"Gods couldn't be bothered with such triviality. In fact, I'd think it
unlikely they could be bothered with priests. If I was a god,
certainly I couldn't."
The boy's face was intent, its youthfulness somewhat ludicrous in view
of the dark robes he wore. He leaned forward, "Yeah, you talk about
priests and undertakers and all battening on human sorrow, but how
about you? How about the Category Military? How many men you killed,
major?"
Joe winced. "Too many," he said abruptly. The tic was at the side of
his mouth, unbeknownst to him. He added, "But mercenaries have
deliberately chosen their path. They know what they're going into and
they do it willingly, they haven't been drafted."
He thought a moment, and Phil Holland's talk about the Roman _ludi_
came back to him. He said, "It's like the difference between throwing
a bunch of Christians to some wild bulls in a Roman arena, to being a
torero in Spain, a matador who has chosen his profession and enters
the bullring to make money."
Then the boy said something that gave him greater depth than Joe had
expected. "Yeah," he said, "but maybe the torero was forced into
becoming a bullfighter on account of how bad he needed the money." In
the heat of the discussion, he was emboldened to add, "And these new
Rank Privates that go into a fracas, not knowing what it's all about,
just filled with all the stuff we see on Telly and all. How much of a
chance does one of them have if he runs into an old-timer like Joe
Mauser, out there in no-man's-land?"
_Touche_, Joe thought.
* * * * *
There was the action that sometimes came back to him in his dreams. He
had been a sergeant then, but already the veteran of five years or
more standing, and a double score of fracases. The force of which he
was a member had been in full retreat, and Joe's squad was part of the
rear-guard. The terrain had been mountainous, the High Sierra Military
Reservation. Four of his men had copped one, two so badly that they
had to be left behind, incapable of being moved. Joe, under the
pressure of long hours of retreat under fire, had finally sent the
others on back, and found himself a crevice, near the top of a sierra,
which was all but impregnable.
[Illustration]
His rifle had been a .45-70 Springfield, with its ultra-heavy slug,
but slow muzzle velocity. And Joe had a telescope mounted upon it, an
innovation that barely made the requirement of predating the year 1900
and thus subscribing to the Universal Disarmament Pact between the
Sov-world and the West-world. It had taken the enemy forces a long
time to even locate him, a long time and half a dozen casualties that
Joe had coolly inflicted. The way to get to him, the only way,
involved exposure. Joe could see the enemy officers, through his
scope, at a distance just out of his range. They knew the situation,
being old pros. He found considerable satisfaction in the rage he knew
they were feeling. He was dominating a considerable section of the
front, due to the terrain, and there was but one way to root him out,
direct frontal attack.
They had sent in Rank Privates; Low-Lowers, most of them in their
first fracas. Low-Lowers, the dregs of society, seldom employed and
then at the rapidly disappearing, all but extinct, unskilled labor
jobs. Low-Lowers, most of them probably in this fracas in hopes of the
unlikelihood of so distinguishing themselves that they would be jumped
a caste, or at least acquire an extra share or two of common stock to
better the basic living guaranteed by the State. Rank Privates, most
in their first fracas, unknowledgeable about taking cover and not even
in the physical condition this sort of combat demanded.
They came in time and again, surprisingly courageous, Joe had to
admit, and time and again he decimated them. One by one, coolly,
seldom wasting a shot. Not that he had to watch his ammunition, he had
the squad's full supply. He estimated that before it was through he
had inflicted approximately thirty casualties. Hits in the head, in
the torso, the arms, legs. He had inflicted enough casualties to fill
a field hospital. And it had all ended, finally, when a senior officer
below had arrived on the scene, took in the irritating situation, and
sent a dozen noncoms and junior officers, experienced men, to dig Joe
out. Joe had remained only long enough for a few final shots, none of
them effective, at long range, and had then hauled out and followed
after his squad. He might possibly have got two or three more of his
opponents, but only at his own risk. Besides, already the irritation
and hate that he had built up while on the run, and while his squad
mates were copping wounds, had left him and there was nausea in his
belly at the slaughter he had perpetrated.
