The Skull

Conger agreed to kill a stranger he had
never seen. But he would make no mistakes
because he had the stranger's skull under
his arm.

"What is this opportunity?" Conger asked. "Go on. I'm interested."

The room was silent; all faces were fixed on Conger—still in the drab
prison uniform. The Speaker leaned forward slowly.

"Before you went to prison your trading business was paying well—all
illegal—all very profitable. Now you have nothing, except the prospect
of another six years in a cell."

Conger scowled.

"There is a certain situation, very important to this Council, that
requires your peculiar abilities. Also, it is a situation you might find
interesting. You were a hunter, were you not? You've done a great deal
of trapping, hiding in the bushes, waiting at night for the game? I
imagine hunting must be a source of satisfaction to you, the chase, the
stalking—"

Conger sighed. His lips twisted. "All right," he said. "Leave that out.
Get to the point. Who do you want me to kill?"

The Speaker smiled. "All in proper sequence," he said softly.

The car slid to a stop. It was night; there was no light anywhere along
the street. Conger looked out. "Where are we? What is this place?"

The hand of the guard pressed into his arm. "Come. Through that door."

Conger stepped down, onto the damp sidewalk. The guard came swiftly
after him, and then the Speaker. Conger took a deep breath of the cold
air. He studied the dim outline of the building rising up before them.

"I know this place. I've seen it before." He squinted, his eyes growing
accustomed to the dark. Suddenly he became alert. "This is—"

"Yes. The First Church." The Speaker walked toward the steps. "We're
expected."

"Expected?
Here?
"

"Yes." The Speaker mounted the stairs. "You know we're not allowed in
their Churches, especially with guns!" He stopped. Two armed soldiers
loomed up ahead, one on each side.

"All right?" The Speaker looked up at them. They nodded. The door of the
Church was open. Conger could see other soldiers inside, standing about,
young soldiers with large eyes, gazing at the ikons and holy images.

"I see," he said.

"It was necessary," the Speaker said. "As you know, we have been
singularly unfortunate in the past in our relations with the First
Church."

"This won't help."

"But it's worth it. You will see."

They passed through the hall and into the main chamber where the altar
piece was, and the kneeling places. The Speaker scarcely glanced at the
altar as they passed by. He pushed open a small side door and beckoned
Conger through.

"In here. We have to hurry. The faithful will be flocking in soon."

Conger entered, blinking. They were in a small chamber, low-ceilinged,
with dark panels of old wood. There was a smell of ashes and smoldering
spices in the room. He sniffed. "What's that? The smell."

"Cups on the wall. I don't know." The Speaker crossed impatiently to the
far side. "According to our information, it is hidden here by this—"

Conger looked around the room. He saw books and papers, holy signs and
images. A strange low shiver went through him.

"Does my job involve anyone of the Church? If it does—"

The Speaker turned, astonished. "Can it be that you believe in the
Founder? Is it possible, a hunter, a killer—"

"No. Of course not. All their business about resignation to death,
non-violence—"

"What is it, then?"

Conger shrugged. "I've been taught not to mix with such as these. They
have strange abilities. And you can't reason with them."

The Speaker studied Conger thoughtfully. "You have the wrong idea. It is
no one here that we have in mind. We've found that killing them only
tends to increase their numbers."

"Then why come here? Let's leave."

"No. We came for something important. Something you will need to
identify your man. Without it you won't be able to find him." A trace
of a smile crossed the Speaker's face. "We don't want you to kill the
wrong person. It's too important."

"I don't make mistakes." Conger's chest rose. "Listen, Speaker—"

"This is an unusual situation," the Speaker said. "You see, the person
you are after—the person that we are sending you to find—is known only
by certain objects here. They are the only traces, the only means of
identification. Without them—"

"What are they?"

He came toward the Speaker. The Speaker moved to one side. "Look," he
said. He drew a sliding wall away, showing a dark square hole. "In
there."

Conger squatted down, staring in. He frowned. "A skull! A skeleton!"

"The man you are after has been dead for two centuries," the Speaker
said. "This is all that remains of him. And this is all you have with
which to find him."

For a long time Conger said nothing. He stared down at the bones, dimly
visible in the recess of the wall. How could a man dead centuries be
killed? How could he be stalked, brought down?

Conger was a hunter, a man who had lived as he pleased, where he
pleased. He had kept himself alive by trading, bringing furs and pelts
in from the Provinces on his own ship, riding at high speed, slipping
through the customs line around Earth.

He had hunted in the great mountains of the moon. He had stalked through
empty Martian cities. He had explored—

The Speaker said, "Soldier, take these objects and have them carried to
the car. Don't lose any part of them."

