Chapter VII

Gawroi's office at Kedaki College was furnished home-style with low benches and a central mat rather than chairs and a desk. The home-style furnishings, in their simple beauty, were not popular here on Kedak. Typical, thought Gawroi angrily. For five thousand years home-style is good enough for the Kedaki. For five thousand years no muddle-brained agitators question the value of home-style, its beauty or its function. Then a wave of false galactic brotherhood sweeps Kedak and the big, ungainly desks and chairs clutter more offices every day, so a man finds it difficult to move about without striking his body against some sharp edge or other.

And emotionally? Emotionally it is the same. The Kedaki religion is--the Kedaki religion. The cornerstone on which the world-spanning structure that is the edifice of Kedaki culture rests. The womb of knowledge and the sum of knowledge. But--questioned now. Doubted secretly by some among the highborn, as if they get a masochistic satisfaction from believing their gods are false and their fifty-generation belief in metempsychosis an attempt of their own class to keep the lowborn in servitude. Why, it was ridiculous!

"Come in, come in, my dear fellow!" Gawroi boomed, motioning his visitor to one of the low benches. "So you are Felg."

"I came as soon as I saw your announcement," Felg said, seating himself uncomfortably on the low bench.

"Tell me about it, Felg. What you said by phone, it could be very important."

Felg licked his lips nervously. "You realize I'm not usually an informer, but when I saw that the Chairman of the Department of Archaeology at the College and the police were both seeking this Matlin...."

"The police were not my idea," Gawroi growled. And they weren't, but not for the reason he would have this Felg think. If the Five Bureau decided to ring in the police, he supposed that was the Five Bureau's business. But the police might make Matlin--the Earthman Rhodes, he was sure--wary. "Now, then. You say you know the whereabouts of Matlin?"

"I think so."

"May I ask, Felg, why you...." Gawroi let his voice trail off, hoping Felg would interrupt him. And Felg did.

"Why I inform on this man? Because it is my duty as a loyal Kedaki, as a servant of my world and the world-idea which governs us, through five thousand years, from Balata 'kai."

"Good," said Gawroi. "Now tell me."

"Last night the man Matlin took a bus to Haatok."

"The northern outskirt of the city?"

"Yes, Haatok. This was as close to Balata 'kai as public conveyance could take him."

"He's going to Balata 'kai?"

"The bus was night darkened. I was on the bus. I got off the bus at Haatok, as he did. He was in the company of a woman named Haazahri."

"Haazahri," said Gawroi, writing the name down. "Go ahead."

"On the bus, he and the woman Haazahri spoke softly, but I heard some of their words. In the morning, that is, today, they were going to Balata 'kai."

"Why? Did they say why?"

"I failed to hear them. Why do you want this Matlin?"

"Isn't his illegal entry into Balata 'kai enough?"

"You didn't know that," said Felg, "until I told you."

"I'll ask you a question, Felg. Why did you want to inform on Matlin?"

"I already told you...."

"And I'm asking again. What were your personal reasons?"

"I have no personal reasons."

"Well, not that it matters."

Felg said suddenly, "You want to kill Matlin, don't you?"

"Eh? What's that?" Gawroi, startled, looked down at the reclining man. He had an impulse to kick the smirking face. Then he calmed himself with an effort and said, "But that's ridiculous! I have reason to believe that the man who calls himself Matlin is actually an Earthman named Rhodes, a victim of amnesia, suffered in the quake. Rhodes was a colleague of mine, you see, and...."

"I hate Matlin!" Felg said in a soft but hate-filled voice. "There's a brother to my hate in this room, I know there is, and nothing you can say will hide it. But don't you see, Gawroi? You don't have to tell me about your hatred. You can keep it secret. The important fact is, you hate. You want to kill this man. I hate him. I want to destroy him. I hate that man."

"Rhodes...." began Gawroi mildly.

"Rhodes? All right, all right, Rhodes. Maybe Matlin _is_ an Earthman somehow wearing purple skin. I don't care. It means nothing, nothing. Together, if we can find Matlin out there, in Balata 'kai...."

