Masters of the Maze (9 page)

All, in one mind-searing second, this raced through the brain of the great ‘Gorretta-Sire. Huge, immense, immediate, was his need for anger-outlet. With a roar that shook the charts upon the walls of his chamber, he leaped from his dais and tore the Ma in half; then, bellowing his rage and fear and grief, he hurled his vast body out into the corridors and, trampling and tearing all who failed to flee in time, he made his furious and frantic way to the pen where a sufficient number of the unfit and the superfluous were kept for just such moments.

At length, sated, recovered, he sent messages revealing the matter to all his fellow Sires. The conference which followed was long and troubled. It was entirely possible that the wretched Na 14 had failed to get through to his destination, in which case no danger need be feared that he and any swarm he might raise would ever retrace the incredible difficulties of the journey and mount an invasion of the Chulpex world. They might hope this to be the case — but if it were the case, they would be no better off. Happen what had, happen what might, again there had been a loss of time and time was as precious as life; indeed, it might be said that time
was
life.

Arristemurriste broke the silence. “It might be well that this has happened,” he said. “It has shocked us from our accustomed thought patterns. A new thing has occurred, a new possibility has arisen, a new threat. Now, before we become accustomed to it and sink again into our old dull ways while the world continues to grow cold about us, let us consider a new plan.

“Everything must be changed, every emphasis placed upon breaking through. The number of mission groups, of trained agents, must be — not only doubled, tripled — but squared, cubed, increased again and again. Let the classrooms never be empty by day or by night. Pour forth our scouts until our swarm-houses sound to the echo of their emptiness. We can no longer wait.

“We cannot wait!”

• • •

“Let us consider the possibility,” said King Wen, “that the Maze was not created in the past, but will be created in the future. As it occupies — and the verb, to occupy, is here used as a mere convenience — as it ‘occupies’ all time or is occupied by all time, this is possible.”

Benjamin Bathurst shook his head. “This is not possible,” he said, agreeably.

Enoch ben Jared said, “He is called
The Place,
for He is the place of the universe; but the universe is not His place. Surely it is but a commonplace, thus, to point out that He who is everywhere is also of necessity everywhen? — though is He bound to any necessity? only if He chooses to be — therefore He even now presides over the Last Judgment and even yet His spirit hovers over the face of the deep at First Beginning.”

“It cannot be created henceforth,” said Appolonius of Tyana, “for we are too near the end of time, near entropy. Unless we are correct in that time is infinitely divisible and therefore we ourselves will be and in fact already have been.”

Caressing the muzzle of his bull, the Old Chap murmured that the secret of the Maze lay in its having no secret, the universe being in fact non-serial.

The Masters smiled at one another, and prepared to meditate calmly for an aeon or two.

• • •

But when the Chulpex Sires sent for the ward, living and pulsing fragment of the living and pulsing Maze, they learned that it, too, was gone. They had wondered how the Na 14 had dared. Now they knew. He had thought himself quite safe from pursuit, thus; he must have considered that he had climbed a height and pulled the ladder after him, or crossed a chasm and withdrawn the bridge. He surely believed he had left his Sires and fellows blind and stumbling, unable to know where he had gone, unable to follow.

“The blow is grievous,” said Arristemurriste, in a muted voice.

But the ‘Gorretta-Sire, calmed and refreshed by his anger-outlet, lifted an arm and pointed. “He has not taken the charts,” ‘Gorretta said. “He may have already passed onto ways which are not charted …

“Yet, again, he may not.”

The conclusion, the decision, was obvious: The Na 14 had to be pursued, and with all power and with all haste.

