Special Deliverance

17

When Lansing woke in the morning, all the rest were still asleep. Underneath the huddled blankets, the Parson had uncoiled a bit. He was still in a semifetal position, but not tied up in quite so hard a knot.

Jurgens squatted beside the fire, watching a bubbling pot of oatmeal. The coffee was set off to one side, on a small bed of raked-out coals, keeping warm.

Lansing crawled out of his sleeping bag and squatted beside Jurgens.

“How is our man?” he asked.

“He rested fairly easily,” said Jurgens. “The last few hours he’s been all right. Earlier he had a spell of shakes, quivering all over. No use calling anyone, for no one could have done anything for him. I watched over him and made sure that he kept covered. Finally he quit shaking and drifted off to sleep. You know, Lansing, we could have brought along some medicine. Why didn’t someone think of that?”

“We do have some bandages and painkillers and disinfectants,” said Lansing, “but I suppose that was all that was available. It wouldn’t do us much good if we had other medicines. Not one of us has a shred of medical knowledge. Even if we had medicines, we’d not know how to use them.”

“It seemed to me,” said Jurgens, “that the Brigadier was uncommonly rough on him.”

“The Brigadier was scared,” said Lansing. “He has problems of his own.”

“I don’t see any problems for him.”

“He’s assumed the responsibility of watching after us. The kind of man he is, it’s quite natural for him. He worries about everything we do, every step we take. He acts like a mother hen. It’s not easy for him.”

“Lansing, we can look out for ourselves.”

“I know, but he doesn’t think so. He probably blames himself for what happened to the Parson.”

“He doesn’t even like the Parson.”

“I know. No one likes the Parson. He is hard to get along with.”

“Then why did you go walking with him?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I was sorry for him. He seems so much alone. No man should be as alone as he is.”

“You’re the one,” said Jurgens, “who takes care of all of us. Without showing it, you take care of all of us. You have told no one about me, not about what I told you. Who I am and where I came from.”

“When Mary asked you, you begged to be excused, I figured then that you wanted no one else to know.”

“But I told you. You see what I mean. I told you. I trusted you. I don’t know why, but I thought it was all right. I wanted you to know.”

“Maybe because I have a father-confessor image.” “It’s more than that,” said Jurgens. Lansing got up and walked to the entrance. On the stairs outside, he stopped and looked about the plaza. It was a peaceful scene. Although the east was brightening, the sun was not up yet. In the thin light of early dawn, the buildings that surrounded the plaza showed pink rather than the red they would become when the sun came up. A tang of cold hung in the air, and somewhere among the ruins a lone bird was cheeping.

A footstep sounded behind him and Lansing turned. The Brigadier was coming down the steps. “The Parson seems little better,” he said. “Jurgens told me,” said Lansing, “that he had the shakes early on, but quieted down and seemed to be sleeping for the last few hours.”

“He presents a problem,” said the Brigadier. “So?”

“We must be about our work. We must comb the city. I’m convinced there’s something here that must be found.” “Let’s take just a few minutes,” said Lansing, “and try to think things through. We have never really tried to think the situation through. You’re convinced, I suppose, that somewhere there is a key that will free us from this place, let us go back to where we came from.”

“No,” said the Brigadier. “No, I don’t think that. I don’t think we ever will be able to go back to where we came from. The road back home is closed to us. But there must be a road to somewhere else.”

“You think, perhaps, that we are here, were brought here by some strange agency to work out a puzzle, to find our way to a place the agency wants us to go but insists we find on our own. Like rats running a maze?”

The Brigadier looked at him narrowly. “Lansing, you are playing the devil’s advocate. Why should you do that?” “Perhaps because I have no idea of why we’re here or what we’re supposed to do, if anything.”

“So you propose that we loll back and wait for events to take their course?”

“No, I don’t propose that. I think we have to look for some way out, but I haven’t the foggiest what we should be looking for.”

