The Cat Who Walks Through Walls (7 page)

“So write it again and leave that part in and the other part out. Just be sure to change the names and places; I don’t want any complaints.”

At a later time I did so and sold that version to him also, but never did get around to telling Fingerhut that it hadn’t happened to a schoolmate of my mother, but was something I had cribbed from a book belonging to my Aunt Abby: the librettos of
The Ring Cycle
by Richard Wagner, who should have stuck to composing music and found himself a W. S. Gilbert to write his librettos; Wagner was a terrible writer.

But his preposterous plots were just right for the true confessions trade…toned down a little, not quite so hard core—and, of course, different names and locales. I didn’t steal them. Or not quite. They are all in the public domain today, copyrights expired, and besides, Wagner stole those plots in the first place.

I could have made a soft living on nothing but Wagnerian plots. But I got bored with it. When Fingerhut retired and bought a turkey ranch, I quit the confession business and started writing war stories. This was more difficult—for a time I almost starved—because military matters I do know something about, and that (as Fingerhut had pointed out) is a handicap.

After a while I learned to suppress what I knew, not let it get in the way of the story. But I never had that trouble with confession stories as neither Fingerhut, nor I, nor Wagner, knew anything at all about women.

Especially about Gwen. Somewhere I had acquired the conviction that women need at least seven pack mules to travel. Or their equivalent in big suitcases. And of course women are by nature disorganized. So I believed.

Gwen moved out of her compartment with just one large case of clothes, smaller than my duffel bag, with every garment neatly folded, and one smaller case of—well, non-clothes. Things.

She lined up our chattels—duffel bag, bundle, large case, small case, her purse, my cane, bonsai tree—and looked at them. “I think I can work out a way,” she said, “for us to handle all of them at once.”

“I don’t see how,” I objected, “with only two hands apiece. I had better order a freight cage.”

“If you wish, Richard.”

“I will.” I turned toward her terminal…and stopped. “Uh—”

Gwen gave full attention to our little maple tree.

“Uh—” I repeated. “Gwen, you’re going to have to loosen up. I’ll slide out and find that nearest terminal booth, then come back—”

“No, Richard.”

“Huh? Just long enough to—”

“No, Richard.”

I heaved a sigh. “What’s your solution?”

“Richard, I will agree to any course of action that does not involve us being separated. Leave everything inside this compartment and hope that we can get back in—that’s one way. Place everything just outside the door and leave it, while we go to order a freight cage—and call Mr. Middlegaff—that’s another way.”

“And have it all disappear while we are gone. Or are there no two-legged rats in this neighborhood?” I was being sarcastic. Every habitat in space has its nightwalkers, invisible habitants who cannot afford to remain in space but who evade being returned to Earth. In Golden Rule I suspect that the management spaced them when they caught them…although there were darker rumors, ones that caused me to avoid all sorts of ground pork.

“There is still a third way, sir, adequate for moving us as far as that terminal booth. That being as far as we can go until the housing office gives us a new assignment. Once we know our new address we can call for a cage and wait for it.

“The booth is only a short distance. Sir, earlier you said you could carry both your bag and your bundle, with your cane strapped to your bag. For this short distance I agree to that. I can carry both my cases, one in each hand, with the strap of my purse let out so that I can sling it over my shoulder.

“The only problem then is the little tree. Richard, you’ve seen pictures in
National Geographic
of native girls carrying bundles on their heads?” She didn’t wait for me to agree; she picked up the little potted tree, placed it atop her head, took her hands away, smiled at me, and sank down, bending only her knees, spine straight and bearing erect—picked up her two cases.

She walked the length of her compartment, turned and faced me. I applauded.

“Thank you, sir. Just one thing more. The walkways are sometimes crowded. If someone jostles me, I’ll do this.” She simulated staggering from being bumped, dropped both cases, caught the bonsai as it fell, put it back on top her head, again picked up her luggage. “Like that.”

“And I’ll drop my bags and grab my cane and beat him with it. The jerk who jostled you. Not to death. Just a reprimand.” I added, “Assuming that the miscreant is male and of mature years. If not, I’ll make the punishment fit the criminal.”

“I’m sure you will, dear. But, truly, I don’t think anyone will jostle me, as you will be walking in front of me, breaking trail. All right?”

