I came up out of a drugged sleep to see early morning sunshine glowing through curtains at an open window. I had a headache like a cracked anvil. Roosevelt was sitting in a brocaded chair beside the bed, dressed in a fantastic outfit that somehow, on him, looked natural enough: a short, loose coat with a fur collar, tight breeches, slippers with jeweled pompons, a big gold chain across his chest, and jewels everywhere, stitched to his sleeves, sparkling in finger rings.
He said "Good morning" in a cheery tone and passed me a cup of coffee. "We've been through a difficult time," he went on. "But it's over now, Curlon. I regret the necessity for the things I was forced to do—but I had no choice. And we succeeded, you and I. Now the victory and all its fruits are ours." He said this in a low voice, but his black eyes glowed like a man looking at visions.
I tried the coffee. It was hot and strong, but it didn't help my head any.
"You understand, don't you?" His eyes probed mine. "A great new destiny is taking shape—for you as well as me. Think of it, Curlon! Who hasn't wished to seize the sorry scheme of things entire, and mold it nearer to his heart's desire? We—we've done it—together! Out of the ashes of the old, a new world rises—a world in which our fates loom like colossi over the faceless mob! The world that should have been, Curlon, a world of might and glory, such as has never before been seen—spread at our feet like a carpet! We've turned back the clock of fate, set history back on a course that seemed doomed forever!"
"What about the girl?" I asked.
"I'm sorry; she was a shadow in a twilight world. And you, I'm afraid, were caught up in her spell. I did what I had to do. I would have brought her with us, but it was impossible. The fabric I'm weaving is too fragile at this stage to support the transfer of a key figure from a peripheral A-line."
"I don't know what you're doing, Roosevelt," I said. "But whatever it is, the price is too high."
"One day you'll understand, Curlon. Of all mankind you'll understand best. Because, out of all the millions of pawns on the board, you alone are my compeer; like mine, your destiny is entwined with that of the new world that's taking shape."
"Count me out, General," I said. "I want no part of your operations. If you'll tell me where my pants are, I'll be going now."
Roosevelt shook his head, smiling a little. "Curlon, don't talk like a fool. Do you have any idea where you are?"
I got out of bed, shakily, and went to the window and looked down on lawns and flowerbeds that were almost familiar.
"This is a world-line far removed from the turmoil of the Blight," Roosevelt said as I dressed in the loose shirt and tight pants laid out for me. "Its common-history date with your world is 1199 A.D. We're in the city of Londres, capital of the province of New Normandy, an autonomous duchy under the French king, Louis Augustus. Great affairs are afoot here, Curlon. Rebels challenge the power of the Emperor, loyalists are charged with treason, and across the Channel, Louis waits, ready to land forces at Harwich and Dover and Newcastle if needed. A touch would send the situation crashing into war. It's what which we must prevent."
"And what's in it for you, General?"
"I'm known here; I enjoy the confidence of both Viceroy Garonne and important members of the rebellious faction. My hope is to prevent bloodshed, stabilize the situation. A strongly established A-line is necessary to contain the vast energies I've channeled here. You'll recall what I told you of key objects, key lines. New Normandy will become the key line of its probability quantum, with the aid of the artifact we brought here. And with the rise of the new master-line, our stars too will ascend!"
"And where do I come in?"
"Ten days ago, Duke Richard fell dead at a public ceremony in full view of the populace. Murdered, they say. The rebels charge the loyalists with eliminating the natural leader of the Britons; the loyalists in turn charge the rebels with killing a man they regarded as no more than a vassal of the French king. The tension has reached crisis level; it must be relieved."
"I still haven't heard anything illuminating."
"It's really quite obvious," Roosevelt said. "As a Plantagenet born and bred, you'll step forward to take up the role of the Duke of Londres."
"You're out of your mind, General," I told him.
"Nothing could be simpler," he said with a wave of the hand. "No one could deny that you look the part; you're enough like the departed Duke to be his brother. However, we shall present you in the role of a more distant relation, raised secretly north of the Scots border. Your appearance will satisfy the most fanatical rebel, and of course you'll make suitably defiant pronouncements to satisfy that clique. More discreetly, you'll engage in dialogues with Viceroy Garonne aimed at easing the crisis and restoring civil order."
