Edgar Burroughs - Beyond The Farthest Star

"A highly intelligent man, well fitted for the post he occupies," I replied. "Although he must have to contend with all types of criminals, scoundrels, and traitors, he appears to me to be fair and just, without being soft or sentimental." I was learning to talk like a Kapar and to lie like one too.

As Sagra and I walked home that night, I asked her what had been troubling her, for she had not seemed herself at all.

"I am worried and frightened," she replied; "Grunge has been making advances to me, and Gimmel Gora knows it. I am afraid of both of them, for I believe that both are agents of the Zabo."

"Neither one of us has anything to fear," I said. "Aren't we both good Kapars?"

"I sometimes wonder if you are," she said.

"At first I may have been a little critical," I said, "but that was before I understood the strength and beauty of their system. Now I am as good a Kapar as there is." From this speech it might be assumed that I was suspicious of Morga Sagra, and the assumption would be wholly correct. I was suspicious of Morga Sagra, of Grunge, of Gimmel Gora, of Lotar Canl, my man—in fact, of everybody. In this respect, at least, I had become a good Kapar.

When I got home that night, I found that my quarters had been thoroughly ransacked. The contents of every drawer was scattered about on the floor; my rugs had been torn up, and my mattress cut open.

While I was viewing the havoc, Lotar Canl came home. He looked around the place, and then, with the faintest of smiles on his lips he said, "Burglars. I hope that they got nothing of value, sir."

Most of my gold and jewels are deposited in a safe place; but in addition to that which I carry on my person, I had left a handful of gold in one of the drawers in my desk, and this I found scattered on the floor-all of it.

"Well," I said, "they overlooked this gold, and there was nothing else in the apartment anybody would wish."

"They must have been frightened away before they could gather this up," said Lotar Canl.

The little game that he and I were playing was almost laughable for neither of us dared suggest the truth-that the apartment had been searched by the police.

"I am glad," he said, "that you had nothing of value here other than this gold."

When I met Sagra the next day, I said nothing about the matter to her, for I had learned that no matter how often one's home is "burglarized" or even if his grandmother is taken at midnight and beheaded, he does not mention the occurrence to anyone; but Sagra was less reticent. She told me that she was being constantly watched; that her room had been searched three times, and that she was terrified. "I have a secret enemy," she said, "who is leaving no stone unturned to get me destroyed."

"Have you any idea who it is?" I asked.

"Yes," she said, "I think I know."

"Gimmel Gora?"

She nodded, and then she whispered, "And you must be careful of Grunge. He thinks that you are my man, and he would like to get rid of you."

There had never been any suggestion of any sentimental relationship between Morga Sagra and me. She had used me in order to get to Kapara; and because we had been two strangers in a strange land, we had been constantly thrown together since. I know that she enjoyed my company, and I still found her witty and entertaining when she was not entirely preoccupied with the terror which now obsessed her. If ever a just retribution were being meted to a person, this was the instance. I was confident that Morga Sagra would have given her soul to have been back in Unis; and to her terror was added hopelessness, for she knew that she could never return.

That evening we went to call on Horthal Wend and his woman, Haka Gera. She was a heavy minded, rather stupid woman, but evidently a good housekeeper and probably a good manager, which I judged Horthal Wend needed, for he was evidently easy-going and careless.

We talked about art, literature, music, the weather, and the wonders of Kapar ideology-about the only safe subject for discussion in Kapara; and even then we had to be careful. If one should by mistake express appreciation of some work of art or musical composition by a person in bad odour with the heads of the state or with the Zabo, that was treason.

During the evening, their fourteen year old son, Horthal Gyl, joined us. He was a precocious child, and I do not like precocious children. He was a loudmouthed little egotist who knew it all, and he kept projecting himself into the conversation until he practically monopolized it.

Horthal Wend was evidently very proud of him and very fond of him; but once when he made a gesture as though to caress the lad, the boy struck his hand away.

"None of that!" he growled at his father; "such maudlin sentimentality is not for Kapar men. I am ashamed of you."

"Now, now," said his mother gently; "it is not wrong for your father to love you."

"I do not wish him to love me," snapped the boy. "I only wish that he should admire me and be proud of me because I am hard. I do not want him or anyone to be as ashamed of me as I am of him because of his sentimentality and softness."

Horthal Wend tried to smile as he shook his head. "You see, he is a good Kapar," he said; and, I thought, a little sadly.

"I see," I said.

The boy shot me a quick suspicious look. Evidently I had not kept my innermost feelings out of those two words.

We left shortly after this and as we walked home, I was conscious of a feeling of great depression. I think it was caused by the attitude of that son to his father. "Horthal Gyl will grow up to be a fine example of the Kapar gentlemen," I said.

"I would rather not discuss him," replied Sagra.

I WENT TO BED immediately after reaching my apartment. Lotar Canl had asked for the entire night off; so when I was awakened shortly after mid-night by a summons at my door, I had to answer it myself. As I opened it, two green-clad Zabo troopers stepped in with drawn pistols.

"Dress and come with us," said one of them.

"There must be some mistake," I said; "I am Korvan Don, you can't want me."

"Shut up and get dressed," said the one who had first spoken, "or we'll take you along in your nightclothes."

While I was dressing, I racked my brains trying to think what I had done to deserve arrest. Of course I knew it would be useless to ask these men. Even if they knew, which they probably did not, they wouldn't tell me. Naturally I thought of Grunge, because of what Morga Sagra had told me, but the man could not possibly have had anything to report against me; although, of course, he could have fabricated some story.

I was taken directly to Gurrul's office; and although it was well after midnight, he was still there. He gave me one of his most terrible looks and then screamed at me, "So you slipped at last, you filthy spy. I have always suspected you, and I am always right."

"I don't know what you are talking about," I said. "You can have absolutely no charge against me; because I have spoken no treasonable words since I came to Kapara. I defy anyone to prove that I am not as good a Kapar as you.

"Oh," he barked, "so you haven't said anything treasonable? Well, you idiot, you have written it;" and he took a small red book from a drawer in his desk and held it up in front of me and shook it in my face. "Your diary, you fool." He turned the leaves and scanned the pages for a moment and then he read, "'Gurrul is a fat idiot'; so I am a fat idiot, am I?" He turned a few more pages, and read again. "'The Zabo is made up of moronic murderers; and when our revolution succeeds, I shall have them all beheaded. I shall behead Gurrul myself.' What do you say to that?"

"I say that I never saw that book before and that I never wrote any of the things which you have read."