The Fresco (34 page)

Benita started, gritted her teeth and began to move out of her hiding place. She still had a few shots left. Maybe she could hit a Fluiquosm when it started to move one of the humans. It stood to reason she'd be able to tell where it was from the way the packaged body was moved….

“Shhh,” said a voice at her ear.

Slowly, in total terror, she turned her head to confront the huge, compound eyes of…an Inkleozese, who spoke at some length, unintelligibly.

“The Pistach are on their way,” whispered the translator. “I strongly suggest that you stay here very quietly while we conduct our business. Our being here makes the ensuing time an official matter. It will be tiresome, time consuming, but do be still. They will not speak freely if they know you are listening.”

“The others…” murmured Benita, gesturing.

“They will not be harmed, and they will not move on their own. Only you were given the ability to shake off the Fluiquosm mindfog. Immunity to common types of predation is a usual gift to give an intermediary. We do not like persons of any planet interfering with official intermediaries.” The Inkleozese went up the trunk and out along a branch, where it disappeared among the leaves.

Like a great, big wasp, Benita thought to herself. A huge wasp, going about its business. Except it had more than six legs. However many legs, its presence was reassuring, and the expectation of Chiddy and Vess arriving was even more
so. And what was that about who speaking freely? The predators? Who cared if they spoke freely!

In the clearing, a fire had been built, and the Wulivery, some half dozen of them, were gathered around their fallen leader, while a dozen or so Xankatikitiki were busy with their slain comrades. The night was chilly, and she recalled that both the Wulivery and Xankatikitiki had high body temperatures. No doubt they felt the cold, but the Fluiquosm probably did not.

Abruptly, the fire leapt up, a bright light illuminated the clearing, and Chiddy's voice, tight with fury, said in impeccable English, “You will all have the courtesy to stay precisely where you are.” His words were followed by loud, simultaneous translations.

There were exclamations of surprise and annoyance. There was movement among the trees, quickly stopped, and several Inkleozese moved into the clearing tugging nets that were full of something invisible. These were pegged down with considerable dispatch under Chiddy's watchful eyes, though they continued to move restlessly as Chiddy spoke angrily.

“Stinky seems to have met with difficulty, and so has ‘Growr. Well, they have played games with your membership in the Confederation for many years. The last time you pulled something like this your people paid a monstrous fine. That alone should have been enough to dissuade you from repeating your behavior.”

“Oh, end talk, Pistach,” said a voice from one of the nets. “This planet is incredibly rich! There's enough here for all of us. You take the western half of it and civilize it. We'll take Asia and Africa and eat them. And the Inkleozese can monitor Europe to their souls' content. We won't even stumble over one another!”

“That may be true,” said Chiddy. “But we have rules against involving ourselves in adversarial or factional relationships on new planets. You're working with a rebel force against the legitimate government of this nation.”

“You're working with a reactionary element against the best interest of the people of this planet,” charged one of the
Wulivery. “And we're prepared to bring it before the Confederation court! These people don't need civilizing! They need weeding out! They need cutting down, losing their flab! Our entire population could dine four meals a day for a century before humans would even notice a drop in their population density!”

“That's true, but irrelevant,” said Chiddy, wrathfully. “The humans must come to grips with their own population problem.”

“Just like they come to grips with their own drug problem?” cried Odiferous Tentacle. “You're very selective which problems you will solve and which you won't.”

“We only solve the ones that affect Neighborliness, and you very well known it,” snapped Chiddy. “We solve situations that may lead to general war, situations that cause continuing discontent among populations. In our opinion, drugs do that, and weapons do that and repressions do that. Such things are powderkegs, just waiting to explode! Men with breeding madness versus women. Catholic Ireland versus the northern Protestants! Israel versus the Palestinians! Iraq or the Turks versus the Kurds! Serbia, what's left of it, versus the Universe! Ridiculous. These can be handled with a few suspensions, a few vanishments, without ending in a war that will kill off half the world's population!”

“Enough,” said one of the Inkleozese. “We are here to monitor this situation. We have already found the three predatory races to be in contempt of the regulations concerning hunting rights on assisted planets. We find the predatory races were properly informed of the Pistach initiative on Earth. We find the Xankatikitiki, the Fluiquosm, the Wulivery have no right to be here.”