"What's going to make me do all this?"
"This is the drama of life itself—and you were a part of it from the moment you were born—and before. Like me, you're the inheritor of a mighty dynasty. All that you might have been—that your analogs, those close to you might have done—all the vast repercussions across time and history of every act of that great clan, chopped down in the prime of their strength—all those aborted probability energies must find their expression in you—and in the world you help create!"
"What about my own world?"
"The new master-line will dominate the quantum," Roosevelt said flatly. "In the readjustment that accompanies its establishment, lesser lines must of necessity be sacrificed. The Imperium and the Blight-Insular lines will go under. But that's a matter of no moment to you, Mr. Curlon—or to me. Our destinies lie elsewhere."
"You have it all figured out," I said. "There's just one weak point."
"Which is?"
"I won't play."
Roosevelt looked grim. "Understand me, Curlon: I want you as my willing ally; but willing or not, you'll help me."
"You're bluffing, Roosevelt. You need a walking, talking puppet, not a man with wires on his wrists."
He made an impatient gesture. "I told you I regretted that, and the need for drugging you to bring you here. But I'd do it again, ten thousand times, if that were the only way! The Old Empire will rise again! We're not discussing if, Curlon; only how. Meet this challenge—lend me your full support, and your future will be of a splendor unimaginable to you now. Defy me, and you'll walk like a corpse through what would have been your triumph. Which do you want, Curlon? Honors, or rotted rags? Majesty, or misery?"
"You've worked your story out pretty carefully, General. But it still doesn't make sense."
"The rebels are strong," Roosevelt said grudgingly. "They have all the strength on their side, if the truth were known. They could seize power any time they chose. They lack only one thing: leadership. They'll rally to you, Curlon—but instead of leading them to victory, you'll cool their revolutionary fervor. Because if they should rise up and cast out the French, a major branching of the line will result! Seven hundred years of stable history would be shattered, creating a whole new probability spectrum. I need not detail the effect this would have on my plans for New Normandy!"
I smiled a smile I didn't feel. "You're in trouble, aren't you, Roosevelt? You need me—and not just to carry a spear in the third act of some farce to fool the locals. What is it? What's the real reason for trying to drag me into this paranoid fantasy-system of yours?"
"I've told you! We're linked, you and I, all down through the corridors of past time, on every world within a thousand years of common history. As your fortunes wax, so do mine. I can force you, Curlon—but to the extent that I must break you to my will our joint stature is diminished. Join with me freely, lend your mana to mine—and anything we desire is within our grasp!"
"And if I don't?"
"I want your willing aid," he said in a steely voice. "But your broken mind and body, dangling from the strings, will serve if need be."
"Everything you say confirms the one clear idea I've gotten from all this, Roosevelt. Whatever this fight is, you're on one side, and I'm on the other."
"I can break you, Curlon. The stronger man can always break the weaker. A simple demonstration will suffice to prove my point." He took a stance with his feet apart and raised his arms until they were level with his shoulders, smiling.
"The first to drop his arms acknowledges the other man his superior—at least in one small way."
I put my arms out. The effort made my temples pound, but I didn't burst into tears. If Roosevelt wanted to play little games I was willing to go along. The hamburger machines could wait.
"In every world, in every time, the will of some man has shaped reality," Roosevelt said suddenly. "Here, now, that old rule is still in force—but made more potent by the existence of titanic new forces. Those forces are at the command of whoever can master them. Fate is a fragile thing, Curlon. A mindless thing, controlled by the whim of a strong man. Let an Alexander set out to conquer the world; the world becomes what he makes it. Without Alexander, there would have been no Caesar, no Attila, no Muhammad, no Hitler in your world, no Guglielmo Maxoni in the Zero-zero line. Men make fate, Curlon, not the other way around. You saw that demonstrated when we fought together, back to back. We two form islands of stability about ourselves, even in a sea of formlessness.
"But only one of us can shape the cosmos to his will. That one will be me. I'll dominate you—not because I hate you—I have no cause for enmity. But because I must—as an Alexander must destroy a Darius."
