The Penultimate Truth (7 page)

     "'Found!'"

     "These completed objects, made up by Lindblom, using Eisenbludt's studios in Moscow, will be planted on the land Runcible is about to break for his new conapts. However, it must be established in advance that they are of incalculable archeological worth. A series of articles in the prewar scientific journal _Natural World_, which as you know was formerly available to every educated man in the world, must analyze these as--"

     The office door opened. Looking wary, Verne Lindblom entered. "I was told to come here," he said to Brose; he glanced, then, at Adams. But said nothing more. However, they both understood; the vid-conversation which had taken place a half hour ago was not to be referred to.

     "These," Brose said to Lindblom, "are the scale drawings of the artifacts which you will make to be planted in Southern Utah. At the proper geological stratum." He swiveled the scroll for Lindblom to see; Verne glanced briefly, professionally. "There is a time factor, but I'm sure you can have them ready when needed. The first 'dozer needn't dig them up. Just so they appear before the digging ends and the construction begins."

     Lindblom said, "You have someone on Runcible's work crew who'll spot them, if necessary? If they otherwise go unnoticed?" He seemed, to Adams, to understand fundamentally what was going on; someone had already briefed him. He himself, however; he was baffled. But he played along; he continued to study the painstakingly, professionally executed drawings.

     "Of course," Brose said. "An engineer named Robert--" He tried to recall; the eighty-two-year-old brain flagged. "Hig," Brose said at last. "Bob Hig. He'll spot them if no one else does, so will you start, then, Lindblom? Eisenbludt knows you're to be given use of every tool and studio facility you need. But he doesn't know what for, and we will keep it limited to as few people as we can, throughout."

     "Hig finds them," Lindblom said, "notifies Runcible. Meanwhile--" He glanced at Adams. "You'll have your series in the prewar _Natural World_ by some world-famous archeologist regarding artifacts of this sort."

     "I see," Adams said, and genuinely did see, now. The articles which he would write would be printed in the journal, backdated, the issues artificially aged so as to appear authentically prewar; on the basis of them, as universally accepted valid scientific opinion, _the Estes Park Government would claim the artifacts to be priceless finds_. They would then go before the Recon Dis-In Council at Mexico City, the high court of the world that stood above both Wes-Dem and Pac-Peop and each Yance-man anywhere in the world--and above the wealthy, powerful builder Louis Runcible. And on the basis of these backdated spurious articles the council would rule the Estes Park Government to be legally correct. For artifacts of such worth automatically made the land government property.

     But--Brose did not want the land. So something was still wrong.

     "You do not see," Brose said, reading his expression. "Tell him, Lindblom."

     Verne Lindblom said, "The sequence is this. Hig, or someone else on Runcible's work crew supervising the leadies and the big autonomic rigs, discovers the artifacts and tells Runcible. And regardless of their worth, U.S. law notwithstanding--"

     "Oh my god," Adams said. Runcible would know that, if brought to the Estes Park Government's attention, these artifacts would cost him his land. "He'd conceal the find," Adams said.

     "Of course." Brose nodded in delight. "We've had Mrs. Morgen, at the Institute of Applied Psychiatric Research in Berlin, independently analyze the fully documented psych-profile of the man; and she agrees with our own psychiatrists. Why, hell; he's a businessman-- he's after wealth and power. What do priceless ancient artifacts made by a nonterran raiding party that landed in Southern Utah six hundred years ago mean to him? These skulls; the ones not Homo sapiens. Your articles will show a photo of this drawing. You will conjecture that these nonterrans landed, conjecture by meager bones and artifacts discovered what they were like, that they were engaged in a skirmish by an Indian war party, and the nonterrans lost, did not colonize Earth--all this is conjecture, and the evidence at the time of your articles, thirty years ago, was incomplete. But further finds were hoped for. These are those."

     "So now," Adams said, "we have fully representative weapons and bones. At last. The conjectures of thirty years ago have been verified and this is a moment of vast scientific import." He walked to the window, pretended to look out. The conapt builder Louis Runcible, when notified of the finds, would guess wrong--would suspect that they had been planted on his land so that he would lose that land; and, guessing wrong, would conceal the finds and continue with his digging and construction work.

     Whereupon--

     Motivated by loyalty to science rather than to his "employer" and that industrial magnate's greed, Robert Hig would "reluctantly" leak the discovery of the artifacts to the Estes Park Government.

     Which would make Runcible a felon. Because there was that law, obtaining again and again as the leadies employed by each Yance-man at his private demesne dug and dug for prewar relics of artistic and technological worth. Whatever he found--whatever his leadies found-- belonged to him, if there was no overriding--i.e., major--archeological worth.

     And a nonterran race which had landed on Earth six hundred years ago, fought a pitched battle with local Indians and then retreated, once more departed--it would be a _nolo contendere_ plea by Runcible before the Recon Dis-In Council in Mexico City; despite the finest legal help on Earth he wouldn't have the ghost of a chance.

     But Runcible would not merely lose his land.

     It would be a prison sentence for forty to fifty years, depending on the skill of the Estes Park Government's attorneys before the Council. And the Precious Relics Ordinance, as the law was called, had been tested by a number of Yance-men various times; discoveries of magnitude which had deliberately gone unreported and then been found out--the council would throw the book at Runcible and he would be wiped out; the economic empire which he had built up, his conapts all over the world, would revert to public domain: this was the punitive clause of the Precious Relics Ordinance, the clause that gave it such fierce gnashing teeth. The person convicted under the ordinance not only went to prison--he forfeited his holdings _in toto_.

     It all made sense to Adams; he saw now what his articles for _Natural World_, for issues of thirty years ago, were to consist of.

