Preferred Risk by Edson McCann (most read book in the world txt) 📕

Class-A. Not many can do it, but I sweated it out. Thirty years living like a dog and killing myself with work and study. Not even a real woman until I met Susan, and she went to Defoe. But I wanted it easier for the young men. I wanted everybody to have a good life. No harm to anyone. Pull together, and forget the tough times. Then you had to come and blow the roof off...."

I felt sick. It was probably all true, and few men could make it. But if that's what it took to advance under the Company rules, it was justification enough for our fight. "You'll be all right, Sam," I told him. "You'll go to sleep with the others. And when you wake up, you may have to work like hell again, but it'll be to rebuild the Earth, not to ruin it. Maybe there'll even be a chance with Susan again."

Defoe laughed sardonically. "Very nice, Thomas. And I suppose you mean it. What's in the future for me?"

"Suspension until the new government gets organized and can decide your case. I'd like to vote now for permanent suspension."

His face lost some of his amusement. Then he shrugged. "All right, I suppose I knew that. But now will you satisfy my curiosity? Just how did you work the business with Bay 100?"

"What happened to Slovetski?" I asked. I couldn't be sure about some of my suspicions over Benedetto's death, but I couldn't take chances that the man might still be loose somewhere, or else hiding out here until we were off guard.

He shook his head. "I can answer, but I'm waiting for a better offer."

"Sam?" I asked.

Gogarty nodded slowly. "All right, Tom. I guess you're the boss now. And I think I'm even glad of it. I always liked you. I'll answer about Slovetski."

Defoe snarled and swung, then saw my rifle coming up, and straightened again. "You win once more, Thomas. Your great international rebel cooperated with us very nicely after we caught him. We arranged for him to receive all calls to his most secret hideout right here in this room. It netted us his fellow conspirators—including your father, Miss dell'Angela!"

She gasped faintly, but her head came up at once. "Nikolas was no traitor. You're lying!"

"Why should I lie?" he asked. "With the right use of certain drugs, any man can become a traitor. And Dr. Lawton is an expert on drugs."

"Where is he?" I asked.

He shrugged. "How should I know? He wanted a radioactive world, so I let him enjoy it. We put him outside just before we closed the doors permanently."

Gogarty nodded confirmation. I turned it over. He might even have been one of the men waiting outside. But it wouldn't matter. Without his organization and with a world where life outside was impossible, Slovetski's power was finished.

I turned to Zorchi. "The men who broke in will be going crazy soon," I told him. "While Rena finds the paging system and reassures them they'll all be treated in the reception room, how about getting Lawton to locate and revive a couple of the doctors you know and trust?"

Rena came back from the paging system, and Zorchi prodded Lawton with the gun, heading him toward the files that would show the location of the doctors. Gogarty stood up doubtfully, but I shook my head. Zorchi was able to handle a man of Lawton's type, even without full use of his legs, and I couldn't trust Gogarty yet.

"You can give me a hand with Defoe, Sam," I suggested. "We'd better strap him down first."

Gogarty nodded, and then suddenly let out a shocked cry, and was cringing back!

In the split second when both Rena and I had looked away, Defoe had whipped out an automatic and was now covering us, his teeth exposed in a taut smile. "Never underestimate an opponent, Thomas," he said. "And never believe what he says. You should have searched me, you know."

The gun was centered on Rena and he waited, as if expecting me to make some move. All I could do was stand there, cursing myself. I'd thought of everything—except the obvious!

Defoe backed toward the door and slipped around it, drawing its heavy weight slowly shut until only a crack showed. Then he laughed. "Give my love to Millen," he said, and laughed softly.

I jumped for the door, but his feet were already moving out of the passage. The door began opening again, but I knew it was too late. Then, it was open. And amazingly, Defoe stood not ten feet away.

At the other end of the passage, a ragged bloody figure was standing, swaying slowly from side to side, holding a rifle. I took a second look to recognize Nikolas Slovetski. He was moving slowly toward Defoe. And now Defoe jerked back and began frantically digging for the automatic he must have pocketed.

