Peace in the Wilderness Read online

  “Good God,” Kerry said simply. For a moment, his eagerness to get all of the facts outweighed even his concern over Ben's desperate condition. A dozen urgent questions trembled on his tongue, but he resolutely suppressed his curiosity.

  “I still say you'd be better off at my house,” he said.

  Lew Fallon crossed the room to stand beside him. “I'm afraid he's right,” he said. “There's an alert out on the Night Police frequency. I was listening just now. I knew it was a mistake to call you at the newspaper building."

  Ben said in a barely audible whisper, “I don't want to get you in trouble if I can help it, Kerry. Or you either, Lew—"

  Fallon made a reckless gesture of repudiation. “Trouble's what I'm looking for! This was a free country once! They owe me something for all the years I thought Dad was dead—"

  Ben Thrusher sank bake against the pillows, his body racked by coughs. When the spasm quieted he muttered, “Remember Kerry doesn't know, and we've no time now to explain. Can you get us out of here?"

  “I guess so—if Mister Donalson isn't afraid to take a few risks,” Fallon said bitterly.

  Kerry turned on him angrily. “Knock it off, will you? I'm here. Isn't that enough?"

  Like many men who lead fairly dull lives and only daydream about adventure, Kerry resented its intrusion into everyday life, and felt almost personally indignant about what seemed like heroics on young Fallon's part. Still, in some obscure corner of his brain, he knew that Ben was neither raving nor a madman.

  Fallon had slipped out of the room, and Ben now lay with his eyes closed. But Kerry, seeing the swollen lids flicker, guessed that the dying man was only avoiding questions. It was vitally necessary for him to hoard his small strength, but a furious impatience nagged at Kerry, and he paced the room restlessly until young Fallon reappeared.

  Over his arm the youth carried a huge, loose raincoat. He said to Kerry, “This place is all locked up for curfew. But there's a service door. If we get caught, leave everything to me.” He went to the bed and drew back the blankets.

  “Do you think you can walk, Ben?” he asked, his voice tight with concern.

  Kerry gasped with horror. Ben's feet were swollen to nearly three times their normal size. Fallon produced an enormous air of carpet-slippers, slit them at toe and heel, and knelt to put them on the useless feet.

  Ben forced himself painfully to a sitting position, and just as he did so Lew broke into Kerry's frozen dismay with a rasping, “Come and help me, Mr. Donalson. Can't you see we'll have to carry him?"

  They bundled the raincoat over Ben's pajamas, lifting and supporting him. Ben crossed the room in a shambling walk, dragging himself along between Lew and Kerry as if the men were living crutches. Although he did not say a word, Kerry felt him wince and heard the harsh catch of breath each time he set one of the swollen feet to the ground. They could only guess at his pain.

  Somehow they got him into a small service elevator and rested, breathing harshly—Ben was a large and heavy man—while it made a creaky and slow descent.

  The back door opened on a narrow areaway, lying deserted in a brilliant vapor-light which brightened its every ugly crevice from the building to the curb. The hoisted Ben bodily into the front seat of a small, war-model electric automobile, and Kerry climbed in after him.

  The big man sagged on Kerry's shoulder. Kerry looked curiously at Fallon as the youngster climbed into the driver's seat.

  As if sensing his apprehensive scrutiny Fallon explained, “We'll take a chance on the law of averages. How many Night Police are in the city? They can't check every street, and they usually concentrate on deserted spots."

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  * * *

  III

  Lew Fallon drove the car down the main street. They encountered no other car, and saw only one pedestrian—a solitary Night Cop lounging in a doorway, his neuron-gun a luminescent halo on his hip. The police officer did not even raise his head as their car's lights swung across his uniform.

  Lew laughed, harshly and contemptuously, “See? They think the whole city is so scared by now that no one would dare-to be here without a police permit!"

  They were rapidly approaching Kerry's street, and the newspaperman was beginning to relax. He had almost convinced himself that the peaceful drive was an anti-climax to a melodramatic prelude when a blinding shaft of light crossed their headlights. One of the small, fast prowlies darted from a side-street and completely blocked their passage, blinking a menacing red signal.

  Lew jammed on the brakes.

