"An ox. A brain made of soap and granite. He says it is a matter of principle. I knew then that I could do nothing. When an Anglo-Saxon talks about his principles, you may as well go home. He won't accept a weapon, he won't postpone the meeting. I think he wants to be a martyr."
Cudyk frowned. "Maybe he does. Have you seen Rack?"
"No. Ferguson pretends not to know where he is."
"That's rather odd. What is his motive, do you think?"
Seu said, "Basically, he is afraid of Rack. He cooperates with him—they use each other—but you know that it's not a marriage of minds. He knows that Rack is stronger than he is, because he is only an amoral egotist, and Rack is a fanatic. I think he believes this business may be Rack's downfall, and he would like that."
He stood up. "I have to go. Will you do it?"
"Yes."
"Good. Let me know." Seu walked out, as hastily as he had entered.
Nick Pappageorge had roused himself and was polishing a tall, fluted silver vase. Cudyk said, "Nick, go and find out where Mr. Harkway is. If he isn't busy, ask him if he'll do me the favor of dropping around to see me. Otherwise, just come back and tell me where he is; I'll go to him."
Nick said, "Sure, Mr. Cudyk," and went out.
Cudyk stared at the tray of unsorted gems on the desk before him. He stirred them with his forefinger, separating out an emerald, two aquamarines, a large turquoise and a star sapphire. That was all he had had to begin with—his dead wife's jewels, carried half across Europe when a loaf of bread was worth more than all the gem stones in the world. The sapphire had bought his passage on the alien ship; the others had been his original stock-in-trade, first at the refugee center on Alfhal, then here on Palumbar. Now he was a prosperous importer, with a business that netted him the equivalent of ten thousand pounds a year.
But the wealth was ashes; he would have traded all of it for one loaf of bread, eaten in peace, on an Earth that had not sunk back to barbarism.
Momentum, he told himself. Momentum, and a remnant of curiosity. Those are the only reasons I can think of why I do not blow out my brains. I wonder what keeps the others from it? Seu? Chong Yin? I don't know. Burgess has his fantasy, though it cracks now and then. Ferguson has the sensibility of a jackal. Rack, as Seu said, is a fanatic. But why do the rest of them keep on? For what?
The doorway darkened again as Harkway came in, followed by Nick. Nick gestured toward the rear of the shop, and Harkway advanced, smiling. His lower lip was stained by a purple substance with a glossy surface.
Cudyk greeted him and offered him a chair. "It was good of you to come over," he said. "I hope I didn't interrupt your work."
Harkway grinned stiffly. "No. I was just finishing lunch when your boy found me. I have nothing more to do until this evening."
Cudyk looked at him. "You got to the hospital after all, I see."
"Yes. Dr. Moskowitz fixed me up nicely."
Cudyk had been asking himself why the M.P.L. man looked so cheerful. Now he thought he understood.
"And Miss Burgess?" he asked.
"Yes," said Harkway, looking embarrassed. He paused. "She's—an exquisite person, Mr. Cudyk."
Cudyk clasped his square hands together, elbows on the arms of his chair. He said, "Forgive me, I'm going to be personal. Am I right in saying that you now feel more than casually interested in Miss Burgess?"
He added, "Please. I have a reason for asking."
Harkway's expression was guarded. "Yes; that's true."
"Do you think she may feel similarly towards you?"
Harkway paused. "I think so. I hope so. Why, Mr. Cudyk?"
"Mr. Harkway, I will be very blunt. Miss Burgess has already lost one lover through no fault of her own, and the experience has not been good for her. She is, as you say, exquisite—she has a beautiful, but not a strong personality. Do you think it is fair for you to give her another such experience, even if the attachment is not fully formed, by allowing yourself to be killed this evening?"
Harkway leaned back in his chair. "Oh," he said, "that's it." He grinned. "I thought you were going to point out that her father broke off the last affair because of the man's politics. If you had, I was going to tell you that Mr. Burgess looked me up this morning and apologized for his attitude yesterday, and breaking down and so on. He's very decent, you know. We're getting along very well."
He paused. "About this other matter," he said seriously, "I'm grateful for your interest, but—I'm afraid I can't concede the validity of your argument." He made an impatient gesture. "I'm not trying to sound noble, but this business is more important than my personal life. That's all, I'm afraid. I'm sorry."
Another fanatic, Cudyk thought. A liberal fanatic. I have seen all kinds, now. He said, "I have one more argument to try. Has Seu explained to you how precarious our position is here on Palumbar?"
"He spoke of it."
"The Niori accepted this one small colony with grave misgivings. Every act of violence that occurs here weakens our position, because it furnishes ammunition for a group which already wants to expel us. Do you understand?"
There was pain in Harkway's eyes. "Mr. Cudyk, it's the same all over the galaxy, wherever these pitifully tiny outgroups exist. My group is trying to attack that problem on a galaxy-wide scale. I don't say we'll succeed, and I grant you the right to doubt that our program is the right one. But we've got to try. Among other things, we've got to clean out the activists, for just the reason you mention. And—pardon me for stressing the obvious—but it's Captain Rack who will be responsible for this particular act of violence if it occurs, not myself."
"And you think that your death at his hands would be a stronger argument than a peaceful meeting, is that it?"
Harkway shook his head ruefully. "I don't know that I have that much courage, Mr. Cudyk. I'm hoping that nothing will happen to me. But I know that the League's prestige here would be enormously hurt if I let Rack bluff me down." He stood up. "You'll be at the meeting?"
"I'm afraid so." Cudyk stood and offered his hand. "The best of luck."
He watched the young man go, feeling very old and tired. He had known it would be this way; he had only tried for Seu's sake. Now he was involved; he had allowed himself to feel the tug of love and pity toward still another lost soul. Such bonds were destructive—they turned the heart brittle and weathered it away, bit by bit.
The assembly hall was well filled, although Harkway had made no special effort to advertise the meeting. He had known, Cudyk thought, that Rack's threat would be more than sufficient. The youngster was not stupid.
There were no women or children. Ferguson was there, and a large contingent of his employees—gamblers, pimps, waiters and strong-arm men—as well as most of the Russian population. All but a few of the Chinese had stayed away, as had Burgess. But a number of men whom Cudyk knew to have M.P.L. leanings, and an even larger number of neutrals, were there. The audience was about evenly divided, for and against Harkway. If he somehow came through this alive, it was just possible that he could swing the Quarter his way. A futile victory; but of course Harkway did not believe that.
There was a murmur and a shuffle of feet as Rack entered with three other men—Monk, the one called Spider, and young Tom De Grasse, who had once been engaged to Kathy Burgess. The sound dropped almost to stillness for a few moments after the four men took seats at the side of the hall, then rose again to a steady rumble. Harkway and Seu had not yet appeared.
Cudyk saw the man to his right getting up, moving away; he turned in time to see Seu wedge himself through a gap in the line of chairs and sit down in the vacated place.
The fat man's face was blandly expressionless, but Cudyk knew that something had happened. "What is it?" he asked.