breathed with a regularity hard to associate with a human being—a regularity reminiscent of a machine. Specifically, a malfunctioning machine, and more specifically yet, the turning of a borer shaft in a well-oiled, but worn, sleeve.
Alert now, I tried to locate the sound. At first it seemed to be all around me, a part of the night air itself, but I finally narrowed it down to the northeast section of the cemetery. Tower 11's territory.
I called 11. Kester's lean young face came into focus on the telescreen. "You should be hearing a borer," I said. "Unless you're deaf. Do you hear one?"
Kester's face seemed strained. "Yes. I—I think so."
"Then why didn't you report it? I can hear the damn thing way over here!"
"I—I was going to," Kester said. "I wanted to make sure."
"Make sure! How sure do you have to be? Now listen. You stay by your blaster and keep your eyes and your ears open. I'm coming over to see if I can locate the 'copter. If I do locate it I'll throw a flare under it, and if they try to rise, you burn them. If they don't try to rise and we can take them alive, so much the better. I'd like to see a real live ghoul. But otherwise, you burn them! If we lose another car-corpse, we'll all be out on our ears."
"All right," Kester said. The screen went blank.
Descending the tower ladder, I wondered what kind of a guard detail I had. Last night, Betz's negligence had cost me a Cadillac. Tonight, Kester's negligence had very nearly cost me another—and might yet, if I wasn't careful.
I couldn't understand it. They were both newly-married men (Kester had applied for a wife the same day Betz had) and, since women were forbidden to work after marrying, both of them certainly needed the better wages Cadillac paid. Why should they deliberately jeopardize their status?
Maybe Betz really hadn't seen or heard anything until it was too late. Maybe Kester really hadn't been sure that the sound he was hearing was the turning of a borer.
But I was sure, and the closer I got to Tower 11, the surer I became. I timed my approach with the swath of the searchlight, made certain there was plenty of concealment available whenever it passed my way. That wasn't hard to do, with all the lombardies, the arborvitae, the hills, dales and gardens that infested the place. But for once the ancient automakers' passion for landscaping was benefitting me instead of the ghouls.
Tower 11 was a tripodal skeleton stabbing into the cadaverous face of the rising moon. It loomed higher and higher above me as I neared the source of the sound. I swore silently at Kester. He was either stone deaf and blind as a bat, or a deliberate traitor to the Cadillac cause. The exhuming was taking place practically under his nose.
I crept beneath the hem of a lombardy curtain and lay in the deep shadows. I could see the cargo 'copter clearly now. It squatted over a grave mound less than twenty feet from my hiding place, its rotating borer protruding from its open belly like an enormous stinger. The grave mound was already perforated with a score of holes, spaced so that when the car-casket was drawn upward, the hard-packed earth would crumble and fall apart.
The borer was now probing for the eye of the casket. Even as I watched I heard the grind of steel against gun metal, saw the borer reverse its spiral and rise swiftly into the hold of the 'copter. A bright light stabbed down into the new hole, was quickly extinguished. I thought I heard the sound of a breath being expelled in relief, but I wasn't sure. Shortly thereafter, I heard the almost inaudible hum of a winch motor, saw the hook dangling on the end of the steel cable just before it disappeared into the hole.
I pulled a flare from my belt, broke the seal. My aim was excellent. The flare landed in the center of the grave mound, went off the minute it hit the ground. The light was blinding. The whole northeast section of the cemetery became as bright as noonday, the interior of the 'copter leaped into dazzling detail. I could see the dungaree-clad ghouls standing on the edge of the open hatch. I could see the winch operator's face——
It was a striking face. It was a twentieth century landscape. The smear of grease on one of the pink cheeks had no effect whatsoever on the white cloud. The blue eyes, blinded by the unexpected light, flowed their blue and beautiful way along the green lip of the nonpareil meadow. The forested hills were more exquisite than ever—
But the solitary bird was gone, and the sky was empty.
And then, suddenly, I could not see anything at all. The ground erupted as the casket broke free, and a shower of dirt and broken clods engulfed me. I staggered to my feet, shielding my eyes with my arms, gasping for breath. By the time I regained my vision the 'copter was high above the lombardies, the exhumed car-casket swinging wildly beneath the still-opened hatch.
Don't shoot! my mind screamed to Kester. Don't shoot! But the words were locked in my throat and I could not utter them. I could only stand there helplessly, waiting for the disintegrating beam to lance out from the tower, waiting for the 'copter and the ghouls—and my conniving Julia—to become bright embers in the night sky.
But I needn't have worried. Kester missed by a mile.
I turned him in. What else could I do? I'd spent nine years languishing in lonely towers through long and lonely nights, faithfully guarding the buried art of the automakers. I couldn't throw those years away out of foolish loyalty to a man as obviously indifferent to the cause as Kester was.
But I didn't feel very proud of myself, standing there in the Cadillac Sexton's office the next morning, with Kester, his face cold and expressionless, standing beside me. I didn't feel proud at all. And the Sexton's praise of my last night's action only turned my stomach.
I was cheating and I knew it. I should have turned in Julia too. But I couldn't do that. Before I took any action, I had to see her, question her myself. There had to be a reasonable explanation for her complicity. There had to be!
After the Sexton dismissed me I waited outside for Kester. He didn't seem like a chastened man when he stepped into the morning sunlight. If anything, he seemed relieved—if not actually happy.
He would have walked right by me without a word, but I touched his shoulder and he paused. "I'm sorry," I said. "I didn't want to turn you in but I had no choice. But the Sexton let you go?"
He nodded.
"I'm sorry," I said again.
He looked at me for a long moment. Then he said: "Bartlett, you're a fool," and turned and walked away.