“Now you’re part of us officially,” Rita O’Neill said.
Benteley grunted.
The woman’s eyes were dark and intense. “You saved my uncle’s life. You saved all our lives; the body would have blown this resort to fragments.”
“Leave him alone,” Shaeffer said to her warningly.
Rita ignored him. Leaning toward Benteley, her strong face avid, she continued, “You should have killed Verrick while you were at it. You could have. He was there, too.”
Benteley threw down his fork. “I’m through eating.” He got to his feet and left the table. “If nobody minds, I’ll be outside walking around.”
He strode out of the dining room and into the corridor. A few Directorate officials stood here and there talking softly. Benteley wandered aimlessly around, his mind in turmoil.
After awhile Rita O’Neill appeared at the doorway. She stood watching him, her arms folded tautly. “I’m sorry,” she said presently.
“It’s all right.”
She came up beside him, breathing rapidly, red lips half-parted. “I shouldn’t have said that. You’ve done enough.” She put her quick, feverish fingers on Benteley’s arm. “Thanks.”
Benteley pulled away. “I broke my oath to Verrick; let’s face it. But that’s all I can do. I killed Moore—he was as soulless as he is bodyless. He’s nothing but a calculating intellect, not a man. But I’m not going to touch Reese Verrick.”
Rita’s black eyes blazed. “Common sense ought to tell you better than that. You’re so noble and full of ethics! Don’t you know what Verrick would do to you if he caught you?”
“You don’t know when to stop. I swore on to your uncle; isn’t that enough? On paper I’m a felon; I broke a law. But I don’t consider myself a criminal.” He faced her defiantly. “Understand?”
Rita retreated. “I don’t consider you a felon, either.” She hesitated uncertainly. “Will you try to tell him what to do?”
“Cartwright? Of course not.”
“You’ll let him run things himself? Wakeman wouldn’t let him. He has to run things; you can’t interfere.”
“I never told anybody what to do in my life. All I want to do is—” Benteley shrugged angrily, unhappily. “I don’t know. Be another Al Davis, I suppose. Have my house and a good job. Mind my own business.” His voice rose in despair. “But goddam it, not in this system. I want to be an Al Davis in some world where I can obey the laws, not break them. I want to obey the laws! I want to respect them. I want to respect the people around me.”
Rita was silent a moment. “You respect my uncle. You will, if you don’t now.” She broke off, embarrassed. “Don’t you respect me?”
“Sure,” Benteley said.
“Do you mean it?”
Benteley grinned crookedly. “Of course. In fact . . .”
At the end of the hall Major Shaeffer appeared. He shouted at Benteley, faint and shrill. “Benteley, _run!_”
Benteley stood paralyzed. Then he jerked away from Rita O’Neill. “Get in there with your uncle.” He yanked out his popper.
“But what-”
Benteley turned and raced down the corridor to the descent ramp. Corpsmen and Directorate officials scurried everywhere. He reached the ground level and ran desperately toward the balloon-wall.
It was too late.
A clumsy figure in a half-removed Parley suit blocked his way. Eleanor Stevens, red hair flaming, face pale, gasping for breath, hurried up beside him. “Get out of here,” she panted. In the heavy unfamiliar suit, she stumbled over a supply-carrier and half-fell against the wall. “Ted,” she wailed. “Don’t try to fight him; just run. If he gets you—”
“I know,” Benteley said. “He’ll kill me.”
At the entrance-sphincter of the balloon, a single high-velocity Hill transport had landed on the arid surface. Passengers were climbing out; a small knot of bulky figures was moving cautiously toward the resort.
Reese Verrick had arrived.
FIFTEEN
LEON CARTWRIGHT moved toward the entrance-sphincter. “You had better disappear for awhile,” he said to Benteley, “I’ll talk to Verrick.”
Shaeffer gave rapid instructions; a group of Corpsmen came hurrying up, accompanied by a handful of Directorate officials. “It isn’t really worth it,” Shaeffer said to Cartwright. “He might as well stay here. He can’t leave the resort and Verrick knows he’s here. We might as well get this thrashed out.”
“Verrick can just walk in here?” Benteley asked helplessly.
“Of course,” Cartwright answered. “This is a public resort. He’s not an assassin; he’s an ordinary citizen.”
“Do you mind being present?” Shaeffer asked Benteley. “It may be—difficult.”