  A uniformed man jumped from the prowlie, his right hand ghostly by the phosphorescence around his neuron-gun. He strode up to the car.

  “What is it this time?” he asked angrily. “Are you taking your wife to the maternity hospital? If you're not, your excuse had better be good."

  Kerry was startled. As was so often the case with law-abiding citizens, it had never occurred to him that the Night Police had to deal with such minor violations fairly often. In the news stories he printed such violations were a serious matter and the Night Police fast on the trigger. This particular officer had his neuron-gun in readiness, but otherwise he sounded like an argumentative daytime traffic cop.

  Lew completely lowered the front window. “I'm glad we ran into you,” he said. “My friends and I were playing cards at my house and we forgot the time. It was after curfew when we broke the game up, and when I tried to call up for a police escort, my phone was out of order and this guy's wife is waiting for him. We called and called, but we couldn't even get the operator. So we decided to go out and hunt one up."

  The nightman glanced in the window, his disinterested eyes passing over Ben, sagging beneath the raincoat and slouch hat. He stared for an instant at Kerry in his neat snap-brim and overcoat. Then he bolstered the neuron-gun.

  “Go ahead,” he said. “I'll follow you."

  They pulled up before Kerry's house, and the policeman got out of the prowlie again and came to the car window. “I want to see you get in off the street. Go on in right now. And another time, keep an eye on the clock, will you?"

  Lew grumbled, “Helluva note when it's a crime to drive your friends home—"

  The policeman was bored, but courteous. “It's no crime to be on the street. But the law says you have to tell us beforehand for your own protection. That way we know who you are and where you'll be, and won't make the mistake of shooting you for a Pharig. You want me to radio for a permit for you to drive home?"

  Fallon looked at Kerry. “No thanks, we'll spend the night here."

  “Sure, glad to have you.” Kerry said, picking up his cue. The policeman lost interest and turned away.

  For his benefit. Lew said in a loud voice, “Our friend here's had one too many. We'd better give him a hand or he'll flop on his noggin."

  Grudgingly admiring Fallon's quick thinking, Kerry helped him hoist the sagging Ben out of the car. As, they stumbled up the steps Kerry saw, behind the curtained window of the front door, the silhouette of a woman. He called out and the door opened from inside. Swiftly they hauled Ben over the threshold.

  Ruth Donalson, her fingers still gripping the doorhandle, cried out in relief as Kerry came toward her.

  “Kerry! Oh darling, do you know what time it is? I was so frightened—” Her eyes fell on the sagging man and all the blood drained from her face.

  Lew Fallon moved, with a catlike swiftness, to slam the door before her scream could reach the ears of the departing policeman.

  The woman wailed “Ben! What happened to you?"

  “Be quiet, Ruthie,” Kerry urged.

  Ruth subsided and drew back, her eyes wide with distress and pity.

  Ben's lips moved in their frightful smile. “Anyway you recognized me, Ruthie,” he said. “That's more than, Kerry did."

  Ruth Donalson was quick to recover her self-control. “But you are hurt. You're sick! The front bedroom, Kerry, it's closer. Let me go first and pull down the shades."<
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  She hurried ahead, drawing down opaque blinds in a room of spacious dimensions. There was a moment of waiting. They heard the prowlie roar and drive away. Finally Ruth pulled down a blanket and let the two men ease Ben Thrusher down on the clean sheets.

  “What's the matter with him, Kerry?” she demanded, while Lew Fallon bent to help Ben out of the bursting slippers.

  Ben Thrusher closed his eyes and said huskily, “Radiation burns. Don't worry, Ruthie—I'm in no great pain, It's swell to see you again. You go on to bed now. I've got to talk to Kerry while there's still time."

  “Do as he says, dear,” Kerry said. “If there's any trouble I want you to be able to say honestly that you didn't know anything about it."

  Ruth started to leave, then turned in bewildered uncertainty toward Lew Fallon. Kerry, recalling himself, said: “Mr. Fallon—my wife. You remember Dr. Fallon, Ruthie?"

  Ruth nodded. “Yes, of course. And this young man is his son. I'm sorry we haven't another guest room. But I'll make up a bed right away—"

  “Please don't bother,” Fallon protested. “I don't think any of us will do much sleeping."