"Funny," I said. "I never had any interest in shaping the cosmos to my will. But I'm not willing to see it shaped to yours. Home was never much to me, but I'm not ready to see it flushed down the drain to give you a roost to rule."
Roosevelt nodded. "I suppose it's a thing outside both of us, Curlon, written in the stars, as they say. For seven hundred years, your ancestors and mine fought to rule the quantum. Think of it, Plantagenet! In a thousand billion alternate world-lines, each differing from the others in some greater or lesser degree, your clan and mine, striving, down through the centuries, each to dominate his world, none knowing of the others, all driven by the common instinct to fulfill the potentiality inherent in them. And then—the day of cataclysm, when the Blight swept in to wipe them out, root, stem and branch—all but one man of my line, and one of yours."
It had been about ten minutes since the game had begun. Fiery pains were shooting along the backs of my arms and shoulders. Roosevelt was still standing as rigid as a statue. His arms hadn't quivered.
"They tell me the blight dates back to the nineties," I said. "You're a little young to be remembering it—unless your Imperium has face-lift techniques that beat anything Hollywood's come up with."
"I'm telling you what I've learned—what my researchers have revealed, what I was told—" He cut himself off.
"I thought this was all your own idea, Roosevelt."
"Told—by my father," Roosevelt said. "He devoted his life to the conviction that somehow—somewhere—our time would come again. His world was gone—but how could such glory be forever vanished? He worked, studied, and in the end made his discovery. He was old then, but he passed the charge on to me. And I've made it good! I worked first to gain a powerful position within Imperial Intelligence—the one organization that knew the secrets of the Net. This gave me a platform from which to prepare this line—New Normandy—to be the vessel that would contain and shape the forces of the Blight."
I had to concentrate on keeping my arms at shoulder level. Somehow, it seemed important not to lose at Roosevelt's game. If he was suffering, he didn't show it.
"Are you tiring?" he asked in a conventional tone. "Poor Mother Nature, so blind in her efforts to protect the body. She sends pain as a warning, first. Then little by little, she'll numb the nerves. Your arms will begin to sag. You'll try, with all your will, to hold them high—to outdo me, your inevitable master. But you'll fail. Oh, the strength is there—but Nature forces you to husband your strength. So though you might be willing of yourself, to endure the torture of fatigue until death from exhaustion—she won't let you. You'll suffer—for nothing. A pity, Mr. Curlon."
I was glad he felt like talking. It kept my mind off the hot clamps set in the back of my neck. I tried to fan a little spark of anger alive—another of Mother Nature's tricks, this one on my side. I wanted to keep him chattering, but at the same time coax along the frustration I hoped he was beginning to feel.
"Seeing you drop will be worth waiting for," I said.
"But you won't. I'm stronger than you are, Mr. Curlon. Since childhood I've trained every day in these exercises—and the mental control that goes with them. At the age of seven I could hold a fencing foil across my palm at arm's length for a quarter of an hour. For me, this is literally child's play. But not for you."
"There's nothing to this," I said breezily. "I can stand here all day."
"So far, you've endured it for less than a quarter of an hour. How will you feel fifteen minutes from now, eh, Mr. Curlon? And half an hour after that?" He smiled—not quite the easy smile he'd have liked. "In spite of yourself, you'll have failed long before then. A simple demonstration, Curlon—but a necessary one. You must be brought to realize that in me you've met your superior."
"There must be a catch to it," I said. "Maybe this is supposed to keep my attention occupied while your pals aim a spy beam at my brains—or whatever it is mad scientists do."
"Don't talk like a fool, Curlon," Roosevelt almost snapped the words. "Or—why, yes, I see." He smiled and the strain went out of his face. "Very good, Mr. Curlon. You were almost beginning to irritate me. A well-designed tactic. Such distractions can appreciably sap endurance. By the way, how are your arms feeling? A trifle heavy?"
"Fine," I said in what I hoped was a light tone. "How about yours?" The lines of fire were lancing out into my trapezius muscles, playing around my elbows, tingling in my fingertips. My head ached. Roosevelt looked as good as new. He stared across at me, silent now. That bothered me. I wanted him to talk.