“All right. Except that you should strip to the waist.”

“Really?”

“All pictures of that sort in
National Geographic
always show the women stripped to the waist. That’s why they print them.”

“All right if you say to. Although I’m not really endowed for that.”

“Quit fishing for compliments, monkey face; you do all right. But you’re much too good for the common people, so keep your shirt on.”

“I don’t mind. If you really think I should.”

“You’re too willing. Do as you please but I am not, repeat
not
, urging you to. Are all women exhibitionists?”

“Yes.”

The discussion ended because her door signal sounded. She looked surprised. I said, “Let me,” and stepped to the door, touched the voice button. “Yes?”

“Message from the Manager!”

I took my finger off the voice button, looked at Gwen. “Shall I open up?”

“I think we must.”

I touched the dilator button; the door spread open. A man in a proctor’s uniform stepped inside; I let the door snap back. He shoved a clipboard at me. “Sign here. Senator.” Then he pulled it back. “Say, you
are
the Senator from Standard Oil, ain’t you?”

“He is one of those people who would be enormously improved by death.”

H. H. MUNRO
1870-1916

I said, “You have that backwards. Who are
you?
Identify yourself.”

“Hunh? If you ain’t the Senator, forget it; I got the wrong address.” He started to back out and bumped his behind against the door—looked startled and turned his head, reached for the dilator button.

I slapped his hand down. “I told you to identify yourself. That clown suit you’re wearing is no identification; I want to see your credentials. Gwen! Cover him!”

“Right, Senator!”

He reached for a hip pocket, made a fast draw. Gwen kicked whatever it was out of his hand; I chopped him in the left side of his neck. His clipboard went flying and down he went, falling with the curiously graceful leisureliness of low gravity.

I knelt by him. “Keep him covered, Gwen.”

“One second. Senator—watch him!” I pulled back and waited. She went on, “Okay now. But don’t get in my line of fire. please.”

“Roger wilco.” I kept my eyes on our guest, collapsed loosely on the deck. His awkward posture seemed to say that he was unconscious. Nevertheless there was a chance that he was shamming; I had not hit him all that hard. So I applied my thumb to the left lower cervical pressure point, jabbing hard to cause him to scream and claw at the ceiling if he were awake. He did not move.

So I searched him. First from behind, then I rolled him over. His trousers did not quite match his tunic, and they lacked the braid down the sides that a proctor’s uniform trousers should have. The tunic was not a good fit. His pockets held a few crowns in paper, a lottery ticket, and five cartridges. These last were Skoda 6.5 mm longs, unjacketed, expanding, used in pistols, tommies, and rifles—and illegal almost everywhere. No wallet, no IDs, nothing else.

He needed a bath.

I rocked back and stood up. “Keep your gun on him, Gwen. I think he’s a nightwalker.”

“I think so, too. Please look at this, sir, while I keep him covered.” Gwen pointed at a pistol lying on the deck.

Calling it a “pistol” dignifies it more than it deserves. It was a lethal weapon, homemade, of the category known traditionally as “rumble gun.” I studied it as thoroughly as I could without touching it. Its barrel was metal tubing so light in gauge that I wondered whether or not it had ever been fired. The handgrip was plastic, ground or whittled to conform to a fist. The firing mechanism was concealed by a metal cover held in place by (believe me!) rubber bands. That it was a single-shot weapon seemed certain. But with that flimsy barrel it could turn out to be a one-shot as well; it seemed to me to be almost as dangerous to the user as to his target.

“Nasty little thing,” I said. “I don’t want to touch it; it’s a built-in booby trap.”

I looked up at Gwen. She had him covered with a weapon quite as lethal but embodying all the best in modern gunsmith’s art, a nine-shot Miyako. “When he pulled a gun on you, why didn’t you shoot him? Instead of taking a chance on disarming him? You can get very dead that way.”

“Because.”

“Because what? If someone pulls a gun on you, kill him at once. If you can.”

“I couldn’t. When you told me to cover him, my purse was ’way over there. So I covered him with
this
.” Something suddenly glinted in her other hand and she appeared to be a two-gun fighter. Then she clipped it back into her breast pocket—a pen. “I was caught flat-footed, boss. I’m sorry.”

“Oh, that I could make such mistakes! When I yelled at you to cover him, I was simply trying to distract him. I didn’t know you were heeled.”

