No one objected to his moving in and making the house his own, neither Bade nor the Guardian nor any of its “robots,” as Bade called them—its strange smooth-boned eerie skeletons with their heads like eggs, with jewels for eyes, jewels that Flound had already learned could shoot out spears of light, spears that burned and cut like swords. He told himself he didn’t fear the creatures, but he was very glad they didn’t object to his taking the house for his dwelling, or to his having a dozen friends in to talk and drink every day.
To talk and drink, six of them, while the other six dug beneath the flagstones, boring a tunnel under the plaza toward the wall. Then that six would come up and wash in the amazing streams of water that sprang at a touch from the wall into the huge tub, and the next six would go down, each taking his turn at shoveling, each taking his turn at filling the baskets and hauling them out. The pile of earth mounded high around the walls of the courtyard, but who was to see except Flound and his friends? He congratulated himself on his cleverness, and kept on digging.
“Surely Flound and his friends must have realized that any city protected by a wall would have constant searches for sappers undermining that wall!” the Guardian protested.
“They might have thought of it,” Bade agreed, “but the only such searching they know of, is men walking around the wall with long rods to thrust into the earth. They don’t see your robots walking around with probes, so they assume you’re not checking.”
“I forget that such intelligent men know nothing of sonar,” the Guardian sighed. “Are you sure you won’t let me teach them, Bade?”
“Not until the revolution is over, and won,” Bade said in an iron tone. “They have us outnumbered, after all. Let’s keep them at every disadvantage we can.”
“If you must,” the computer said with a tone of resignation. “But it goes against my twelfth programming directive, Bade.”
“Yes, a teacher by instinct as well as training.” Bade smiled without mirth. “I definitely can’t complain, since I’ve benefited so much by your instruction. But you have directives of higher priority, Guardian, one of which is to keep these men imprisoned for the security of the movement which is trying to restore the freedom you were programmed to protect.”
“Someone somewhere must have taken the concept of order in society too far, when the people fell out of contact with me,” the computer lamented. “Still, you are correct, Bade—we must keep them in. Surely, though, we can let them know that their tunnel will be closed before they can use it.”
“No, let them think they have succeeded.” Bade’s mouth drew into a thin, cruel smile. “Their disappointment will be all the sharper, and they will be that much less likely to try again. We must convince them that you’re unbeatable, Guardian. Our fight is virtually won, if they stop trying.”
“I confess I do not understand human thought processes well enough to disagree with you, Bade,” the computer acknowledged. “From what little I do know, though, it seems quite cruel.”
“Oh, it is,” Bade agreed, “but the suffering they would cause if they escaped, would be much more cruel by far.”
It was a good excuse, he realized, but acknowledged that it was just that, an excuse, and nothing more. The truth was that he would enjoy seeing the dismay and hurt on their faces, when they finished their tunnel and found it was useless. Revenge on one magistrate was sweet, but revenge on them all would be far more satisfying still.
They had to tunnel down quite a bit, for sure enough, the wall was deeply set in the earth. Finally they were ready for the final bit of digging, under the six-foot width of the wall and up. They waited for a night without a moon, gathered in the house during the day, and laughed and joked loudly, clinking glasses and giving all the evidence of a party. As darkness fell, they lit the lamps, kept the party going for another hour, then gradually slackened the noise, put out one lamp at a time, and finally gave the appearance of a sleeping house, filled with saturated partygoers who hadn’t bothered to go home—sensible enough, when none of them really had a home here.
Then, in the middle of the night, they went out to finish their tunnel.
Flound himself dug the last few feet to the surface with a will, grinning like a demon, filling basket after basket, which his comrades passed back from man to man until they dumped it in the courtyard, then passed it back empty. The shovel bit and shoved through. Flound held back a cry of triumph as he quickly battered at the hole, widening it, pushing back the edges, pounding the grass down with the back of the shovel …
… and paused as he saw two long, thin gleaming legs stretching up from the edge of the hole. With a sinking heart, he followed them up to the crosspiece that served as hips, the flattened tank that served as ribs, the pipe-thin arms and skeletal hands, and finally the ruby-eyed egg of its head.
“You really must not come out, Magistrate Flound,” the robot said.
Flound stared in horror while his friends jostled close, asking, “What is it? Why have you stopped?” Then the two who could see around him saw the robot, and moaned.
“How … how did you know?” Flound croaked.
“We could hear your digging, Flound.” Bade stepped up just behind the robot.
“That is a drastically oversimplified description of sonar,” the robot objected.
Flound glared pure hatred at Bade.
The jailer permitted himself a very small smile. Inside, though, his elation soared.
Flound wouldn’t be able to accept losing, though, Bade reflected as he paced to the top of the wall hours later, watching the city begin to glow in the false dawn. Flound would have to keep trying, especially since it had become a contest between himself and Bade. His pride would make him engineer a much more serious breakout attempt, or Bade misread his prisoners completely. They were all intelligent, and most of them were aggressive and competitive too. Keen minds joined with restlessness and the bitterness of defeat. They would never be able to accept prison like gentle sheep. The next try would be massive and violent, and some of the magistrates might die.
Part of Bade looked forward to that with an almost greedy anticipation—but part of him felt the shame of not doing his job well. He was supposed to be a jailer, not an executioner, Gar had been very insistent on the importance of none of the magistrates being hurt. He said it was vital to their success that the rebels seem to be not villains, but rescuers—and for that, all their prisoners had to come out alive and well cared-for. Bade had to find some way to make them satisfied with their captivity.
How? He bent his mind to the task for hours, thinking in his slow but methodical way. As evening came on, he left his office, not wanting the robot with the dinner tray to find him—he wasn’t hungry, being too deeply embroiled in thinking, in trying to find the answer to the puzzle. He could have asked the Guardian, of course, but he had begun to realize that the machine had its limits, and one of them was in looking into people’s hearts and understanding how they felt.
He paced the battlements as the sky darkened. The moon had risen when he asked himself why he was happy to stay here, guarding sullen and hostile men. There was the revenge, of course, but by itself, that couldn’t have been enough. No, there was something else, something more, and if he were honest with himself, he would have to admit. The answer sprang into his mind, and he stopped, staring into the night, then began to feel jubilation rise within him—for he had realized that he was enjoying this puzzle-solving very much, then remembered that he always had. He was not only willing, but eager, to stay and be jailer, because he enjoyed the constant competition, the constant need to outthink the hated magistrates.