A Maze of Death (12 page)

Tony said raptly, “There is a deity above the Deity. One who embraces all four.”

“What four? Four what?”

“The four Manifestations. The Mentufacturer, the—”

“Who’s the fourth?”

“The Form Destroyer.”

“You mean you can commune with a god that combines the Form Destroyer with the other three? But that’s not possible, Tony; they are good gods and the Form Destroyer is evil.”

“I know that,” he said in a sullen voice. “That’s why what I see is so keen. A god-above-god, which no one can see but me.” Again, by degrees, he drifted back into his trance; he ceased speaking to her.

“How come you can see something that no one else can, and still call it real?” Susie asked. “Specktowsky didn’t say anything about such a super Deity. I think it’s all in your own mind.” She felt cross and cold, and the cigarette burned her nose; she had, as usual, been smoking too much. “Let’s go to bed, Tony,” she said vigorously, and stubbed out her cigarette. “Come on.” Bending, she took hold of him by the arm. But he remained inert. Like a rock.

Time passed. He communed on and on.

“Jesus!” she said angrily. “Well the hell with it; I’ll leave. Goodnight.” Rising, she walked rapidly to the door, opened it, stood half inside and half out. “We could have so much fun if we went to bed,” she said plaintively. “Is there something about me you don’t like? I mean, I could change it. And I’ve been reading; there’re several positions I didn’t know. Let me teach them to you; they sound like a lot of fun.”

Tony Dunkelwelt opened his eyes and, unwinkingly, regarded
her. She could not decipher the expression on his face, and it made her uneasy; she began rubbing her bare arms and shivering.

“The Form Destroyer,” Tony said, “is absolutely-not-God.”

“I realize that,” she said.

“But ‘absolutely-not-God’ is a category of being.”

“If you say so, Tony.”

“And God contains all categories of being. Therefore God can be absolutely-not-God, which transcends human reason and logic. But we intuitively feel it to be so. Don’t you? Wouldn’t you prefer a monism that transcends our pitiful dualism? Specktowsky was a great man, but there is a higher monistic structure above the dualism that he foresaw.
There is a higher God.”
He eyed her. “What do you think about that?” he asked, a little timidly.

“I think it’s wonderful,” Susie said, with enthusiasm. “It must be so great to have trances and perceive what you perceive. You should write a book saying that what Specktowsky says is wrong.”

“It’s not wrong,” Tony said. “It’s transcended by what I see. When you get to that level, two opposite things can be equal. That’s what I’m trying to reveal.”

“Couldn’t you reveal it tomorrow?” she asked, still shivering and massaging her bare arms. “I’m so cold and so tired and I had an awful run-in with that goddam Mary Morley tonight already, so come on, please; let’s go to bed.”

“I’m a prophet,” Tony said. “Like Christ or Moses or Specktowsky. I will never be forgotten.” Again he shut his eyes. The weak candle flickered and almost went out. He did not notice.

“If you’re a prophet,” Susie said, “perform a miracle.” She had read in Specktowsky’s Book about that, about the prophets having miraculous powers. “Prove it to me,” she said.

One eye opened. “Why must you have a sign?”

“I don’t want a sign. I want a miracle.”

“A miracle,” he said, “is a sign. All right, I’ll do something that will show you.” He gazed around the room, his face holding a deeply-ingrained resentment. She had awakened him now, she realized. And he didn’t like it.

“Your face is turning black,” she said.

He touched his brow experimentally. “It’s turning red. But the candle light doesn’t contain a full light spectrum so it looks black.” He slid to his feet and walked stiffly about, rubbing the base of his neck.

“How long were you sitting there?” she asked.

“I don’t know.”

“That’s right; you lose all conception of time.” She had heard him say it. That part alone awed her. “Okay,” she said, “turn this into a stone.” She had found a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, and a knife; holding up the loaf of bread she moved toward him, feeling mischievous. “Can you do that?”

Solemnly, he said, “The opposite of Christ’s miracle.”

“Can you do it?”

He accepted the loaf of bread from her, held it with both hands; he gazed down at it, his lips moving. His entire face began to writhe, as if with tremendous effort. The darkness grew; his eyes faded out and were replaced by impenetrable buttons of darkness.

