CHAPTER 10

He could not help wonder as they ran through the alleyway towards a lighted area that might or might not lead to Bowdler's house, just how long the shock of what he had just done would keep the irate citizens off his trail. Pat ran at his side, her long legs easily keeping stride with him. If she was concerned about her own safety it did not show in her expression which was calm, and almost contemplative, if you disregarded the little quirk of a smile that turned up the ends of her full lips.

Despite the anxiety of his position, Comstock could not help but compare the feeling of ebullience and general physical well-being that surged through him, with the sadness and the feeling of despondency that he had always experienced after his monthly visits to the b.....l.

If he had not been so busy running and praying that they could avoid the R.A.'s, he would like to have sat down and tried to reason out just what was the underlying reason for this change in his attitude towards sex, and its aftermath.

The pounding of their feet was the only sound in the silent night. Beside them the grey brick walls that lined the alley through which they ran were completely featureless. No windows or doors broke the long straight lines that reared up around them.

Pat paused and said, "Why are we running? It's quite clear that we ..." she giggled, "scared everyone away with our outrageous conduct."

The fact that she was able to muster up a smile under these dire circumstances made a warm feeling well up in Comstock's chest. He feebly returned the smile, and then putting out his arms took her in them. He kissed her chastely on the lips and found that even this modest gesture made his temples pound.

Enfolding her and drawing her closer to him, he leaned his back against the nearest wall and whispered into her ear some of the phrases he had stored up from his reading which he had meant to say to Grundy's girl, Helen.

Their bodies were glued so tightly together that when the sound came, their start of surprise was completely mutual. "Ssssst." It sibilated. And then again, "Sssst!"

Thunderstruck, their arms still pressing around each other, Pat and Comstock looked around them. There was nothing to see. Nothing at all.

Then the sound became words, "Sssst, the R.A.'s after you?"

"Uh huh." Comstock managed to answer.

"Count three and then press against the fifth block from the ground."

Feeling that they had absolutely nothing to lose, Comstock obeyed the whispered command.

The fifth block up looked exactly like all the others. But when Comstock pushed at it, an irregular segment suddenly swung inwards. Low light was visible for a moment through the opening. Then it vanished and Comstock, holding Pat by the hand as though to give her reassurance, but really so that he could draw strength from her nearness, stepped through the dark aperture.

* * * * *

At that particular moment, back at Bowdler's house, Grundy, Helen and the owner of the robot house were seated in the library. Bowdler had his hand outstretched to a lever that projected from behind some books. His eyes were glued to a clock. He said, "Five seconds ... four ... three ..." then he shook his heavy head, and threw the lever back in its slot. "I'm afraid we'll have to give them up. It's past midnight. We'll try again at noon tomorrow."

"Don't you dare leave the force field open for a few moments more?" Grundy pleaded.

Shaking his leonine head, Bowdler pushed some books into place so that the lever was hidden from sight. "I would if I could, Grundy. But they must take their chances now."

"Even if Comstock has found that poor girl," Helen said, "what can they do out in the night?"

"Twelve more hours before they can make another attempt to reach safety here." Grundy shook his head. "I can't imagine where they can hide from the omnipresent R.A.'s."

"If only Comstock knew a little more," Helen said, "but we didn't dare try to open his eyes till you were here and it could be done under your aegis."

"The poor innocent," Bowdler said, "you were right to wait for me, but I wish things had worked out differently. Pat doesn't know much more about reality than Comstock." He sighed and then rested his big head on the myriad chins that formed a collar of flesh around his neck.

"What," Grundy asked, "will the R.A.'s do if they capture them?"

"Stun them to death, I'm afraid," Bowdler said.

"No," Helen said hopelessly, "no, they wouldn't...."

But the R.A.'s would, all three of them knew that. Then they just sat and waited, Bowdler staring sightlessly off into a future that only he could envisage, Helen and Grundy holding onto each other desperately in just the same fashion that Pat and Comstock were clinging to each other, as they followed someone or something through a pitch black room that seemed to stretch out forever.