As the vote concluded it was now Arrettagorretta who repeated the warning and the words. “We cannot wait.
We cannot wait
.
“

Joseph Bellamy had said good night to his guest and now intended to take his ten o’clock medications and retire for the night himself. It was perhaps too early to tell what, if anything, he might expect from the young man … but the impressions seemed not unfavorable. Gordon appeared a serious and sober type, though inclined to be a bit vague on the precise nature of his writings. Not that Bellamy had been altogether precise, either. But that was not to be expected. One did not blurt out such a matter. One did not say — one
could
not say — I belong to a secret society, membership in which is limited to freemasons but which does not have any other connection with official or so-called “clandestine” freemasonry. One could not, at a first meeting and over cocktails or dinner or cigars and brandy, reveal that this secret society held in its hands the fate of humankind, which it guarded at great and terrible cost from greater and more terrible disaster. Not yet … Not yet …

Bellamy knew this as he knew his own name; yet his illness and his weariness and the knowledge that every year the average age of the Esquires of the Sword rose and that every year there were fewer of them — thus the burden increased while the bearers dwindled — made him repeat, unwittingly, the words of the Chulpex Sires:
“We cannot wait. We cannot wait.”

He took his medications and shuffled about the great, chill room gathering things together. He had glanced automatically at the ward-stone on entering; fortunately, all appeared well, no manifestations along the glowing lines of light required his attention. He hoped it would remain so at least until midnight, when his own watch ended, and that of Ralph Wiedemyer began. He hoped, too, that Ralph’s own health at least grew no worse. It should not, if loneliness was “a contributing factor” (cant phrase!), for Ralph lived and always had in a house full of family … family which knew only that “Uncle is a little bit … you know? — but perfectly harmless and really very nice: only he has to be left
alone
at nights; that’s all …”

He looked out of the window, seeing that which he knew lay in the direction he looked, though he could not see it even in the daytime, not that it was all that far away in space. Geography rather than distance blocked what was a theoretically possible — should someone only clear away a range of low mountains and straighten out a river valley — view of the Flint lands. They, too, kept (at least Bellamy supposed they still kept) a Vigil, though a short-sighted and thoroughly selfish Vigil it was; had been since the days when General Flint, appropriately enough a friend of Colonel Burr, had broken with the Elected Esquires and founded his own degrees and order.

Once a year Bellamy received an investigator’s report on the current Flint, a major in the militia or whatever they called it nowadays, or had been; but he had no great faith in it. What the man did in New York was hardly comparable in importance to what he did or hoped to do back there in the pitted hills behind Flint’s Forge — although the report contained general references on this subject, too; Bellamy supposed the investigation firm had some yokel on their gratuities list — ah, well.

What had that last creature mumbled and whined at him?
Much old, much cold.
Yes, yes. And not just them, alone.
Much gold
: that was of course a lie, still, how often must that lie and others like it have been believed, legends of faërie gold which turned to ashes with the setting sun. And not that legend alone, no, the Chulpex were hardly pleasant or innocuous creatures, disliked from mere bigoted ignorance of their mores or folkways: faërie gold, what else? ghouls, ghosts, vampires. But — and this was a perpetual
but
— the Chulpexes were not the only, though they seemed the greatest, menace posed by the ever-guarded Maze. No —

Something flickered, something fled, moved like a fluid along a line on the “stone” surface of the ward, which changed color slightly but perceptibly.
So near!
And then he realized, with astonished horror, that the movement indicated was not on one of the usual lines. Automatically, he started for the “sword,” the thin, thin thing with the short crossbar — But of what use was that,
there
? It was then he felt again the warning in his chest, the sick and painful swelling of his heart. He had been cautioned. He dared not move. He dared not
not
move. If he should fail his trust, what might happen? And if he were to die — in
there
? Helplessly, his mind darted about. His eyes, too. The feeling of joy was like cool water on hot skin. Slowly, ever so slowly, he made his way, hands spread out like a blind man’s, over to the table.

There, in the little plastic vial, were the tablets.

There, in the wall behind, was the signal.

He did not know which to do first. Perhaps he might manage to do both together.

