There was no sign of movement from the building across the way. But Broward was sure that armed men were standing behind the windows there."I wish I had some gravpaks," he said.
"We have several in the supply room," said the Pope.
"Four should be enough. Let"s get them."
A few minutes later, one pak had been tied to the center left side of a jeep. Manipulating the pak"s controls, Broward caused the vehicle to be raised several feet in the air. Then he guided the featherweight until it lay on its side at right angles to his jeep across the front. Father Ignacio supplied the strips, torn from sheets, that anch.o.r.ed the near-weightless frame to the front of Broward"s vehicle.
"It"ll make a shield," the Moonman said. "If their bullets don"t wreck the pak or cut the strips, it"ll do fine."
He and the two officers slipped into the harnesses attached to the paks, tightened them, and tried the pak controls. Then, they got into the jeep.
"Father Ignacio will take the other jeep and make a run for the elevators," said the Pope. "He will spread the word on the upper levels that Howards is trying to kill me. It will not be a lie, because I am certain that Howards will take such action when he sees what I am about to do."
"Holy Father, what is that?" cried Saavedra.
"What I should have done long ago but held off doing because of politics, or rather, fear of meddling in politics. Also, I was afraid. I was afraid that the Church might be crushed, and I sinned in thinking that, for the Church will live as long as G.o.d decrees, and we know how long that is. Worse, I feared for my sheep. If I denounced Howards and I were imprisoned, who then would protect them from the wolves? I should have known Whom that Person would be."
Broward hesitated. What if the Angels seized the Pope as a hostage? Well, what if they seized anybody as such? That which must be done would be done, no matter who got hurt "
Father Ignacio said, "Holy Father, he will kill you! He is a vile and evil man!"
The Pope held up his hand in remonstration. "Do not try to stop me. I have delayed too long now. Do as I said."
Ignacio dropped to his knees and said, "Father, bless me!"
"And you, young man, bless me. And do not forget to tell the others that, if I do not return, Father Mendoza should succeed me."
The young priest wept. Siricio said, "Compose yourself and come with me. You must hear my confession."
Broward paid them no attention, for he was carefully instructing the other two in the plan of attack. They objected several times, and he answered them. They had some good points which he accepted and thus changed the course of the a.s.sault.
By then, Father Ignacio had come back outdoors. With him was another priest, a man about the pontiffs age.
Broward was surprised, for be had seen n.o.body else while he was in the house.
"Father Gomez was at his prayers," said Father Ignacio, as if that explained his nonappearance. "He will go the opposite direction I"ll take; he"ll try to head off the troops stationed nearby."
Broward wondered why the troops had not appeared if they were so near. The young priest, answering, said, "I"m puzzled. I do not know. But His Holiness wishes to see you."
Broward went into the house just in time to see the pontiff coming out of a room near the front door. He was wearing a small plastic box which hung from a cord around his neck and lay on his chest.
"I want everybody in the plaza to hear my voice," he said. He smiled at Broward."Tell me, my son, why have you, a Soviet and an atheist, placed your life in jeopardy to save your enemy?"
"I do not believe in the Soviet ideology," Broward said. "As for my so-called atheism, I am not so sure now about it.
I have seen some strange things recently. I mentioned the man Moshe Yamanuchi. But I did not have time to tell you that he felt that Something, a Voice, was urging him."
"Ah, yes, the Jew. G.o.d would not allow the Chosen Race to die out. It is not time yet."
"Moshe would not agree with your view of that, I"m sure. But he does agree with you that there is a G.o.d.
However, you do not have to be a Christian or a Moslem or a Hindu to love mankind, to want to see them happy. I did not want to be a ma.s.s murderer. By killing the people of Mars, I drive another nail into Man"s coffin. Too many nails have been hammered in lately; a few more, and Man will be buried forever."
"You could not love Man unless you also loved G.o.d," replied Siricio. "You may deny it, but I am sure that you do, somewhere in your being."
"Perhaps," Broward replied. "But let"s get on with what we have to do. You wanted to talk to Howards and his men first, right? I can give you a minute or two. That is, if the troops don"t show. When they do, I have to move."
"Good bye, my son," said the Pope. "I hope I will see you again in a place we both will like."
"I doubt it," said Broward. "But n.o.body"s ever disproved that there is such a place."
"I would not believe them if they did."
He blessed Broward and then stepped out. Broward watched him cross the great plaza, stepping around the corpses, stopping once to examine a man, apparently to determine whether or not he was alive. Broward also glanced at the two entrances to the plaza. Both were still deserted.
The erect and lonely figure of the priest became smaller as he neared the neo-Gothic front of the building.
This had its back placed solidly against the rock wall of the huge cavern, and it extended for about 20 meters outwards.
The front reared up straight like a cliff carved with the heads of men, gargoyles, animals and various religious and secular symbols. It was the only one of its kind that Broward had seen here, though such buildings were numerous onEarth. There were no steps to the main entrance, which lay flush with the plaza floor. The entrance itself was wide enough for six men to go in shoulder to shoulder and high enough that a man standing on another"s shoulders could not reach the top. It had two plastic gates of open grillework.