"Keeping up the patter's hard work, eh? But I'll tip you, Roosevelt. You picked the wrong man. I'm a fisherman. I'm used to fighting the big ones eight hours at a stretch. For me, this is a nice rest."
"A flimsy lie, Curlon. I expect better of you."
"The circulation is the weak point," I said. "Soldiers who could march all day in the sun under a full pack used to drop out in a dead faint on parade. Standing at attention, not moving, restricted the flow of blood to the brain—and all of a sudden—blackout. Some fellows couldn't take it. Nothing against them, just a peculiarity of the metabolism. It never bothered me. Good circulation, you know. How's yours?"
"Excellent, I assure you."
"But you're not talking." I gave him a grin that cost me a year off the end of my life.
"I've said what I intended."
"I don't believe you. You had canned lecture number three all ready to go. I can see it in your eyes."
Roosevelt laughed—a genuine laugh. "Mr. Curlon, you're a man after my own heart. I wish we could have met in another time at another place. We might have been friends, you and I."
Neither of us said anything after that. I discovered I was counting off the seconds. It had been about twenty minutes now, maybe a little more. I realized one hand was sagging and brought it back up. Roosevelt smiled a faint smile. More time passed. I thought about things, then tried not to think about things. It occurred to me that the ancient Chinese had wasted a lot of time and effort designing iron maidens and chipping bamboo splinters. Torture was a sport you could play without equipment. And Roosevelt's version was a double challenge, because the only one forcing me was me. I could quit now and laugh it off and call for the next round.
That was the catch. There'd be a next round—and one after that. And if I quit on the first, I'd quit sooner on the second, until I refused to meet his challenge—and that was what he wanted.
That was his swindle. To make me think that if I lost—I'd lost. But it wasn't true. Losing was nothing. Only surrender counted.
And once I understood that, I felt better. The pain was like flaying knives, but it was just pain, something to be endured until it ended. I hitched my arms back up into line and stared across at him through the fading light. . .
. . . and came to, lying on the floor. Roosevelt was standing over me. His face looked yellowish and drawn.
"A commendable effort, Curlon," he said. "One hour and twelve minutes. But as you see—you lost. As you must always lose—because it's your destiny to lose to me. Now—will you join with me willingly?"
I climbed back to my feet, feeling dizzy, and with slow fires still burning in my shoulders, I raised my arms to the crucifix position.
"Ready to try it again?" I said. Roosevelt's face twitched before he laughed.
I grinned at him. "You're afraid, aren't you, Roosevelt? You see your grand scheme coming apart at the seams—and you're afraid."
He nodded. "Yes—I'm afraid. Afraid of my own weakness. You see—incredible though it may seem to you—I truly wanted you to be a part of it, Plantagenet. A foolish sentimentality—but you, like me, are a man of the ancient stock. Even a god can be lonely—or a devil. I offered you comradeship. But at the first trial, you turned against me. I should have known then. And now I've learned the lesson. I have no choice left to me. My course is plain now."
"You're a flawed devil, Roosevelt," I said. "A devil with a conscience. I pity you."
He shook his head. "I want none of your pity, Plantagenet. As I can have none of your friendship. What I want from you, I'll take, though the taking will destroy you."
"Or you."
"That's a risk I'll run." He motioned to the waiting guards; they closed in around me. "Spend these next hours in meditation," he said. "Tonight you'll be invested with the honors of a dukedom. And tomorrow you'll be hanged in chains."
The dungeons under the viceregal palace were everything that dungeons should be, with damp stone walls and iron doors and unshielded electric lights that were worse than smoky flambeaux. The armed men in Swiss Guard uniforms that had herded me down the upper levels waited while a burly man with a round, oily, unshaven face opened a barrel grill on a six-by-eight stone box with straw. I didn't move fast enough for him; he swung a kick to hurry me along, but it never landed. Roosevelt showed up in time to slam the back of his hand across the fat face.
"You'd treat a royal duke like a common felon?" he barked. "You're not fit to touch the floor he stands on."