  Kerry asked, “Are the kids in bed, dear?"

  “Yes, hours ago—or they ought to be,” Ruth said. The words were hardly out of her mouth when there was a sudden sound behind her.

  “Phil!” Kerry snapped, catching sight of a small freckled face in the doorway, “Go right back to bed this instant."

  “I heard the police car, Daddy—” the little boy started to protest. But Ruth hurriedly blocked the door so that he could not see into the room, and pulled it shut behind her.

  Inside the room, Ben Thrusher said, “Ruthie hasn't changed a bit, has she? Bless her! Phil must be quite a boy by now,” he added with a faint sigh.

  “Did you really want to see the kid, Ben?"

  Ben said quietly, “Sure. But I don't want him to see me. Not like this."

  Kerry said uncomfortably, “Ben, is there anything I can do for you, anything you need? Should I try to get hold of that doctor I mentioned?"

  But Ben's eyes had slipped shut. Kerry drew up a chair, and sat motionless at his old friend's side for some minutes. In the back of his mind he was still as concerned as ever about Ben. But the instincts of a newspaperman are a recognizable syndrome. Hunger, thirst, and sex are minor tropisms compared to a newsman's curiosity.

  He got up and joined Lew Fallon, who had drawn the shade a little aside and was looking out guardedly into the lighted street.

  He said “They're not likely to look for him here. And now don't you think you owe me some explanation of all this? I heard that the Army closed down the rocket project—about the time Ben was supposed to have been killed."

  Fallon let the shade fall into place and turned around with a gesture of bitter impatience. “And didn't it ever strike you as being deliberately planned? When the whole planet is in the throes of total war with invaders from outer space, why would the Army close down rocket research at the precise moment when four top scientists disappear!"

  Kerry thought he was beginning to understand. “You mean the project just went underground? Then why—?"

  The bandaged man on the bed stirred. He said, “Let me tell it, Lew. No, it wasn't an Army ship. You might call me a—well, a fifth columnist. The Army really thought I was dead. I covered my tracks pretty well.” Ben's voice had cleared a little, and was almost recognizable.

  “Listen carefully, Kerry. When the Science draft took me in the Army I was told I'd be working on rockets and guided missiles for the Free Americas. We were all set to beat the Asian Alliance to the Moon. We even had rocket bombs with thermonuclear warheads to blast the Asians right off the planet if they gave us any trouble. Then we're confronted with the Pharig threat, and immediately the Free Americas are rubbing noses with the Asians. And what does Earth-United Science Services order me to do? Build solar-power packs—cheap power for private homes. War effort, they called it!"

  “But the solar-power project was a wartime measure,” Kerry pointed out. “The big central power-plants were too easy a target. Remember when the Pharigs bombed Niagara and Grand Coulee? If we'd ever had a complete power failure in those areas—"

  “Considerate of them, wasn't it—to wait until everyone in both areas was using solar-power,” said Ben quietly. “I know all the arguments for decentralization, Kerry. I fell for it too—for a while. Do you remember the big Pharig ships that crashed in Iceland and Tibet?"

  On familiar ground now, Kerry said, “Sure. I went to Iceland to get the story."

  Embittered laughter came from Ben's ravaged throat. “I'll bet you didn't get within a mile of it!"

  “You'd lose your bet. I saw it from two hundred feet. But I wasn't allowed aboard, and the Army officials deliberately exposed all the film we brought, so we couldn't print photographs."

  “For the omnipresent reason of public morale, I suppose,” Ben commented. “I wasn't allowed aboard, either. Not a single man from the rocket-research division was allowed aboard. But they couldn't clamp down on public information eight years ago the way they can today. Pass or no pass, I decided I'd get to see the thing from the inside. So, finally, I did get aboard. And I snooped and snooped until I found it—” His voice thinned out.

  Kerry had to prompt him. “Found what?"

  “I still don't know who slipped up and left it there for me to find,” Ben said. “But when I saw it, I resigned. That Pharig ship was made right here on Earth, Kerry. It didn't come from outer space at all."

  Kerry looked at him, appalled. “Does that mean—that some men from the rocket project sold out to the Pharigs?"

