It sounded logical. Crag said, “I know what I’m going to do with part of my freedom, then.”
Olliver’s voice was sharp again. “Not until after, Crag. I don’t care what you do-after the job I want you to do for me. You agree to that?”
Crag shrugged. “Okay. What’s the job?” He didn’t really care what it was, or even how risky it was. For the difference between life on Callisto and freedom and a million, he couldn’t think of anything he wouldn’t do. He’d try it even if there was one chance in a thousand of his pulling it off and staying alive.
Olliver said, “This isn’t the time or place to tell you about it; we shouldn’t talk too long. You’ll be a free man when we talk. That much comes first. The million comes afterwards, if you succeed.”
“And if I turn down the job after you’ve let me go?”
“I don’t think you will. It’s not an easy one, but I don’t think you’ll turn it down for a million, even if you’re already free. And there might be more for you in it than just money-but we won’t talk about that unless you succeed. Fair enough?”
“Fair enough. But-I want to be sure about this framing business. Do you mean to tell me it was just coincidence that you wanted me to do something for you and that I got framed and you sat on the case?”
Olliver smiled again. “It’s a small world, Crag. And it’s partly a coincidence, but not as much of a one as you think. First, you’re not the only man in the system that could do what I want done. +You’re one of several I had in mind. Possibly the best, I’ll give you that. I was wondering how to contact one of you. And I saw your name on the docket and requested to sit on the case. You should know enough about law to know that a judge can ask to sit on a case if he has had previous experience with the accused.”
Crag nodded. That was true, and it made sense.
Olliver said, “But to brass tacks; we shouldn’t be talking much longer than this. I don’t want any suspicion to attach to me when you escape.”
“Escape?”
“Of course. You were judged guilty, Crag, and on strong evidence. I couldn’t possibly free you legally; I couldn’t even have given you a lighter sentence than I did. If I freed you now, you I’d he impeached. But I-or perhaps I should say we-can arrange for you to escape. Today, shortly after you’re returned to your cell to await transportation to Callisto.”
“Who’s we?” Crag asked.
“A new political party, Crag, that’s going to bring this world-the whole System-out of the degradation into which it has sunk. It’s going to end the bribery and corruption. It’s going to take us back to old-fashioned democracy by ending the deadlock between the Guilds and the Syndicates. It’s going to be a middle-of-the-road party. ‘We’re going to bring honest government back and-he stopped and grinned boyishly. “I didn’t mean to start a lecture. In which I suppose you aren’t interested anyway. We call ourselves the Cooperationists.”
“You’re working under cover?”
“For the present. Not much longer. In a few months we come into the open, in time to start gathering support-votes-for the next elections.” He made a sudden impatient gesture. “But I’ll tell you all this later, when we’re at leisure. Right now the important thing is your escape.
“You’ll he taken back to your cell when I give the signal that we’re through talking. I’ll put on the record that you were intransigent and unrepentant and that I am making no modification of your sentence. Within an hour from your return, arrangements for your escape will be made and you’ll be told what to do.”
“Told how?”
“By the speaker in your cell. They’re on private, tap-proof circuits. A member of the party has access to them. Simply follow instructions and you’ll be free by seventeen hours.”
“And then? If I still want to earn the million?”
“Come to my house. It’s listed; you can get the address when you need it. Be there at twenty-two.”
“It’s guarded?” Crag asked. He knew that houses of most important political figures were.
“Yes. And I’m not going to tell the guards to let you in. They’re not party members. I think they’re in the pay of the opposition, but that’s all right with me. I use them to allay suspicion.”
“How do I get past them, then?”
Olliver said, “If you can’t do that, without help or advice from me, then you’re not the man I think you are, Crag and you’re not the man I want. But don’t kill unless you have to. I don’t like violence, unless it’s absolutely necessary and in a good cause. I don’t like it even then, but-“
He glanced at his wrist watch and then reached out and put his fingers on a button on one side of the bench. He asked, “Agreed?” and as Crag nodded, he pushed the button.
The two guards came back in. Oliver said, “Return the prisoner to his cell.”
One on each side of him, they led him back up the ramp to the floor above and escorted him all the way to his cell.
The door clanged. Crag sat down on the bed and tried to puzzle things out. He wasn’t modest enough about his particular talents to wonder why Olliver had chosen him if he had a dirty job to be done. But he was curious what dirty job a man like Olliver would have to offer. If there was an honest and fair man in politics, Olliver was that man. It must be something of overwhelming importance if Olliver was sacrificing his principles to expediency.
Well, he, Crag, certainly had nothing to lose, whether he trusted Olliver’s motives or not. And he thought he trusted them.
He went back to the window and stood there looking down at the teeming city, thinking with wonder how greatly his fortunes had changed in the brief space of an hour and a half. That long ago he’d stood here like this and wondered whether to batter through the plastic pane and throw himself from the window. Now he was not only to be free but to have a chance at more money than he’d ever hoped to see in one sum.
When an hour was nearly up, he went over and stood by the speaker grille so he would not miss anything that came over it. One cannot ask questions over a one-way communicator, and he’d have to get every word the first time.
It was well that he did. The voice, when it came, was soft-and it was a woman’s voice. From the window he could have heard it, but might have missed part of the message. “I have just moved the switch that unlocks your cell door,” the voice said. “Leave your cell and walk as you did on your way to the courtroom. I will meet you at the portal, at the place where two guards met you before.”
The cell door was unlocked, all right. He went through it and along the corridor.
A woman waited for him. She was beautiful; not even the severe costume of a technician could completely conceal the soft, lush curves of her body; not even the fact that she wore horn-rimmed spectacles and was completely without makeup could detract from the beauty of her face. Her eyes even through glass, were the darkest, deepest blue he had ever seen, and her hair-what showed of it beneath the technician’s beret-was burnished copper.
He stared at her as he came near. And hated her, partly because she was a woman and partly because she was so beautiful. But mostly because her hair was exactly the same color as Lea’s had been.
She held out a little metal bar. “Take this,” she told him. “Put it in your pocket. It’s radioactive; without it or without a guard with you who has one, every portal here is a death-trap.”
“I know,” he said shortly.
A paper, folded small, was next. “A diagram,” she said, “showing you a way out along which, if you’re lucky, you’ll encounter no guards. In case you do-“