* * * * *

The peculiar door had swung to behind them making all seeing impossible. Comstock held his right arm around Pat's waist and held his left hand before him wishing that his finger tips could see.

The unknown voice that they had heard only once said, "Just a couple of seconds more, my buckos, and we'll be able to dispense with this blasted Stygian darkness."

A fumbling sound, a click, and then white light poured down in an iris-closing flood.

Blinking, Comstock and Pat looked around them. The room through which they had been moving sightlessly was big but not as big as their imaginations had made it. The clutter dwarfed the dimensions in any event. Every available foot of space ahead of them was piled high with a tangle of household objects that ranged from chairs and tables to rugs and bed linen.

Their mysterious host was facing them and as their eyes became accustomed to the light they saw a man of more than average height, lean as a willow branch, a piratical smile creasing his lantern jawed face, as he opened his arms in an all embracing gesture and said, "Welcome to the Haven."

Danger had made Comstock super-cautious, otherwise he might have ruined everything right then and there; for the first thought that occurred to him was that by some stroke of incalculable luck they had stumbled onto still another rebel. But remembering that Bowdler had said that there were only four fellow fighters altogether made Comstock wait for a lead. He said, "Thanks. You've probably saved our lives."

Hands on his narrow hips, the stranger frankly eyed Pat appreciatively. A low whistle preceded his next words, "Put twenty years on you, honey child, and you're going to be a real live doll!"

If this man liked old women, Comstock reasoned, he could not be a fellow rebel. But that made his conduct even more remarkable. Go slow, very slowly and carefully, Comstock brooded, as Pat smilingly asked, "May we know who you are?"

With vast mock-modesty, the man bowed low, and said, "I am known by a variety of names, none of them my own. I am perhaps best known as the Picaroon." Then he waited for them to express surprise and pleasure.

They just looked at him. Slightly crestfallen he rose from his bowing position, and said, almost anxiously, "You've heard of me? The Picaroon? I steal from the poor and give to the rich?"

Comstock turned his head and looked inquiringly at Pat. She was as puzzled as he.

Considerably crestfallen the man said, "The greatest outlaw in all New Australia? The man the R.A.'s would give their left arms to capture?" A frown crossed his face, then he said as though talking to himself, "The dirty rats! They were supposed to write me up, they promised they would, when I got sick and had to become a thief."

Whirling around on tip toe like a dancer, he pointed at the accumulation of odds and ends that crowded the room. "Then what have I been working so hard for? Why have I worked my fingers to the bone stealing ... stealing, out every night when I should be asleep, burglarizing every innocent house I come to? Why, I ask you, why? It's enough to make a man become a cynic, that's what it is!"

Slumping into a chair that was already overcrowded with various objects, he put his head in his hands. A terrifying thought seemed to occur to him. He looked up at them. "If you don't even know who I am, if they aren't even writing up my criminal exploits, what did I go to all the trouble of preparing this Haven for? If they're not chasing me, if there is no danger, how can my cure work?"

"I'm sure I don't know," Comstock said since the man seemed to want some kind of an answer. All the while the thief had been talking, Comstock had been racking his weary brain trying to recollect what illness crime was a cure for. He couldn't remember.

A hopeful look came over the man's face and he leaped up from his seat. A long forefinger jutted out at Comstock. The man said, "I've got it. You're lying to me! You're undercover workers for the R.A. You're spies come to root me out! Luckily I have taken precautions against that very thing. The Picaroon can't be caught napping! No indeed!"

Whirling around the man who called himself the Picaroon suddenly swooped towards a pile of metallic looking objects whose identity Comstock had not yet been able to determine.

The thing he grabbed was about three feet long, made of some shining metal, was about an inch in diameter and came to a point. The handle, if that was what it was, glittered as he inserted his hand in the metallic basketwork and twirled the point of the object dangerously near Comstock's nose. Comstock felt his nostrils twitch as the object stirred up a breeze as it swirled past him.