“I’ll stay,” Benteley said.
Verrick and his small group pushed slowly through the wide entrance-sphincter. Removing their suits, they glanced cautiously around.
“Hello, Verrick,” Cartwright said. The two of them shook hands. “Come on inside and have a cup of coffee. We were eating.”
“Thanks,” Verrick answered. “Yes, if you don’t mind.” He looked haggard, but calm. His voice was low; he followed Cartwright obediently up the corridor toward the dining-room. “You know, don’t you, that Pellig has left?”
“I know,” Cartwright said. “He’s heading out toward John Preston’s ship.”
The others followed after the two of them as they entered the dining-room and seated themselves. MacMillans had cleared the table; they rapidly reset cups and saucers. Benteley seated himself beside Rita O’Neill at the far end of the table from Verrick. Verrick saw him, but he gave no sign beyond a momentary flicker of recognition. Shaeffer, the other Corpsmen and Directorate officials, took seats in the background and listened and watched respectfully.
“I suppose he’ll find it,” Verrick murmured. “When I left Farben, he was already thirty-nine astronomical units out; I checked with the ipvic monitor. Thanks.” He accepted black coffee and sipped it with relief. “A hell of a lot has happened, today.”
“What would Moore do if he got hold of Preston’s material?” Cartwright asked. “You know him better than I do.”
“It’s hard to say. Moore was always a lone wolf. He was in it for himself . . . I provided him with materials and he worked away on his projects. He’s brilliant.”
“I got that impression. Didn’t he engineer the whole Pellig project?”
“It was all his idea. I went out and hired him; I knew he was good. I didn’t try to tell him what to do.”
Eleanor Stevens had come quietly into the dining-room. She stood, nervous and uncertain, her small thin hands clasped tightly together. After a moment of anxious indecision she slipped into a seat in the dim recesses of the room and watched wide-eyed, a demure and terrified shape half-lost in the shadows.
“I wondered where you went,” Verrick said to her. “You beat me here by—” He examined his watch.
“Only a few minutes.”
“Will Moore go back to you if he gets what he wants?” Cartwright asked.
“I doubt it. There wouldn’t be any real reason.”
“His oath?”
“He never worried about that sort of thing.” Verrick’s deep-set eyes strayed vaguely. “It seems to be the fashion among the bright young men. I suppose oaths don’t seem as important as they did, once.”
Benteley said nothing. Under his fingers his hand-weapon was cold and moist with perspiration. His coffee cooled beside him, untouched. Rita O’Neill smoked convulsively, stubbed her cigarette out, lit another and then stubbed out that.
“Are you going to call a second Challenge Convention?” Cartwright asked Verrick.
“Oh, I don’t know. Not for awhile.” Verrick made an intricate pyramid with his massive hands, studied it, then dissolved it back into individual fingers. He gazed absently around the dining-room. “I don’t remember this place. It’s Directorate property, isn’t it?”
Shaeffer answered. “We always arrange something in advance. You’ll recall the interplan station we fixed for you outside Mars. That was constructed during Robinson’s reign.”
“Robinson.” Verrick mused cloudily. “I remember him. God, that was ten years ago. Has it really been that long?”
“Why did you come here?” Rita O’Neill’s voice cracked out.
Verrick’s shaggy eyebrows pulled together in a weary frown. He didn’t know Rita, obviously. He turned to Cartwright for an explanation. “My niece,” Cartwright said. He introduced them; Rita glared down at her coffee cup and said nothing. Her lips turned white and she clenched her fists until Verrick forgot her and went back to pyramiding his fingers and brooding.
“Of course,” Verrick said finally, “I don’t know what Benteley has told you. I suppose you understand my set-up, by now.”
“What Benteley didn’t tell me orally, Shaeffer scanned,” Cartwright answered.
Verrick muttered obscurely. “Then you know all I have to say by way of explanation,” he finished. He raised his massive head. “Can I take that for granted?”
“Yes,” Cartwright said, nodding. “Of course.”
“I don’t intend to bring in anything to do with Herb Moore. As far as I’m concerned that’s over and finished.” Verrick struggled with his pocket and finally brought out a massive Hopper popper, which he propped upright against his water glass and napkin ring. “I can’t very well kill Benteley here at the table. I’ll wait until later on.” A thought struck him. “I don’t have to kill him here at the resort. He can go back with me and I’ll kill him along the way, somewhere.”