“I said I was sorry. Once I had time to get at my purse I got out this persuader. But I had to disarm him first.”

I found myself wondering what a field commander could do with a thousand like Gwen. She masses about fifty kilos and stands not much over a meter and a half high—say one hundred sixty centimeters in her bare feet. But size has little to do with it, as Goliath found out a while back.

On the other hand there aren’t a thousand Gwens anywhere. Perhaps just as well. “Were you carrying that Miyako in your purse last night?”

She hesitated. “If I had been, the results might have been regrettable, don’t you think?”

“I withdraw the question. I think our friend is waking up. Keep your gun on him while I find out.” Again I gave him my thumb.

He yelped.

“Sit up,” I said. “Don’t try to stand up; just sit up and place your hands on top of your head. What’s your name?”

He urged on me an action both unlikely and lewd. “Now, now,” I reproved him, “let’s have no rudeness, please. Mistress Hardesty,” I went on, looking directly at Gwen, “would you enjoy shooting him just a little bit? A flesh wound? Enough to teach him to be polite.”

“If you say so. Senator. Now?”

“Well…let’s allow him that one mistake. But no second chance. Try not to kill him; we want him to talk. Can you hit him in the fleshy part of a thigh? Not hit the bone?”

“I can try.”

“That’s all anyone can ask. If you do hit a bone, it won’t be out of spite. Now let’s start over. What is your name?”

“Uh… Bill.”

“Bill, what is the rest of your name?”

“Aw, just Bill. That’s all the name I use.”

Gwen said, “A little flesh wound now. Senator? To sharpen his memory?”

“Perhaps. Do you want it in your left leg. Bill? Or your right?”

“Neither one! Look, Senator, ‘Bill’ actually is all the name I’ve got—and make her not point that thing at me, will you, please?”

“Keep him covered. Mistress Hardesty. Bill, she won’t shoot you as long as you cooperate. What happened to your last name?”

“I never had one. I was ‘Bill Number Six’ at the Holy Name Children’s Refuge. Dirtside, that is. New Orleans.”

“I see. I begin to see. But what did it say on your passport when you came here?”

“Didn’t have one. Just a contractor’s work card. It read ‘William No-Middle-Name Johnson.’ But that was just what the labor recruiter wrote on it. Look, she’s wiggling that gun at me!”

“Then don’t do anything to annoy her. You know how women are.”

“I sure do! They ought not to be
allowed
to have firearms!”

“An interesting thought. Speaking of firearms—That one you were carrying: I want to unload it but I’m afraid that it might explode in my hand. So we will risk your hand instead. Without getting up, turn around so that your back is toward Mistress Hardesty. I am going to push your zapgun to where you can reach it. When I tell you to—not before!—you can take your hands down, unload it, then again put your hands on your head. But listen closely to this:

“Mistress Hardesty, when Bill turns around, take a bead on his spine just below his neck. If he makes one little suspicious move—kill him! Don’t wait to be told, don’t give him a second chance, don’t make it a flesh wound—kill him instantly.”

“With great pleasure. Senator!”

Bill let out a moan.

“All right. Bill, turn around. Don’t use your hands, just willpower.”

He pivoted on his buttocks, scraping his heels to do so. I noted with approval that Gwen had shifted to the steady two-handed grip. I then took my cane and pushed Bill’s homemade gun along the deck to a point in front of him. “Bill, don’t make any sudden moves. Take your hands down. Unload your pistol. Leave it open with its load beside it. Then put your hands back on your head.”

I backed up Gwen with my cane and held my breath while Bill did exactly what I had told him to do. I had no compunction about killing him and I felt sure that Gwen would kill him at once if he tried to turn that homemade gun on us.

But I worried over what to do with his body. I didn’t want him dead. Unless you are on a battlefield or in a hospital, a corpse is an embarrassment, hard to explain. The management was bound to be stuffy about it.

So I breathed a sigh of relief when he finished his assigned task and put his hands back on his head.

I reached out with my cane, reversed, and dragged that nasty little gun and its one cartridge toward me—pocketed that cartridge, then ground a heel down onto its tubing barrel, crushing the muzzle and ruining the firing mockup, then said to Gwen, “You can ease up a little now. No need to kill him this instant. Drop back to flesh-wound alert.”