Behind the gates stood a man in a white uniform. Behind him was a mob of men. At that distance, the face of the man in front was not recognizable, but Broward thought it must be Howards. He had a reputation for not liking to have more than one person at a time near him.
The Pope halted, only a few meters from the gates. Suddenly, a great voice spoke. It bounced off the front of the house and the plaza walls behind it and came as a thunderous echo to Broward.
"Howards! And those who serve Howards! Mars is doomed!"
And the voice told of the ship that waited somewhere above the red planet and of the weapon of total destruction and death that it carried. It told what would happen if Howards was not unseated at once and a new government formed. It went on to describe graphically what would result.
Broward looked at the tunnels. No one yet. Then, he saw a jeep drive along the front of the buildings and cut across at top speed and enter the tunnel that led to the elevators. Father Ignacio was driving it.
So far, so good. No one behind the windows of the president"s house had fixed at the young priest.
"You are an evil man," the voice boomed. "You, Howards, are guilty of spilling the blood of countless men, women, and children. I am not talking of the murders you had committed on Earth for your vile political purposes. I accuse you of exploding the cobalt bombs on Earth so that all life would perish there. I accuse you of planning to do so to the end that you might then come to Mars and be sole ruler of all mankind. I accuse you of the murder of eight billion people and of all the life that G.o.d created to flourish on the face of His green Earth, green no longer.
"I could accuse you of many other evil and monstrous deeds, such as the adultery you are now contemplating forcing on a virtuous wife and the fornication you are now forcing on the daughter of General Mier."
"But these, evil though they may be, are as nothing to the murder of Earth!"
The scream that came from the man by the gates could be heard even across the plaza. The white figure pointed at the Pope, its head turned towards those behind him. Obviously, he was ordering them to fire.
But n.o.body obeyed. Even these men hesitated.
Then, the white figure pulled a weapon from the white holster on its white belt. There was a spurt of flame which Broward could see because his angle of vision was between the two men on the opposite sides of the gate.
Another followed the first, and another.
Siricio II fell backward and lay on the rock floor, his arms spread out.
Broward cast another look at the tunnel but saw no one. Then he turned and sprinted down the hall, burst through the door, and cried, "Let"s go!"
Quiroga and Saavedra were sitting in the jeep that had the other jeep placed on its hood, "We heard him,"
said Quiroga. He was white and shaking. "We heard the shots, too. Was the Holy Father... ?"
Broward nodded and climbed into the jeep behind Quiroga, who was in the driver"s seat. "Howards murdered him."
"Holy Mother of Mary!" said Saavedra. Both Argentineans crossed themselves.
"Howards" men will be stunned," said Broward. "They can"t help it. Let"s go!"
Quiroga sat motionless except for the silent moving of his lips. His hands gripped the little wheel on the end of the long flexible steering rod. He stared straight ahead.
Broward pounded him hard on his back. "Are you going to sit here and be slaughtered like the Holy Father?"
he shouted. "Come on now! Or get out and let me take your place! I"ll do it alone if you"ve lost your guts!"
Quiroga said, harshly, "I"m all right. And watch your language. No man calls me a coward."
The jeep started slowly around the rear of the house. Then, when it rounded the corner, it straightened out.
Quiroga turned the acceleration disc, and the jeep surged ahead so swiftly that all three were thrust back against the seats. Broward picked up one of the burpers from the floor and looked at the upper row of windows in the building. It was from there that the fire of the Angels would be most dangerous. The closer the jeep got to the building, the better angle those in the upper story would have to shoot over the vehicle that was their shield.
"This is going to take good timing," he said to Saavedra, who held a knife in one hand. "When I give the word..."
The plaza became a h.e.l.l of noise. The entire front of the building seemed to blaze. But Broward was already pulling his head down when the hail came and the jeep began to shake. Bullets went whing! zeeee! past them; explosive bullets struck the body of the shield and bent it over towards the men.
Quiroga had locked the controls and slipped from the seat to the hood, unhindered because there was no windshield.
Saavedra and Broward, crouching, followed him beneath the shelter of irradiated plastic that formed the vehicle"s body.
Broward peered through the opening between the shield and the hood. "Slow it down!" he shouted to Quiroga, who held the controls in his hands. The shaft, capable of being telescoped and very flexible, was bent forwards over the hood.
The jeep checked, and the men slid against the frame of the shield. Broward"s head banged into a tire; for a second he almost blacked out.
Then, the three were pressed against the frame; the jeep had rammed into the building. Saavedra slashed at the strips of sheet that held one end, then slid the knife over to Broward. He grabbed at it, it struck his hand, and dived off the hood onto the ground. Without thinking, he jumped off the hood, picked up the knife, and leaped back onto the hood. Explosive bullets, striking the rock floor, threw chips "of stone like sharpnel and zinged off the hood.
He felt something sharp hit his face, put his hand up, and it came away with blood. But he used the other hand to slash atthe strips holding down his end of the shield. In the meantime, the others, weightless because of their gravpaks, were clinging to the underside of the shield. It rose, pulled upwards by the counterdrive of the paks attached to it Broward sprang up and grabbed hold of a jeep wheel, his momentum sending the vehicle more quickly upwards.
