High-Opp by Frank Herbert
“Can we talk here?” Peterson’s husky voice rumbled in the effort to keep it low.
“You are now conversant with a privilege of Upper Rank,” said Movius. “A master scrambler on the building. It prevents any kind of tapping.”
Peterson’s eyes blinked. “A courier came in from Madrid today.”
Something occurred to Movius. “How’d you get in here? Nobody’s allowed in this building without a permit and the place is crawling with guards.”
Peterson grinned, pulled out a thin leather folder. “What kind of a permit do you need?” He pulled out a building maintenance permit signed with Warren Gerard’s unmistakable scrawl. “Traced the signature from a regular Bu-Trans order.”
“Anybody could do that,” said Movius.
“Anybody with enough brass,” said Peterson.
“Well, come in and sit down.” Movius waited for Peterson to crowd his barrel-shape into a chair, then perched on the arm of a chair opposite. “What’s the word?”
“People are all ready to revolt. Capetown was set to go it on their own. Now they say they’ll wait for the word from here. They like the idea of all moving at once.”
“How many are ready?”
“Maybe one hundred cities—the big ones. More coming in every day.”
“How’re we coming on the new headquarters?”
“Furniture goes in today,” said Peterson. “It’ll be ready by tomorrow night.”
Movius nodded. “All right. Here’s a message for you to take to Phil Henry: get the parts for the beam trap into a shipment to Bu-Psych by tomorrow morning. Have the men start assembling it tomorrow night. Got that?”
Peterson nodded. “I’m still not sure what that thing will do.”
“It’ll cause the biggest furor this government has ever seen,” said Movius. “The Coor is like Montcalm ignoring the Cliffs of Abraham.”
“What’s that?”
“That’s out of a history book,” said Movius. “A general once lost an ancient city called Quebec because he thought there was one way the enemy could not reach him and failed to guard that way.”
“Oh.”
“The Coor and all of his advisors believe it’s impossible to trap a communications beam without jamming it so that the effort would be noticeable. Phil Henry and I figured out a way to do it way back when we were in Comp Section together. Only we didn’t think there was any use for the idea and dropped it.”
“I’ll see that Phil gets the word today,” said Janus. “Soon’s I can.”
Movius got to his feet. “How many new recruits?”
Peterson wiped perspiration from his face with a soiled handkerchief. “Over two hundred today. That makes it sixty thousand in this city alone.”
“That’s a lot of people to trust.”
Peterson shook his head. “It isn’t hard to trust angry people. And it’s not hard to find out who’s angry and why. The Madrid courier said all of the people he talked to like the way you’re operating. They listened close to your recordings. He said they like the way you’re putting it over on the High-Opps.”
The door rattled, opened. Grace stood in the doorway with a package in her arms. She looked at Peterson questioningly.
“I was just going,” said Peterson.
“No need to leave on my account, Janus,” said Grace.
“Have to be getting back,” said Peterson. He lifted his bulk out of the chair, went to the door, turned sideways to go past Grace. Movius noted amusedly that Peterson was no thinner that way than across the beam.
Grace closed the door, dropped her package on the hall table, met him halfway across the room. They clung to each other for a moment without speaking. Grace pushed away.
Movius said, “Janus and I . . .”
“Will it wait?” She smoothed a non-existent wrinkle from his lapel, turned away from him. “You must stay away from my father. Don’t let my father or Navvy get near you.”
“But your note said you’d gone with Navvy to . . .”
“I made him drop me off downstairs in the basement driveway.”
“Why?” he asked. “Because your father is spying on me for O’Brien?”
She whirled on him. “Don’t be an oaf! I knew the second I told you about my father’s phone call the other night that you’d planted the story with O’Brien.” She twisted her hands. “You’re going to hate me.”
“I couldn’t do that.” Why did the lie come so easily? “I’m in love with you.” Somewhere in his mind a tiny thought said, “That’s right. You are in love with her.” He’d known it for three days now—three days and nights.
“You shouldn’t have gone out,” he said. “It’s dangerous.”
“I thought I’d be back before you got home and . . .”
“And what?” He moved to her, stroked her hair.
“I had to find out what they’re planning,” she said. She leaned against him, her cheek against his chin. “I had Navvy take me to father’s apartment to get some things I’d left there. I got away from Navvy and looked in a special place. I found a note for Navvy. It said, ‘We’ll have to do without.’ And . . .”
“What does that mean?”
“It means they plan to kill you.” She began to cry.
He held her away, looked at her. “How do you know?”
The tears rolled down her cheeks. “Because he was going to send me that message once.”
Movius jerked away from her. “Until you became untrustworthy!”
She nodded.
“That’s why they let you marry me. They wanted a scorpion in my bedroom. A trained scorpion that’d sting me when they gave the word.”
Again she nodded. The tears were now a steady pulse out of her eyes.
The agony in Grace’s expression came through the numbness in him. She risked me hating her, he thought. She risked it rather than let me be killed. He pulled her to him, stroked her head.
“I knew he was cold,” he said, “but . . .”