“Neither do I,” said the Brigadier, “but we have to look none the less. And that’s why I say we have a problem. All of us should be out there looking, but we can’t leave the Parson alone. Someone must stay with him, and that cuts down our force. We lose not one person, but two.”

“You’re right,” said Lansing. “The Parson can’t be left alone. I think Jurgens would be willing. He still has trouble getting around.”

“Not Jurgens. We need him with us. He has a good head on his shoulders. He doesn’t say much, but he’s a thoughtful one. He has a good eye. He notices things.”

“All right. Take him along. I’ll stay.”

“Not you. I need you. Do you think Sandra would be agreeable to staying? She’s not of much value in the field. At best she’s a fuzzy-headed creature.”

“You could ask her,” Lansing said.

Sandra agreed to remain behind with the Parson, and after breakfast the others started out. The Brigadier had the expedition well planned.

“Lansing, you and Mary take that street over there and go down its length. If you reach the end of it, then go to the next street over and come back. Jurgens and I will take this street and do the same.”

“What will we be looking for?” asked Mary.

“For anything unusual. For anything that catches the eye. Even a hunch. It pays to follow hunches. I wish we had the time and people to make a house-by-house survey, but that’s impossible. We’ll have to pick our shots.”

“It sounds haphazard to me,” said Mary. “From you I would have expected a more logical plan.”

Mary and Lansing walked down the street that had been indicated. Often the way was partially blocked by fallen masonry. There was nothing unusual to see. The houses were dowdy stone buildings, much the worse for wear and, for the most part, indistinguishable from one another. They appeared to be residences, although there could be no certainty of that.

They entered and explored a few houses, which were not at all unusual, since it seemed that exploring none was a shirking of their duty, and found nothing. The rooms were bare and depressing, coated with dust unmarked by any sign of recent intrusion. Lansing tried to imagine the rooms inhabited by happy, cheerful folks with words spoken and laughter ringing out, but found it was impossible to conjure up such images and finally gave up. The city was dead, the houses dead, the rooms dead. They had died too long ago to harbor ghosts. They had lost all memory. Nothing was left.

“It seems hopeless to me,” said Mary, “this blind searching for some unknown factor. Even if it should be here, and there’s no evidence that it is, it could take years to find. If you ask me, I think the Brigadier’s insane.”

“Perhaps not insane,” said Lansing. “Simply a man driven by an insane purpose. Even when we were at the cube, he was certain that what we were looking for would be found in the city. At that time, of course, he was thinking of the city in different terms. He was thinking we would find people here.”

“But not finding them, wouldn’t it seem reasonable he should change his thinking?”

“Perhaps it would be reasonable for you and me. We can admit mistakes; we can adjust to changing situations. But not the Brigadier. He plans a course of action and he follows it. If he says a thing is so, then it is so. He will not change his mind.”

“Knowing this, what do we do about it?” “We play along with him. We travel a few more miles with him. Maybe the time will come, not too long from now, when he’ll become persuaded.” “I’m afraid we’ll have to wait too long.” “If so,” said Lansing, “then we’ll decide what to do.” “Knocking in his silly head would be my first suggestion.”

He grinned at her, and she smiled back. “Maybe,” she told him, “that’s a shade too vicious. But there are times I like to think of it.”

They had been sitting on a slab of stone and as they rose to go on, Mary spoke sharply. “Listen. Is that someone screaming?”

For a moment they stood rigid, side by side, then the sound that Lansing had not heard at first came again — faint, far off, thinned by distance, the sound of a woman screaming.

“Sandra!” Mary cried and started to run down the street toward the plaza. She was running lightly, as if her feet were winged, Lansing coming on heavily in her wake. The path was tortuous, hemmed in by blocks of stone that had fallen in the narrow street. Several times Lansing heard the screaming again. He burst out of the street into the plaza. Mary was halfway across it. On the stairs that led up to the camp stood Sandra, waving her arms frantically, still screaming. He tried to force a burst of speed, but his legs would not respond.

