A Maze of Death

6

The four men carried Tallchief’s body across the dark, nocturnal compound. Cold wind licked at them and they shivered; they drew together against the hostile presence of Delmak-O—the hostile presence which had killed Ben Tallchief.

Babble switched on lights here and there. At last they had Tallchief up on the high, metal-topped table.

“I think we should retire to our individual living quarters and stay there until Dr. Babble has finished his autopsy,” Susie Smart said, shivering.

Wade Frazer spoke up. “Better if we stay together, at least until Dr. Babble’s report is in. And I also think that under these unexpected circumstances, this terrible event in our lives, that we must immediately elect a leader, a strong one who can keep us together as a group, when in fact right now we are not, but should be—must be. Doesn’t everyone agree?”

After a pause Glen Belsnor said, “Yeah.”

“We can vote,” Betty Jo Berm said. “In a democratic way. But I think we must be careful.” She struggled to express herself. “We mustn’t give a leader too much power. And we should be able to recall him when and if at any time we’re not satisfied with him; then we can vote him out as our leader and elect someone else. But while he is leader we should obey him—we don’t want him to be too weak, either. If he’s too weak we’ll just be like we are now: a mere collection of individuals who can’t function together, even in the face of death.”

“Then let’s get back to the briefing room,” Tony Dunkelwelt said, “rather than to our personal quarters. So we can start casting votes. I mean, it or they could kill us before we have a leader; we don’t want to wait.”

In a group they made their way somberly from Dr. Babble’s infirmary to the briefing room. The transmitter and receiver were still on; each person, entering, heard the dull, low hum.

“So big,” Maggie Walsh said, gazing at the transmitter. “And so useless.”

“Do you think we should arm ourselves?” Bert Kosler said, plucking at Morley’s sleeve. “If there’s someone after us to kill all of us—”

“Let’s wait for Babble’s autopsy report,” Seth Morley said.

Seating himself, Wade Frazer said in a business-like way, “We’ll vote by a show of hands. Everybody sit down and be quiet and I’ll read off our names and keep the tally. Is that satisfactory to everyone?” There was a sardonic undertone to his voice, and Seth Morley did not like it.

Ignatz Thugg said, “You won’t get it, Frazer. No matter how badly you want it. Nobody in this room is going to let somebody like you tell them what to do.” He dropped into a chair, crossed his legs, and got a tobacco cigarette from his jacket pocket.

As Wade Frazer read off the names and took the tally, several others made their own notations. They don’t trust Frazer to make an accurate account, Seth Morley realized. He did not blame them.

“The greatest number of votes for one person,” Frazer said, when all the names had been read, “goes to Glen Belsnor.” He dropped his tally sheet with a blatant sneer… as if, Morley thought, the psychologist is saying ‘Go ahead and doom yourselves. It’s your lives, if you want to toss them away.’ But it seemed to him that Belsnor was a good choice; on his own very limited knowledge he had himself voted for the electronics maintenance man. He was satisfied, even if Frazer was not. And by their relieved stir he guessed that most of the others were, too.

“While we’re waiting for Dr. Babble’s report,” Maggie Walsh said, “perhaps we should join in a group prayer for Mr. Tallchief ‘s psyche to be taken immediately into immortality.”

“Read from Specktowsky’s Book,” Betty Jo Berm said. She dipped into her pocket and brought out her own copy, which she passed to Maggie Walsh. “Read the part on page 70 about the Intercessor. Isn’t it the Intercessor that we want to reach?”

From memory, Maggie Walsh intoned the words which all of them knew. “‘By His appearance in history and creation, the Intercessor offered Himself as a sacrifice by which the Curse could be partially nullified. Satisfied as to the redemption of His creation by this manifestation of Himself, this signal of His great—but partial—victory, the Deity “died” and then remanifested Himself to indicate that He had overcome the Curse and hence death, and, having done this, moved up through the concentric circles back to God Himself.’ And I will add another part which is pertinent. “The next—and last—period is the Day of Audit, in which the heavens will roll back like a scroll and each living thing—and hence all creatures, both sentient man and man-like nonterrestrial organisms—will be reconciled with the original Deity, from whose unity of being everything has come (with the possible exception of the Form Destroyer).’” She paused a moment and then said, “Repeat what I say after me, all of you, either aloud or in your thoughts.”

They lifted their faces and gazed straight upward, in the accepted fashion. So that the Deity could hear them more readily.

“We did not know Mr. Tallchief too well.”