Another man grabbed up the fat man's keys, led the way along the narrow passage, opened an oak door on a larger cell with a bed and a loophole window.
"You'll meditate here in peace," Roosevelt told me, "until I have need of you."
I lay on the bed and waited for the pounding in my head to retreat to a bearable level.
. . . and woke up with a voice that wasn't in my head, whispering, "Plantagenet! Be of good cheer! Wait for the signal!"
I lay where I was and waited for more, but there wasn't any more.
"Who's that?" I whispered, but nobody answered. I got up and examined the wall by my head, and the bed itself. It was just a wall, just a bed. I went to the door and listened, pulled myself up and looked out the six-inch slit at a light-well. There were no lines dangling there with files tied to them; no trapdoors opened up in the ceiling. I was locked in a cell, with no way out, and that was that. The voices were probably courtesy of the management, another of Roosevelt's subtle moves to either wear me down or convince me I was crazy. He was doing pretty well on both counts.
I was having a fine dream about a place where flowers as big as cabbages grew on trees beside a still lake. Ironel was there, walking toward me across the water, and the water broke into a sea of glass splinters, and when I tried to reach her, the flowers turned to heads that shouted threats and the branches were arms that grabbed at me, and shook me—
Hands shook me awake; lights shone in my face. Men with neat uniforms and unholstered nerve-guns took me along passages and up stairs to a room where Roosevelt waited, rigged out in purple velvet and ermine and loops of gold cord. A jewel-covered sword as big as a cased garrison flag hung at his side as if it belonged there. He didn't talk, and neither did I. Nobody was interested in the condemned man's last words.
Servants clustered around, fitting me with heavy garments of silk and satin and gold thread. A barber trimmed my hair, and poured perfume on me. Someone fitted red leather shoes to my feet. Roosevelt himself strapped a wide, brocaded baldric around my waist, and the tailor's helper attached a jeweled scabbard to it. The hilt that projected from it was unadorned and battered. It was my old knife, looking out of place in all this magnificence. The armorer complained, offered a shiny sword, but Roosevelt waved him away.
"Your sole possession, eh, Curlon?" he said. "It shares your aura strongly. You'll keep it by you—in your moment of glory."
A procession formed up in the wide corridor outside, with the gun-handlers sticking unobtrusively close to me. Roosevelt was beside me as we walked up a wide staircase into an echoing hall hung with spears and banners and grim-faced paintings. Wigged and spangled and beribboned people filled the room. Beyond an arched opening, I saw a high, stained-glass window above a canopied altar. I knew where I was then.
I was standing in the spot where I had stood with Ironel, with the griffin, Vrodelix, beside us, just before Roosevelt had tried the first time to reach the altar. Now the floor was carpeted in gold rose, and there was an odor of incense in the air, and the woodwork gleamed with the dull shine of wax—but it was the same room—and not the same. Not by a thousand years of history.
We halted, and priests in red robes and dry-faced old men in ribbons and fluffy little wigs went into action, handing ritual objects back and forth, ducking their heads at each other, mumbling incantations. I suppose it was an impressive ceremony, there in the ancient room under the damask-draped, age-blackened beams, but I hardly noticed it. I kept remembering Ironel, leading Roosevelt to her Pretty Place, so that he could destroy it.
The odor of incense was strong; strong enough to burn my eyes. I sniffed harder and realized I was smelling something more than scented smoke; it was the real kind, that comes from burning wood and cloth and paint. There was a faint, brassy haze in the air. Roosevelt was looking back; the head priest interrupted his spiel. The gun-handlers jostled in close to me, looking worried. Roosevelt snapped off some orders, and I heard yells from outside the big room. A wave of heat rolled at us then, and the party broke up. Four guns prodded me toward the archway. If this was a signal, it was a dandy, but there wasn't much I could do about it. The nerve-gun squad cut a path through the notables who were dithering, coughing, half headed one way and half the other. We reached the low steps, and two new guards came in from the flank and there was some fast footwork, and they were close to me, and the crowd was closing around us, fighting for position. An old boy in pink and gold, with his wig askew, thrust his face close to mine.
