The Syndic Part 2

The man who was roaring moved up to the aisle door, fell silent, saw and smelled the blood and fainted.

A woman began to pound the guard on Charles' right with her fists, yelling: "What did you do to my husband? You shot my husband!" She meant the man who had fainted; Charles peeled her off the bodyguard.

Somehow they got into the lobby, followed by most of the audience. The three bodyguards held them at bay. Charles found he was deaf in his right ear and supposed it was temporary. Least of his worries. Halloran had taken a shot at him. The guard named Weltfisch had intercepted it.

The guard named Donnel had shot Halloran down.

He said to Donnel: "You know Halloran long?"

Donnel, not taking his eyes from the crowd, said: "Couple of years, sir.

He was just a guy in the bodyguard pool."

"Get me out of here," Orsino said. "To the Syndic Building."

In the big black car, he could almost forget the horror; he could hope that time would erase it completely. It wasn't like polo. That shot had been _aimed_.

The limousine purred to a halt before the t.i.tanic bulk of the Syndic Building, was checked and rolled on into the Unrestricted Entrance. An elevator silently lifted the car and pa.s.sengers past floors devoted to Alcohol Clerical, Alcohol Research, and Testing, Transport, Collections Audit and Control, Cleaning and Dying, Female Recruitment and Retirement, up, up, up, past sections and sub-sections Charles had never entered, Syndic member though he was, to an automatic stop at a floor whose indicator said: _enforcement and public relations_.

It was only 9:45 P.M.; F. W. Taylor would be in and working. Charles said: "Wait here, boys," and muttered the code phrase to the door. It sprang open.

F. W. Taylor was dictating, machine-gun fas.h.i.+on, to a mike. He looked dog-tired. His face turned up with a frown as Charles entered and then the frown became a beam of pleasure.

"Charles, my boy! Sit down!" He snapped off the machine.

"Uncle--" Charles began.

"It was so kind of you to drop in. I thought you'd be at the theater."

"I was, Uncle, but--"

"I'm working on a revision for the next edition of _Organization, Symbolism and Morale_. You'd never guess who inspired it."

"I'm sure I wouldn't, Uncle. Uncle--"

"Old Thornberry, President of the Chase National. He had the infernal gall to refuse a line of credit to young McGurn. _Bankers!_ You won't believe it, but people used to _beg_ them to take over their property, tie up their incomes, virtually enslave them. People _demanded_ it. The same way they demanded inexpensive liquor, tobacco and consumer goods, clean women and a chance to win a fortune and our ancestors obliged them. Our ancestors were sneered at in their day, you know. They were called criminals when they distributed goods and services at a price people could afford to pay."

"Uncle!"

"Hush, boy, I know what you're going to say. You can't fool the people forever! When they'd had enough hounding and restriction, they rose in their might.

"The people demanded freedom of choice, Falcaro and the rest rose to lead them in the Syndic and the Mob and they drove the Government into the sea."

"Uncle Frank--"

"From which it still occasionally ventures to annoy our coastal cities,"

F. W. Taylor commented. He warmed to his subject. "You should have seen the old boy blubber. The last of the old-time bankers, and they deserved everything they got. They brought it on themselves. They had what they called laissez-faire, and it worked for awhile until they got to tinkering with it. They demanded things called protective tariffs, tax remissions, subsidies--regulation, regulation, regulation, always of the other fellow. But there were enough bankers on all sides for everybody to be somebody else's other fellow. Coercion s...o...b..lled and the Government lost public acceptance. They had a thing called the public debt which I can't begin to explain to you except to say that it was something written on paper and that it raised the cost of everything tremendously. Well, believe me or not, they _didn't_ just throw away the piece of paper or scratch out the writing on it. They let it ride until ordinary people couldn't afford the pleasant things in life."

"Uncle--"

A cautious periscope broke the choppy water off Sea Island, Georgia. At the other end of the periscope were Captain Van Dellen of the North American Navy, lean as a hound, and fat little Commander Grinnel.

"You might take her in a little closer, Van," said Grinnel mildly.

"The exercise won't do you any lasting damage," Van Dellen said. Grinnel was very, very, near to a couple of admirals and normally Van Dellen gave him the kid-glove treatment in spite of ranking him. But this was _his_ s.h.i.+p and no cloak and dagger artist from an O.N.I. desk was telling him how to con it.