Perhaps …

• • •

The sound, so faint and strange, at first made Nate Gordon think of sleigh bells. He paused, his pants half off, drew them on again, lit the lamp, went to the window, rubbed away the mist or frost, and peered out, holding his hand against the reflected light. But no cheery, picturesque Christmas-card scene of Pickwick types in a one-horse open cutter met his eyes. Nothing met his eyes except the frozen ground and, up and ahead, a light gleaming in the black hulk of Darkglen House. The sound ceased, began again, ended abruptly.

Nate pulled on the huge old bathrobe which had been provided him and went to the door. The wind blew chill in his face, but no one was there; as he looked about, shivering, he saw that there was no doorbell — just a knocker. He closed the door and considered. If the noise had not come from outside, then, it must have come from inside (unless someone was overhead in a balloon, ringing a hand bell). It had
seemed
like a bell. His glance went up — Sure enough. There, high up, was an old-fashioned electric bell-clapper. Even as he looked at it, a long loop of dusty matter detached itself and dropped silently to the floor. This, evidently, had muffled the sound and made it seem so curious and distant.

There was only one place the bell could have been rung, and that was in the main house; and it could mean only that he was for some reason wanted there. Nate dressed again, muffled and bundled himself up, took a quick shot from the bonded bottle, and trudged into the night.

It took several minutes of, first knocking, then pounding, then calling, at the side door he’d left by to convince him that no one was going to come and let him in. He deliberated a moment. The cold was numbing, and he wanted to return to his cottage. But then the bell might ring again, and — Besides, it was possible that something was wrong. The old man might have fallen and broken a bone or something. Nate shrugged and shivered and started trudging around the outside of the house, looking for another way in. Salt crystals crunched underfoot. Better that than snow to flounder in. The windows of the house were too high up for him to reach, and the basement windows were all shut tight. The house had many doors, as was to be expected.

What was not to be expected was that one of them, low down and opening upon a set of sunken steps, should be wide open; or that upon the lowest step should be an incongruous wad of steel wool.

Nate had lived long enough in Manhattan to recognize this, jimmy-marks and the other signs of burglary. It was, he realized, extremely unlikely, however, that here in the wilderness, miles and miles from bloody woof-woof, a Manhattan-type burglar had jimmied open the door of Darkglen House in hopes of snatching up a radio or a typewriter or a record player to convert into quick fix-money.

And a country-house break-in implied a much bigger job … and it implied, too, more than one man.

Swiftly, he considered. Loop around and look for the car they must have come in and drive it away for help? No: the car might be parked a mile away and have someone waiting in it. Get upstairs as quickly as he could? For one thing, he had no light, he could spend forever groping in the basement looking for the stairs. Perhaps the best thing was to get back to the guest cottage and have the operator get the nearest police (state, probably) on the phone, and then ask
them
what to do while he was waiting.

Half irresolute, he turned to go, turned back, the door blew open a little bit more than it had been; and on the ground, just before it swung back to where it had been, he saw a pale little patch just about the size of a book of matches. He stooped, groped, found it. That was what it was.

Common sense told him never to mind the matches but go on and carry out his program of calling for help. Slowly, Nate shut the door behind him and, not so much ignoring common sense as allowing it to wait a bit, he stood with his back against the door and struck a match. As far as he could see, advancing cautiously in the accompanying circle of scant, pale light, the floor was clean and bare of obstacles. The flame came close to his fingers. He blew it out, and listened and lit another. It seemed to him that he could hear faint noises above. He lit another match, and went on ahead.

Someone — Ozzie Heid, probably — had thoughtfully left a flashlight looped with a piece of cord hanging from a nail at the foot of the stairs. It was old and battered and bound with black tape, and its beam was feeble. But it served. Nate passed through the large kitchen still faintly warm and faintly smelling of the last meal cooked, passed through several large pantries and anterooms. Massy old pieces of furniture filled with china and cutlery and linen and glass enough to serve, probably, the entire population of Nokomas at a sit-down supper, lined the walls. And ahead, at last, he recognized the huge double-doors which opened onto the great living room. He turned off the flashlight.

