Christopher Grimm - The Science Fiction Archive #3

"I'm new in the parish," the other man replied and let it hang there.

"Oh…? Females…? Narcophagi…? Thrill-mills?"

But to each of these questions the nondescript man shook his head.

"Games?" the driver finally asked, although he could guess what was wanted by then. "Dice…? Roulette…? Farjeen?"

"Is there a good zarquil game in town?"

The driver moved so he could see the face of the man behind him in the teleview. A very ordinary face. "Look, colleague, why don't you commit suicide? It's cleaner and quicker."

"I can't contact your attitude," the passenger said with a thin smile. "Bet you've never tried the game yourself. Each time it happens, there's a … well, there's no experience to match it at a thrill-mill." He gave a sigh that was almost an audible shudder, and which the driver misinterpreted as an expression of ecstasy.

"Each time, eh? You're a dutchman then?" The driver spat out of the window. "If it wasn't for the nibble, I'd throw you right out of the cab. Without even bothering to take it down even. I hate dutchmen … anybody with any legitimate feelings hates 'em."

"But it would be silly to let personal prejudice stand in the way of a commission, wouldn't it?" the other man asked coolly.

"Of course. You'll need plenty of foliage, though."

"I have sufficient funds. I also have a gun."

"You're the dictator," the driver agreed sullenly.

It was a dark and rainy night in early fall. Gabe Lockard was in no condition to drive the helicar. However, he was stubborn.

"Let me take the controls, honey," the light-haired girl urged, but he shook his handsome head.

"Show you I can do something 'sides look pretty," he said thickly, referring to an earlier and not amicable conversation they had held, and of which she still bore the reminder on one thickly made-up cheek.

Fortunately the car was flying low, contrary to regulations, so that when they smashed into the beacon tower on the outskirts of the little town, they didn't have far to fall. And hardly had their car crashed on the ground when the car that had been following them landed, and a short fat man was puffing toward them through the mist.

To the girl's indignation, the stranger not only hauled Gabe out onto the dripping grass first, but stopped and deliberately examined the young man by the light of his minilume, almost as if she weren't there at all. Only when she started to struggle out by herself did he seem to remember her existence. He pulled her away from the wreck just a moment before the fuel tank exploded and the 'copter went up in flames.

Gabe opened his eyes and saw the fat man gazing down at him speculatively. "My guardian angel," he mumbled—shock had sobered him a little, but not enough. He sat up. "Guess I'm not hurt or you'd have thrown me back in."

"And that's no joke," the fat man agreed.

The girl shivered and at that moment Gabriel suddenly seemed to recall that he had not been alone. "How about Helen? She on course?"

"Seems to be," the fat man said. "You all right, miss?" he asked, glancing toward the girl without, she thought, much apparent concern.

" Mrs. ," Gabriel corrected. "Allow me to introduce you to Mrs. Gabriel Lockard," he said, bowing from his seated position toward the girl. "Pretty bauble, isn't she?"

"I'm delighted to meet you, Mrs. Gabriel Lockard," the fat man said, looking at her intently. His small eyes seemed to strip the make-up from her cheek and examine the livid bruise underneath. "I hope you'll be worthy of the name." The light given off by the flaming car flickered on his face and Gabriel's and, she supposed, hers too. Otherwise, darkness surrounded the three of them.

There were no public illuminators this far out—even in town the lights were dimming and not being replaced fast enough nor by the newer models. The town, the civilization, the planet all were old and beginning to slide downhill....

Gabe gave a short laugh, for no reason that she could see.

There was the feeling that she had encountered the fat man before, which was, of course, absurd. She had an excellent memory for faces and his was not included in her gallery. The girl pulled her thin jacket closer about her chilly body. "Aren't you going to introduce your—your friend to me, Gabe?"

"I don't know who he is," Gabe said almost merrily, "except that he's no friend of mine. Do you have a name, stranger?"

"Of course I have a name." The fat man extracted an identification card from his wallet and read it. "Says here I'm Dominic Bianchi, and Dominic Bianchi is a retail milgot dealer.... Only he isn't a retail milgot dealer any more; the poor fellow went bankrupt a couple of weeks ago, and now he isn't … anything."

"You saved our lives," the girl said. "I'd like to give you some token of my—of our appreciation." Her hand reached toward her credit-carrier with deliberate insult. He might have saved her life, but only casually, as a by-product of some larger scheme, and her appreciation held little gratitude.

The fat man shook his head without rancor. "I have plenty of money, thank you, Mrs. Gabriel Lockard.... Come," he addressed her husband, "if you get up, I'll drive you home. I warn you, be more careful in the future! Sometimes," he added musingly, "I almost wish you would let something happen. Then my problem would not be any problem, would it?"

Gabriel shivered. "I'll be careful," he vowed. "I promise—I'll be careful."

When he was sure that his charge was safely tucked in for the night, the fat man checked his personal possessions. He then requested a taxi driver to take him to the nearest zarquil game. The driver accepted the commission phlegmatically. Perhaps he was more hardened than the others had been; perhaps he was unaware that the fat man was not a desperate or despairing individual seeking one last chance, but what was known colloquially as a flying dutchman, a man, or woman, who went from one zarquil game to another, loving the thrill of the sport, if you could call it that, for its own sake, and not for the futile hope it extended and which was its sole shred of claim to moral justification. Perhaps—and this was the most likely hypothesis—he just didn't care.

Zarquil was extremely illegal, of course—so much so that there were many legitimate citizens who weren't quite sure just what the word implied, knowing merely that it was one of those nameless horrors so deliciously hinted at by the fax sheets under the generic term of "crimes against nature." Actually the phrase was more appropriate to zarquil than to most of the other activities to which it was commonly applied. And this was one crime—for it was crime in law as well as nature—in which victim had to be considered as guilty as perpetrator; otherwise the whole legal structure of society would collapse.

Playing the game was fabulously expensive; it had to be to make it profitable for the Vinzz to run it. Those odd creatures from Altair's seventh planet cared nothing for the welfare of the completely alien human beings; all they wanted was to feather their own pockets with interstellar credits, so that they could return to Vinau and buy many slaves. For, on Vinau, bodies were of little account, and so to them zarquil was the equivalent of the terrestrial game musical chairs. Which was why they came to Terra to make profits—there has never been big money in musical chairs as such.

When the zarquil operators were apprehended, which was not frequent—as they had strange powers, which, not being definable, were beyond the law—they suffered their sentences with equanimity. No Earth court could give an effective prison sentence to a creature whose life spanned approximately two thousand terrestrial years. And capital punishment had become obsolete on Terra, which very possibly saved the terrestrials embarrassment, for it was not certain that their weapons could kill the Vinzz … or whether, in fact, the Vinzz merely expired after a period of years out of sheer boredom. Fortunately, because trade was more profitable than war, there had always been peace between Vinau and Terra, and, for that reason, Terra could not bar the entrance of apparently respectable citizens of a friendly planet.