“We raise a point of procedure,” cried a voice from an empty net.

“State your point,” answered the Inkleozese.

“Section 7A of the book of procedures establishes that when an initiative is begun on a false premise, that the initiative may be cancelled when the premise is corrected.”

“What false premise?” cried Chiddy.

“You say that Neighborliness will be best assured by elim
inating drugs and weapons and by quieting repressions. We, the predators, say that Neighborliness will be best assured when the population of this planet is reduced by at least half and that the best way to do this is to increase drugs and weapons, increase warlike situations, and let the predators have freedom to hunt here as they will.”

Hidden behind her tree, Benita shuddered. The world had been repeatedly swept by war and famine and plague when the population had been a quarter of what it was now! Less than a hundred years ago. Sparse population didn't equal peace. It never had. All it meant were fewer casualties.

The agitated net spoke again: “I will quote our Pistach friend who said, on Earthian TV, that it had read in a gardening book that one saved much labor by learning to love weeds….”

“Out of context,” cried Vess. “We said allow people to kill themselves if they will. We said nothing about doing the killing for them! We find no fault with suicide! People who risk their own lives or who do not want to live should not be rescued or required to live. We find great fault with murder!”

Three of the Inkleozese put their heads together, their antennas touching. One of them turned to the predators, saying, “You have legitimate points of argument. However, once planetary assistance has begun, points of procedure must be argued before the Council, not on the planet in question. Research into the history of this planet must be done. We will do so, and we will notify you of the hearing. In the meantime, you will return to your ships. You will enter into no further agreements with humans on this planet. The Pistach will continue their efforts for the time being, though those efforts may be set aside if your appeal is granted.”

There were howls, chitterings, yips and stinks of annoyance, but within a short time the predators had departed, along with their dead comrades. Then the Inkleozese set about lowering the captives from the trees and stripping off the membrane wrappers. At this point, Chiddy came to Benita.

“Are you all right, dearest Benita?” He morphed into his favorite male human form, one she had become accustomed
to, a rather professorial or perhaps wizardly form with graying hair and far-seeing eyes. “Oh, we so deeply regret not being there when these…naughty people took you away. There is your friend, Chad. The Inkleozese are helping him, now. It is necessary they work on him a little, wiping out the mind picture put in his head by the Fluiquosm.”

“My son ought to be among those prisoners,” she murmured. “And the girl who was taken at the same time. And Bert.”

“What is best to do with them?” Chiddy asked. “We can return them near the place they were taken from. Perhaps that would save much trouble?”

“It would save trouble. I think. Only…didn't the cabal ask that they be kidnapped? This has all happened in such a rush. It's hard to think. It's still night, but it's Monday, isn't it? I'm supposed to appear before a committee this morning? And…Morse? He believes he still has Bert and Carlos and Angelica, even though it wasn't really Angelica? Maybe we shouldn't let him know what's happened here tonight. Maybe we should let him think he still has them.”

“For what reason?”

“I don't know. Just that telling the truth to men like that never does any good. They always deal from a stacked deck.”

“Which is cheating?”

“Yes. And the only way to beat a cheater is to cheat better,” she said.

The nearest Inkleozese said, “We will take these people, your son and his father and the female, and we will keep them for a time, while you decide what should be done with them. The others, we will return to the places they were taken from.”

“Perhaps that's best,” agreed Chiddy. “What is important now is to get you and Chad back to your homes. It is almost dawn.”

One thing about Inkleozese, Benita soon understood, was their extreme efficiency. Everything happened with such dispatch that she found it difficult to remember how, exactly, she'd gotten home. She'd come in a ship, a very small
one, and it had landed outside the back door, and they had let her in even though she hadn't had her keys with her. It was just as she had left it, except that the broken glass had been swept up, the broken windows had been boarded up, and Sasquatch was missing. A howl that came up the firewell from the stockroom told Benita he wasn't far away. She went into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror. A mess. She took off her trousers and looked at her legs. Her knees and lower legs were blistered where they'd been in contact with Stinky as she crawled out.

She stripped off the rest of her clothes, took a quick, hot shower, and put on one of her long sleep-tees. As she came out the bathroom door she heard an “Ahem” from the doorway.

Chiddy. He was holding out a small bottle. “Tonic,” he said. “To make you feel you have slept well and are unstressed and confident. We sent some home with Chad, as well.”