"Favor the left, y'r Grace," he hissed in my ear. I was still working on that one when I saw the nearest guard put his nerve-gun in his partner's kidney and press the button. Two more men in uniform came from somewhere; I heard a thud behind me, and then we were clear, peeling off from the edge of the main crowd, heading right into the smoke.
"Only a few yards, y'r Grace," the little old man squeaked. A door opened and we were in a cramped stairway, leading down. On the landing, all four guards stripped off their uniform jackets and tossed their caps aside and pulled on workmen's coveralls from a stack behind the door. The old fellow ditched his wig and cape and was in a footman's black livery. They handed me a long gray cloak. The whole operation was like a well-practiced ballet. It didn't take twenty seconds.
On the next floor down, we pushed out into a concourse full of spectators, firemen, a few belted earls and mitred priests, none of them looking at a repair crew in dirty overalls. The old man led the way to a passage where a lone sentry stood, looking anxious. He stepped in front of us, and the old boy raised a finger and drew him around to the right while one of the others expertly sapped him back of the ear. Then we were in the passage and running.
Two startled scrubwomen watched us cross the kitchen and duck out a door between garbage cans into an unlit alley. The truck parked there started up with a lot of valve click and black kerosene exhaust. I went over the tailgate and the old man scrambled up behind me and pulled the canvas flap down as the truck pulled away. Three minutes later, it slowed, stopped. I heard voices up front, the clatter of a gun, leather boots on cobbles. After a minute, gears clashes and we went on. On the bench opposite, my new friend let out a held breath and grinned from ear to ear.
"Worked like a charm," he said. He cackled and rubbed his hands together. "Like a bloody charm, beggin' y'r Grace's pardon."
The old man's name was Wilibald. "Our friends are waiting for y'r Grace," he said. "True Britons, they are, every man Jock o' 'em. Simple men, y'r Grace, but honest! Not like those treasonous palace blackguards in their silks and jewels!" He gnashed his gums and wagged his head.
"That was a neat play, Wilibald," I said. "How did you manage it?"
"There's true men among the Bluecoats, y'r Grace. The jailor was one. He tried to lodge y'r Grace in a safe cell—one we'd a tunnel to—but his high and mightiness the Baron would ha' none o't. So it took a little longer. But here y'r Grace be now, all the same!" He cackled and rasped his hands together like a cricket's wings.
"You're with the rebel party?"
"Some call us rebels, y'r Grace—but to honest men, we're patriots, pledged to rid these islands o' the French pox!"
"Why did you spring me?"
"Why? Why?" the old man looked astonished. "When word went abroad the Plantagenet was housed in the viceregal tombs, what other course could a loyal Briton follow, y'r Grace? Did y'r Grace deem we'd leave ye there to rot?"
"But I'm not—" I started and left it hanging.
"Not what, y'r Grace?" Wilibald asked. "Not surprised? Of course not. There's ten million Britons in this island, sworn to free the land o' tyranny!"
"Not going to waste any time," I finished. "We'll strike immediately."
The traffic on the road was a mixed bag of horse carts, big solid-tired trucks with open cabs, little droop-snoot cars that looked as if they came in cereal boxes and more than a sprinkling of blue-painted military vehicles. According to Wili, the viceroy was concentrating his forces around the fortified ports, ready to cover the landing of reinforcements if the talk of rebellion crystallized into action. The place we were headed for was the country seat of Sir John Lackland.
"A dark-avised gentleman," Wili said. "But moneyed, and of the ancient stock." He rambled on for the next hour, filling me in on the local situation. The rebels, he swore, were ready to move. And according to Roosevelt, if they moved, they'd win.
"You'll see," Wili told me. "Loyal Britons will rise to a man and flock to y'r Grace's standard!"
After an hour's run, we turned down a side road and swung in between brick pillars, went along a drive that led through tended woods into a cobbled yard fronting a three-story house with flower boxes and leaded windows and half-timbered gables that looked like the real thing. Steps went up to a broad veranda. An old man in a fancy vest and black pants and house slippers let us in. His eyes bugged when he saw me.
"'Is Grace must see Sir John at once," Wili said.
