SEVEN

Monitor 6Y9 stood staring at the electronic scanner-glass, her gaunt

body stooping a little, her face half in shadow. Behind her the high

white wall of a Security Observatory towered, totally blank from floor

to ceiling and shining with a dull lustre. At her side stood a bearded

young man in the somber black garb of an Advisory Specialist, his face

almost as gaunt as the woman's and scarcely more masculine in aspect,

for the woman was an Amazon in build and strength despite her leanness.

"They have escaped," the gaunt woman murmured. "See there! That blind,

stupid pig of a para-guard lying bound and nothing but a stretch of

dense woodland beyond with no scanner pickup anywhere."

"No reason to take it so much to heart," the bearded man said, a

slight smile on his thin, almost bloodless lips. "You seem to hate

them for personal reasons, and that surprises me. I'd advise you to

keep how you feel to yourself. If they have committed the grave crime

you've charged them with--and attacking that guard was just as grave a

crime--they will have to answer for their criminal behavior with their

lives. Doesn't that satisfy you? To feel personal animosity toward a

lawbreaker is inexcusable in a Monitor. It would be inexcusable in me."

"You are a fool!" the gaunt woman said, turning upon him with a gesture

of angry defiance, her dark eyes flashing. "I am not obliged to take

your advice, for my authority is superior to yours."

"You might do well to heed it," the young man said. "Your authority is

not superior to the Supreme Council of Monitors in full, law-making

session. And an Advisory Supervisor, even an Advisory Specialist, can

strongly influence the voting."

"And why should you influence the Council in a manner unfavorable to

me," the gaunt woman demanded. "Have I not always been your friend?

Don't forget, it was I who elevated you to your high station. If you

turn against me now you will regret it."

The young man inclined his head. "Perhaps. I do owe a great deal to

you. But personal animosity can distort judgment, and further threaten

our supremacy. I do not like it. We must act coolly and without bias."

"How can I act coolly when those two accused me of--" The gaunt woman

hesitated and tightened her lips, a deep flush creeping up over her

cheekbones. "On the travel strip they accused me of secretly harboring

criminal impulses as monstrous as their own," she went on in a

sudden, uncontrollable burst of rage. "They dared to affront my ears

with outrageous and shameful insinuations. They said that I too had

experienced the stirring and that I refused to face the truth about

myself and that the repression of that baseness in me had made me cruel

and vindictive. They said I was envious of what they did openly and

without shame, in the full light of day."

"Was it really as bad as all that?" the Advisory Specialist asked, his

voice not entirely lacking in sympathy. "Well, I can understand how

you must have felt. But at least they only made love openly when the

travel strip was deserted for many paces and when you were still in the

distance. You told me so yourself."

"I could still see them. The security guard could see them as well."

"It might have been better if you had shut your eyes to what you

saw. The rebellion is spreading rapidly and we encounter many such

criminal transgressions daily, even on the travel strips. Those two

were unusual in many ways, more daring than most of the others, willing

to take greater risks. To defy a Monitor as they did, threatening her

with physical violence and to leave the strip and take to the woods

in a daring bid for freedom, skilfully eluding pursuit, displaying

extraordinary intelligence, outwitting us at every turn. Surely you

must realize that it has set a dangerous example which others may not

be slow in following!"

"That is why they must be caught and brought to justice!" the gaunt

woman cried, her fury making her tremble and congesting the whites of

her eyes. "The death sentence must be imposed as quickly as possible.

They must stand before the Supreme Council, stripped naked, exposed in

all of their shame, and they must be forced to make a full confession.

Oh, we shall not spare them. _I_ will not spare them. I shall demand

that right.

"I shall force them to reveal all of the monstrous details of their

nights together in the dark: the criminal moments of unlawful

love-making, her wantonness, his amorous abandonment to her every

illicit whim. It is the woman who is always the most to blame. She has

led him on and destroyed him, for no man can resist a woman skilled in

all of the wiles and enticements of the harlot. Yes, yes, yes ... I

will use that old, almost forgotten word. I have read the old books

and I know what a harlot was and what a harlot did. I will fling the

word in her face. Harlot and courtesan, strumpet and destroyer of men!"

"There is another word, a more ribald word, that you had best not say,"

the young man advised. "You must try to control yourself and exercise

calm judgment when you make the charge. Otherwise the Council will

accuse you of bias."

