‘But at that,’ he continued, ‘it’s an easier place to live than with the Angels.’
‘The Angels?’
‘Sure. We still got ’em. Must have been two or three thousand die-hards that chose to go to Coventry after the Revolution-you know that. There’s still a colony up in the hills to the north, complete with Prophet Incarnate and the works. They aren’t bad hombres, but they’ll pray you into heaven even if it kills you.’
All three states had one curious characteristic in common-each one claimed to be the only legal government of the entire United States, and each looked forward to some future day when they would reclaim the ‘unredeemed’ portion; i.e., outside Coventry. To the Angels, this was an event which would occur when the First Prophet returned to earth to lead them again. In New America it was hardly more than a convenient campaign plank, to be forgotten after each election. But in the Free State it was a fixed policy.
Pursuant to this purpose there had been a whole series of wars between the Free State and New America. The Liberator held, quite logically, that New America was an unredeemed section, and that is was necessary to bring it under the rule of the Free State before the advantages of their culture could be extended to the outside.
Magee’s words demolished MacKinnon’s dream of finding an anarchistic utopia within the barrier, but he could not let his fond illusion die without a protest. ‘But see here, Fader,’ he persisted, ‘isn’t there some place where a man can live quietly by himself without all this insufferable interference?’
‘No-‘considered Fader, ‘no . . . not unless you took to the hills and hid. Then you ‘ud be all right, as long as you steered clear of the Angels. But it would be pretty slim pickin’s, living off the country. Ever tried it?’
‘No . . . not exactly-but I’ve read all the classics: Zane Grey, and Emerson Hough, and so forth.’
‘Well . . . maybe you could do it. But if you really want to go off and be a hermit, you ‘ud do better to try it on the Outside, where there aren’t so many objections to it.’
‘No’-MacKinnon’s backbone stiffened at once-‘no, I’ll never do that. I’ll never submit to psychological reorientation just to have a chance to be let alone. If I could go back to where I was before a couple of months ago, before I was arrested, it might be all right to go off to the Rockies, or look up an abandoned farm somewhere. . . But with that diagnosis staring me in the face . . . after being told I wasn’t fit for human society until I had had my emotions re-tailored to fit a cautious little pattern, I couldn’t face it. Not if it meant going to a sanitarium’
‘I see,’ agreed Fader, nodding, ‘you want to go to Coventry, but you don’t want the Barrier to shut you off from the rest of the world.’
‘No, that’s not quite fair . . . Well, maybe, in a way. Say, you don’t think I’m not fit to associate with, do you?’
‘You look all right to me,’ Magee reassured him, with a grin, ‘but I’m in Coventry too, remember. Maybe I’m no judge.’
‘You don’t talk as if you liked it much. Why are you here?’
Magee held up a gently admonishing finger. ‘Tut! Tut! That is the one question you must never ask a man here. You must assume that he came here because he knew how swell everything is here.’
‘Still . . . you don’t seem to like it.’
‘I didn’t say I didn’t like it. I do like it; it has flavor. Its little incongruities are a source of innocent merriment. And anytime they turn on the heat I can always go back through the Gate and rest up for a while in a nice quiet hospital, until things quiet down.’
MacKinnon was puzzled again. ‘Turn on the heat? Do they supply too hot weather here?’
‘Huh? Oh. I didn’t mean weather control-there isn’t any of that here, except what leaks over from outside. I was just using an old figure of speech.’