The loaf of bread flipped from his hands, rose until it hung well above him … it twisted, became hazy, and then, like a stone, it dropped to the floor.
Like
a stone? She knelt down to stare at it, wondering if the light of the room had put her into a hypnotic trance. The loaf of bread was gone. What rested on the floor appeared to be a smooth, large rock, a water-tumbled rock, with pale sides. “My good God,” she said, half-aloud. “Can I pick it up? Is it safe?”

Tony, his eyes once more filled with life, also knelt and stared at it. “God’s power,” he said, “was in me. I didn’t do that; it was done
through
me.”

Picking up the rock—it was heavy—she discovered that it felt warm and nearly alive. An animate rock, she said to
herself. As if it’s organic. Maybe it’s not a real rock. She banged it against the floor; it felt hard enough, and it made the right noise. It is a rock, she realized. It is!

“Can I have it?” she asked. Her awe had become complete now; she gazed at him hopefully, willing to do exactly what he said.

“You may have it, Suzanne,” Tony said in a calm voice. “But arise and go back to your room. I’m tired.” He did sound tired, and his entire body drooped. “I’ll see you in the morning at breakfast. Good night.”

“Goodnight,” she said, “but I can undress you and put you to bed; I’d enjoy that.”

“No,” he said. He went to the door and held it open for her.

“Kiss.” Coming up to him she leaned forward and kissed him on the lips. “Thank you,” she said, feeling humble.

“Goodnight, Tony. And thanks for the miracle.” The door started to close behind her but, adroitly, she stopped it with the wedge-shaped toe of her shoe. “Can I tell everyone about this? I mean, isn’t this the first miracle you’ve ever done? Shouldn’t they know? But if you don’t want them to know I won’t tell them.”

“Let me sleep,” he said, and shut the door; it clicked in her face and she felt animal terror—this was what she feared most in life: the clicking shut of a man’s door in her face. Instantly, she raised her hand to knock, discovered the rock … she banged on the door with the rock, but not loudly, just enough to let him know how desperate she was to get back in, but not enough to bother him if he didn’t want to answer.

He didn’t. No sound, no movement of the door. Nothing but the void.

“Tony?” she gasped, pressing her ear to the door. Silence.

“Okay,” she said numbly; clutching her rock she walked unsteadily across the porch toward her own living quarters.

The rock vanished. Her hand felt nothing.

“Damn,” she said, not knowing how to react. Where had
it gone? Into air. But then it must have been an illusion, she realized. He put me in a hypnotic state and made me believe. I should have known it wasn’t really true.

A million stars burst into wheels of light, blistering, cold light, that drenched her. It came from behind and she felt the great weight of it crash into her. “Tony,” she said, and fell into the waiting void. She thought nothing; she felt nothing. She saw only, saw the void as it absorbed her, waiting below and beneath her as she plummeted down the many miles.

On her hands and knees she died. Alone on the porch. Still clutching for what did not exist.

Glen Belsnor lay dreaming. In the dark of night he dreamed of himself; he perceived himself as he really was, a wise and beneficial provider. Happily he thought, I can do it. I can take care of them all, help them and protect them. They must be protected at all costs, he thought to himself in his dream.

In his dream he attached connecting cable, screwed a circuit-breaker in place, tried out a servo-assist unit.

A hum rose from the elaborate mechanism. A generated field, miles high, rose in every direction. No one can get past that, he said to himself in satisfaction, and some of his fear began to dwindle away. The colony is safe and I have done it.

In the colony the people moved back and forth, wearing long red robes. It became midday and then it became midday for a thousand years. He saw, all at once, that they had become old. Tottering, with tattered beards—the women, too—they crept about in a feeble, insect-like manner. And some of them, he saw, were blind.

Then we’re not safe, he realized. Even with the field in operation. They are fading away from inside. They will all die anyhow.

“Belsnor!”

He opened his eyes and knew what it was.

Gray, early-morning sunlight filtered through the shades of his room. Seven
A.M
., he saw by his self-winding wristwatch. He rose up to a sitting position, pushing the covers away. Chill morning air plucked at him and he shivered. “Who?” he said to the men and women pouring into his room. He shut his eyes, grimaced, felt, despite the emergency, the rancid remains of sleep still clinging to him.