They all said, “We did not know Mr. Tallchief too well.”

“But he seemed to be a fine man.”

They all said, “But he seemed to be a fine man.”

Maggie hesitated, reflected, then said, “Remove him from time and thereby make him immortal.”

“Remove him from time and thereby make him immortal.”

“Restore his form to that which he possessed before the Form Destroyer went to work on him.”

They all said, “Restore his form to that—” They broke off. Dr. Milton Babble had come into the briefing room, looking ruffled.

“We must finish the prayer,” Maggie said.

“You can finish it some other time,” Dr. Babble said. “I’ve been able to determine the cause of death.” He consulted several sheets of paper which he had brought along. “Cause of death: vast inflammation of the bronchial passages, due to an unnatural amount of histamine in the blood, resulting in a stricture of the trachea; exact cause of death was suffocation as reaction to a heterogenic allergen. He must have been stung by an insect or brushed against a plant while he was unloading his noser. An insect or plant containing a substance to which he was violently allergic. Remember how sick Susie Smart was her first week here, from brushing against one of the nettle-like bushes? And Kosler.” He gestured in the direction of the elderly custodian. “If he hadn’t gotten to me as quick as he did he would be dead, too. With Tallchief the situation was against us; he had gone out by himself, at night, and there was no one around to react to his plight. He died alone, but if we had been there he could have been saved.”

After a pause Roberta Rockingham, seated, with a huge rug over her lap, said, “Why, I think that’s ever so much more encouraging than our own speculation. It would appear that no one is trying to kill us… which is really quite wonderful, don’t you think?” She gazed around at them, straining to hear if any had spoken.

“Evidently,” Wade Frazer said remotely, with a private grimace.

“Babble,” Ignatz Thugg said, “we voted without you.”

“Good grief,” Betty Jo Berm said. “That’s so. We’ll have to vote again.”

“You selected one of us as a leader?” Babble said. “Without letting me exercise my own personal involvement? Who did you decide on?”

“On me,” Glen Belsnor said.

Babble consulted with himself. “It’s all right as far as I’m concerned,” he said at last, “to have Glen as our leader.”

“He won by three votes,” Susie Smart said.

Babble nodded. “In any case I’m satisfied.”

Seth Morley walked over to Babble, faced him and said, “You’re sure that was the cause of death?”

“Beyond doubt. I have equipment which can determine—”

“Did you find an insect bite-mark on him anywhere?”

“Actually no,” Babble said.

“A possible spot where a plant leaf might have speared him?”

“No,” Babble said, “but that isn’t an important aspect of such a determination. Some of the insects here are so small that any sting-spot or bite-spot wouldn’t be visible without a microscopic examination, and that would take days.”

“But you’re satisfied,” Belsnor said, also coming up; he stood with his arms folded, rocking back and forth on his heels.

“Absolutely.” Babble nodded vigorously.

“You know what it would mean if you’re wrong.”

“How? Explain.”

“Oh Christ, Babble,” Susie Smart said, “it’s obvious. If someone or something deliberately killed him then we’re in just as much danger as he was—possibly. But if an insect stung him—”

“That’s what it was,” Babble said. “An insect stung him.” His ears had turned bright carmen with stubborn, irritable anger. “Do you think this is my first autopsy? That I’m not capable of handling pathology-report instrumentation that I’ve handled all my adult life?” He glared at Susie Smart. “Miss Dumb,” he said.

“Come on, Babble,” Tony Dunkelwelt said.

“It’s Dr. Babble to you, sonny,” Babble said. Nothing is changed, Seth Morley said to himself. We are as we were, a mob of twelve people. And it may destroy us. End forever our various separate lives.

“I feel a vast amount of relief,” Susie Smart said, coming up beside him and Mary. “I guess we were becoming paranoid; we thought everyone was after us, trying to kill us.”

Thinking about Ben Tallchief—and his last encounter with him—Morley felt no sympathetic resonance within him to her newly refreshed attitude. “A man is dead,” he said.

“We barely knew him. In fact we didn’t know him at all.”

“True,” Morley said. Maybe it’s because I feel so much personal guilt. “Maybe I did it,” he said aloud to her.

“A bug did it,” Mary said.

“May we finish the prayer, now?” Maggie Walsh said. Seth Morley said to her, “How come we need to shoot a petition-prayer eighty thousand miles up from the planet’s surface, but this sort of prayer can be done without electronic help?” I know the answer, he said to himself. This prayer now—it really doesn’t matter to us if it’s heard. It is merely a ceremony, this prayer. The other one was different. The other time we needed something for ourselves, not for Tallchief. Thinking this he felt more gloomy than ever. “I’ll see you later,” he said aloud to Mary. “I’m going to go unpack the boxes I’ve brought from our noser.”

