The Collected Stories of Frank Herbert (75 page)

Senhor Prefect Martinho muttered under his breath, withdrew a small Permalight from a drawer of the desk, handed the light to his son.

Joao peered at the insect, still not using the light. “How strange it is,” he said. “See how it exactly matches the tone of the ivory.”

The insect stopped, pointed its antennae toward the two men.

“Things have been seen,” Joao said. “There are stories. Something like this was found near one of the barrier villages last month. It was inside the green area, on a path beside a river. Two farmers found it while searching for a sick man.” Joao looked at his father. “They are very watchful of sickness in the newly green regions, you know. There have been epidemics … and that is another thing.”

“There is no relationship,” his father snapped. “Without insects to carry disease, we will have less illness.”

“Perhaps,” Joao said, and his tone said he did not believe it.

Joao returned his attention to the insect. “I do not think our ecologists know all they say they do. And I mistrust our Chinese advisors. They speak in such flowery terms of the benefits from eliminating useless insects, but they will not let us go into their green areas and inspect. Excuses. Always excuses. I think they are having troubles they do not wish us to know.”

“That's foolishness,” the elder Martinho growled, but his tone said this was not a position he cared to defend. “They are honorable men. Their way of life is closer to our socialism than it is to the decadent capitalism of North America. Your trouble is you see them too much through the eyes of those who educated you.”

“I'll wager this insect is one of the spontaneous mutations,” Joao said. “It is almost as though they appeared according to some plan. Find me something in which I may capture this creature and take it to the laboratory.”

The elder Martinho remained standing by his chair. “Where will you say it was found?”

“Right here,” Joao said.

“You will not hesitate to expose me to more ridicule?”

“But Father…”

“Can't you hear what they will say? In his own home this insect is found. It is a strange new kind. Perhaps he breeds them there to reinfest the green.”

“Now
you
are talking nonsense, father. Mutations are common in a threatened species. And we cannot deny there is threat to insect species—the poisons, the barrier vibrations, the traps. Get me a container, Father. I cannot leave this creature, or I'd get a container myself.”

“And you will tell where it was found?”

“I can do nothing else. We must cordon off this area, search it out. This could be … an accident…”

“Or a deliberate attempt to embarrass me.”

Joao took his attention from the insect, studied his father.
That
was a possibility, of course. The Carsonites had friends in many places … and some were fanatics who would stoop to any scheme. Still …

Decision came to Joao. He returned his attention to the motionless insect. His father had to be told, had to be reasoned with at any cost. Someone whose voice carried authority had to get down to the Capitol and make them listen.

“Our earliest poisons killed off the weak and selected out those insects immune to this threat,” Joao said. “Only the immune remained to breed. The poisons we use now … some of them do not leave such loopholes and the deadly vibrations at the barriers…” He shrugged. “This is a form of beetle, Father. I will show you a thing.”

Joao drew a long, thin whistle of shiny metal from his pocket. “There was a time when this called countless beetles to their deaths. I had merely to tune it across their attraction spectrum.” He put the whistle to his lips, blew while turning the end of it.

No sound audible to human ears came from the instrument, but the beetle's antennae writhed.

Joao removed the whistle from his mouth.

The antennae stopped writhing.

“It stayed put, you see,” Joao said. “And there are indications of malignant intelligence among them. The insects are far from extinction, Father … and they are beginning to strike back.”

“Malignant intelligence, pah!”

“You must believe me, Father,” Joao said. “No one else will listen. They laugh and say we are too long in the jungle. And where is our evidence? And they say such stories could be expected from ignorant farmers but not from
bandeirantes.
You must listen, Father, and believe. It is why I was chosen to come here … because you are my father and you might listen to your own son.”

“Believe what?” the elder Martinho demanded, and he was the Prefect now, standing erect, glaring coldly at his son.

“In the
sertao
of Goyaz last week,” Joao said, “Antonil Lisboa's
bandeirante
lost three men who…”

“Accidents.”

“They were killed with formic acid and oil of copahu.”

“They were careless with their poisons. Men grow careless when they…”

“Father! The formic acid was a particularly strong type, but still recognizable as having been … or being of a type manufactured by insects. And the men were drenched with it. While the oil of copahu…”

“You imply that insects such as this…” The Prefect pointed to the motionless creature on the crucifix. “… blind creatures such as this…”

“They're not blind, Father.”

“I did not mean literally blind, but without intelligence,” the elder Martinho said. “You cannot be seriously implying that these creatures attacked humans and killed them.”

“We have yet to discover precisely how the men were slain,” Joao said. “We have only their bodies and the physical evidence at the scene. But there have been other deaths, Father, and men missing and we grow more and more certain that…”

He broke off as the beetle crawled off the crucifix onto the desk. Immediately, it darkened to brown, blending with the wood surface.

“Please, Father. Get me a container.”

“I will get you a container only if you promise to use discretion in your story of where this creature was found,” the Prefect said.

“Father, I…”

The beetle leaped off the desk far out into the middle of the room, scuttled to the wall, up the wall, into a crack beside a window.

Joao pressed the switch of the handlight, directed its beam into the hole which had swallowed the strange beetle.

“How long has this hole been here, Father?”

“For years. It was a flaw in the masonry … an earthquake, I believe.”

Joao turned, crossed to the door in three strides, went through an arched hallway, down a flight of stone steps, through another door and short hall, through a grillwork gate and into the exterior garden. He set the handlight to full intensity, washed its blue glare over the wall beneath the study window.

“Joao, what are you doing?”

“My job, Father,” Joao said. He glanced back, saw that the elder Martinho had stopped just outside the gate.

Joao returned his attention to the exterior wall, washed the blue glare of light on the stones beneath the window. He crouched low, running the light along the ground, peering behind each clod, erasing all shadows.