Slovetski leaped, tossing the gun aside in a way that indicated it must have been empty. A bullet from Defoe's automatic caught his shoulder in mid-leap, but it couldn't stop him. He crashed squarely on Defoe, swinging a knife as the other went down. It missed, ringing against the hard floor.

I'd come unfrozen by then. I kicked the knife aside and grabbed the gun from Defoe's hands. Slovetski lay limp on him, and I rolled the smaller man aside.

Defoe was out cold from the blow of his head hitting the floor. Gogarty had come out behind me and now began binding him up. He opened his eyes slowly, blinked, and tried to grin as he stared at the bonds. He swung his head to the figure on the floor beside him. "Shall we go quietly, Nikolas?" he asked, as Gogarty picked him up and carried him back to the private vault.

But his sarcasm was wasted on Slovetski. The man must have been dying as he stumbled and groped his way toward the place where he knew Defoe must be. And the bullet in the shoulder had finished him. Rena bent over him, a faint sob on her lips.

Surprisingly, he fought his way back to consciousness, staring up at her. "Rena," he said weakly. "Benedetto! I loved him. I—" Then his head rolled toward me. "At least, I lived to die in a revolution, Thomas. Dirty business, revolution. When in the course of human events, it becomes—"

He died before he could finish. I went looking for Lawton, to make sure Defoe was suspended at once. He'd be the last political suspendee, if I had anything to do with it, but there would be a certain pleasure in watching Lawton do the job.

XIX

The doors of the reception hall were closed again, but there was no lock now. One of the two doctors whom Zorchi had trusted was there now, waiting for the stragglers who came in slowly as a result of our broadcast. We couldn't reach them all, of course, but some could be saved. The men who had fought with us were treated and suspended. Even the boy and his dog had finally reached us and been put away.

In the main room of the executive vault, Carmody was waiting for Rena and me as we came in, haggard from lack of sleep, but somehow younger-looking than he had been since we had first revived him.

He stood up, managing a tired smile. "The first work's done, Tom," he said. "It wasn't too hard, once they learned Defoe was suspended; a lot of the others were afraid of him, I guess. So far, I've only contacted the ones I can trust, but it's a beginning. I've gotten tapes of their delegation of authority to you as acting assistant Chief Underwriter. I guess the factor that influenced them most was your willingness to give up all hopes of suspension for the emergency. And having Zorchi was a help, too—one man like him is worth an army now. I'll introduce you tomorrow."

He stumbled out, heading toward the sleeping quarters.

Well, I had the chance I'd wanted. And I had his promise to put off suspension until things were running properly. With time to develop a small staff, and with a chance to begin the work of locating the men to study the problems that had to be solved, I couldn't ask for much more.

Zorchi grinned at me. "Emperor Weels!" he mocked.

I grinned back. "If you ever say that seriously, Luigi, I want you to say it with a bullet through my brain. I've seen enough cases of power corrupting."

For a second, he studied me. "If that day should come, then there shall be the bullet. But now, even I must sleep," he said.

Then he glanced at Rena. "I have left orders that a priest should be wakened."

She colored faintly.

"You'll be best man, I suppose?" I asked.

This time, even his beard couldn't conceal his amusement. "Is Zorchi not always the best man?" he asked as he left us alone.

I stared at the vault that would be my home for the next twenty-five or fifty years—until I was an old man, and the rest of the world was ready to be awakened. "It's a lousy place to spend a honeymoon," I told Rena.

She leaned against me. "But perhaps a good place to bring up children," she said. "A place to teach them that their children will have a good world, Tom. That's all a woman ever wants, I guess."

I drew her to me. It was a good way to think of the future, whatever happened. And it would be a better world, where the virtues of the Company could be used.

Probably it wouldn't be perfect.

Even the best form of government all the experts could devise couldn't offer a permanent solution. But it could give men a chance to fight their way to a still better world.

[Transcriber's Note: There are two section V headings as per the orginal publication.]

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Preferred Risk, by Edson McCann