“But don’t go near the nosers,” Mary warned him. “Until tomorrow; until we have time to scout out the plant or bug—”

“I won’t be outdoors,” Morley agreed. “I’ll go directly to our quarters.” He strode from the briefing room out into the compound. A moment later he was ascending the steps to the porch of their joint living quarters.

I’ll ask The Book, Seth Morley said to hmself. He rummaged through several cartons and at last found his copy of How I Rose From the Dead in My Spare Time and So Can You. Seated, he held it on his lap, placed both hands on it, shut his eyes, turned his face upward and said, “Who or what killed Ben Tallchief?”

He then, eyes shut, opened the book to a page at random, put his finger at one exact spot, and opened his eyes.

His finger rested on: the Form Destroyer.

That doesn’t tell us much, he reflected. All death comes as a result of a deterioration of form, due to the activity of the Form Destroyer.

And yet it scared him.

It doesn’t sound like a bug or a plant, he thought starkly. It sounds like something entirely else.

A tap-tap sounded at his door.

Rising warily, he moved by slow degrees to the door; keeping it shut he swept the curtain back from the small window and peered out into the night darkness. Someone stood on the porch, someone small, with long hair, tight sweater, peek-n-squeeze bra, tight short skirt, barefoot. Susie Smart has come to visit, he said to himself, and unlocked the door.

“Hi,” she said brightly, smiling up at him. “May I come in and talk a little?”

He led her over to The Book. “I asked it what or who killed Tallchief.”

“What did it say?” She seated herself, crossed her bare legs and leaned forward to see as he placed his finger on the same spot as before. “The Form Destroyer,” she said soberly. “But it’s always the Form Destroyer.”

“Yet I think it means something.”

“That it wasn’t an insect?”

He nodded.

“Do you have anything to eat or drink?” Susie said. “Any candy?”

“The Form Destroyer,” he said, “is loose outside.”

“You’re scaring me.”

“Yes,” he said. “I want to. We’ve got to get a prayer off this planet and to the relay network. We’re not going to survive unless we get help.”

“The Walker comes without prayer,” Susie said.

“I have a Baby Ruth candy bar,” he said. “You can have that.” He rummaged through a suitcase of Mary’s, found it, handed it to her.

“Thank you,” she said, tearing the paper from one of the candy bar’s blunt ends.

He said, “I think we’re doomed.”

“We’re always doomed. It’s the essence of life.”

“Doomed immediately. Not abstractly—doomed in the sense that I and Mary were doomed when I tried to load up the Morbid Chicken. Mors certa, hora incerta; there’s a big difference between knowing that you’re going to die and knowing you’re going to die within the next calendar month.”

“Your wife is very attractive.”

He sighed.

“How long have you two been married?” Susie gazed at him intently.

“Eight years,” he said.

Susie Smart swiftly stood up. “Come over to my place and let me show you how nice these little rooms can be fixed up. Come on—it’s depressing in here.” She tugged little-girl-wise at his hand and he found himself following after her.

They danced up the porch, passed several doorways and came at last to Susie’s door. It was unlocked; she opened it, welcoming him into warmth and light. She had told the truth; it did look nice. Can we make ours as nice as this? he asked himself as he looked around, at the pictures on the walls, the textures of fabrics, and the many, many planter boxes and pots, out of which multicolored blossoms dazzled the eye.

“Nice,” he said.

Susie banged the door shut. “Is that all you can say? It’s taken me a month to make it look like this.”

“‘Nice’ was your word for it, not mine.”

She laughed. “I can call it ‘nice,’ but since you’re a visitor you have to be more lavish about it.”

“Okay,” he said, “it’s wonderful.”

“That’s better.” She seated herself in a black canvas-backed chair facing him, leaned back, rubbed her hands together briskly, then fastened her attention on him. “I’m waiting,” she said.

“For what?”

“For you to proposition me.”

“Why would I do that?”

Susie said, “I’m the settlement whore. You’re supposed to die of priapism because of me. Haven’t you heard?”

“I just got here late today,” he pointed out.

“But somebody must have told you.”

“When someone does,” he said, “he’ll get his nose punched in.”

“But it’s true.”

“Why?” he said.