His searching scrutiny passed over the raw earth, turned to the bushes, then the lawn.

Joao heard his father come up behind.

“Do you see it, son?”

“No, Father.”

“You should have allowed me to crush it.”

From the outer garden that bordered the road and the stone fence, there came a piercing stridulation. It hung on the air in almost tangible waves, making Joao think of the hunting cry of jungle predators. A shiver moved up his spine. He turned toward the driveway where he had parked his airtruck, sent the blue glare of light stabbing there.

He broke off, staring at the lawn. “What is that?”

The ground appeared to be in motion, reaching out toward them like the curling of a wave on a beach. Already, they were cut off from the house. The wave was still some ten paces away, but moving in rapidly.

Joao stood up, clutched his father's arm. He spoke quietly, hoping not to alarm the old man further. “We must get to my truck, Father. We must run across them.”

“Them?”

“Those are like the insect we saw inside, father—millions of them. Perhaps they are not beetles, after all. Perhaps they are like army ants. We must make it to the truck. I have equipment and supplies there. We will be safe inside. It is a
bandeirante
truck, Father. You must run with me. I will help you.”

They began to run, Joao holding his father's arm, pointing the way with the light.

Let his heart be strong enough,
Joao prayed.

They were into the creeping waves of insects then, but the creatures leaped aside, opening a pathway which closed behind the running men.

The white form of the airtruck loomed out of the shadows at the far curve of the driveway about fifteen meters ahead.

“Joao … my heart,” the elder Martinho gasped.

“You can make it,” Joao panted. “Faster!” He almost lifted his father from the ground for the last few paces.

They were at the wide rear door into the truck's lab compartment now. Joao yanked open the door, slapped the light switch, reached for a spray hood and poison gun. He stopped, stared into the yellow-lighted compartment.

Two men sat there—
sertao
Indians by the look of them, with bright glaring eyes and bang-cut black hair beneath straw hats. They looked to be identical twins—even to the mud-gray clothing and sandals, the leather shoulder bags. The beetle-like insects crawled around them, up the walls, over the instruments and vials.

“What the devil?” Joao blurted.

One of the pair held a qena flute. He gestured with it, spoke in a rasping, oddly inflected voice: “Enter. You will not be harmed if you obey.”

Joao felt his father sag, caught the old man in his arms. How light he felt! Joao stepped up into the truck, carrying his father. The elder Martinho breathed in short, painful gasps. His face was a pale blue and sweat stood out on his forehead.

“Joao,” he whispered. “Pain … my chest.”

“Medicine, Father,” Joao said. “Where is your medicine?”

“House,” the old man said.

“It appears to be dying,” one of the Indians rasped.

Still holding his father in his arms, Joao, whirled toward the pair, blazed: “I don't know who you are or why you loosed those bugs here, but my father's dying and needs help. Get out of my way!”

“Obey or both die,” said the Indian with the flute.

“He needs his medicine and a doctor,” Joao pleaded. He didn't like the way the Indian pointed that flute. The motion suggested the instrument was actually a weapon.

“What part has failed?” asked the other Indian. He stared curiously at Joao's father. The old man's breathing had become shallow and rapid.

“It's his heart,” Joao said. “I know you farmers don't think he's acted fast enough for…”

“Not farmers,” said the one with the flute. “Heart?”

“Pump,” said the other.

“Pump,” The Indian with the flute stood up from the bench at the front of the lab, gestured down. “Put … Father here.”

The other one got off the bench, stood aside.

In spite of fear for his father, Joao was caught by the strange look of this pair, the fine, scale-like lines in their skin, the glittering brilliance of their eyes.

“Put Father here,” repeated the one with the flute, pointing at the bench. “Help can be…”

“Attained,” said the other one.

“Attained,” said the one with the flute.

Joao focused now on the masses of insects around the walls, the waiting quietude in their ranks. They
were
like the one in the study.

The old man's breathing was now very shallow, very rapid.

He's dying,
Joao thought in desperation.

“Help can be attained,” repeated the one with the flute. “If you obey, we will not harm.”

The Indian lifted his flute, pointed it at Joao like a weapon. “Obey.”

There was no mistaking the gesture.

Slowly, Joao advanced, deposited his father gently on the bench.

The other Indian bent over the elder Martinho's head, raised an eyelid. There was a professional directness about the gesture. The Indian pushed gently on the dying man's diaphragm, removed the Prefect's belt, loosened his collar. A stubby brown finger was placed against the artery in the old man's neck.

“Very weak,” the Indian rasped.

Joao took another, closer look at this Indian, wondering at the
sertao
backwoodsman who behaved like a doctor.

“We've got to get him to a hospital,” Joao said. “And his medicine in…”

“Hospital,” the Indian agreed.

“Hospital?” asked the one with the flute.

A low, stridulate hissing came from the other Indian.

“Hospital,” said the one with the flute.

That stridulate hissing! Joao stared at the Indian beside the Prefect. The sound had been reminiscent of the weird call that had echoed across the lawn.

The one with the flute poked him, said: “You will go into front and maneuver this…”

“Vehicle,” said the one beside Joao's father.

“Vehicle,” said the one with the flute.

“Hospital?” Joao pleaded.

“Hospital,” agreed the one with the flute.

Joao looked once more to his father. The other Indian already was strapping the elder Martinho to the bench in preparation for movement. How competent the man appeared in spite of his backwoods look.

“Obey,” said the one with the flute.

Joao opened the door into the front compartment, slipped through, feeling the other one follow. A few drops of rain spattered darkly against the curved windshield. Joao squeezed into the operator's seat, noted how the Indian crouched behind him, flute pointed and ready.