Carson mopped his brow. "I didn't suspect that it had gone that far."
"It has gone that far," Hamelin said icily, "and it is accelerating. Your own project has helped to accelerate it. Col. Mudgett here mentioned the opening of isolated cities to the pestilences. Shall I tell you how Louisville fell?"
"A spy again, I suppose," Mudgett said.
"No, Colonel. Not a spy. A band of—of vigilantes, of mutineers. I'm familiar with your slogan, 'The Earth to those who fight for it.' Do you know the counter-slogan that's circulating among the people?"
They waited. Hamelin smiled and said: "'Let's die on the surface.'
"They overwhelmed the military detachment there, put the city administration to death, and blew open the shaft to the surface. About a thousand people actually made it to the top. Within twenty-four hours the city was dead—as the ringleaders had been warned would be the outcome. The warning didn't deter them. Nor did it protect the prudent citizens who had no part in the affair."
Hamelin leaned forward suddenly. "People won't wait to be told when it's their turn to be re-educated. They'll be tired of waiting, tired to the point of insanity of living at the bottom of a hole. They'll just go.
"And that, gentlemen, will leave the world to the enemy ... or, more likely, the rats. They alone are immune to everything by now."
There was a long silence. At last Carson said mildly: "Why aren't we immune to everything by now?"
"Eh? Why—the new generations. They've never been exposed."