Deus Irae

“How far were you willing to go to insure Tiber’s not seeing him? I wonder. Might it extend to actual violence?”

Pete snapped a stick of his own.

“You said it,” he said. “I didn’t.”

“I may be doing you people a favor just by doing my job,” Schuld said.

“Maybe.”

“Too bad I didn’t know about it sooner. If a man is going to labor for two masters, he might as well draw good wages from both of them.”

“Christianity is broke,” Pete said. “But I’ll remember you in my prayers.”

Schuld slapped him on the shoulder.

“Pete, I like you,” he said. “Okay. We’ll do it your way. Tibor doesn’t have to know.”

“Thanks.”

Beneath that Swiss movement, Pete wondered as they headed back, what is the spark—the mainspring—really like, hunter? The money they will pay you? The hate? Or something else?

There came a sharp yelp. Schuld had kicked Toby, who had emerged before him, snarling. It could have been an accident, but, “Damn dog!” he said. “It hates me.”

Sixteen

Pete Sands set up his radio gear by moonlight, working in the middle of a small glade about a quarter of a mile back along the road from the site of their encampment.

Neat, he thought, the way it worked out, Schuld’s suggesting what I was going to do anyway: take this walk.

He plugged in the earphone, cranked the transmitter.

“Dr. Abernathy,” he said, raising the microphone. “Pete Sands here. Hello?”

There followed a brief burst of static, then, “Hello, Pete. This is Abernathy. How is it going?”

“I’ve located Tibor,” Pete said.

“Is he aware of your presence?”

“Yes. We are traveling together now. I am calling from just outside our camp.”

“Oh. So you have joined him. What are your plans?”

“They are somewhat complicated,” Pete said. “There is a third party involved—a fellow named Jack Schuld. I met him yesterday. He saved my life, actually. He seems to have a pretty good idea as to Lufteufel’s whereabouts. He has offered to guide us to him. We may reach the place tomorrow.”

Pete smiled at the sharp intake of breath on the other end. He continued: “I have made a deal with him, however. He will not point him out to Tibor. He is going to confess to a case of mistaken identity and we will bypass the real Lufteufel and continue on.”

“Wait a minute, Pete. I do not understand you. Why go through all that in the first place then? Why go that route at all?”

“Well,” Pete said lamely, “he will do me this favor in return for our company on the way.”

“Pete, what ate you leaving out? It doesn’t make sense. There has to be more to it than that.”

“All right. He is an assassin. He is on his way to kill Lufteufel. He thinks he would seem less suspicious traveling in the company of an inc.”

“Pete! That makes you a party to murder!”

“Not really. I disapprove of murder. We discussed that earlier. And he may even have a legal right to do this—as an executioner. He is in the employ of a police organization—at least he says he is, and I believe him. Whatever, I am powerless to stop him, no matter what my feelings. If you got a good look at him, you would know what I mean. I thought you would be happy to learn—”

“—of a man’s death. Pete, I don’t like this at all.”

“Then suggest something else, sir.”

“Could you get away from this Schuld? You and Tibor sneak off during the night? Just go on by yourselves?”

“Too late. Tiber would not cooperate if I couldn’t give him an awfully good reason—and I can’t. He believes Schuld can show him his man. And I am certain we could not sneak off anyway. Schuld is too alert a fellow. He’s a hunter.”

“Do you think you could warn Lufteufel when you reach him?”

“No,” Pete said, “not now that I’ve set it up for Tibor to miss him completely or only to glimpse him without knowing who he is. I didn’t think you would take it this way.”

“I am trying to protect you from an occasion for sin.”

“I don’t see it as such.”

“… Most likely mortal.”

“I hope not. I guess that I am going to have to play it by ear now. I will let you know what happens.”

“Wait, Pete! Listen! Try to find some way to part company with that Schuld fellow as fast as possible. If it weren’t for him, you wouldn’t even be going near Lufteufel. You are not responsible for Schuld’s actions unless you are in a position to influence them by action or the withholding of action yourself. Morally as well as practically, you are better off without him. Get out! Get away from him!”

“And leave Tibor?”

“No, take Tibor with you.”

“Against his will? Kidnap him, you mean?”

There was silence, then a little static.

Finally, “I don’t know how to tell you to do it,” he said. “That is your problem. But you must look for a way.”

“I will see what I can do,” Pete said, “but it doesn’t look promising.”

“I will continue to pray,” Dr. Abernathy replied. “When will you call me again?”

“Tomorrow evening, I guess. I probably won’t be able to get off a call during the day.”

“All right. I will be waiting. Good night.”

“Good night.”

The static gave way to crickets. Pete disassembled the gear.

“Tibor,” Schuld said, stirring the fire, “Tibor McMasters, on his way to immortality.”

“Huh?” said Tibor. He had been staring into the flames, finding the face of a girl named Fay Blame who had been more than kind to him in the past. If He had left me those arms and legs, he had been thinking, I could go back and tell her how I really feel. I could hold her, run my fingers through her hair, mold her form like a sculptor. She would let me, too, I think. I would be like other men. I…

“Huh?”

“Immortality,” Schuld repeated. “Better than progeny, even, for they have a way of disappointing, embarrassing, hurting their begetters. But painting is ‘the grandchild of nature and related to God.’ “

“I do not understand,” Tibor said.

“ ‘Though the poet is as free as the painter in the invention of his fictions, they are not so satisfactory to men as paintings,’ “ Schuld said, “ ‘for, though poetry is able to describe forms, actions, and places in words, the painter deals with the actual similitude of the forms, in order to represent them. Now tell me which is the nearer to the actual man: the name of the man or the image of the man. The name of the man differs in different countries, but his form is never changed but by death.’”

“I think I see what you mean,” Tibor said.

“ ‘… And this is true knowledge and the legitimate issue of nature.’ Leonardo da Vinci wrote that in one of his notebooks. It feels right, too. And it will fit the present case so well. You will be remembered, Tibor McMasters, not for a passel of snot-nosed brats creeping toward eternity’s rim, dull variations on the DNA you’re stuck with, but for the exercise of your power to create the other image—the deathless similitude of a particular form. And you will be father to a vision that rises above nature itself, that is superior to it because divine. Among all men, you have been singled out for this measure of immortality.”

Tibor smiled.

“It is quite a responsibility they’ve given me,” he said.

“You are very modest,” Schuld said, “and more than a little naive. Do you think you were chosen simply because you were the best painter in town when the SOWs needed a murch? There is more to it than that. Would you believe that Charlottesville, Utah, was chosen to house the murch before it was your town? Would you believe that your town was chosen because you are the greatest artist alive today?”

Tibor turned and stared at him. “Father Handy never indicated anything like that,” he said.

“He gets his orders, as do those from whom he takes them.”

“You have lost me—again,” Tibor said. “How could you know these things?”