‘Wait,’ Festenburg said, holding up his hand. ‘One item. Just this particular exhibit, all properly sealed hermetically, bathed in a solution that maintains the thing ad infinitum, or, as you probably will prefer, ad nauseam. May I take you there? It’s in what we at the White House call Room 3-C.’ Festenburg walked to the door, held it open for Eric.
After a pause Eric followed.
Hands in the pockets of his rumpled, unpressed trousers, Festenburg led the way down one corridor after another until at last they stood on a subsurface level, facing two high-ranking Secret Service men stationed at a metal reinforced door marked TOP SECRET, NO UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL PERMITTED.
‘I’m authorized,’ Festenburg said genially. ‘Gino’s given me the run of the warren; he has great trust in me, and because of this you’re going to see a state secret which you normally would never in a thousand years be allowed to view.’ As he passed by the uniformed Secret Service men and pushed open the door he added, ‘However, there will be one disappointing aspect of this; I’m going to show it to you but not explain it. I’d like to explain it but – very simply I can’t.’
In the center of the murky, cold room Eric saw a casket. As Festenburg had said, it was hermetically sealed; a pump throbbed dully, at its task of maintaining at extreme low temperatures whatever lay within the casket.
‘Look at it,’ Festenburg said sharply.
Deliberately pausing, Eric lit a cigarette, then walked over.
In the casket, supine, lay Gino Molinari, his face locked in agony. He was dead. Blood could be seen, dried drops on his neck. His uniform was torn, stained with mud. Both hands were lifted, the fingers writhing, as if trying even now to fight back at whatever — whoever – it was that had murdered him. Yes, Eric thought. I’m seeing the results of an assassination; this is the leader’s corpse, flailed with bullets emanating from a weapon with notably high muzzle velocity; the man’s body had been twisted, almost torn apart. It had been a savage assault. And – successful.
‘Well,’ Festenburg said, after a time, taking in a deep rush of breath, ‘there are several ways this item – which I like to think of as Exhibit One of the Cheyenne Freak Show – can be explained. Let’s assume it’s a robant. Waiting here in the wings for the moment that Gino needs it. Built by GRS Enterprises, the inventive Dawson Cutter, whom you must meet someday.’
‘Why would Molinari need this?’
Festenburg, scratching his nose, said, ‘Several reasons. In case of an attempted assassination – one which failed – this could be exhibited, taking the heat off Gino while he hid out. Or – it could be for the benefit of our sanguine ally; Gino may have it in the back of his mind that some incredibly complex, baroque plan will be necessary, something involving his retirement from office under the pressure they’re exerting on him.’
‘You’re sure this is a robant?’ To Eric the thing in the casket looked real.
‘I don’t even think it is, let alone know.’ Festenburg jerked his head and Eric saw that the two Secret Service men had entered the room; obviously it would not be possible to inspect the corpse.
‘How long has it been here?’
‘Only Gino knows and he won’t say; he just smiles slyly. “You wait, Don,” he says in his secretive fashion. “I got a big use for it.”‘
‘And if it’s not a robant—’
Then it’s Gino Molinari lying there ripped apart by machine-gun slugs. A primitive, outmoded weapon but it certainly can kill its victim beyond the possibility of even org-trans repair; you can see that the brain case has been punctured – the brain is destroyed. If it is Gino, then where’s it from? The future? There is a theory, having to do with your firm, TF&D. A subsidiary has developed a drug which permits its user to move freely in time. You know about that?’ He studied Eric intently.
‘No,’ Eric admitted. The rumor was more or less new to him.
