Doorways in the Sand Read online

  Oh yes . . .

  Article 7224, Section C. It had to do, I gathered, with the removal of intelligent creatures from their home planets without their consent. Part of a galactic treaty to which my rescuers’ worlds were signatory, it was the closest thing to an interstellar constitution that they had. There was, however, sufficient ambiguity in the present situation to make for a debatable issue, in that there was also provision for removal without consent for a variety of overriding causes, such as quarantine for species protection, non-military reprisal for violations of certain other provisions, a kind of sensitive catchall for “interstellar security” and several more along these lines, all of which they discussed and rediscussed at great length. I had obviously touched on a delicate area, especially in light of the recency of their initial contact with Earth. Ragma kept insisting that if they chose one of the exceptions as controlling and removed me on that basis, their legal department would back them up. If it ever actually came to a point where an adjudication became necessary and they were reversed, he felt that he and Charv would not be held especially liable for their interpretation of the law, in that they were field operatives rather than trained legal personnel. Charv, meanwhile, maintained that it was obvious that none of the exceptions applied and that it would be even more obvious what they had done. Better, he decided, to let the telepathic analyst they employed implant the desire to cooperate within my mind. There were several, he was certain, who could be persuaded to solve their problem in that fashion. But this irritated Ragma. It would be a clear violation of my rights under another provision, as well as concealment of the evidence of their violation under this one. He would have no part of it. If they were going to move me, he wanted a defense other than concealment. So they reviewed the exceptions again, pondering each word, letting the words talk to each other, recalling past cases, sounding the while like Jesuits, Talmudists, dictionary editors or disciples of the New Criticism. We continued to orbit the Earth.

  It was not until much later that Charv interrupted things with a question that had been bothering me all along: “Where did he learn about Article 7224, anyway?”

  They repaired to the sling, interrupting my view of storm patterns off Cape Hatteras. Seeing that my eyes were open, they nodded and gestured in what I believe they intended as a pantomime of good will and concern.

  “Have you been resting well?” Charv inquired.

  “Quite.”

  “Water?”

  “Please.”

  I drank some, then: “Sandwich?” he asked.

  “Yes. Thanks.”

  He produced one and I began eating.

  “We have been quite concerned over your well-being—and about doing the right thing in your case.”

  “That is good of you.”

  “We have been wondering about something that you said a while back, dealing with our offer to provide you with sanctuary during a fairly routine investigation we will be conducting on your planet. It seemed as if you cited a section of the Galactic Code just before you dropped off to sleep last time. But you mumbled somewhat and we could not be certain. Was this the case?”

  “Yes.”

  “I see,” he said, adjusting his sunglasses. “Would you mind telling us how you became acquainted with its provisions?”

  “Such things travel quickly in academic circles,” I offered, which was the best response I could locate in my supply of misleading statements.

  “It is possible,” said Ragma, dropping back into whatever they had been speaking earlier. “Their scholars have been working on translations. They may be completed by now and circulating about their universities. It is not my department, so I cannot be certain.”

  “And if somebody has put together a course on the subject, this one has probably taken it,” said Charv. “Yes. Unfortunate.”

  “Then you must be aware,” Charv continued, switching back to English and aiming it in my direction, “that your planet is not yet signatory to the agreement.”

  “Of course,” I replied. “But then, my concern is really with your own actions under its provisions.”

  “Yes, of course,” he said, glancing at Ragma.

  Ragma moved nearer, his unblinking wombat eyes holding something like a glare.

  “Mister Cassidy,” he said, “let me put it as simply as possible. We are law officers—cops, if you like—with a job to do. I regret that we cannot give you the particulars, as it would probably make it much easier to obtain your cooperation. As it is, your presence on your planet would represent a distinct impediment to us, while your absence would make things considerably simpler. As we have already told you, if you remain you will be in some danger. Bearing this in mind, it seems obvious that we would both be best served if you would agree to a small vacation.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Then perhaps,” he went on, “I may appeal to your venality as well as your much-lauded primate adventuresomeness. A trip like this would probably cost you a fortune if you could arrange it yourself, and you would have an opportunity to see sights none of your kind has ever witnessed before.”

  It did get through to me, that. At any other time I would not have hesitated. But my feelings had just then sorted themselves out. It went without saying that something was amiss and that I was a part of it. But it was more than the world that was out of whack. Something that I did not understand had happened/was happening to me. I grew convinced that the only way I could discover it and remedy or exploit it was to stay home and do my own investigating. I was doubtful that anyone else’s would serve my ends as I would have them served.

  So: “I am sorry,” I repeated.

  He sighed, turned away, looked out the port and regarded the Earth.

  Finally: “Yours is a very stubborn race,” he said.

  When I did not respond, he added, “But so is mine. We must return you if you insist. But I will find a way to achieve the necessary results without your cooperation.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “If you are lucky,” he said, “you may live to regret your decision.”