The lean man said, "I knew this old sword would come in handy some day. No one can outwit the Picaroon." He laughed and his voice was pitched at what Comstock considered an almost hysterical note.

The point of what the Picaroon had called a sword swung back and forth in front of Pat and Comstock. With his other hand he grabbed a long loop of narrow cloth and threw it to Pat. "Tie up your fellow spy and then I'll take care of you...."

Comstock said, "Do as he tells you, Pat, darling. Do it instantly." His voice quavered for he had suddenly recollected what sickness it was that thieving cured.

Unexpectedly docile, Pat did as she was directed. She tied Comstock's hands behind his back, not too tightly, however, Comstock was pleased to notice, and then turning, faced their captor.

She asked, "What now, noble Picaroon?"

"Good girl," Comstock thought, "She's realized that only madmen are forced to become anti-social creatures."

Humming to himself the Picaroon whirled the point of the "sword" under Comstock's chin and said to Pat, "If only you were a little older, child, you and I could make such beautiful music together.... But then there's no reason why I can't keep you here in the Haven till you age properly, now is there?"

"No," Pat agreed hastily, "none at all."

* * * * *

The lunatic whistled cheerily to himself as he cleared a free space on a couch and forced Pat to lie down on it. Then he tied her ankles with a silk scarf, and her wrists with a plastic substance that was known to have a tensile strength equal to that of the metal that this culture used for the framework of their buildings.

Donning a broad brimmed hat, and throwing a cape-like cloth around his wide shoulders, the Picaroon bowed deeply to Pat. Walking to one wall, he pressed his fingers against a projecting button and said, "'Tis not long past midnight ... there's a bad night's work still to be done. Tonight, the Picaroon strikes again!"

* * * * *

He was gone. They were alone. Comstock looked helplessly at Pat. She tried to manufacture a smile but it was no great shakes.

"If," Comstock said, "I can get this thing off my wrists, perhaps we can be out of here before that insane creature returns."

"Escape from this retreat directly into the Grandfather's Right Arms?" Pat asked gently.

Comstock stopped struggling with his bonds for a moment as he considered what she had said. "If we can fend off this 'Picaroon' until about eleven-thirty tomorrow then we can make a dash for Bowdler's house.

"I think that's our only chance, and a slim one it is."

Almost twelve hours ahead of them, at the mercy of a madman, before they could dare run the daylight gauntlet of the outdoors, under the menace of the R.A.'s. Comstock shuddered. The risk was tremendous, yet what else was there that they could do? He couldn't bear the thought of staying here in the Picaroon's Haven right around the clock, he didn't think he could stand twenty-four hours more of the nerve racking strain he was undergoing, even though that might be a more intelligent plan to attack.

Roughly twelve hours more, one way, and a full twenty-four the other....

Pat said, when she saw his brow furrowed with painful thought, "Now's the time to think of my name."

"Huh?" he said, not very intelligently.

"Patience and Fortitude, remember?"

He had the patience, the only question was whether or not he had the fortitude to put up with the Picaroon's mad fantasies.

At length the secret door opened and the man he was brooding about entered, bowed down with an even more useless collection of stolen objects than the ones which already burdened the room.

Striking an attitude, the Picaroon dropped the load he was carrying and roared, "Once more has the Picaroon dared the armed forces and the majesty of The Grandfather's law; once more his nimble fingers have plucked from the very heart of our solid citizenry those stolen treasures which will emblazon his name in the criminal hall of fame."

He bowed.

Pat said under her breath, "Patience and Fortitude...."

Then the Picaroon darted suddenly towards Comstock, his lean fingers outstretched. He said, "And you, you poisonous emissary of the forces of law and order, you, the Picaroon will punish in fitting style!"

Comstock held his breath as he waited to see what new vagary had further addled the brain of their insane captor.