"Sir John's been abed this twoday wi' a touch o' the ague. He's had no callers—"
"He has now," Wili cut him off.
The old fellow dithered, then led the way into a dark room full of books, and shuffled away.
I looked at the books on the shelves, mostly leather-bound volumes with titles like Historic Courts and Campaigns Among the Quanecticott. After five minutes or so the door opened and the old fellow was back, piping that Sir John would see us now.
The master of the house was in a bedroom on the top floor, a lean-faced sharp-nosed old aristocrat with a silky black eyebrow-moustache and a matching fringe of hair around a high bald dome. He was propped up in a bed no larger than a skating rink, half buried in a violet satin pillow with an embroidered monogram and more lace than a Hollywood bishop. He had a tan woolen bathrobe with satin lapels wrapped around him, and a knitted shawl over that, and even so, the end of his nose looked cold. When he saw me, he nearly jumped out of bed.
"What—now. . . ?" he stared from me to Wili and back. "Why did you come here—of all places?"
"Where else would I be more likely to find friends?" I came back.
"Friends? I'd heard that the viceregent had declared a pretender heir to the dukedom, but I scarce expected to see him present himself here in that guise."
"How do you know I'm the man—or that I'm an imposter?"
"Why—why—who else would you be?"
"You mean you're accepting me as genuine? I'm glad, Sir John. Because the time has come for action."
"Action? What action?"
"The liberation of Briton."
"Are you mad? You'd bring destruction down on my house—on all of us! We Plantagenets have always lived on sufferance! The murder of Duke Richard shows us all how precarious our position is—"
"Who killed him?"
"Why—Garrone's men, of course."
"I wonder about that. From the viceroy's point of view, it was a foolish move. It aligned the Britons against him more solidly than Richard ever did alive."
"Conjecture. Idle conjecture," Sir John barked. "You come here, unbidden, preaching treason! What do I know about you? You imagine I'll place our trust in an upstart, a stranger?"
"Hardly that, Sir John," Wili said indignantly. "One glance at him—"
"What do you know of him, fellow? Is any oversized carrot-locked bumpkin who cares to lay claim to the dukedom to be accepted without question?"
"That's hardly fair, Sir John—"
"Enough! The matter will have to wait for resolution until I can summon certain influential men! In the meantime, I'll give you sanctuary. I can do no more." Lackland gave me a look like a dagger in the ribs and yanked at his bellcord. The old footman popped in with a speed that suggested he'd been standing by not far away.
"Show milord to his suite," Lackland got out between lips as stiff as a Hoover collar. "And quarter Master Wilibald below stairs."
I followed my guide along the corridor to a high-ceilinged, airy room with big windows and a sitting room and bath opening from it. The old fellow showed me the soap and towel and then paused at the door and gave me a sly look.
"It did me heart proud to hear y'r honor gi' a bit o' the rough to his Lordship," he cackled. "It's been a weary time since a real fighting duke put foot o' these old boards, beggin' y'r Honor's pardon."
"You listen at keyholes, eh?" But I grinned at him. "Wake me as soon as the clan's gathered. I wouldn't want to miss anything."
"Rely on me, y'r Grace," he said and went out and I pulled off my boots and lay in the dark and slid off into a dream about knights on horseback riding with leveled lances into the fire of massed machine guns.
I came back from somewhere a long way off with a hand shaking my shoulder and a thin old voice saying, "They're here, y'r Grace! Milord Lackland's wi' 'em i' the study this minute—and unless I mistake me, there's mischief afoot!"
"Does Lackland know you're here?"
"Not 'em, y'r Grace."
We went down the stairs and across the hall to a door that was standing ajar. When Wili got close he turned and gave me a quick jerk of the head, cupping his ear.
". . . imposter, gentlemen," Lackland was saying. "No true Briton, but a hireling of Garrone, bought with French gold and sent here to betray us all—"
I pushed the door open and walked in. The talk cut off as if a switch had been thrown. There were about a dozen men grouped around a long table with Lackland seated at the head. They were dressed in a variety of costumes, but all of them featured fur and brocades and a sword slung at the hip. The nearest was a big, wide-shouldered, neckless man with a curly black beard and ferocious eyes. He took a step back when he saw me, looked me up and down, surprised.