  HANGING THERE, tensing and untensing my muscles to counteract the pendulum effect of the long, knotted line, I examined the penny on which Lincoln faced to the left. It looked precisely the way a penny would look if I were regarding it in a mirror, reversed lettering and all. Only I was holding it in the palm of my hand.

  Beside/below me, where I dangled but a couple of feet above the floor, hummed the Rhennius machine: three jet-black housings set in a line on a circular platform that rotated slowly in a counterclockwise direction, the end units each extruding a shaft—one vertical, one horizontal—about which passed what appeared to be a Moebius strip of a belt almost a meter in width, one strand half running through a tunnel in the curved and striated central unit, which faintly resembled a wide hand cupped as in the act of scratching.

  Pumping my knees, feet braced against the terminal knot, I set up a gentle swaying that bore me, moments later, back above the ingoing aperture of the middle component. Lowering myself, extending my arm, I dropped the penny onto the belt, was halted at the end of my arc, began the return swing. Still crouched and reaching, I snared the penny as it emerged.

  Not what I had expected. Not at all, and no indeed.

  In that its first journey through the innards of the thing had reversed the coin, I had assumed that running it through the works again would return it to normal. Instead, I now held a metal disk on which the design was properly oriented but was incised, intaglio-like, rather than raised. This applied to both sides, and in the place of the milling the edges were step-recessed, like a train wheel.

  Curiouser and curiouser. I would simply have to do it again to see what happened next. I straightened, gripped the line with my knees, began to redirect my errant arc.

  For a moment I glanced up into the gloom where my thirty-foot puppet string reached to its shadowy bar. An I-beam, too near the ceiling to mount, I had traversed it aardvar
k-style—ankles locked above, letting my fingers do the walking. I wore a dark sweater and trousers and had on thin-soled suede boots. I had carried the line coiled about my left shoulder until I had reached a point as near to being directly above the apparatus as was possible.

  I had made my way in through a skylight I had had to jimmy after cutting away some grillwork and jump-wiring three alarms in a fashion that produced a small nostalgia for my abandoned major in electrical engineering. The hall below was dim, the only illumination provided by a series of floor-level spots that encircled the display and concentrated their beams upward upon it. A low guardrail enclosed the machine, and concealed electric eyes fenced it invisibly. Sensor plates within the floor and the platform would betray a footstep. There was a television camera bolted to my beam. I had turned it slowly, slightly, so that it was still focussed on the display—only farther southward, as I planned to descend on the north side where the belt was flattest just before it reached the central unit—a guesstimate, from those four courses in TV production. There were guards in the building, but one had just made his rounds and I planned to be quick. All plans have their limits and hazards, which is why insurance companies get rich.

  The night was cloudy and a very cold wind went around in it. My breath flapped ghostly wings and flew away. The only witness to my finger-numbing exercises on the roof was a tired-looking cat crouched in the scuttleway. The chill had been about when I had arrived in town the night before, a journey resulting from a decision I had reached on Hal’s couch the previous day.

  After Charv and Ragma had, at my request, set me down about fifty miles out of town during the dark of the moon, I had hitched rides and gotten back to my neighborhood well after midnight. And a good thing it was that I had.

  There is a side street that dead-ends into my own, and my building is right across the way from it. As you proceed along that side street the windows of my apartment are in plain sight. More naturally in night’s dark and quiet than they would by day, my eyes sought them. Dark, as they should be. Blank. Vacant.

  But then, half a minute later, as I neared the corner, came a small flare, a tiny flickering, blackness again.

  Any other time and I would have dismissed it if I had noted it at all. It could very easily have been a reflection or an imagining. Yet . . .

  Yes. But recently recuperated and still full of warnings, I would be a fool to be anything but wary. Neither a fool nor a raisin be, I told myself as I put on my waries, turned right and headed away.

  I walked a pair of blocks to and a couple from, coming at last up the alley behind my building. There was a rear entranceway, but I avoided it, making my way to a place where I could go from pipe to sill to ledge to fire escape, which I did.

  In a very brief while I was on the roof and moving across it. Then down the pipe to the place I had stood when talking with Paul Byler. I edged forward from there and peered in my bedroom window. Too dark to tell anything for certain. It was the other window, though, that had framed what might have been the lighting of a cigarette.

  I rested my fingertips on the window, pressed firmly, then exerted a steady pressure upward. It slid open without a sound, the reward of consideration. Being an erratic sleeper and fond of my nighttime gambols, I kept the running grooves heavily waxed so as not to disturb my roommate.

  Leaving my shoes behind on the ledge, I entered and stood still, ready to flee.

  I waited a minute, breathing slowdy, through my mouth. Quieter that way. Another minute . . .

  A creak from my uneasy easy chair reached me, an effect it always manages when its occupant uncrosses and recrosses his legs.

  That would place a person to the right of the desk in the front room, in a position near to the window.

  “Is there any coffee in that thing?” a harsh voice managed softly.