Ignatz Thugg, wearing gaily-decorated pajamas, said loudly. “Susie Smart.”

Putting on his bathrobe, Belsnor moved numbly toward the door.

“Do you know what this means?” Wade Frazer said.

“Yes,” he said. “I know exactly what it means.”

Roberta Rockingham, touching the corner of a small linen handkerchief to her eyes, said, “She was such a bright spirit, always lighting up things with her presence. How could anybody do it to her?” A trail of tears materialized on her withered cheeks.

He made his way across the compound; the others clumped after him, none of them speaking.

There she lay, on the porch. A few steps from her door. He bent over her, touched the back of her neck. Absolutely cold. No life of any kind. “You examined her?” he said to Battle. “She really is dead? There’s no doubt about it?”

“Look at your hand,” Wade Frazer said.

Belsnor removed his hand from the girl’s neck. His hand dripped blood. And now he saw the mass of blood in her hair, near the top of her skull. Her head had been crushed in.

“Care to revise your autopsy?” he said scathingly to Babble. “Your opinion about Tallchief; do you care to change it now?”

No one spoke.

Belsnor looked around, saw not far off a loaf of bread. “She must have been carrying that,” he said.

“She got it from me,” Tony Dunkelwelt said. His face had paled from shock; his words were barely audible. “She left my room last night and I went to bed. I didn’t kill her. I didn’t even know about it until I heard Dr. Babble and the others yelling.”

“We’re not saying you did it,” Belsnor said to him. Yes, she used to flit from one room to another at night, he thought. We made fun of her and she was a little deranged … but she never hurt anybody. She was as innocent as a human being could get; she was even innocent of her own wrongdoing.

The new man, Russell, approached. The expression on his face showed that he, too, without even knowing her, understood what an awful thing it was, what an awful moment it was for all of them.

“You see what you came here to see?” Belsnor said to him harshly.

Russell said, “I wonder if you could get help by means of the transmitter in my noser.”

“They’re not good enough,” Belsnor said. “The noser radio-rig. Not good enough at all.” He rose to his feet stiffly, hearing his bones crack. And it’s Terra that’s doing this, he thought, remembering what Seth Morley and Babble had said last night when they brought Russell over. Our own government. As if we’re rats in a maze with death; rodents confined with the ultimate adversary, to die one by one until none are left.

Seth Morley beckoned him off to one side, away from the others. “You’re sure you don’t want to tell them? They have a right to know who the enemy is.”

Belsnor said, “I don’t want them to know because as I explained to you their morale is low enough already. If they knew it came from Terra they wouldn’t be able to survive; they’d go friggin’ mad.”

“I’ll leave it up to you,” Seth Morley said. “You’ve been elected as the group’s leader.” But his tone of voice showed that he disagreed, and very strongly. As he had last night.

“In time,” Belsnor said, clamping his long, expert fingers around Seth’s upper arm. “When the right time comes—”

“It never will,” Seth Morley said, moving back a step. “They’ll die without knowing.”

Maybe, Belsnor thought, it would be better that way. Better if all men, wherever they are, were to die without knowing who did it or why.

Squatting down, Russell turned Susie Smart over; he gazed down at her and said, “She certainly was a pretty girl.”

“Pretty,” Belsnor said harshly, “but batty. She had an overactive sex drive: she had to sleep with every man she came across. We can do without her.”

“You bastard,” Seth Morley said, his tone fierce.

Belsnor lifted his empty hands and said, “What do you want me to say? That we can’t get along without her? That this is the end?”

Morley did not answer.

To Maggie Walsh, Belsnor said, “Say a prayer.” It was time for the ceremony of death, the rituals so firmly attached to it that even he himself could not imagine a death without it.

“Give me a few minutes,” Maggie Walsh said huskily. “I—just can’t talk now.” She retreated and turned her back; he heard her sobbing.

“I’ll say it,” Belsnor said, with savage fury.

Seth Morley said, “I’d like permission to go on an exploratory trip outside the settlement. Russell wants to come along.”

“Why?” Belsnor said.

Morley said in a low, steady voice, “I’ve seen the miniaturized version of the Building. I think it’s time to confront the real thing.”

“Take someone with you,” Belsnor said. “Someone who knows their way around out there.”

“I’ll go with them,” Betty Jo Berm spoke up.