The soldier went into the cupboard, reaching gingerly, squatting on his
heels.

"It is my hope," the Speaker continued softly, to Conger, "that you will
demonstrate your loyalty to us, now. There are always ways for citizens
to restore themselves, to show their devotion to their society. For you
I think this would be a very good chance. I seriously doubt that a
better one will come. And for your efforts there will be quite a
restitution, of course."

The two men looked at each other; Conger, thin, unkempt, the Speaker
immaculate in his uniform.

"I understand you," Conger said. "I mean, I understand this part, about
the chance. But how can a man who has been dead two centuries be—"

"I'll explain later," the Speaker said. "Right now we have to hurry!"
The soldier had gone out with the bones, wrapped in a blanket held
carefully in his arms. The Speaker walked to the door. "Come. They've
already discovered that we've broken in here, and they'll be coming at
any moment."

They hurried down the damp steps to the waiting car. A second later the
driver lifted the car up into the air, above the house-tops.

The Speaker settled back in the seat.

"The First Church has an interesting past," he said. "I suppose you are
familiar with it, but I'd like to speak of a few points that are of
relevancy to us.

"It was in the twentieth century that the Movement began—during one of
the periodic wars. The Movement developed rapidly, feeding on the
general sense of futility, the realization that each war was breeding
greater war, with no end in sight. The Movement posed a simple answer to
the problem: Without military preparations—weapons—there could be no
war. And without machinery and complex scientific technocracy there
could be no weapons.

"The Movement preached that you couldn't stop war by planning for it.
They preached that man was losing to his machinery and science, that it
was getting away from him, pushing him into greater and greater wars.
Down with society, they shouted. Down with factories and science! A few
more wars and there wouldn't be much left of the world.

"The Founder was an obscure person from a small town in the American
Middle West. We don't even know his name. All we know is that one day he
appeared, preaching a doctrine of non-violence, non-resistance; no
fighting, no paying taxes for guns, no research except for medicine.
Live out your life quietly, tending your garden, staying out of public
affairs; mind your own business. Be obscure, unknown, poor. Give away
most of your possessions, leave the city. At least that was what
developed from what he told the people."

The car dropped down and landed on a roof.

"The Founder preached this doctrine, or the germ of it; there's no
telling how much the faithful have added themselves. The local
authorities picked him up at once, of course. Apparently they were
convinced that he meant it; he was never released. He was put to death,
and his body buried secretly. It seemed that the cult was finished."

The Speaker smiled. "Unfortunately, some of his disciples reported
seeing him after the date of his death. The rumor spread; he had
conquered death, he was divine. It took hold, grew. And here we are
today, with a First Church, obstructing all social progress, destroying
society, sowing the seeds of anarchy—"

"But the wars," Conger said. "About them?"

"The wars? Well, there were no more wars. It must be acknowledged that
the elimination of war was the direct result of non-violence practiced
on a general scale. But we can take a more objective view of war today.
What was so terrible about it? War had a profound selective value,
perfectly in accord with the teachings of Darwin and Mendel and others.
Without war the mass of useless, incompetent mankind, without training
or intelligence, is permitted to grow and expand unchecked. War acted to
reduce their numbers; like storms and earthquakes and droughts, it was
nature's way of eliminating the unfit.

"Without war the lower elements of mankind have increased all out of
proportion. They threaten the educated few, those with scientific
knowledge and training, the ones equipped to direct society. They have
no regard for science or a scientific society, based on reason. And this
Movement seeks to aid and abet them. Only when scientists are in full
control can the—"

He looked at his watch and then kicked the car door open. "I'll tell you
the rest as we walk."

They crossed the dark roof. "Doubtless you now know whom those bones
belonged to, who it is that we are after. He has been dead just two
centuries, now, this ignorant man from the Middle West, this Founder.
The tragedy is that the authorities of the time acted too slowly. They
allowed him to speak, to get his message across. He was allowed to
preach, to start his cult. And once such a thing is under way, there's
no stopping it.

"But what if he had died before he preached? What if none of his
doctrines had ever been spoken? It took only a moment for him to utter
them, that we know. They say he spoke just once, just one time.
Then
the authorities came, taking him away. He offered no resistance; the
incident was small."

The Speaker turned to Conger.

"Small, but we're reaping the consequences of it today."

They went inside the building. Inside, the soldiers had already laid out
the skeleton on a table. The soldiers stood around it, their young faces
intense.

Conger went over to the table, pushing past them. He bent down, staring
at the bones. "So these are his remains," he murmured. "The Founder. The
Church has hidden them for two centuries."