‘Anyhow, here’s this corpse,’ Festenburg said. ‘Lying here day after day, driving me nuts. Perhaps it’s from an alternate present in which Gino has been assassinated, driven out of office the hard way by a splinter political group of Terrans backed by Lilistar. But there’s a further ramification of this theory, one which really haunts me.’ Festenburg’s tone now was somber; he was no longer in a joking mood. ‘That would imply something about the virile, strutting Gino Molinari who made that video tape; that’s not a robant either and GRS Enterprises did not manufacture it because it too is an authentic Gino Molinari from an alternate present. One in which war didn’t come about, one perhaps in which Terra didn’t even get mixed up with Lilistar. Gino Molinari has gone into a more reassuring world and plucked his healthy counterpart over here to assist him. What do you think, doctor? Could that be it?’
Baffled, Eric said, ‘If I knew anything about that drug—’
‘I assumed you would. I’m disappointed; that was my reason for bringing you here. Anyhow – there’s one other possibility . . . logically. Suggested by this assassinated corpse, here.’ Festenburg hesitated. ‘I hate to mention it because it’s so bizarre that it makes my other conjectures look tainted by association.’
‘Go head,’ Eric said tightly.
‘There is no Gino Molinari.’
Eric grunted. Good grief, he thought.
‘All of them are robants. The healthy one who’s on the video tape, the tired, sick one you’ve met, this dead one here in the casket – that somebody, possibly GRS Enterprises, engineered this to keep the ‘Starmen from taking over our planet. So far they’ve made use of the ill one.’ Festenburg gestured. ‘And now they’ve hauled out the healthy one, made the first tape of him. And there may be more. Logically, why not? I’ve even tried to imagine what other alternatives might be like. You tell me. In addition to the three we know, what’s left?’
Eric said, ‘Obviously it leaves the possibility of building one with powers above the norm. Beyond the merely healthy.’ He thought, then, of Molinari’s recovery from one terminal illness after another. ‘But maybe we have that already. Have you read the medical file?’
‘Yes.’ Festenburg nodded. ‘And there’s one very interesting .quality about it. None of the tests were conducted by any persons now on his medical staff. Teagarden didn’t authorize any of them; the tests predate him, and as far as I know, Teagarden, like yourself, has never managed to subject Gino to even a cursory physical exam. Nor do I think he ever will. Nor do I think you ever will, doctor. Even if you’re kept around here for years.’
‘Your mind,’ Eric said, ‘is certainly hyperactive.’
‘Am I a glandular case?’
‘That has no bearing on the matter. But you certainly have spun a lot of ad hoc ideas out of your own head.’
‘Based on facts,’ Festenburg pointed out. ‘I want to know what Gino is up to. I think he’s one hell of a smart man. I think he can outthink the ‘Starmen any day of the week, and if he had the economic resources and the population behind him that they have, he’d be in the driver’s seat, no contest. As it is, he’s in charge of one dinky planet and they have a system-wide empire of twelve planets and eight moons. It’s frankly a wonder he’s been able to accomplish all he has. You know, doctor, you’re here to find out what’s making Gino sick. I say that’s not the issue. It’s obvious what’s making him sick: the whole darn situation. The real question is: What’s keeping him alive? That’s the real mystery. The miracle.’
‘I guess you’re right.’ Grudgingly, he had to admit that despite his repellent qualities Festenburg was intelligent and original; he had managed to see the problem properly. No wonder Molinari had hired him.
‘You’ve met the schoolgirl shrew?’
‘Mary Reineke?’ Eric nodded.
‘Christ, here’s this tragic, complicated mess, this sick man barely making it through the day with the weight of the world, of Terra itself, on his back, knowing he’s losing the war, knowing the reegs are going to get us if by some miracle Lilistar doesn’t – and in addition he’s got Mary on his back. And the final blistering irony is that Mary, by being a shrew and simple-minded, selfish, demanding, and anything else you want to articulate as a basic character defect – she does have him on his feet; you’ve seen her get him out of bed and back into uniform, functioning again. Do you know anything about Zen, doctor? This is a Zen paradox, because from a logical standpoint Mary ought to have been the final straw that utterly destroyed Gino. It makes you rethink the entire role of adversity in human life. To tell you the truth, I detest her. She detests me, too, naturally. Our only working connection is through Gino; we both want him to make it.’