"Let them accuse me! I will speak my mind."

"I have advised and warned you," the young man said. "I can do no more.

And I'm afraid you're forgetting that they must first be captured. Look

at the glass. More para-guards are descending and the scanner beams are

moving again. Another stretch of woodland is coming into view. Their

capture may not be long delayed. There is consolation in that--it is an

encouraging step forward. The pursuit has been resumed."

The gaunt woman swung about to face the glass, her eyes brightening, a

rapacious eagerness in her stare.

In the depths of the brightly illumined glass the forest seemed elfin

and remote, enveloped in a weaving interplay of light and shade. Five

para-guards were descending slowly above a boulder-strewn stretch

of forest floor, brightened here and there by red and yellow fungus

growths and moss-covered logs that glowed with a faint phosphorescence

in the shadowed hollows between the rocks.

One by one the para-guards reached the ground, threw off their

cumbersome air-suspension equipment, and checked the firing mechanism

of their hand-guns, their faces harsh and grimly purposeful in the

downstreaming light. Two of them were equipped with portable scanners

and as they moved the instruments about the scene shifted and another

stretch of woodland filled the glass. A patch of open sky swept

suddenly into view and across it a flying machine darted, looking, in

the glass' miniature reproduction of the scene, not unlike an enormous,

blue-black hornet.

"They must be taken alive," the gaunt woman breathed. "With success so

near I would be a fool not to change my original orders. Even if they

resist they must not be attacked with weapons. I will issue new orders

immediately."

"I would advise you to give it careful thought," the young man said.

"You will be risking the lives of five para-guards. The man is armed

now and--"

"Be silent. I shall do as I please. The death of five guards would be

a very cheap price to pay for the apprehension alive of such monstrous

criminals."

The young man sighed. "Have it your own way, then. But the Council may

not take a kindly view of such head-strong behavior. After all, human

life has _some_ value."

The gaunt woman's eyes flashed again in anger, but before she could

reply the entrance panel on the opposite wall of the Security

Observatory glided open, and an armed guard stood framed in the

aperture. He stood stiffly at attention, his hand raised in salute,

his expression tense, but deferential, as if the news he had to convey

would have burst from his lips if he had dared to ignore discipline.

The Monitor regarded him irately for an instant, and although the anger

in her eyes was not meant for him it caused him to take a swift step

backward.

"What is it?" she demanded. "Don't just stand there. Speak up."

"We followed your instructions and dropped seven para-guards at the

opposite end of the forest," he said. "They have captured a man and

a woman. They may be the two you seek, though it is hard to believe

they could have covered so many miles. They were dragged from a tangle

of underbrush, locked criminally in each other's arms. They are not

sex-privileged."

The gaunt woman stood very still, her lips paling a little, an

indescribable look, of shock and triumph commingled, perhaps, coming

into her face.

"Where are they?" she demanded, her voice so choked with emotion that

the guard had to strain to catch the words. "What have you done with

them?"

"They are here," he said. "I knew that you would want me to bring them

here immediately. They are just outside--"

"Bring them in! You try my patience. Bring them in and be quick about

it."

The guard swung about and was gone for a moment. When he returned he

was accompanied by a man and a woman, both securely gagged and with

their hands tied behind them.

The woman was dark-haired and dark-eyed, with exotically beautiful

features, her eyes almond-shaped, her skin so fair and delicately

textured that it seemed almost transparent. The man was well past his

first youth, but still in his prime, with a lithe strength in his build

and posture, an absence of excess weight, which made it hard to think

of him as a man approaching middle age. He was deeply sun-bronzed,

and had the look of a man who has lived most of his life under open

skies. There was great strength in his features as well, features too

rugged to be thought of as handsome but radiating a strange kind of

sensitivity, as if he were both an athlete and poet, man of action and

dreamer of dreams.

The woman was shaking her head violently in an attempt to dislodge the

gag, her dark eyes flashing with anger, but the man stood very still

and straight, regarding his captors with a coldly defiant stare. There

was contempt in his gaze as well, a proud disdain which he made no

effort to conceal.

The gaunt woman stood staring at them for a moment with a look of

bitter, rage-envenomed disappointment on her face. Then, quite

suddenly, her eyes clouded over and became almost opaque, like the

eyes of a cobra poised to strike.