“Is it a drug?” she asked.

He frowned. “You mean, is it addictive? No. Unless you are addicted to staying up all night every night and being frightened out of your wits all the time. Then, I suppose, one might come to rely on it.”

She laughed, the laughter becoming almost hysterical, until she found herself sitting on the bed, Chiddy holding a cold washcloth to her head. “Did you think they would eat you?” he asked.

“Chiddy, they did eat me! Or, one of them did. I was inside a Wulivery. My legs, look at them, they're all red and blistered and they burn like fury…”

He growled something and disappeared, returning in a moment with another bottle containing a lotion that he spread upon the reddened skin. The relief from pain was immediate. “Twice each day,” he muttered angrily, recapping the bottle and setting it beside her. “The Inkleozese didn't tell me. How did you get out?”

“I killed it,” she said. “And two Xankatikitiki, as well.”

“You killed them! Three of them. Remarkable.”

“Oh, yeah. I'm a walking advertisement for the NRA. Where did the Inkleozese take Bert and the kids?”

He shrugged. “Somewhere nearby. They will not suffer, any of them, and Vess and I agree it is best for the cabal not to know what has happened. In a few hours, you must appear before Senator Morse's committee.”

“That's right,” she sighed.

He stared at her for a time, nodding. “Chad will come get you. Until near the time, perhaps you should sleep.”

“If I can, sure.”

“Drink the tonic,” he said. “You'll find you can.”

MONDAY

By eight o'clock on Monday morning, Benita felt considerably better. Chiddy's tonic had calmed her down, brightened her eyes, and allowed her to convince herself, as Chiddy suggested, that she was involved in an interesting episode in human history rather than the debacle of the millennium. Shortly after eight, Chad called to say she was to appear before Morse's committee in closed session. “I don't like that closed session bit.”

“Neither do I. We'll see what we can do when we get there.”

Chad drove her to the Capitol, where they went down a wide hallway without attracting the least attention. In the committee room, Senator Morse was already seated, glaring at the far end of the table with its empty chair, the one Benita was presumably to occupy. When he looked up and saw her, he started, very much as though her presence was unexpected.

Chad caught the reaction and pressed her arm. Benita murmured, “He thought I wouldn't show up. Now isn't that interesting.”

To either side of the table committee members fumbled
papers and murmured to one another, glancing with equal curiosity first at Benita and Chad and then at Morse. Perhaps, Benita thought, they had assumed she would have two heads. Or tentacles. Perhaps they had assumed a pregnant Morse would not appear. Whatever their assumptions, here she was, and here he was, and the one thing that really bothered her was that there were no neutral outside observers in the room. She didn't trust Morse and much preferred that he do nothing to her or with her in private.

“Who are you?” Morse demanded of Chad.

“I'm the intermediary's bodyguard, Senator. I'm an FBI agent, and I'll stay with her during the hearing.”

“You will not,” said Morse. “This is a private hearing.”

Benita felt herself flushing. It was all too, too reminiscent of a former occasion. “I agreed to speak to this committee voluntarily,” she said. “However, I will not do so unless Agent Riley is here.”

“My dear lady, you will be held in contempt of Congress if you do not do precisely what we order,” sneered Morse.

She started to speak, hushing when Chad put his hand on her arm. “Senator, the envoys are not delighted at your demanding the intermediary to be here, and though we do not know how they might react to such an action on your part, we have seen what actions they are capable of. Our agency, at least, feels it is wiser to be cautious.”

One of Morse's committee members leaned over and whispered in Morse's ear, his hand over the microphone. Morse's nostrils flared and his mouth twisted unattractively.

Benita distinctly heard the colleague say, “By, you're making an ass of yourself. We don't want to rub the envoys the wrong way and this hearing is all on the record, anyhow.”

While Morse, flushing, pretended to look at the papers before him, Benita sat down, her feet together in ladylike fashion, her hands folded in her lap.

The colleague asked her to state her name.

“Your committee knows who I really am,” she said. “You were told by Congressman Alvarez. The envoys prefer that my name not be widely used. To protect my privacy and
that of my family, and for the purposes of this hearing, I am Jane Doe.”

“For the purposes of this hearing,” snarled Morse, “you are whoever you are. Give us your name.”