“Dr. Babble explained to me that it’s a diencephalic disturbance in my brain.”

He said, “That Babble. You know what he said about my visit with the Walker? He said most of what I said was untrue.”

“Dr. Babble has a keen little maliciousness about him. He loves to put down everyone and everything.”

“If you know that about him,” Seth Morley said, “then you know enough not to pay any attention.”

“He just explained why I’m that way. I am that way. I’ve slept with every man in the settlement, except that Wade Frazer.” She shook her head, making a wry face. “He’s awful.”

With curiosity, he said, “What does Frazer say about you? After all, he’s a psychologist. Or claims he is.”

“He says that—” She reflected, staring up pensively at the ceiling of the room, meantime chewing abstractedly on her lower lip. “It’s a search for the great world-father archetype. That’s what Jung would have said. Do you know about Jung?”

“Yes,” he said, although in fact he had only heard little more than the name; Jung, he had been told, had in many ways laid the groundwork for a rapprochement between intellectuals and religion—but at that point Seth Morley’s knowledge gave out. “I see,” he said.

“Jung believed that our attitudes toward our actual mothers and fathers are because they embody certain male and female archetypes. For instance, there’s the great bad earth-father and the good earth-father and the destroying earthfather, and so forth… and the same with women. My mother was the bad earth-mother, so all my psychic energy was turned toward my father.”

“Hmm,” he said. He had, all at once, begun to think about Mary. Not that he was afraid of her, but what would she think when she got back to their living quarters and found him gone? And then—God forbid—found him here with Susie Dumb, the self-admitted settlement whore?

Susie said, “Do you think the sexual act makes a person impure?”

“Sometimes,” he responded reflexively, still thinking about his wife. His heart labored and he felt his pulse race. “Specktowsky isn’t too clear about that in The Book,” he mumbled.

“You’re going to take a walk with me,” Susie said.

“Now? I am? Where? Why?”

“Not now. Tomorrow when it’s daylight. I’ll take you outside the settlement, out into the real Delmak-O. Where the strange things are, the movements that you catch out of the corner of your eye—and the Building.”

“I’d like to see the Building,” he said, truthfully.

Abruptly she rose. “Better get back to your living quarters, Mr. Seth Morley,” she said.

“Why?” He, too, confused, rose to his feet.

“Because if you stay here your attractive wife is going to find us and create chaos and open the way for the Form Destroyer, who you say is loose outside, to get all of us.” She laughed, showing perfect, pale teeth.

“Can Mary come on our walk?” he asked.

“No.” She shook her head. “Just you. Okay?”

He hesitated, a flock of thoughts invading his mind; they pulled him this way and that, then departed, leaving him free to make an answer. “If I can work it,” he said.

“Try. Please. I can show you all the places and life forms and things I’ve discovered.”

“Are they beautiful?”

“S-some. Why are you looking at me so intently? You make me nervous.”

“I think you’re insane,” he said.

“I’m just outspoken. I simply say, ‘A man is a sperm’s way of producing another sperm.’ That’s merely practical.”

Seth Morley said, “I don’t know much about Jungian analysis, but I certainly do not recall—” He broke off. Something had moved at the periphery of his vision.

“What’s the matter?” Susie Smart asked.

He turned swiftly, and this time saw it clearly. On the top of the dresser a small gray square object inched its way forward, then, apparently aware of him, ceased moving.

In two steps he was over to it; he snatched up the object, held it gripped tightly in the palm of his hand.

“Don’t hurt it,” Susie said. “It’s harmless. Here, give it to me.” She held out her hand, and, reluctantly, he opened his enclosing fingers.

The object which he held resembled a tiny building. “Yes,” Susie said, seeing the expression on his face. “It comes from the Building. It’s a sort of offspring, I suppose. Anyhow it’s exactly like the Building but smaller.” She took it from him, for a time examined it, then placed it back on the dresser. “It’s alive,” she said.

“I know,” he said. Holding it, he had felt the animate quality of it; it had pushed against his fingers, trying to get out.

“They’re all over the place,” Susie said. “Out there.” She made a vague gesture. “Maybe tomorrow we can find you one.”

“I don’t want one,” he said.

“You will when you’ve been here long enough.”

“Why?”

“I guess they’re company. Something to break the monotony. I remember as a child finding a Ganymedian toad in our garden. It was so beautiful with its shining flame and its long smooth hair that—”

Morley said, “It could have been one of these things that killed Tallchief.”