  Lew Fallon cut in angrily, “Listen to what he says, will you, not to your own ideas! Why do you think he had to disappear? He's trying to tell you that the ship was a big fake. There aren't any Pharigs. There never were any!"

  If Ben had said it, Kerry might have dismissed it as delirium. He stared at the hard-headed youth, then back at the dying man on the bed. Ben's hairless skull moved in silent agreement. When the silence threatened to become unendurable, Kerry said quite reasonably, “But that's impossible."

  “Have you ever seen a Pharig? Has anyone you know ever seen one? What do you know about the Pharigs? Not just what do you copy off the news releases and the news wires and the propaganda releases of Earth United, but what do you really know?"

  Kerry pressed his fingers against his eyes. “How do I know the south pole exists? I've never been there. How do I know the moon's not made of green cheese? No, I've never seen a Pharig."

  “And neither has anybody else, because there aren't any such creatures."

  “You're crazy,” Kerry said. But to his surprise his voice carried no conviction. He was trying to remember the different Pharig atrocity stories he had printed in the last year. People brutally murdered in the streets—buildings and property wrecked. Yet the crime rate was falling so low that city after city was abolishing its prison system. If the Pharigs did not exist, why were such inhuman acts committed?

  He put the question in terrible puzzlement, adding, “Of course I've never seen a Pharig. Not to my knowledge. But they're humanoid. It takes a neuron-gun charge to prove a man isn't one, and if he is, there isn't enough left for an autopsy. For all I know, you could both be Pharigs!"

  “Convenient, isn't it?” Ben Thrusher said, a bleak hopelessness in his voice.

  Lew Fallon interrupted. “Have you ever seen a single so-called Pharig atrocity that couldn't be the work of human vandals or hooligans?"

  Kerry said helplessly, “There's no arguing on those grounds."

  Ben twisted spasmodically on the bed, pressing his swollen face into the pillow. His voice came out muffled, “No arguing with me. What about you? You understand it better now. Even if the hoax could be exposed, who'd believe it after thirteen years? And the longer it goes on, the harder it would be to convince anyone. Oh, hell, why didn't I die in the crash? After all I went through to get in touch with you—”
He pounded the pillow furiously with his swathed fists, then collapsed and lay still, gasping and choking.

  Kerry approached the bed and laid a hand on the quivering shoulders. “Try to get some rest, old man. Can't you tell me in the morning?"

  Ben Thrusher rolled over. His face had visibly deteriorated in the last few hours. Now it was a swollen, grotesque mask, unnaturally drained of all expression.

  Fallon said fiercely, “Give him a chance, will you? He hasn't time to argue every point with you! And if you believe in this non-existent war, name one war plant that's making anything in the shape of a weapon! Why did we never use any of our stockpiled H-bombs against the Pharigs?"

  “In our own atmosphere?” Kerry demanded. “If we'd done that the radioactive fallout would have endangered the lives of our own citizens!"

  “I know what the war plants are making. Solar power packs. I'll bet you have one on this house right now?” He mimicked Kerry's nod. “Cheap proteins, yeast and fungi stuff, for the Famine Belt countries—"

  “Well, what of that? An Earth divided is an Earth—"

  “I'd rather you didn't repeat that one-world propaganda excuse in my presence,” Ben said weakly.

  “Why didn't we accept the risks and wallop the Pharigs right out of the Solar System?"

  “When we didn't even have space flight?"

  Ben gave an almost inarticulate groan of protest. “We didn't have space flight? The everlasting hell we didn't! I developed the drive myself—my team, that is—and the Army of Earth United thanked us politely, closed down the rocket project and told me to go build solar-power packs instead."

  His voice failed, and Fallon took up the story. It had taken them eight years. Young Fallon did not know all of the details, but he sketched them in. Eight years of being officially dead; eight years of hiding, of working in secret.

  He would not name the private enterprise and industries who had financed the ship. But he was quite explicit about their reasons. They were men, and groups of men, who for one reason or another hated the new regime. They were men who had been appalled by what they considered the betrayal of the Free Americas through cooperation with the Asian Alliance and who rebelled against the military rule which the population as a whole accepted as a necessity. They were above all men who objected to the centralized police law—for although the Army of Earth United functioned on a planet-wide scale, there was no government more central than the local government of each city.