“Since this intermediary business has been dumped on me, Senator, and since my family knows nothing about it, it would be polite of the committee to grant my wish for anonymity.”

Morse spluttered and boomed, “It will be necessary to question your family in order to ascertain that you are who and what you say you are.”

Benita glared at him, feeling her mind slip a gear. “That is utterly specious, Senator. The FBI has already ascertained that I am who I say I am. Why don't you ask your questions, and if you think some particular question isn't answered honestly, we can talk about a polygraph. My intention is to tell the truth, and since I have not been consulted about any decisions the envoys have made or any activity they have engaged in or thought of engaging in, I have no reason whatsoever to lie about it.”

Benita had read McIntyre's
FrankenStarr
when it first came out, so she wasn't totally unprepared for the deep-water fishing expedition Morse conducted. Where had she met the aliens? What had they looked like to her? What had she done, where had she gone? When had she met with the president?

“The day after I delivered the cube to Congressman Alvarez.”

“Who else was at that meeting?”

“General Wallace.”

“Was that the only time you met with the president?”

“That was the only time I have seen the president in person,” Benita answered. “Agent Riley was appointed my go-between to the White House, and I have communicated through him.”

Her answers obviously displeased Morse. “Aside from that dinner you attended, who have you spoken to about the aliens?”

“The only people I have spoken to about the aliens are Rep
resentative Alvarez and General Wallace, and—” she meant to continue with the SOS and the FL, but he interrupted.

“And the president?”

“No, I didn't speak to him about them even when I saw him. The president simply thanked me for my efforts because by that time he'd already seen the envoys for himself.”

“What have you done since that time?” asked someone else.

“Once the FBI was involved, I figured the matter was out of my hands. Since then, all I've done is transmit messages from the Pistach to Mr. Riley, who transmits them to whoever needs to know.”

“Why was the FBI involved in the first place?” Morse snarled, with a glare at Chad.

Benita pursed her lips, considering. “To do just what you said you wanted to do, Senator. The White House and the Justice Department felt it was wise to check me out and be sure I am who I say I am, to be sure my story is true.”

Somebody snapped at Chad, “Is that the case?”

Chad said it was.

At this juncture, Senator Morse snarled at Benita, “This all sounds very innocent, but you and I both know that you and the president and others have conspired to let these predators take over our country, haven't you?”

That came so far from left field that her jaw dropped and the committee members hastily covered microphones and began muttering to one another. While they squabbled lengthily, she decided upon a response, beginning by saying stiffly:

“I'm not aware they're taking over the country, sir. If so, I certainly didn't plan it. I can't speak for the Pistach, though my opinion is they didn't plan it either. They were extremely upset when they learned the predators were here, and they've already given them notice to leave the planet.”

She paused, looked thoughtful, shook her head and said, barely audibly, “No, I shouldn't say…”

“Say what?” he pounced. “What were you going to say?”

She bit her lip, hesitated, breathed rapidly to make herself flush. “I'm not sure it's relevant, Senator.”

He almost screamed at her. “I'll be the judge of that! Answer the question.”

She said, haltingly, as if she hadn't planned it down to every pause and sigh: “I started to say that it…ah…probably wasn't the envoys or the president who encouraged the predators.” Sigh. “It's probable that the predators have sought or even made an agreement with some member or members of the U.S. Congress.” Sigh, again, look down, pick at the seam of her skirt, shake her head very slightly. “They do want hunting privileges on Earth very badly.”

Morse turned absolutely white.

“Hunt what?” cried one of the members.

“Why, people,” she said, looking up innocently. “There are more of us here than anything else.”

And at that point the committee room exploded, some yelling, some looking serious, some merely staring angrily at Morse while others focused their suspicion on Benita. There were only men on this committee, loud ones, and Benita put her hands over her ears. Chad leaned over to her and asked her if she wanted to take a break while they ranted at one another. She nodded. He whispered to one of the members, and they went out, Benita to the ladies' room, Chad to a secluded corner of the corridor where he could use his phone. When Benita opened the door to come out, she saw reporters and cameramen in the hallway. She wasn't ready to talk to them yet. They didn't see her, and when she peeked out a bit later, they had gone.

“They'll be downstairs when we're finished,” Chad said, looking into her eyes with frank curiosity. “Did you have that bombshell all ready to drop on him?”