She pulled her head back, looked up at him. “He’s not really. He just can’t feel anything but the need for revenge. He wants to strike back for what they did to my mother.”
“No revenge is worth that.”
She stared at him. “Not even your revenge?”
“No, not even mine.” He took her arm. “Come in here and sit down. I want you to tell me their whole plan, why they called on me. Everything you know.”
She held back. “First I have to know something.”
“What?”
“These nights . . . have you . . .”
He looked at her, loving the little-girl expression of hesitancy. “I started to make love to you out of pity, but . . .”
“But?” The hurt showed near the surface of her eyes.
“But somewhere along the way I found you had more pity than I have.” He shook his head. “Men aren’t very good at this sort of thing. We try to do everything by logic and lose touch with our own feelings.”
“Dan.” Her face glowed. “Let’s apply for sparse area resettlement. We could go away and . . .”
“Grace!”
The glow left her face.
“You know better than that, Grace. We’re riding the tiger now. We can’t get off the tiger until we tame it.”
Chapter 19
“The ruthless side was certain to come out,” said O’Brien. He stood by the window of his office, looking out at the river. “Newton was a threat. Ergo: stamp on Newton. Those other three were a threat. Ergo: dump them out a window.” O’Brien turned and looked at Quilliam London where the angular man stood looking at Movius’ chart.
“I see his decision index still goes up.”
O’Brien crossed to his side. “Up and up. The logical brilliance of the man is uncanny.”
“He once told me he doesn’t use logic,” said London. “The right answer just occurs to him.”
“You told me.”
“So I did. Up he goes. I take it this line contains the decisio
“Yes.”
“Either way the decision index must go up,” said London. “If he actually has seduced my daughter and made her pregnant, that was an excellent tactical move. If it was fabrication, it shows tremendous insight.”
“You talk about it coldly enough,” said O’Brien.
“I shall take a great deal of pleasure in pulling the trigger myself,” said London.
“Unless you happen to fall out a window first.”
London nodded his angular grey head, the hunter eyes going speculative. “You were going to bring me up to date.” This running around in disguise has its drawbacks. I seldom know what’s really going on until I get up here with you.”
O’Brien returned to his chair across the table, sat down. “Movius got Janus Peterson to ferret out the names of Newton’s crowd in Bu-Trans. The list didn’t coincide with one the late Tyle Cotton gave him and . . .”
“The late Tyle Cotton? In Roper’s name, what happened to her? Did she go out a window, too?”
“Sorry, I keep forgetting you’re out of touch with things.”
“That is an understatement.”
“Hmmmm.” O’Brien pursed his lips. “Tyle tried to buy her way out of Bu-Trans and into Bu-Con with a fake list of Newton’s friends. She was way out of her depth. Movius anticipated her, took the list Janus gave him and copied it in her handwriting. He posted that list on the door of CR-14. Eighty-one Bu-Trans employees failed to show for work and Tyle’s body was found floating in the river.”
London eased himself into a chair. “Does her sister know yet?”
O’Brien tipped his head to one side while he tugged at an ear lobe. “I told Marie. All she’d say was that it was long overdue.”
“No love lost there.”
“None at all, evidently.”
“How did Janus get that list?”
“I gave it to him.”
“And the eight-one on the list?”
O’Brien shrugged. “They’ll be reported as evading work order.”
“They’re probably already working in Bu-Con.”
“Certainly.” O’Brien shook his head. “But look at the beauty of the way Movius operates.”
London assumed a sour expression. “How much of this deviousness is aimed at us? What’s he doing today?”
“He’s out with Janus. I don’t quite get the significance of it. Janus called in shortly before you arrived. Movius has been picking up electronics techs, talking with them in the rear of the Bu-Trans van while Janus drives around. One of the men he’s met is an old friend from Comp Section named Phil Henry. We don’t have a single line on this Henry. An apparently insignificant person.”
“Did you alert Janus to the fact he may have to knock off Movius?”
“Yes. That was really why I had him call.”
London sat back in his chair, staring out from under his heavy brows at O’Brien. “you’re been saving some little morsel, Nathan. I know the signs.”
O’Brien smiled. “I’ve a report from Cecelia Lang. Glass is ready to make a deal with Gerard in return for Movius’ hide. Glass is really frightened.”
“What if Gerard goes along with it?” London became thoughtful, answered his own question. “That would save us the trouble, give us a martyr. Martyrs have been valuable to other revolts—Nathan Hale . . . Juarez . . . Lenin . . .”
Chapter 20
Janus Peterson sat across from Movius and Grace in their apartment. He seemed uncomfortable, kept looking out the window at the dusk settling over the city. “I had to come back and tell you. I’ve been thinking for two days now.”
Movius sat on the arm of Grace’s chair, a hand loosely across her shoulders. “What else, Janus?”
“That’s most of it, Dan. I’ve been working for O’Brien eight years now. I guess I’ve always held your opinion of him—a cold-blooded fish thinking of nothing but his charts.”
“He never got things really unified and moving, though,” said Movius.