They floated up the front of the building while bullets poured into the jeep on the building side. Then, the fires ceased.
Apparently, or so it seemed to Broward, the solid bullets were ricocheting back through the windows and the explosive bullets were going off too close to the shooters.
Clinging to the underside like a baby Martian spider to its mother, Broward looked down. They were just above the top row of windows. Now, the men should be running out into the plaza to get a shot at them from the exposed side. And the men in the window now below should be leaning out to fire up at them.
"Use your paks!" he screamed. "Up and over!" They soared above the ascending jeep, corrected their controls, and were on the root.
Broward had been afraid that men would be up there. If so the three would be helpless targets. But there was no one there. Not yet. He landed, flipped oft the pak power, and turned to the others.
Quiroga was all right. Saavedra was not there.
He followed the line indicated by the young officer"s pointing finger. Saavedra was still rising towards the ceiling of the cave. His head lolled; blood spurted out of the hole created when his knee had been blown off.
Quiroga crossed himself and then began, with Broward, to look for entrances on the roof to the story below. But there were none.
Broward cursed and then said, "That figures. He wouldn"t want an a.s.sa.s.sin using the same approach as us."
"What do we do?" Quiroga said. "They"ll be putting on paks and coming up after us in a minute."
Broward looked up at Saavedra"s body, now pressed against the ceiling of the cave, and at the jeep, still rising.
"I"d say we"ve had it. But we"re still alive. Maybe..."
Quiroga, who was facing the wall of rock at the rear of the building, shouted and fired his burper. Broward whirled and saw that a section of the rock, just above the juncture of the building and wall, had moved outwards.
He jumped to one side to be out of sight of anyone on the other side of the half-opened door. Quiroga fired another burst and then ran over alter Broward. The Moonman stopped by the door, fell to the root, shoved his gun under the door and into the opening beyond. He squeezed the trigger and did not release it until he had loosed at least thirty explosive bullets, as indicated by the tiny counter on the barrel.
Quiroga leaped through the opening as soon as the shooting stopped. Broward rose, hesitated a moment, then, hearing nothing, went around the rock-door. The lieutenant was standing inside an open bait-cage, which, in turn, was in a shaft hollowed out of the rock, The only light came from a lamp mounted on a thin pole on one side of the cage. This was mounted on a gravity-unit.
The cage and the walls of the shaft around it, however, were spattered with blood and covered with gobbets of flesh. The stream of explosive bullets poured in by Broward had literally blown the Angels apart. The head of one was missing; it had been knocked over the cage and down into the shaft or else had disintegrated.
Broward said, "Let"s get what"s left of them out of here. Lucky tor us we didn"t destroy the controls."
Part of the plastic rails around the cage had been shattered and there were dents in the floor, but this was the only damage. Before starting to clear out the remains, Broward looked above them and also peered over the edge, for there was some s.p.a.ce between the cage and the shaft. Darkness above and below.
"I think that Howards may have prepared this for a secret getaway," he said. "He probably sent these men up to get us from the rear. Maybe n.o.body else knows."
They dumped the legs and arms and torsos over and kicked bits of flesh and bone down the shaft. Then Broward pulled on the grips fastened to the back of the door and swung it in.
"If the men that"ll be coming after us from the outside don"t know about this shaft, they"re going to be mightily puzzled."
"Yes, but when they report to Howards," Quiroga said, "he"ll know soon enough what"s happened."
Broward hesitated. Up? Or down? If they descended, they might catch Howards by surprise and kill or capture him. This did not seem very likely. Although Howards did not like many people close to him, he made sure that his bodyguards were not too far off. Still, it might be worth taking a chance. The only drawback was that, even if they did get to Howards, they would surely be killed afterwards. Then, the bomb would come.
Besides, he was very curious about where the upper part of the shaft led.
Either way, he had to do something fast. It was possible that Howards might be able to cut off the power to the cage by remote control.
He tested the b.u.t.ton marked with an arrow pointing upward, and the cage began moving up. There was a little wheel by the two b.u.t.tons; he turned it to the right and the cage picked up speed. Rotating the wheel to the left slowed it down until it was crawling. The b.u.t.ton marked A (for alto. "halt" he supposed) stopped the cage.
Having mastered the controls, he resumed upward progress at full speed. Quiroga turned the lamp, which was on a joint, so that it shone straight above them. A minute pa.s.sed, and Quiroga said, "I think we"ve pa.s.sed the second level." A few seconds later, he said, "We should be about even with the top of the first level. Do you think this goes to the surface?"
"We"ll find out soon enough. There"s the end of the shaft."
They rose to the opening. Before reaching it, the cage had begun to slow down without operation of the controls. It stopped, and the two men got off.
They were in a well-lighted place, one large enough to hold several of the type of the four-seater s.p.a.ceshipthat it did contain. The chamber was hollowed out of granite and, beside the craft, had several cots, a tank of water, a large box full of provisions, canned food, medical supplies, and liquor. The illumination came from several mobile luminescent panels leaning against the walls.