I clenched my fists; only the thought of Esther held me where I was.
“Ascribe the heretics,” said Lembken to the deputy priest, and puffed out behind the guard.
Sanson stepped backward and touched the funnel mechanism, which instantly began to scream.
“Heresy in the paper shops!” it howled. “Examine District 5. They say there is a God. Weed out the morons there!”
The writing mechanism began to clack again. I saw the paper riband coil like a snake along the floor between the thrones. Sanson stopped the machine, which was beginning to screech once more. He moved to the vacant throne and sat down.
Again the bell tinkled, and there came in a man of about thirty years, in blue, leading a little boy by the hand. He looked about him in bewilderment, and then, seeing the priest, flung himself on his knees and pressed his lips to the hem of his robe.
“It is not true that I am a heretic, as they say,” he babbled. “I believe in Science Supreme, and Force and Matter, coexistent and consubstantial, according to the Vienna Creed, and in the Boss, the Keeper of Knowledge. That man dies as the beast dies. And that we are immortal in the germ-plasm, through our descendants. I believe in Darwin, Hæckel, and Wells, who brought us to enlightenment—”
“That boy is a moron!” screamed Sanson, interrupting the man’s parrot-rote by leaping from his chair.
He dragged the child from the father, switched on the solar light, and set him down, peering into his face. He took the child’s head between his hands and scanned it. His expression was transformed; he looked like a madman. And then I realized that the man was really mad; a madman ruled the world, as in the time of Caligula.
The father crept humbly toward Sanson; he was shaking pitiably.