"I had never thought to encounter such stupidity," she breathed, more

to herself than to the uneasily staring guard. "Why were they brought

here? They do not in the least resemble the other two. I have never set

eyes on them before. They are complete strangers to me and strangers

who stand accused of the most revolting of crimes should not be brought

into my presence at this time. It is more than I can endure."

The guard's ruddy face changed color, becoming almost pale. "We had

their description, nothing more," he said, quickly and defensively. "No

likenesses were transmitted, since you yourself could only describe

them. We had to make sure. We thought it was just barely possible--"

"Silence, you fool. I have heard enough. Give me your whiplash. I will

not need your hand-gun. Just the whiplash."

"You are not going to--" The guard's face was deathly pale now. "No,

no, try to understand. I have not merited--"

"You blundering stupid fool! It is not you I am going to chastise. It

is these two. I will listen first to what the woman has to say. Then,

if she has no shame, if she will not confess her guilt and admit that

she has been justly accused, as all criminal offenders must do, I will

punish her. Give me the whiplash."

"Yes, of course," the guard said, unbuckling from his waist the

flexible metal rod terminating in five catgut thongs which the gaunt

woman was now regarding with a fixed, almost hypnotic intensity. Some

of the color had crept back into his face and he breathed a long sigh

of relief as he handed it to her.

It was the Advisory Specialist's turn to look at her in consternation.

He stepped quickly forward and laid a restraining hand on her arm.

"You must be quite mad!" he said, warningly. "The Council will not

overlook or forgive the use of a whiplash by a Monitor in a private

interrogation. The very word you used--_chastise_. It is a brutally

primitive word, a word out of the old books, a completely unscientific

word that should be strictly excluded from the vocabulary of a Monitor.

You will bring ruin and disgrace upon both of us. I will not be a party

to it."

"Then go!" the gaunt woman cried, almost screaming the words. "I have

always suspected you were nothing but a coward. Go, leave me. I can no

longer endure the sight of you."

Without a word, his face as pale as the guard's had been, the young man

turned and left the Observatory, the entrance panel closing behind him

with a dull droning.

Grasping the whiplash firmly, the gaunt woman stepped quickly forward

and tore the gag from the dark-eyed girl's mouth.

The girl recoiled a step, and stood for an instant motionless, her

shoulders held straight and her eyes still blazing with anger. She

did not seem to want to be the first to speak, for she kept her lips

tightly compressed and her chin tilted defiantly. So fierce was

her pride and uncompromising dignity that for the briefest instant

the gaunt woman hesitated, as if some vestige of human feeling,

of compassion and respect deep in her nature was urging her to be

merciful. Then, as quickly as it had arisen, the impulse vanished, and

the enraged Monitor unleashed a torrent of vituperation, her voice

trembling with fury.

"Lascivious wanton, lewd temptress, abandoned harlot! How many men

have you betrayed? How many men have you aroused unlawfully, tempting

them to engage in acts of criminal carnality which all of the lessons

of their childhood and early adolescence had given them the strength

and wisdom to withstand? And the glandular injections, the wise, sane

quieting of desire, its almost complete eradication in high-minded

specialists in a hundred fields whose social dedication has made our

society what it is--how dared you flaunt your brazen primitiveness

openly and destroy what it has taken centuries to create?

"You have committed the most terrible of crimes. You have discovered in

your wickedness that here and there, among a few men who are criminals

at heart, the old, dangerous impulses are stirring again and perhaps

have never been wholly subdued. And because they are stirring in you,

because you are an abandoned creature lost to all shame, you have led

many such men along pathways of gross sensuality, of unlawful desire.

How many? A hundred, a thousand? You do not need to tell me. I can

guess. It is always the woman who is most to blame, even when she

consorts with men who are themselves criminals, as is this man here."

The girl spoke then, for the first time. She did not raise her voice

and the anger which flamed in her eyes did not make her words come in a

rush, as the Monitor's words had done. She spoke with dignity and each

word was chosen with care and each word fell on the gaunt woman's ears

with the force of a stinging rebuke.

"If you had wisdom and warmth and understanding you would have said,

quite simply: 'He is a man--you are a woman. No woman can live without

love and give to the world the best that is in her, and increase the

world's store of radiance and tenderness and beauty. And no man can

live without love and be complete in his inmost being, and have the

courage of his beliefs and build proud new worlds on the ashes of a

world such as this, a world which is dying."