“Glen Belsnor took one apart one day,” Susie said. “He said—” She pondered. “It’s harmless, anyhow. The rest of what he said was electronic talk; we couldn’t follow it.”

“And he’d know?”

“Yes.” She nodded.

Seth Morley said, “You—we—have a good leader.” But I don’t think quite good enough, he said to himself.

“Shall we go to bed?” Susie said.

“What?” he said.

“I’m interested in going to bed with you. I can’t judge a man unless I’ve been in bed with him.”

“What about women?”

“I can’t judge them at all. What, do you think I go to bed with the women, too? That’s depraved. That sounds like something Maggie Walsh would do. She’s a lesbian, you know. Or didn’t you know?”

“I don’t see that it matters. Or that it’s any of our business.” He felt shaky and uneasy. “Susie,” he said, “you should get psychiatric help.” He remembered, all at once, what the Walker-on-Earth had said to him, back at Tekel Upharsin. Maybe we all need psychiatric help, he thought. But not from Wade Frazer. That’s totally, entirely out.

“You don’t want to go to bed with me? You’d enjoy it, despite your initial prudery and reservations. I’m very good. I know a lot of ways. Some which you probably never heard about. I made them up myself.”

“From years of experience,” he said.

“Yes.” She nodded. “I started at twelve.”

“No,” he said.

“Yes,” Susie said, and grabbed him by the hand. On her face he saw a desperate expression, as if she were fighting for her life. She drew him toward her, straining with all her strength; he held back and she strained vainly.

Susie Smart felt the man pulling away from her. He’s very strong, she thought. “How come you’re so strong?” she asked, gasping for air; she found herself almost unable to breathe.

“Carry rocks,” he said with a grin.

I want him, she thought. Big, evil, powerful… he could tear me to pieces, she thought. Her longing for him grew.

“I’ll get you,” she gasped, “because I want you.” I need to have you, she said to herself. Covering me like a heavy shade, a protection from the sun and from seeing. I don’t want to look any more, she said to herself. Weigh me down, she thought. Show me what there is of you; show me your real being, without benefit of clothes. Fumbling behind her she unsnapped her peek-n-squeeze bra. Deftly she tugged it out from its place within her sweater; she pulled, strained, managed to drop it onto a chair. At that the man laughed. “Why are you laughing?” she demanded.

“Your neatness,” he said. “Getting it onto a chair instead of dropping it onto the floor.”

“Damn you,” she said, knowing that he, like everyone else, was laughing at her. “I’ll get you,” she snarled, and pulled him with all her strength; this time she managed to move him a few tottering steps in the direction of the bed.

“Hey, goddam it,” he protested. But again she managed to move him several steps. “Stop!” he said. And then she had tumbled him onto the bed. She held him down with one knee and rapidly, with great expertise, unsnapped her skirt and pushed it from the bed, onto the floor.

“See?” she said. “I don’t have to be neat.” She dove for him then; she pinned him down with her knees. “I’m not obsessive,” she said, as she removed the last of her clothing. Now she tore at the buttons of his shirt. A button, ripped loose, rolled like a little wheel from the bed and onto the floor. At that she laughed. She felt very good. This part always excited her—it was like the final stage of a hunt, in this case a hunt for a big animal which smelled of sweat and of cigarette smoke and of agitated fear. How can he be afraid of me? she asked herself, but it was always this way—she had come to accept it. In fact she had come to like it.

“Let—me—go,” he gasped, pushing upward against her weight. “You’re so darn—slippery,” he managed to say as she gripped his head with her knees.

“I can make you so happy, sexually,” she told him; she always said this, and sometimes it worked; sometimes the man gave in at the prospect which she held open to him. “Come on,” she said, in rapid, imploring grunts.

The door of the room banged open. Immediately, instinctively, she sprang from the man, from the bed, stood upright, breathing noisily, peering at the figure in the doorway. His wife. Mary Morley. Susie at once snatched up her clothes; this was one part which she did not enjoy, and she felt overwhelming hatred toward Mary Morley. “Get out of here,” Susie panted. “This is my room.”

“Seth!” Mary Morley said in a shrill voice. “What in the name of God is the matter with you? How could you do this?” She moved stiffly toward the bed, her face pale.

“God,” Morley said, sitting up and smoothing his hair into place. “This girl is nuts,” he said to his wife in a plaintive, whining tone. “I had nothing to do with it; I was trying to get away. You saw that, didn’t you? Couldn’t you tell I was trying to get away? Didn’t you see that?”