“Not the way you’re doing. He always kept putting us off, saying the time wasn’t yet, be patient.”
“When did you run out of patience?”
“When he explained how I might have to pull the trigger, that he was going to get rid of you when you’d served your purpose. I started wondering if I’d wake up some day and find out I’d served my purpose.”
“A lot of people feel that way,” said Movius.
“Revolution is a mean business,” said Peterson.
“Not that mean,” said Grace. She looked up at Movius. “If you destroy all human values, you wind up right where you started. That’s why I’m backing Dan instead of my father.”
“And brother shall be turned against brother and the child against the father,” said Movius.
“What’s that?” asked Peterson.
“Something I heard a pastor say once.”
Peterson hauled his thick bulk out of the chair. “I’ll be shoving off.” He grinned at Movius. “I’ve a little of your work that needs doing.”
“Did you get the word to Phil Henry?”
“I sent a man right after I left you before.”
Movius got to his feet. “Thanks for coming clean with me, Janus. Will you explain to the others that I understand how it is?”
“We knew you would,” said Peterson. “We talked it over before I came back here.”
“He does understand,” said Grace. “That’s why we need him.”
Peterson gave Grace a piercing look. “Just see that nobody,” he emphasized the word, pausing after it, “gets in here who don’t belong in here.” He propelled his huge body toward the door, opened it as the chimes rang.
Over Peterson’s shoulder, Movius caught a glimpse of Navvy’s face. Peterson suddenly thrust himself against Navvy, there was a short scuffle; Peterson pulled away, exposing Navvy, who was rubbing his wrist. “Don’t try them tricks on the man who taught ’em to you,” said Peterson. He pocketed a fap gun.
Navvy’s face was flushed. “I came to find out.”
Peterson took Navvy by the collar, hauled him inside, shut the door. “Find out what?”
“If she is.” He looked at his sister. Grace was standing beside Movius.
“It’s my fault,” she said. “O’Brien loaned us a car today and I let Navvy bring me in the building, the basement driveway, with it. I assumed he’d got right on out. He’s been waiting to come up here instead.”
Movius nodded.
“You want to find out if your sister is what?” demanded Peterson.
“Like O’Brien said.”
“What did O’Brien say?”
“That she was pregnant and had gone back on us.”
“O’Brien’s a cold potato who needs more time in the fire,” said Peterson. “Dan knows all about him and your father and about you and Grace, too!” He propelled Navvy roughly into the room. “I got a question for you, Navvy London.”
Navvy didn’t look at him, stared from Movius to Grace, back to Movius.
“How long you figure it’ll be before your father or O’Brien tosses you into some hot spot that suits their high and mighty convenience?” demanded Peterson.
A pouting look came onto Navvy’s face. It was unlike him and it surprised Movius.
In a stiff manner, Navvy said, “I’m ready to serve wherever I’m needed.”
Peterson curled his lip. “All self-sacrifice. Now ain’t that pretty?” He raised his voice to a near bellow. “And what kind of government do you think their kind’d set up? I’ll tell you what kind! One where you or me wouldn’t count, where everybody’d be expected to give in to the needs of whoever was running things.” Peterson grabbed Navvy’s shoulder, shook him. “You dumb head! What kind of a Sep do you think you are? That’s the kind of government we got now!” He pushed Navvy farther into a chair.
“I never thought,” said Navvy, sinking into a chair.
Chapter 21
O’Brien’s male secretary opened the door softly, peered in at his boss. The Bu-Psych chief stood at the table which served him as a desk, working with a circular slide rule, pausing to jot notations onto a sheet of paper. Beads of perspiration went unnoticed on his cheeks below the greying temples.
“Movius is downstairs,” said the secretary.
O’Brien looked up. “Movius?” It was as though he didn’t know the name. Then, “Movius!”
The secretary nodded. “His driver just let him out. He walked right in and asked to see you.”
O’Brien moved around to his chair, sat down, tugged at his ear. “Well, send him up then.” He managed to look surprised when the secretary ushered Movius into the room. “Something special to report?”
Movius looked down at O’Brien. “No remarks about coming to you openly like this? No recriminations?”
“Who needs to know why you’re here?”
“Perhaps Quilliam London,” said Movius. He sat down across from O’Brien, enjoying the way the man glowered at him. “You rather upset Quilliam the other night. You should be more considerate.” He stared at O’Brien until the latter looked away. “That’s often the trouble with psychological people—so much logic that they have no human feelings.”
“Why are you here?” asked O’Brien.
“For advice. My informants tell me Glass is ready to make a deal with Gerard. I’m the price.”
“Your infor . . .”
“Some of them used to be your informants,” said Movius. “I want to know how desperately you feel about this crisis?”
O’Brien sighed. “You really want to know, do you?” He stood up, went to the big chart. “Look at this.” He pointed. “This blue line is the course of civilization. Here’s the Greeks. This bump’s the Romans. Back here’s the Chinese. Here are the Mongols. Genghis Khan here . . . Kublai Khan on this slope. This is the Anglo-American. Over here is Motojai, pre-Unity.”