"If our world is dying, you have helped to kill it!" the gaunt woman

cried, her face dark with rage. "Do you hear? You have helped with your

wantonness. You were caught making love in the forest like--like wild

animals."

"No, you are mistaken," the dark-eyed girl said quietly. "We were

making love with dignity, tenderness and beauty."

The gaunt woman's rage could no longer be constrained by anything

short of violence. The words that came to her lips in reply were never

uttered. She could no longer articulate and the words became a low

muttering which continued even when she seized the hem of the girl's

white garment and ripped it from her shoulders, baring her back from

neck to waist.

She raised the whiplash and brought it down with all her strength on

the girl's naked back. Three times she raised the punitive weapon and

brought it down with relentless violence, her breath wheezing in her

throat.

The thongs cut cruelly into the girl's flesh, raising long crimson

welts, and sending her staggering forward. She raised her hands to her

face and dropped to her knees, but she neither cringed nor cried out.

She remained kneeling in an upright position, in an attitude that only

great courage could have enabled her to maintain. She was trembling a

little, but she continued to hold her shoulders straight and did not

even moan when the whiplash descended for the fourth and last time.

The gaunt woman was raising the weapon for another blow when the man

hurled himself against her, battering her with his shoulders and elbows

until the whiplash went clattering and she collapsed backwards against

the electronic scanner-glass, shaking but not shattering it, and sank

with a groan to the floor.

She remained sprawled out on the floor for a full minute, clutching at

her side, twisting about in pain, and trying several times to rise, her

eyes darting in desperate appeal toward the guard. Her lips moved but

no sound came from them, for her throat had been bruised so severely

that her vocal cords throbbed dully and she could not even take a deep

breath, or summon the strength to speak.

The girl's enraged lover came and stood over her, glaring savagely down

at her and shaking his head in a vain attempt to dislodge the gag. He

was not aware that the guard had caught and correctly interpreted the

Monitor's unspoken message and was now standing directly behind him

with a small, metallically gleaming hand-gun in his clasp.

The guard raised the weapon slowly and took careful aim, centering its

double sights on a small mole in the middle of the enraged man's back.

The report of the weapon was loud in the Observatory, shaking the

scanner-glass as violently as the Monitor's heavily collapsing body

had done. The impact of its energy charge lifted the enraged man up

and hurled him back against the wall. His body struck the wall and

rebounded, hurling him forward to the floor.

He was dead before he struck the floor, but his lifeless body continued

to move about erratically for a moment, from the impetus of the energy

charge, and its slow dissipation throughout every organ and tissue of

his body.

The girl screamed and ran to him, and threw herself upon him, cradling

his head in her arms, swaying despairingly from side to side.

Getting at last to her feet, the gaunt woman experienced a moment of

terrible remorse, of such acute awareness of what had happened and

could not be undone that she swayed also and covered her face with her

hands.

In that moment she knew that no one, not even a Monitor, could escape

a feeling of guilt for an act of cruelty and violence that could have

been avoided, that need not have taken place at all.

For a moment a noose of savage tightness seemed to wrap itself around

her heart, making it impossible for her to breathe. Then, gradually,

the old hardness reasserted itself and she told herself that she was a

fool to feel any sympathy for the girl or remorse over the death of her

lover.

Were they not both criminals whose rebellion was a threat to the entire

structure of society? Was not the stamping out of such an evil the

first duty of a Monitor and could that duty ever be shirked?

What was the girl saying? The girl had raised her eyes and was staring

at her, but she couldn't seem to catch the words.

Suddenly she did hear them and for an instant the noose feeling

returned, the savage constriction around her heart.

"You will pay in your own way in your own time," the girl was saying.

"If there is any justice left in the world, you will pay for what

you have done. I no longer even hate you. There is a dark horror in

the depth of some minds that destroys everything that is radiant and

beautiful in life. In your mind there is such a horror. And in the end

it will destroy you, for great evil feeds upon evil until there is

nothing left at all."

The Monitor had only the vaguest recollection of speaking to the guard,

of gesturing and saying: "Take her away. And remove the body of that

criminal from this room. When I return I shall expect to find them both

gone."