Grinnel smiled genially at the little joke. "I could call it a disguise," he said patting his paunch, "but you know me too well."

"You'll have no trouble with a sea like this," Van Dellen said, strictly business. He tried to think of some appropriate phrase to recognize the danger Grinnel was plunging into with no resources except quick wits, a trick ring and a pair of guns. But all that bubbled up to the top of his head was; thank G.o.d I'm getting rid of this b.a.s.t.a.r.dly little Sociocrat.

He'll kill me some day if he gets a clean shot and the chance of detection is zero. Thank G.o.d I'm a Const.i.tutionist. We don't go in for things like that--or do we? n.o.body ever tells me anything. A hack of a pigboat driver. And this little b.a.s.t.a.r.d's going to be an admiral some day. But that boy of mine'll be an admiral. He's brainy, like his mother.

Grinnel smiled and said: "Well, this would be it, wouldn't it?"

"Eh?" Van Dellen asked. "Oh. I see what you mean. Chuck!" he called a sailor. "Break out the Commander's capsules. Pa.s.s the word to stand by for ejection."

The Commander was fitted, puffing, into the capsule. He growled at the storekeeper: "You sure this was just unsealed? It feels sticky already."

A brash jayee said: "I saw it unsealed myself three minutes ago, Commander. It'll get stickier if we spend any more time talking. You have"--he glanced at his chronometer--"seventeen minutes now. Let me snap you in."

The Commander huddled down after a searching glance at the jayee's face which photographed it forever in his memory. The top snapped down. Some day--some happy day--that squirt would very much regret telling him off.

He gave an okay sign to Van Dellen who waved back meagerly and managed a smile. Three crewmen fitted the capsule into its lock.

Foomf!

It was through the hatch and bobbing on the surface. Its color matched the water's automatically. Grinnel waggled the lever that aimed it insh.o.r.e and began to turn the propellor crank. He turned fast; the capsule--rudders, crank, flywheel, shaft and all--would dissolve in approximately fifteen minutes. It was his job to be ash.o.r.e when that happened.

And ash.o.r.e he'd be practically a free agent with the loosest sort of roving commission, until January 15th. Then his orders became most specific.

III

Charles Orsino squirmed in the chair. "Uncle--" he pleaded.

"Yes," F. W. Taylor chuckled, "Old Amadeo and his colleagues were called criminals. They were called bootleggers when they got liquor to people without worrying about the public debt or excise taxes. They were called smugglers when they sold cheap b.u.t.ter in the south and cheap margerine in the north. They were called counterfeiters when they sold cheap cigarettes and transportation tickets. They were called high-jackers when they wrested goods from the normal inflation-ridden chain of middlemen and delivered them at a reasonable price to the consumers.

"They were criminals. Bankers were pillars of society.

"Yet these bankers who dominated society, who were considered the voice of eternal truth when they spoke, who thought it was insanity to challenge their beliefs, started somewhere and perhaps they were the best thing for their day and age that could be worked out...."

Father Ambrosius gnawed at a bit of salt herring, wiped his hands, dug through the litter in his chest and found a goose quill and a page of parchment. He scrubbed vigorously with a vinegar-soaked sponge, at the writing on the parchment and was pleased to see that it came off nicely, leaving him a clean surface to scribble his sermon notes on. He cut the quill and slit it while waiting for the parchment to dry, wondering idly what he had erased. (It happened to be the last surviving copy of Tacitus' _Annals_, VII. i-v.)

To work then. The sermon was to be preached on s.e.xagesima Sunday, a prelude to the solemn season of Lent. Father Ambrosius' mind wandered in search of a text. Lent ... salt herring ... penitence ... the capital sins ... avarice ... usury ... delinquent pew rent ... fat-headed young Sir Baldwin in his tumbledown castle on the hill ... salt herring now and _per saeculae saeculorum_ unless Sir Baldwin paid up his delinquent pew rent.

At the moment, Sir Baldwin came swaggering into the cell. Father Ambrosius rose courteously and said, with some insincerity: "_Pax vobisc.u.m._"