Or that time on the Louisiana Reservation in the fracas between Allied
Petroleum and United Oil. Joe had been a lieutenant then and--
But he rejected this trend of thought and brought his attention back
to Sam Soligen.
"Perhaps you're right," he admitted. "Some Low-Lower jerk, impressed
by what he considers high pay and adventure, doesn't stand much of a
chance against an old pro."
The gawky tee-ager broke into a toothy smile. "Gee, I wasn't arguing
with you, major. I don't know anything about it. How about telling me
about one of your fracases, eh? You know, some time you really got in
the dill."
Joe snorted. He seldom met someone not of Category Military who didn't
want a special detailed description of some gory action in which Joe
had participated. And like all veterans of combat, there was nothing
he liked less to do. Combat was something which, when done, you wished
to leave behind you. Were brain washing really practicable, it was
this you would wish to wash away.
But Joe, like others before him, down through the ages, had found a
way out. He had a store of a dozen or so humorous episodes with which
he could regale listeners. That time his horse's cinch had loosened
when he was on a scouting mission and he had galloped around and
around amidst a large company of enemy skirmishers, most of them
running after him and trying to drag him from the horse's back, while
he hung on for dear life.
But it occurred to him that the boy might better appreciate a tale
which involved his father, the Telly reporter, and some act of daring
the small man had performed the better to serve his fracas-buff
audience.
He was well launched into the tale, boosting Freddy Soligen's part
beyond reality, but not impossibly so, when that worthy entered the
room, breaking it off.
While Freddy was shaking hands with his visitor, Sam said, "Hey, Papa,
you never told me about that time you were surrounded by all the field
artillery, and only you and Major Mauser and three other men got out."
Freddy grinned fondly at the boy and then looked his reproach at Joe.
"What're you trying to do, make the life of a Telly reporter sound
romantic to the kid? Stick to the priesthood, son, there's more
chicken dinners involved." He saw Joe was impatient to talk to him.
"How about leaving us alone for a while, Sam? We've got some
business."
"Sure, Papa. I've got to memorize some Greek chants, anyway. How come
they don't have all these rituals and all in some language everybody
can understand?"
"Then everybody might understand them," Freddy said sourly. "Then
what'd happen?"
His son said, "Major, maybe you can finish that story some other time,
huh?"
Joe said, "Sure, sure, sure. It winds up with your father the hero and
they bump him up to Upper-Upper and make him head of Category
Communications."
"On the trank again," Freddy grumbled, but Joe sensed he wasn't
particularly amused.
* * * * *
When the boy was gone, Joe Mauser told the Telly reporter of his
interview with Stonewall Cogswell.
Freddy shook his head. "He wants you to fly that sailplane thing of
yours again, huh? No. That won't do it. We need some gimmick, Joe.
Something--"
Joe said impatiently, "You keep saying that. But, look, I'm a
mercenary. A fighting man can't drop out of participation in the
fracases if he expects the buffs to continue interest in him."
The little man tried to explain. "I'm not saying you're going to drop
out of the fracases. But we need something where we can make you
shine. Somewhere where you can be on every lens for a mile around."
Joe's face was still impatient.
Freddy said sourly, "Listen, you tried to handle all this by yourself,
last time. You dreamed up that fancy glider gimmick and sold it to old
Baron Haer. But did you do yourself any good with the buffs? Like Zen
you did. All you did was louse up a perfectly promising fracas so far
as they were concerned. Hardly a drop of blood was shed. Stonewall
Cogswell just resigned when he saw what he was up against. Oh, sure,
you won the battle for Vacuum Tube Transport, practically all by
yourself, but that's not what the buff wants. He wants blood, he wants
action, spectacular action. And you can't give it to him way up there
in the air. Hey--!"
Joe looked at him, scowling questioningly.