     But, and this made him freeze into stupidity; this blotted his mind of its canniness and made him hang vapidly on the colloquy between Brose and Lindblom, both of whom obviously understood the purpose of this--which he did not.

     Why did the Estes Park Government want to destroy Runcible? Of what was he guilty--at the very least, what menace did he pose to them?

     Louis Runcible who builds housing for tankers who come up to the surface expecting to find the war in progress, only to discover that the war ended years ago and the world's surface is one great park of villas and demesnes for the elite few . . . why, Adams asked himself, must this man be slaughtered, when he is so patently performing a vital service? Not just for the tankers who surface and who must live somewhere, but to us, the Yance-men. Because--and we all know it; we all face it--the tankers living in Runcible's conapts are prisoners and the conapts constitute reservations--or, as the more modern word has it, concentration camps. Preferable to the ant tanks underground, but still camps from which they cannot, even briefly, leave--legally. And, when a couple or a gang of them manage to sneak away illegally, it is General Holt's army here in Wes-Dem or Marshal Harenzany's army in Pac-Peop; anyhow it is an army of very skilled, veteran leadies who track them down and return them to their swimming pools and 3-D TV and wall-to-wall wubfur carpeted conapts.

     Aloud he said, "Lindblom, I'm standing with my back to B rose. Therefore he can't hear me. You can. I want you to casually turn your back to him; don't move toward me--just turn so your face is toward me and not toward him. And then for god's sake tell me why."

     After a moment he heard Lindblom stir. Then say, "Why what, Joe?"

     "Why are they after Runcible?"

     Lindblom said, "Didn't you know?"

     At the desk Brose said, "Nobody's facing me; please turn so we can continue the mapping of this project."

     "Say," Adams grated, staring out the window of the office at the other buildings of the Agency.

     "They think Runcible is systematically tipping off one ant tank after another," Lindblom said. "To the fact that the war is over. _Someone_ is. They know that. Webster Foote and his field people found that out during routine interviews of a group of tankers who surfaced a month or so ago."

     Brose complained with growing peevish suspicion, "What's going on? You two are conversing."

     At that, Adams turned from the window to face Brose; Lindblom, too, turned toward the monster concoction wedged somehow into the chair at the desk. "Not conversing," Adams said to Brose. "Just meditating."

     On Lindblom's face there was no expression. Only empty, stonelike detachment. He had been given a task; he intended to do it. He recommended to Adams by his manner that Joseph Adams do the same.

     But suppose it were not Runcible. Suppose it were someone else. Then this entire project, the faked artifacts, the articles in _Natural World_, the "leak" of the find, the litigation before the Recon Dis-In Council, the destruction of Runcible's economic empire and his imprisonment:

     It was all for nothing.

     Joseph Adams trembled. Because, unlike Brose, unlike Verne Lindblom and probably Robert Hig and anyone and everyone else connected with this project--he had a dreadful intuition that it was all a mistake.

     And his intuition was not going to halt the project.

     Not one bit.

     Again turning his back to Brose, Adam said, "Lindblom, they may be wrong. It may not be Runcible."

     There was no answer. Lindblom could not respond because he was, at the moment, facing Brose, who now, on his feet, was waddling and groping his way, supported by a magnesium crutch, toward the office door, mumbling as he departed.

     "Honest to god," Adams said, staring fixedly out the window, "I'll write the articles, but if it isn't him, I'm going to tip him off." He turned, then, toward Lindblom, tried to read his reaction.

     It was not there to read. But Lindblom had heard.

     The reaction would come, sooner or later; Joseph Adams knew this man, this personal friend, had worked with him enough to be sure of it.

     It would be a strong reaction. After a great deal of soul-searching Verne Lindblom would probably agree, probably help him find a way of tipping off Runcible without leaving a trail back to the source that Brose's agents could trace; Brose's agents and the private hired talents of the Footemen operating in conjunction. On the other hand--

     He had to face it; _was_ facing it.

     Verne Lindblom was a Yance-man, fundamentally. Before and beyond any other consideration.

     His reaction might be to report Adams' statement to Brose.

     The agents of Brose would, then, within minutes, show up at Joseph Adams' demesne and kill him.

     It was that simple.

     And at the moment there was no way he could tell which direction his long-time friend Lindblom would jump; Adams did not possess the services of an international psychiatric profile-analysis organization, as Brose did.

     He could only wait. And pray.

     And prayer, he thought caustically, went out twenty years ago, even _before_ the war.

     The field technician of the private police corporation Webster Foote, Limited, crouched in his cramped bunker and said into his aud receiver which transmitted to headquarters in London, "Sir, I have on tape a two-way conversation."

     "On that same matter we discussed?" Webster Foote's voice came, distantly.

     "Evidently."

     "All right. You know who's the acting contact with Louis Runcible; see that he gets it."

     "I'm sorry to say that this--"

     "Convey it anyhow. We do what we can with what we have." The far-off voice of Webster Foote was authoritative; this, coming from him, was a pronouncement of judgment as well as an order.

     "Yes, Mr. Foote, S.A.P."

     "Indeed," Webster Foote agreed. "Soon as possible." And, in London, at his end, he broke the aud-transmission.

     The Webster Foote, Limited field technician turned at once back to his banks of detection and recording apparatuses, economically operating at low gain but satisfactory output level; he examined the visual, graphic tapes appearing ceaselessly to be certain that during the audcontact with his superior he had missed nothing. Now was _not_ the time to miss anything.

     He had not.

7

     And meanwhile, the superb handwrought speech, untouched, remained in Joseph Adams' briefcase.