He continued to flee, jumping over the yellow knives.
Tse"Naga"Hai rolled over them also, and another fracture occurred; more pieces fell away.
By now, the Rock was bouncing from side to side and rolling in an irregular pattern. And when Nayenezgani leaped over the blue knives and the Rock crashed into them and bounced over, more pieces fell away. By now, its size was considerably reduced though its velocity was increas- ing.
Nayenezgani sprang over the black knives. When he heard the Rock grating and cracking itself upon them, he turned.
All that remained was a relatively small stone. He halted, then moved toward it.
Immediately it swerved, altering its course to bound away from him. Now he pursued it into the west, beyond the San Juan River. Finally, there he caught it, and much of the life and wit seemed gone out of it.
"Now, Tse"Naga"Hai," he said, "the power to harm me is gone from you, but you are not without a certain virtue I noted earlier. In the future you will serve to light the fires of the Dineh."
He raised what remained of the Rock and bore it off with him to show to First Woman, who otherwise would not have believed what he had done.
FINALLY HE SIGHED AND ROSE.
He crossed to the console beside the area enclosed by the shining bars. He pushed the "Messages" b.u.t.ton and the display screen came alive.
EDWIN TEDDERS CALLED, it read, followed by the pre- vious day"s date and the time - the time when his unit had signaled in the wilderness. Below, it listed six other attempts by Edwin Tedders to reach him, the most recent only a few hours ago. There was an eastern code and a number, and a request that he return the call as soon as possible, prefaced by the word URGENT.
He tried to recall whether he had ever known an Edwin Tedders. He decided that he had not.
He punched out the digits and waited.
The buzzing which followed was broken, but the screen remained dark.
"Yes?" came a crisp male voice.
"William Blackhorse Singer," he said, "returning Edwin Tedders"s call."
"Just a moment, please." The words hurried and rose in pitch. "I"ll get him."
He tugged at a turquoise earring and regarded the blank screen. A minute shuffled its numbers on a nearby clock- display. Another...
The screen suddenly glowed, and the heavily lined face of a dark-haired man with pale eyes appeared before him. His smile seemed one of relief rather than pleasure.
"I"m Edwin Tedders," he said. "I"m glad we finally got hold of you, Mr. Singer. Can you come through right now?"
"Maybe." He glanced at the gleaming cage to his left.
"But what"s this all about?"
"I"ll have to tell you in person. Please reverse the transfer charges. It is important, Mr. Singer."
"All right. I"ll come."
He moved to his trip-box and began its activation. It whined faintly for an instant. Zones of color moved upward within the shafts.
"Ready," he said, stepping into the unit.
Looking down, he saw that his feet were growing dim.
For a moment, the world was disarrayed. Then his thoughts fell back into place again. He was standing within a unit similar to his own. When he raised his head he looked out across a large room done up in an old-fashioned man- ner - dark paneled walls, heavy leather chairs, a Chinese rug, bookshelves filled with leatherbound volumes, drapes, a fireplace burning real logs. Two men stood facing him - Tedders, and a slight, blond man whose voice identified him as the one with whom he had first spoken.
"This is Mark Brandes, my secretary," Tedders stated as he watched him step down.
He inadvertently pressed his palm rather than clasping hands, in the old way of the People. Brandes looked puzzled but Tedders was already gesturing toward the chairs.
"Have a seat, Mr. Singer."
"Call me Billy."
"All right, Billy. Would you care for a drink?"
"Sure."
-I have some excellent brandy."
"That"ll be fine."
Tedders looked at Brandes, who immediately moved to a sideboard and poured a pair of drinks.
"Early spring," Tedders said.
Billy nodded, accepted his gla.s.s.
"You"ve had a fascinating career. Both freezing and time- dilation effects kept you around till you could benefit from medical advances. A real old-timer, but you don"t look it."
Billy took a sip of his brandy.
"This is very good stuff," he said.
"Yes. Real vintage. How many trackers are there around these days?"
"I don"t know."
"There are others, but you"re the best. Old school."
Billy chuckled.
"What do you want?" he asked.
Tedders chuckled also.
"The best," he said.
"What do you want tracked?"
"It isn"t exactly that."
"What, then?"
"It"s hard to know where to begin...."
Billy looked out the window, across the moon-flooded lawn. In the distance, the prospect was broken by a high wall.
"I am a special a.s.sistant to Secretary-General Walford,"
Tedders finally stated. "He is here - upstairs - and so are the Stragean amba.s.sador and consul - Stango and Bogarthy. Do you know much about the Strageans?"
"I"ve met a few, here and there."
"How"did they strike you?"
He shrugged.
"Tall, strong, intelligent... What do you mean?"
"Would you want one for an enemy?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"They could be very dangerous."
"In what ways?"
"They"d be hard to stop. They"re shapeshifters. They have a kind of mental control over their bodies. They can move their organs around. They can -"
"Walk through walls?"
Billy shook his head.
"I don"t know about that. I"ve heard it said, but I"ve never -"
"It"s true. They have a training regimen which will pro- duce this ability in some of them. Semireligious, quite ardu- ous, takes years, doesn"t always work. But they can produce some peculiar adepts."
"Then you know more about it than I do."
"Yes."
"So why ask me?"
"One of them is on her way here."
Billy shrugged.
"There are a few thousand around. Have been for years."
Tedders sipped his drink; "They"re all normals. I mean one of those with that special training."
"So?"
"She"s coming to kill the Secretary-General."
Billy sniffed his brandy.
"Good that you got word," he finally said, "and can turn it over to the security people."
"Not good enough."
Throughout the conversation, Tedders had been struggling
to obtain eye-contact. At last Billy was staring at him, and he felt some small sense of triumph, not realizing that this meant the man doubted what he was saying.
"Why not?"
"They"re not equipped to deal with Stragean adepts," he said. "She could well be too much for them."
Billy shook his head.
"I don"t understand why you"re telling me about it."
"The computer came up with your name."
"In response to what?"
"We"d asked it for someone who might be able to stop her."
Billy finished his drink and set the gla.s.s aside.
"Then you need a new programmer or something. There must be a lot of people who know more about Stragean adepts than I do."
"You are an expert on the pursuit and capture of exotic life forms. You spent most of your life doing it. You practi- cally stocked the Interstellar Life Inst.i.tute single-handed, You -"