“Sort of,” she admitted, flushing. “I was angry at being harassed, first off, and when I got here I was even angrier at being accused of things, and I thought, well, that works both ways. Why not be the accuser instead of the accused? That contempt of Congress bit just made me furious, Chad. Just like the judge in Albuquerque. Let Morse be dropped in the you-know-what for a change.”

They went back to the committee room. Senator Morse
was pale, his lips pinched, his jaw seeming set in cement, but he managed to speak without yelling.

“Why did you say the predators had already made contact with members of Congress?”

She gave him her innocent look. “I said it was probable, Senator, because the Pistach told me that's the predators' usual mode of action. If they can get some level of government or even some individual associated with the government to make an agreement with them, like a senator or a representative or some member of the staff of a legislator, even if some other level of government or other individuals would oppose such an agreement, the matter then has to be settled in the Confederation courts, and it can take a very long time to sort out. Centuries, even. During which the predators go on hunting. The Pistach told me the predators always record such understandings…”

Morse turned, if possible, even paler.

“…so they have them for evidence in Confederation courts.”

A thoughtful-looking man at the end of the table asked, “Do you, personally, know anyone who might be involved with the predators?”

“I can't swear to it,” she said. “But I think General McVane may be involved, along with a man named Dink Dinklemier, a man named Prentice Arthur, and a man named Briess. The man named Arthur approached my husband and the man named Briess evidently threatened my son. I also received an anonymous phone call early this morning threatening to hurt my family if I didn't turn myself over to the person calling. I told the voice on the phone that I couldn't because I'd agreed to appear before this committee.”

The place blew up again. The name Dinklemier led them straight to Morse, and he became the immediate focus of their shouted questions. Someone, presumably the vice chairman, grabbed the gavel out of his hand and declared a thirty-minute recess. Chad and Benita left, Chad remarking to the man at the door that they would be in the House gallery. They sat there, watching Congress at work, Benita remarking that on that particular day, it was not exciting.

“I'm not sure it ever is,” Chad admitted. “Why did you clue them in on the cabal?”

“Morse knew where I was because Dink knew where I was from the predators. What he was really after was a private inquiry, just him and me, with nobody monitoring it, so he could extort information or misinformation by threatening me or my family.” She recalled Morse's face and added, “Or by other means.”

“What's his motive?”

“Oh, hell, Chad, I don't know! Maybe he actually believes the president invited the Pistach here, or the predators. Maybe the rest of the cabal didn't tell him they were talking to the predators, so he believes the accusation he just made. Maybe he thinks he can make a name for himself by interrogating the envoys, and he thinks he can get at them through me. Maybe he's just pulling a McCarthy, telling big lies and getting his name in the newspapers. What's your best guess?”

Chad frowned. “It's likely he's known about the predators all along. It's probable he doesn't care whether the information he might get out of you is true or not so long as it includes something he can use. He's part of a small group who would rather get the president than go to heaven. It's deeply personal, it's unabashed hatred, and he keeps yanking at the strings, trying to find something that will come unraveled. It's like the independent prosecutor business. If you don't have a case, just unlimber your fishing poles and go at it until you catch something you can blow up into a case, no matter how irrelevant it is.”

She watched him thinking, each separate thought crossing his face like a cloud shadow, darkening and lightening, the way she had seen them do over the canyon lands, revealing, concealing. She wanted to touch his face, and the thought made her bite her lip and clench her hands. He was a married man. With young sons. He was not available. Nor was she. Nonetheless, though the urge had been a very modest one, it was the first honest-to-God even remotely sexual urge she'd had in…a very long time!

She switched her mind to another subject. “There have to
be a few honest men on that committee who know we appeared voluntarily and won't let him get away with murder,” she murmured.

“You mean literal murder? You think he would kill you?”

“If he wanted to get rid of me and could do it without getting caught. He can still get me arrested on some pretext or other, like that contempt of Congress business. And once I'm in custody, something might happen to me. I'm taking Chiddy's word that I don't have to worry about Bert or Carlos and the girl.”

“And you've made it less likely for Morse to take action by implicating a committee staff member.”

“I hope I did,” she murmured. “Give them all something else to chew on. I was careful to say I couldn't swear to it, so they can't get me on perjury.”

“Remind me never to play cards with you,” he said.