Brink of Madness Part 10

Red's hand blurred suddenly, going for his own weapon. Pell squeezed the trigger, the violet sparks danced for an instant, and then Red stood frozen with his hand almost to his chest.

"I'd advise n.o.body else to try that," said Pell, and then in an ironical tone to Larkin: "C.I.B. agents are trained to be pretty quick with a freezer, right, Chief?"

Larkin seemed to find his voice now. "But--how--what happened? You were injected. How can you...."

"I just took a little precaution, that's all," said Pell. "There'll be plenty of time to explain it all later. You'll probably hear the whole thing in court, Larkin, when I testify at your trial for treason.

Meanwhile, all of you just stay nice and calm while I use the viewer."

He stepped to the viewer and dialed with his free hand. The plate glowed, s.h.i.+mmered and a moment later the pale, grave face of Theodor Rysland came into view. His eyebrows rose as he saw the weapon in Pell's hand and glimpsed the people beyond Pell. "h.e.l.lo--what's this all about?"

"Haven't time to explain fully now," said Pell, "but I want you to get to Larkin's country house as soon as you can. I'll call agent Kronski in a moment and have him bring some others, and together we'll take Larkin and Nebel into custody. They're behind the Supremist movement--a deliberate attempt to take over the government. They did it with a drug; that's how Supremist's are made."

"What's this? A drug?"

"Think about it later," said Pell. "Just grab the facts right now. The drug makes a person subject to post-hypnotic commands--that's why your Supremists are blindly, unthinkingly loyal. However, the command can be erased by a second treatment. That'll be tough and take a lot of ferreting out, but it won't be impossible." He glanced at Ciel, and saw that she was staring at him with horror--with enmity. It sickened him, but he steadied himself with the realization that Ciel would be one of the first to be re-treated.

Several minutes later he had completed his calls. Rysland, Kronski and the others were on the way. He kept the freezer pointed, and watched his captives carefully. Ciel had gone over to the couch and was sitting there, her face in her hands, weeping softly.

"I don't know how you did it," said Larkin. "I don't understand it. The injection should have worked. It always did before."

"Well, it almost worked," said Pell. "I must admit I had quite a time fighting off your commands. But, you see, I knew you'd gotten to Ciel somehow when she called me up to make the date this evening. She spoke of going out to the terrace at the Stardust Cafe. It was a little odd that she should speak of the terrace like that, out of a clear sky--and I wondered why it should be on her mind. Then it struck me that neither of us had ever noticed a terrace there, and Ciel must have some special reason for knowing about it.

"She did, of course--she'd been instructed to get me out there where your boys could slap a freezer on me. So I started guessing with that hunch to work on. Everything more or less fell into place after that. It was pretty certain that they'd try to make a loyal Supremist out of me, too, and that's when I took that little precaution I mentioned to you."

"What precaution?"

Pell smiled. "I had Marco the mentalist hypnotize me and give me a rather special post-hypnotic command. He ordered me not to believe any _subsequent_ post-hypnotic commands. That's why your conditioning didn't work on me."

Larkin could find no words; he just stared.

"Think about it, Larkin," said Pell. "Think hard. Maybe you'd convinced yourself you were doing good, but your purpose was still tyranny. And like any tyranny it contained the means of its own destruction. It always works out that way, Larkin--maybe it's a law, or something."

It had been a long speech for Pell, practically an oration. He was, after all, a cop, not a philosopher. Just a guy trying to get along.

Just an ordinary citizen whose name was legion, looking at his wife now and waiting with what patience he could find for the time when she would be cleared of the poisonous doctrine that any one race or group or even species was supreme.

He was thinking, too, that the trial would keep him busy as the very devil and that they _still_ wouldn't get to that vacation and second honeymoon for a long time....

That, considering everything, was not too much to put up with.