Read Ebook: The Furious Rose by Evans Dean Thorne Illustrator

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Ebook has 140 lines and 7643 words, and 3 pages

"I know." The girl nodded again. "When we were children, we always called them the furious roses because they were a furious red. We always used to say that if an innocent man was executed, the furious red rose would right away turn white, Tony. To show they'd been wrong about him."

He shrugged. "Bedtime stories, Mrs. Haley."

"Not--not that it means anything to me, Tony. They'll find Johnny innocent, of course. All three machines. The final machines."

"A man," said Tony with a vague motion of his hands. "What's the difference what man a woman has? In the morning there's always another--and another name. What's the difference?" He smiled a small toy smile with eyes half closed so the girl couldn't look too closely into them.

But it was all right, she hadn't heard. At least she wasn't balling those big eyes of hers at him. She was looking down into her folded hands.

He continued, "There's a war on, Mrs. Haley. It seems there's always a war on, somehow. And everybody--you, me, the guy down the street who skins ships for a living--we all have to remember that. And yet some of us don't. Some of us go off on a tangent and try to sell out our country and then there's hell to pay. And if we're found guilty, we get the execution. The Neg-Emote."

The girl's lips began to tremble. She looked up. "Does it hurt, Tony? I mean...."

"Physically? No, of course not." A corner of his mouth curled. "We're humane nowadays, hadn't you heard? We just strap a man in a chair and press a button and down comes a metal hood over him. We press some more buttons and pull a switch or two, and that's that. No feeling, nothing. The man's as good as new except he has no emotions any more. No emotions whatever except personal physical pain, such as he'd need in case somebody stepped on his toe or jabbed him with a pin. The State wants us to protect ourselves, you see. It wouldn't want us getting hurt because we don't feel anything."

He stopped because it was getting harder to continue. "We used to call it 'stripping,' but that was long ago before the humane boys decided the term was a little cruel. Now it's just Neg-Emoting. But the same thing. Just a fancy title."

Her big eyes were suddenly eating into his. "What do they do with them, Tony?"

He shrugged again. "Send 'em off to Training. Some can be taught this, some that, but a living death nevertheless. What else can a traitor expect?"

The girl began to tremble all over. "Not Johnny! They can't do that to Johnny! He's innocent, Tony--he didn't do anything! Tony, tell them that! Tell them to let him go...."

He put his teeth together hard. What do you say to a woman who sits across from you, waiting the long, long wait? What do you say to a woman like this when you see the terror--and something else--in eyes like hers?

"You like the guy, Mrs. Haley?" he asked gently. "That's old-fashioned as hell, you know. We all learn that way back in primaries."

But the woman wasn't listening again, wasn't caring what he'd said. She began to whisper very softly:

"In the nights I used to be frightened. I used to lie there asleep and dream of the ships coming down and spraying the house with the burn-waves. And I could hear the roaring thunder of the jets and the house would start to shake and I'd try to yell, but I couldn't. Something inside would be choking me. And just when the burn-waves would be coming hot through the window and licking at the walls inside the room, I'd scream myself awake and jump up in bed and the sweat would be pouring off me."

Tony stared, incredulous, into the big balls of fright that her eyes had become.

"And then the lights would come on again, and there would be Johnny lying next to me smiling a little, and his curly hair would be all tousled from sleep, and he'd say to me, 'Baby, you've been dreaming again. Don't you know I'm here? Don't you know I'll always be here? Don't you know that, Baby?' And then it would be all right, and the roaring jets would be only the dawn shift going out on Security Patrol. And then I could go back to sleep again."

And then: "They'll let him go, Tony. He's innocent, you know. They have to let him go."

He didn't look at her. He got up from his chair, put his hands rigidly at his sides. Then he did look, just once, and very hard.

"Get out of here!" he growled.

"No, Tony."

He took a deep breath, turned, went across the foyer to the levelators. As he passed under the huge Master Screen, her voice came again, but quite thin:

"You'll let me know, Tony? You'll let me know as soon as you get word?"

He didn't answer, didn't look back, didn't do anything except keep going to the levelators. He went upstairs, found the door of Executions, opened it, went through, let it slam shut.

Things started to happen. The Master Clock over on the black desk made a quiet blipping sound and the Emote Neutral lights went out. At once the office was flooded with Amber Official, the working lights. Then the Master Screen glowed and a narrow-faced man with washed-away eyes looked out at him.

Tony looked up. His heart wasn't in it, but he said it anyhow: "Go chase your blonde some more, hell-hips."

He went over to the desk, banged the Supplies and Control button, held it down. Master Screen darkened. He looked at the small square of white paper on the black desk top.

A bill of divorcement. Like that. So in the morning the kid downstairs could go out and get herself another mate and then she could go back to bed again and dream some more about the roaring jets and the burn-waves.

He reached up and wiped at his forehead. She didn't have to see it happen. Nothing in the Constitution--old or new--stated she had to see it happen. He looked down at the matswitch that controlled the visi-lok on the Master Screen. He clamped his teeth together and his hand went out and flipped the switch. The office went dead.

Maybe nobody'd notice. Maybe he'd have time to slip into Cell Two and get it over with before anybody noticed. He started across the room on fast, silent feet.

Don't move? He couldn't have moved if he'd had jets on. And then the hard voice went on again: "Central Command to Supplies and Control. Use Emergency visi-relay. Unlock the Master Screen! This is Command 419, Regulation Four. Signed, Countersigned."

Almost at once the Master Screen flickered into life and a hard, severe-looking face appeared there. "Radek, turn around! Face the screen!"

"Yes, sir." Tony turned.

"Second violation, Radek. Why?"

Tony forced a blank face. He lifted his shoulders, said: "I was over here on my way to Cell Two for the Execution. How could I--"

"That will be all, Radek! Clear your desk. Prepare for judgment on final machines."

Tony swallowed. He didn't move because he couldn't move.

"Well, Radek?"

He fought his face clean, kept his hands rigid at his sides. Sweat was rolling down his back, but that was all right; Central Command couldn't be expected to see sweat roll down a man's back under his clothing, though a lot of people thought so.

"A suggestion, sir," he said at last.

"What?" Hard eyes bored into his own.

He let a little anxious look creep over his face. Not a guilty look--he hoped--but the kind of anxious look a worried but innocent man might have in a spot like this.

He said quickly: "About that visi-lok. I suggest it might have gone into lock by itself. You see, it's one of the old-fashioned kind, the type they used to have that worked with solenoids. We've had trouble with them before."

That brought a little silence. The hard eyes in the screen said at last: "Central Command to Supplies and Control. Is the visi-lok in Executions controlled by a solenoid? Was it never changed to relay?"

Tony gulped. He looked into the Master Screen, but he remained frozen to the floor, hardly breathing. And then a very thin voice answered nervously:

"I--I believe that's correct, sir. I believe Executions does have the old-fashioned solenoid. It seems there hasn't been time to change it. I've been intending to...."

The voice was cut off. The hard eyes came back to Tony. "Decision!" the hard voice said.

"Yes, sir?"

"Exonerated, Radek! Carry on with Execution in Cell Two." The screen went blank.

Tony shuddered. A close one. A damned close one. That was the war for you. Even a man's breaths are counted. He went on shaky feet over to the cooler, reached in, got out a ritual rose, left the office end shuffled down the hall to Cell Two.

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