Mary Morley said in her shrill, speeded-up voice, “If you had wanted to get away you could have.”

“No,” he said imploringly. “Really, so help me God. She had me pinned down. I was getting loose, though. If you hadn’t come in I would have gotten away by myself.”

“I’ll kill you,” Mary Morley said; she spun, paced about in a great circle which swept out most of the room. Looking for something to pick up and hit with; Susie knew the motion, the searching, the glazed, ferocious, incredulous expression on her face. Mary Morley found a vase, snatched it up, stood by the dresser, her chest heaving as she confronted Seth Morley. She raised the vase in a spasmodic, abrupt, backward swing of her right arm .

On the dresser the miniaturized building slid a minute panel aside. A tiny cannon projected. Mary did not see it, but Susie and Seth Morley did.

“Look out!” Seth gasped, groping at his wife to get hold of her hand. He yanked her toward him. The vase crashed to the floor. The barrel of the cannon rotated, taking new aim. All at once a beam projected from it, in Mary Morley’s direction. Susie, laughing, backed away, putting distance between herself and the beam.

The beam missed Mary Morley. On the far wall of the room a hole appeared and through it black night air billowed, cold and harsh, entering the room. Mary wobbled, retreated a step.

Rushing into the bathroom, Seth Morley disappeared, then came dashing out again, the waterglass in his hand. He sprinted to the dresser, poured water onto the building replica. The snout of the cannon ceased to rotate.

“I think I got it,” Seth Morley said, wheezing asthmatically.

From the diminutive structure a curl of gray smoke drifted up. The structure hummed briefly and then a pool of sticky, grease-like stain dribbled out from it, mixing with the pool of water which had now formed around it. The structure bucked, spun, and then all at once decayed into inanimation. He was right; it was dead.

“You killed it,” Susie said, accusingly.

Seth Morley said, “That’s what killed Tallchief.”

“Did it try to kill me?” Mary Morley asked faintly. She looked about unsteadily, the fanaticism of fury gone from her face now. Cautiously, she seated herself and stared at the structure, blank and pale, then said to her husband, “Let’s get out of here.”

To Susie, Seth Morley said, “I’m going to have to tell Glen Belsnor.” He gingerly, and with great caution, picked up the dead little block; holding it in the palm of his hand he stared at it a long, long time.

“It took me three weeks to tame that one,” Susie said. “Now I have to find another, and bring it back here without getting killed, and tame it like I did this one.” She felt massive waves of accusation slapping higher and higher within her. “Look what you did,” she said, and went swiftly to gather up her clothing.

Seth and Mary Morley started toward the door, Seth’s hand on his wife’s back. Guiding her out.

“Goddam you both!” she shouted in accusation. Half-dressed, she followed after them. “What about tomorrow?” she said to Seth. “Are we still going on a walk? I want to show you some of the—”

“No,” he said harshly, and then he turned to gaze at her long and somberly. “You really don’t understand what happened,” he said.

Susie said, “I know what almost happened.”

“Does someone have to die before you can wake up?” he said.

“No,” she said, feeling uneasy; she did not like the expression in his hard, boring eyes. “All right,” she said, “if it’s so important to you, that little toy—”

“‘Toy,’” he said mockingly.

“Toy,” she repeated. “Then you ought to be really interested in what’s out there. Don’t you understand? This is just a model of the real Building. Don’t you want to see it? I’ve seen it very closely. I even know what the sign reads over the main entrance. Not the entrance where the trucks come and go but the entrance—”

“What does it say?” he said.

Susie said, “Will you go with me?” To Mary Morley she said, with all the graciousness she could command, “You, too. Both of you ought to come.”

“I’ll come alone,” Seth said. To his wife he said, “It’s too dangerous; I don’t want you along.”

“You don’t want me along,” Mary said, “for obvious other reasons.” But she sounded dim and scared, as if the close call with the structure’s energy beam had banished every emotion in her except raw, clinging fear.

Seth Morley said, “What does it say over the entrance?”

After a pause Susie said, “It says ‘Whippery.’

“What does that mean?” he said.

“I’m not positive. But it sounds fascinating. Maybe we can somehow get inside, this time. I’ve gone real close, almost up to the wall. But I couldn’t find a side door, and I was afraid—I don’t know why—to go in the main entrance.”

Wordlessly, Seth Morley, steering his dazed wife, strode out into the night. She found herself standing there in the middle of her room, alone and only half-dressed.

“Bitch!” she called loudly after them. Meaning Mary.

They continued on. And were gone from sight.