"Don't be beguiled by his face and stature!" Lackland spat the words. "He'd seize control of the rebellion, and turn coat, come to terms with Garrone! Can he deny it?" He was pointing at me with a finger that quivered with rage.
I didn't answer immediately. What he was saying was precisely what Roosevelt had proposed. There seemed to be a message for me in that somewhere, but it wouldn't come clear.
"You see?" Lackland crowed. "The treacher dares not deny it!"
The black-bearded man drew his sword with a skin-crawling rasp.
"A shrewd stroke!" he said in a high, rasping voice. "With a Plantagenet puppet to dance on his strings, he'd accomplish what the Louis have dreamed of for seven centuries! The total subjugation of Briton!" More swords were out now, ringing me in.
"Spit him, Tudor!" Lackland screamed.
"Stop!" Wilibald stood in the doorway with fire in his old eye. "Would you murder our Duke in cold blood? In the name of Free Briton, I say he deserves a better hearing at your Lordship's hands than this!"
For an instant, nobody moved—and in the silence I heard a droning sound, far away but coming closer. The others heard it, too. Eyes swiveled to stare at the ceiling as if they could see through it. A man rushed to the window, threw back the long drapes to stare out. Another jumped for a wall switch. Tudor didn't move as the chandelier went dark, leaving just what light filtered in from the hall.
"An aircraft!" a man at the window called. "Coming straight in over us!"
"It was a trick to get us here together!" a lean man in yellow snarled, and drew back his sword for a cut. I saw this from the corner of my eye; it was Tudor I was watching. His jaw had set harder, and the tendons beside his neck tensed and I knew the thrust was coming.
I twisted sideways and leaned back and the point ripped through the ruffles on the front of my shirt; my back-handed swing caught him across the cheekbone, knocked him backward into the table as the room went pitch dark. The engines sounded as if they were right down the chimney. A piece of bric-a-brac fell from the mantle.
The to-to! to-to! marched across off to the right and the engine sound was deafening, and then receding. I heard glass tinkling, but the ceiling didn't fall in. I slid along the wall toward the door and heard feet break for it and a chair went over. Somebody slammed into me and I grabbed him and threw him ahead of me. I found the door and got through it, and could see the big hall faintly by the moonlight coming through the stained glass along the gallery. There was a lot of yelling that was drowned by the bomber's engines. Then a flash lit the room and the wall seemed to jump outward about a foot. When things stopped falling, I was bruised, but still alive. Wilibald was lying a few feet away, covered with dust and brick chips. There was a timber across his legs above the ankle; by the time I got it clear the plane was making its third run. With the old man over my shoulder, I reached the rear hall just as the front of the house blew in. I made it out through the kitchen door, went across grass that was littered with bricks. Blood from a cut on my scalp was running into my eyes. I made it to a line of trees before my legs folded.
The roof was gone from the house and flames were leaping up a hundred feet high and boiling into smoke clouds that glowed orange on their undersides. The shells of the walls that were still standing stood up in black silhouetted against the fire, and the windows were bright orange rectangles cut in the black.
Then there was a sound and I tried to get up and made it as far as my hands and knees, and three men with singed beards and torn finery and bare swords in their hands came out of the darkness to surround me.
One of the men was Tudor; he stepped in close and drew his arm back, and I was bracing myself for the thrust when all three of them turned and looked toward the house. Light flickered from among the trees lining the drive; pieces of bark jumped from the bole of the tree beside me and the man nearest it went over backward and the man beside him spun and fell, and Tudor turned to run, but it was the wrong reflex. I saw the bullets smack into him, throw him six feet onto his face.
There were men on the drive, coming up at a run—men in blue uniforms. I started to crawl and suddenly old Wilibald was there, his thin hair wild, soot on his face. He had been below the line of fire, like me; he was all right.
"Run, Wili!" I yelled. He hesitated for a moment, then turned and disappeared into the woods. Then the soldiers were all around me, grim and helmeted, smoking guns ready. And I waited for what came next.