Mary flew up the stairs and caught Sandra in her arms, the two of them standing together, clinging to one another. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the Brigadier pop out of a street into the plaza. Lansing kept on doggedly, reached the bottom of the stairs and dashed on up. “What goes on?” he panted.

“It’s the Parson,” Mary said. “He has disappeared.” “Disappeared! Sandra was supposed to watch him.” “I had to go to the bathroom,” Sandra yelled at him. “I had to find a place to go. It was only for a minute.”

“You’ve looked?” asked Mary.

“I’ve looked for him,” Sandra shrilled. “I’ve looked everywhere.”

The Brigadier came puffing up the stairs. Behind him, still out in the plaza, Jurgens came, hopping along, nailing with his crutch in an attempt to hurry.

“What’s all the racket?” the Brigadier demanded.

“The Parson’s gone,” said Lansing.

“So he ran off,” said the Brigadier. “The little scut ran off.”

“I tried to find him,” Sandra screamed.

“I know where he is,” said Mary. “I am sure I know.”

“So do I,” said Lansing, charging for the entrance.

Mary yelled after him, running as she called, “You’ll find a flashlight by my sleeping bag. I kept it there all night.”

Lansing saw the flash and scooped it up, scarcely pausing in his stride. He ran for the basement stairs. As he went down them, he was talking to himself. “The fool!” he said. “The terrible, awful fool!”

He reached the basement and plunged for the central corridor, the bobbing flashlight beaming the way before him.

There still might be time, he told himself. There still might be time, but he was sure there wasn’t.

He was right — there wasn’t.

The big room at the end of the corridor was empty. The row of peepholes gleamed faintly in the dark.

He reached the first door, the one that opened on the crabapple world, and flashed the torch upon it. The lugs that had held the door securely against opening dangled on their bolts.

Lansing reached for the door and a terrific force hit him from behind, throwing him to the floor. The flashlight, still lit, went rolling. He had bumped his head against the floor in falling and stars and flashes of light went buzzing through his brain, but still he fought against the weight that held him down.

“You idiot!” yelled the Brigadier. “What were you about to do?”

“The Parson,” Lansing mumbled thickly. “He went through the door.”

“And you were going to follow?”

“Why, yes, of course. I could have found him…”

“You utter fool!” yelled the Brigadier. “That’s a one-way door. You go in, but you can’t come back. Go in and there is no door. Now will you behave yourself if I let you up?”

Mary had picked up the flashlight and was shining it on Lansing. “The Brigadier is right,” she said. “It could be a one-way door.” Then she screamed, “Sandra, get away from there!”

As she screamed, Jurgens came out of the dark and lunged with his crutch at Sandra. It struck her in the ribs and flung her to one side.

The Brigadier lumbered to his feet and backed against the door, guarding it against all comers.

“You understand,” he said. “No one goes through this door. No one touches it.”

Lansing climbed shakily to his feet. Jurgens, after knocking her down, was helping Sandra up.

“There it is,” said Mary, shining the torch upon the floor. “There’s the wrench he used to loosen the lugs.”

“I saw it yesterday,” said Jurgens. “It was hanging on a hook beside the door.”

Mary stooped and picked up the wrench.

“Now,” said the Brigadier, “since all of us have gone through our periods of insanity, let’s settle down. We’ll put the lugs back in place, then we’ll throw away the wrench.”

“How do you know it’s a one-way door?” Sandra demanded.

“I don’t know,” said the Brigadier. “I’m just betting that it is.”

And that was it, thought Lansing. No one could know, not even the Brigadier. And until they knew, knew without question, no one could go through the door.

“There’s no way of knowing,” said Jurgens, “until you step through the door. Then it could be too late.”

“How right,” said the Brigadier. “But no one is going to try.”

He held out a hand to Mary, and she handed him the wrench.

“Hold the light on me,” he said, “so I can see what I’m doing.”