Faint light spilled out somewhere ahead. Nate waited for his eyes to adjust. It didn’t take long. And so he came, finally, to the room where Joseph Bellamy lay, his grey face to the side, one palm pressing the rug, the other hidden from view somewhere beneath his chest.

There was no doubt in Nate’s mind that the man was dead.

He looked around for the telephone. The room was in disorder. He saw the phone, but, before going for it, he quickly — as silently as he could — closed the door and turned both lock and night-latch. Then he picked up the phone and dialed 0. The thought occurred to him that he owed it to the man on the floor, his host and not-quite kinsman, to try artificial respiration. He knelt, taking the phone down with him; turned Bellamy on his back and looked once, quickly, into the intent and puzzled face. Then he pinched shut the cool flesh of the nostrils, covered the dry lips with his mouth, and breathed in. He released his fingers and listened to the whisper of the twice-used air, closed the escape and breathed in again.

He did this for some time, without observing the slightest effect.

And then he realized that the telephone signal had been droning on without once having been interrupted by the voice of the operator. He filled the lungs once more, but held the nostrils shut a second more than usual as, with his other hand he broke the telephone connection by pressing the stud; then he dialed 0 again. He resumed the mouth-breathing efforts. After a long while the buzz of the signal suddenly ceased. He grabbed for the phone and got hold of it just in time to hear the silence conclude and the signal’s drone commence again.

Dizzy from his efforts, his pulse drumming heavily, he let the phone slip, slipped himself, and fell across the body. He heard a sound of surprise, too low to be an exclamation. A wild hope and excitement flew up in him, he glanced quickly at Bellamy’s face … but it had begun to go loose and flaccid and it was more than ever the clay-gray face of a corpse …

There was no other sound he was aware of hearing, but he twisted his head around and up, so quickly it was painful, and he saw, standing in a doorway, a man who was perfectly strange to him: a young man perhaps a few years his senior, with a dark, outraged, astonished face.

For a few seconds they thrust stares at each other. Then, “I guard. I serve. I seek,” said the other man. He seemed to say it unwillingly, dubiously and threateningly, somehow in the manner of a dog circling around and uncertain if it will be friend or foe.

Nate Gordon said, “What in the hell — ”

The dark young man’s face turned darker yet. He took a step forward, pointed a finger, stopped, clenched his fist, breathed noisily. Nate started to scramble up, the other man’s head sunk, he crouched. Then, face twisting, he turned and ran back behind the door he stood in. His footsteps suddenly ceased. Nate ran after him. There was a thud. And there was no one in the room when Nate got there. No one in the room without windows, the room with no doors except the door he now stood in.

Someone else, perhaps, might have retreated — not necessarily out of cowardice, but out of helplessness. But Nate Gordon had not only read much cheap fiction, seen so many cheap movies and TV shows, he had himself written so much of it that he could no more stop doing what he now proceeded to do than he could have stopped breathing. He began to rap the paneled walls of this inner room from as high as he could reach right down to the floor. Nothing sounded hollow: this was not part of the script, the necessary, logically following sequence of mart-events: but then almost at once something happened which was: Nate, stooping low and rapping near the floor, noticed a faint line of discoloration on the rug as it met the wall. Neither voice nor instinct that he could think of, but a vigorous imagination responding to the pressures of this new familiar situation, directed his next action.

He slid his fingers, knuckle-sides down, back along the rug … the tips of them did pass under the paneling … he levered and jerked … the paneling slid up …

The wall behind was solid.

Or —

Was it?

Perhaps the thing was just a trick of the lights, perhaps he was still dizzy, but — He came up closer to it and it seemed to quiver and recede, folding in upon itself in the manner of an optical illusion; and then it was gone. Beneath his feet Nate Gordon still felt the rug and the chill air of that windowless inner room in Darkglen House, but before and all around his face he saw —