  “I think so” came the reply.

  “Then pour me some.”

  Sounds of a thermos being unstoppered. Pouring. A few scrapes and bumps. A muttered “Thanks.” They placed the other fellow at the desk itself.

  A slurp. A sigh. The scratch of a match. More silence.

  Then: “Wouldn’t it be funny if he’d gotten himself killed?”

  A snort.

  “Yeah. Not bloody likely, though.”

  “How can you say that?”

  “He stinks of luck, or something like it. And he’s such an odd one to begin with.”

  “That I’ll buy. Wish he’d hurry up and find his way home.”

  “That makes for two of us.”

  The one in the easy chair got to his feet and moved to the window. After a time he sighed. “How long, how long, O Lord?”

  “It will be worth the wait.”

  “I’m not denying it. But the sooner we catch hold of him the better.”

  “Of course. I’ll drink to that.”

  “Hear! What’ve you got there?”

  “A bit of brandy.”

  “You’ve had that all along and you’ve been giving me this black mud?”

  “You kept asking for coffee. Besides, I just found it a while back.”

  “Pass it here.”

  “There’s another glass. Let’s be genteel. It’s good stuff.”

  “Pour!”

  I heard the cork come out of my Christmas bottle. A few clinks followed and footfalls.

  “Here you are.”

  “Smells good.”

  “Doesn’t it?”

  “To the Queen!”

  A shuffling of feet. A single clink.

  “God save ’er!”

  They reseated themselves after that and grew silent once again. I stood there for perhaps a quarter of an hour, but nothing more was said.

  So I edged my way to the corner rack, found some money I had left behind still in its place in the boot, removed it, pocketed it, removed myself back to the ledge.

  I closed the window as carefully as I had opened it, retreated to the roof, cut across the path of a black cat who arched his back and spat—doubtless superstitious, not that I blamed him—and made my way away.

  After scouting Hal’s building for loiterers other than myself and not spotting any, I rang his place from the booth on the corner. I was somewhat surprised to have my call answered in a matter of seconds.

  “Yeah?”

  “Hal?”

  “Yeah. Who’s this?”

  “Your old buddy who climbs things.”

  “Hoo boy! What kind of trouble are you in, anyway?”

  “If I knew that I’d have something for my pains. Can you tell me anything about it?”

  “Probably nothing important. But there are some small things that might—”

  “Listen, may I come over?”

  “Sure, why not?”

  “Now, I mean. I hate to be a bother, but—”

  “No trouble. C’mon up.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Matter of fact, no. Mary and I had a little difference of opinion and she’s spending the weekend at her mother’s. I’m half stoned, which leaves me half sober. Which is enough. You tell me your troubles and I’ll tell you mine.”

  “It’s a deal. I’ll be there in half a minute.”

  “Great. See you then.”

  So I cradled it, walked over, went in, buzzed his number and got admitted. Moments later I was knocking on his door.

  “Prompt, oh prompt,” he said, swinging it wide and stepping aside. “Enter, pray.”

  “In which order?”

  “Oh, bless this house, by all means, first. It could use a little grace.”

  “Bless,” I said, stepping in. “Sorry to hear you got troubles.”

  “They’ll pass. It started out with a burnt dinner and being late for a show, that’s all. Stupid thing. I thought it was her when the phone rang. I guess I’ll have to do my apologizing tomorrow. The hangover should make me sound exceptionally repentant. What’re you drinking?”

  “I don’t really . . . Oh, what the hell! Whatever you’
ve got there.”

  “A drop of soda in a sea of Scotch.”

  “Make it the other way around,” I said, moving on into the living room and settling in a big, soft, tilted chair.

  Moments later Hal came in, handed me a tall glass from which I took a healthy slug, sat down across from me, tasted his own, then said, “Have you committed any especially monstrous acts lately?”

  I shook my head.

  “Always the victim, never the victor. What have you heard?”

  “Nothing, really. It’s all been implication and inference. People have been asking me a lot about you but not telling me much.”

  “People? Who?”

  “Well, your adviser Dennis Wexroth was one—”

  “What did he want?”

  “More information about your individual project in Australia.”

  “Like, for instance?”

  “Like where. He wanted to know exactly where you were digging around.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “That I didn’t know, which was reasonably true. This was over the phone. Then he stopped by in person, and he had a man along with him—a Mister Nadler. The guy had an I.D. card saying he was an employee of the State Department. He acted as if they were concerned about the possibility of your removing artifacts from over there and creating an incident.”

  I said something vulgar.

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought, too,” he said. “He pressed me to rack my memory for anything you might have said concerning your itinerary. I was tempted to misremember, say, Tasmania. Got scared, though. Didn’t know what they could do. So I just kept insisting you hadn’t told me anything of your plans.”

  “Good. When did this happen?”

  “Oh, you’d been gone for over a week. I’d gotten your postcard from Tokyo.”

  “I see. That’s it, then?”