Clifford Simak - Project Pope

'Strange, said the cardinal. 'Very strange, indeed, Doctor, have you ever seen anything quite like it?

'No, I have not, said Tennyson. 'You seem astonished. Can it be true you have never seen an Old One?

'As I told you, long ago, when we first came here. The stories had it that they were globular, but you know how stories are. I, myself, have never seen one until now.

The Old One came up to the foot of the stairs. There it halted and its spinning stopped. It dropped to the pavement and rested there.

'Those pockmarks on its hide, said Tennyson, 'must be sensory receptors. Sight, smell, hearing — Lord knows what else.

The cardinal said nothing. He stood erect, no longer muffled by his robes, like a soldier at attention.

The Old One sprouted an arm on his right side. It pushed out of his body and grew in length. At the end of it was what amounted to an outsize hand. It reached the hand into a pocket that had not been apparent before the hand dipped into it. It brought out something clutched in its fist and, lengthening its arm to do the job, laid it on the pavement. It was a human body. Tenderly, the fingers of the massive hand straightened the body and turned it on its back.

'My God! Tennyson cried. 'That's Decker!

He went several steps down the stairs, then stopped. The Old One's hand had dipped into the pocket again and now came out. Carefully and neatly, it deposited what it had brought from the pocket alongside Decker's body — a rifle, a rolled-up sleeping bag, a knapsack, a camp axe and a battered coffee kettle.

On the left side it also grew an arm, and with it reached into another pocket on the left side of its body. Out of it it brought another object and laid it on the pavement, alongside Decker's body — a robot with the top of its metal skull torn off, and another rifle. Carefully the fingers straightened out the dead robot and laid the rifle beside it.

The Old One pulled its arms back into its body, became a simple globe again.

It began to hum, like a vibrating drum, and its humming filled the air, as if the air itself might be vibrating. Out of the humming came human words, deep, slow, and somberous.

'We are wardens, it said. 'We keep watch upon this planet. We allow no killing here. Killing for food to keep life within the body is acceptable, for this is the plan of life for some. But not killing for any other reason.

The humming subsided and the words fell away.

Then the humming began again and more words came. 'We have lived in peace with you. We want to keep on living so. Do not allow this to happen again.

'But, sir, cried Tennyson, 'you killed three humans only a short time ago.

The humming built up. 'They came hunting us. They had it in their minds to kill us. This is not allowed. No one kills us. We killed to save ourselves. We killed because the humans were not desirable — they had no place upon this planet.

The humming died and the Old One began to spin. Once it had started spinning, it began to move away, down the esplanade.

Tennyson leaped down the stairs and knelt beside Decker in hope that there might be life still within the man. Decker was dead, had been dead for hours.

Tennyson looked up at Cardinal Theodosius, who was coming slowly down the stairs. Behind him, Tennyson heard the drumbeat of running footsteps. When he turned, he saw that it was Ecuyer.

'Jill is back, Ecuyer shouted at him.

The running man pulled up in front of him, panting from his running.

'She said she had been to the equation world. She said… He stopped and gazed in horror at what lay upon the pavement.

'What have we here? he asked.

'Decker dead. The Old One brought him home.

'So that was an Old One, said Ecuyer. 'I could not know. One hears so many stories. Jason, do you know what happened?

Tennyson shook his head. 'The Old One brought that other. A robot with the top of its head shot off.

Ecuyer walked over to the robot, stood peering down at it.

'Jason, he said haltingly, 'do you know who this is?

'Just a robot. I can't tell…

'It's our boy, Hubert, said Ecuyer. 'The one that cooked your meals and cleaned up the place, that looked after you.

'It seems fairly clear what happened, said Tennyson. 'Decker was hit in the upper part of the chest. One lung was damaged. He probably died soon after. But before he died, he got off one good shot at Hubert. The bullet caught the robot in the eye and took off the top of the skull. The robotic brain is a mess. A tangle of smashed circuitry. He probably died the moment he was hit.

'What I can't get straight, said Ecuyer, 'is why the two of them should have been out there, shooting up one another. And Hubert? Why Hubert? He was a scary little creature. He had his faults as a servant, but he did all right. I was really fond of him. He had been with me for years. Decker — hell, I don't think he had ever seen Decker. Knew who he was, of course. Everyone in End of Nothing knew who Decker was.

'The rifle Hubert used, said Jill, 'was the one the doctor had carried when he went out to hunt the Old Ones. It might be interesting to know where and how Hubert got that rifle.

'It might not have been hard for anyone to pick up, said Ecuyer. 'The robots would have made no great fuss about it. They'd just have tucked it away somewhere when it was brought back with the men the Old Ones killed. No one would have attached much importance to the rifle. Robots have no use for rifles.

'One of them had, Tennyson said bitterly. 'It's a damn shame. Decker was a good man. I liked him from the ground up. He was a friend of mine. The only thing wrong with him was that he might have known where Heaven is.

'I'd go along with you on that, said Ecuyer, 'except I can't believe Hubert would have been mixed up with the theologians. I don't know what he thought about the issue. I never talked with him about it. But he was not the sort of robot-

'He could have heard us talking, said Jill. 'He was always hiding around a corner, listening. He could have heard one of us say that there was a chance Decker could show the way of Heaven.

'Yes, that's true, said Ecuyer. 'He was always listening. He soaked up information. He was hell on gossip, and Vatican is just one great gossip factory. But he had been with me for years before I loaned him to you, Jason, and I would swear that he was harmless.

'You were wrong, said Jill. 'He was far from harmless.

'You have to look at it this way, said Tennyson. 'The two Heaven cubes disappeared — which, I think, means they were stolen. Decker had been killed and when we searched his cabin, we found nothing to indicate he had any knowledge of Heaven. Someone, maybe Hubert, maybe someone else, searched the cabin before we did and either found the evidence or didn't find it. If they didn't find it, it's probable Decker had hidden it somewhere else. If he did, there's little chance of ever finding it. If someone else found it in the cabin, there's no chance it will turn up. It probably has been destroyed, as the cubes may have been destroyed. With the cubes gone and whatever evidence Decker may have had gone as well, and Decker dead, there isn't a chance of anyone getting to Heaven.

'Maybe Mary, said Jill.

'I don't think so, said Tennyson. 'She's in a coma. She may not make it through the night. The shock of going out to face that crowd of fanatics — she collapsed and had to be carried back to bed.

'Which leaves us empty, said Jill.

'And plays into the hands of the theologians, said Ecuyer. 'Dead, Mary would be more acceptable as a saint than if she kept on living. There's something slightly phoney about a living saint. But once she is dead, they can ram this saint business through to a finish. Vatican will have its first saint and no one arguing about Heaven, for that first saint found it and-