* * * * *

Gawroi was thinking: perhaps I can use this man's hatred. Because now that the Five Bureau had seen fit to call in the police, it was very dangerous. The police could be a problem. The police did not work secretly. Whatever the police did would be open to public scrutiny. So, if the police caught Matlin-Rhodes, he might escape with his life--and even his secret. The secret! The knowledge Matlin-Rhodes carried around in his head, lost to the world, lost even to himself--that was important!

Rhodes had said it was _The Book of the Dead_. The real _Book of the Dead_. Now, Gawroi and any loyal Kedaki knew better; it was not _The Book of the Dead_; it was a fantastically clever forgery; and it could bring the multiple hells of uncertainty to Kedak if Rhodes were given the chance to find where he had hidden it and the chance to make its contents public. Rhodes had told him about it. "_The Book of the Dead_, Gawroi," he had said, before the quake. "I'll tell you about this holy of holies of yours, Gawroi, and if I'm irreverent, I can't help being irreverent. Man, look around you! Must the lowborn remain lowborn, with no chance to better themselves, generation after generation? Do you really need human footstools to support the soles and heels of your vanity? They thought so for five thousand years, and they gave you a legacy. They gave you _The Book of the Dead_, with its lies and exaggerations and fabrications and deceit. Reincarnation! The writers of that book didn't know anything more about reincarnation than I do! But the lowborn swallowed their story for five thousand years. Well, it's time this stopped...."

And Gawroi had said, "What's it your business? You, an Earthman?"

"Sure, I'm an Earthman," Rhodes had answered. "But I'm a scientist first. I seek the truth, Gawroi, and I've found the truth. It won't be hidden much longer."

"Hidden?" Gawroi had asked incredulously. "It's hidden?"

"Hell, yes, it's hidden. Don't you think I know the score? I'd be beaten if necessary, for possession of that book."

Beaten was an understatement. The next day, Rhodes had been imprisoned. His mistake, Gawroi thought coldly, was confiding in me. I was a fellow scientist, though, and men like Rhodes make much of the scientific fraternity. Well, I'm a scientist second, a Kedaki first.

And now, this. Now Felg. Through Felg and with Felg, he could perhaps get to Matlin-Rhodes before the police. And make sure that the false _Book of the Dead_, and its forger, were not allowed to poison the minds of a whole people.

He asked Felg, "Why didn't you go to the police?"

"At first," Felg said, "I thought I would go to the police. There in Haatok, though, I changed my mind. Listen, Gawroi: I reasoned that if the police wanted him and you wanted him too, then your reason must be more than merely academic. And, while this Matlin spent the night in an Haatokian inn with the woman Haazahri, I told myself: Gawroi's the man for you. Go to Gawroi because neither your personal reason for hating Matlin, nor his, need bow before the will of the police. The police, capable but indifferent, might bungle. But Gawroi and yourself--"

"That's enough," said Gawroi. "I see what you mean. Felg listen to me. If we do this thing together, if we join forces, my motives must never be questioned."

"Nor mine."

"Good. Very well, Felg. I hate this Matlin. And you--you want Matlin killed?"

"Killed," echoed Felg.

"One promise. He is not to be killed until he leads me to something."

"Where? We can't be chasing all over Kedak."

"In Balata 'kai, probably. That's why he went there."

"Is he really an Earthman named Rhodes?"

"I believe so. Does it matter?"

"It doesn't matter to me. But it might matter to the police."

"Exactly. You haven't told anyone else?"

"No."

"And the woman with Rhodes? Haazahri? What of her?"

"You leave Haazahri to me," Felg said.

Gawroi shook his hand, regretting the need for the Earth-style gesture which had swept the galaxy. He had an instinctive dislike for Felg, but thought Felg just the man to help him, just the man to join him at Balata 'kai, just the man to see to it that Matlin-Rhodes never returned to Junction City alive....