COMPLEAT Collected SFF Works, page 404
Rabb pushed out his underlip sullenly and looked up at the Eagle in its little gold-lined alcove. He hesitated.
"What did Haliaia do to you, anyhow?" I asked, and then bit my tongue a little trying to take back that give-away accent, with its frank implication. I knew damn well what he had done to me. But he'd been safe. He knew I couldn't touch him. Black Presidents have to give up personal animosities when they take office. Or at least, they have to go through the motions.
"He swindled me out of an inheritance," Rabb said. "He's a cousin of mine." He hit his knee with a doubled fist. "Twenty years' service just to wipe out a man like that," he said. "It isn't fair."
"You could always go to court," I suggested, and we both laughed. It would take more like a hundred years of service to pay out the bribes that solution would cost. Law courts have nothing to do with justice any more. With no salaries involved, the officials live on bribes. It's a survival, like trial by combat, and it'll die out presently. Social control is based on corporate magic today, each corporation formed of people chosen according to aptitude, training and interest. Rabb had far more in common with me, his phrater in the Communications Corporation, than with his blood-relative Haliaia, that big, brown, handsome, half-Polynesian who thinks he can get away with—well, not murder, of course. But it's worse than that to steal a man's wife.
Rabb was still sitting there considering.
"Twenty years is too long," he said. "I couldn't face it, not even to get back at Jake. Six years is my limit. What could you do to him for that?"
"Disease and injury," I said. "On the non-physical plane, I could make him very unhappy. But I can't guarantee anything, of course. It all depends on how strong the White President of his clan is. Everything's curable except soul-stealing—if the other guy's White President is good enough."
"I know your reputation, Mr. Cole," Rabb said. "You're just about the biggest in the business. I know you'll do your best. And it's worth six years to me."
"No more?"
He shook his head slowly.
"All right, Rabb," I said. "Sign here, then." I pushed a contract and a pen across the desk. "And here—that's for your insurance. Can't have you die on us before your term's up."
He scribbled his name twice. "That's all," I said.
"But will I—"
"You'll be notified, in detail. Eyewitness reports on Haliaia's progress will be mailed to you weekly. That's part of the service. Okay, Rabb? Good afternoon."
He went out awkwardly, shuffling sidewise not to turn his back on the Eagle, whose strong, sacred wings theoretically carry the Communications Corporation in flight around the world. I shuffled his papers together and poised them over the slot in my desk that would suck them down to Administration.
Under my breath I said, "The damned fool." But I couldn't quite let go of the papers. I couldn't quite decide. On the one hand, some richer enemy of Jake Haliaia's might turn up eventually. On the other, Rabb was a bird in the hand. I'd waited six months even for this. Haliaia was a man who made enemies right and left, sure. But soul-stealing is an expensive business. Unless Haliaia antagonized somebody so high in rating that the investment of only a few years' service would do the job, I'd be no better off for waiting. Ideally, somebody else would turn up wanting what I wanted—Haliaia's death. Practically, it wasn't likely. I'd have to gimmick somebody's papers to get the man disposed of. Rabb's papers were as good as anybody's, for that purpose. But it's a risk. It's always a risk to tamper with corporate magic.
I'd gladly have paid Rabb's expenses out of my own pocket, if I'd dared. Did I dare? For months now I'd been telling myself that I risked nothing. I know how this so-called magic works. I know the truth. Magic can't affect a man if there's no such thing as magic. Or anyhow, not if he doesn't believe in it. My magic works, sure. But not because it's real.
Still, forty years of training leaves its compulsions. A Black President who turns his powers to selfish ends has never been heard of. I'll bet it's been done, but not by anyone fool enough to get found out. At worst, I'd lose my job, which I spent fifteen years learning, and my prestige, which is always a good thing to have, and my pay, which is one of the highest in the Corporation. At worst, that is, from my enlightened viewpoint. From theirs, the worst is the soul-stealing spell, and I'd certainly get slapped with that. When they found it wouldn't work—what? A President, black or white, is immune to magic himself as long as his totem protects him—that is, as long as he doesn't break any major taboos, especially in public. But suppose I broke the biggest taboo, and it became known? My soul might be stolen. In that case, everyone would expect me to cooperate by dying.
When I didn't die at the appointed time, what then? Would there be a more realistic attempt to murder me, with a bullet or poison? I thought that would depend entirely on how superstitious my would-be executioners were. If they were skeptical enough, they'd certainly not depend on magic alone, after they saw it wasn't succeeding. But if they weren't skeptical, then they'd simply decide that my magic was stronger than theirs, and my prestige and power would rise higher than ever.
Was I the only President who wasn't blinded by superstitious belief in magic?
Well, there was one quick way to find out. I laid Rabb's papers on my desk and pushed the button that locked my office door. I didn't want any inquiring eyes to notice them before I made my mind up. I flipped the intercom switch and said to my secretary, "I'll be in Thornvald's office, Jan. Don't bother us unless it's urgent."
There is a private door in my office and in Thornvald's that opens on our connecting bridge. I always liked to cross over that way. Communications headquarters building covers two square miles. Above it our twin towers rise impressively, for I'm the nominal head of the Corporation, along with Karl Thornvald, the White President. Walking across the bridge, you can always hear the wind howling thinly through the steel structuring and sometimes a surprised bird looks wildly at you from beyond the glass. I used to wonder how we'd handle the embarrassment if an eagle ever came by and knocked itself senseless against our bridge. Probably nobody'd ever notice. It's amazing how much a person can train himself to ignore if his beliefs are contravened.
Crossing the bridge is almost like flying. You're so high in the blue air, all the rooftops far below and spreading out enormously to the ring of green fields a mile away in every direction. For a moment it reminded me of the hallucination of flight that comes with the Eagle ritual.
Thornvald's telltale showed he was alone. I knocked and went in. His desk is like mine, with the Eagle Totem on the wall, but otherwise the office is bright and cheerful, without the black-magic props I have to have around.
Karl is a plump, round-faced man with an air of impressive solemnity he can put on at will. Right now he put it on automatically as the door opened, and then shrugged and gave me a mild grin.
"Hello, Lloyd," he said. "What's up?"
"Coffee break," I said. He shook his head over the papers in his hand, laid them down, shrugged again and pushed the coffee button. Two coffee bulbs rose instantly out of a desk panel.
"Good idea," he said, biting his open in that irritating, unsanitary way of his. "I've been sweating out a cure for a tough case. A key sonar man. The clan really needs him."
I opened my coffee with one hand and with the other reached for the paper he was handing me.
"Somebody in Food Corporation put a spell on him, eh?"
"Right. And you know Mumm. He's tricky, and getting trickier."
I knew him. Mumm is the new Black President of Foods, a young man and a very smart one, out to make a reputation for himself fast.
Thornvald said sadly, "I can't locate the real trouble. I thought it might be a foreign body, but the fluoroscope says no. And the man thinks he'll die."
"This says it's the Pneumonia Spell?"
"I think it is, but—"
"With pneumonia anybody'd feel lousy," I said. "Have you ever considered that what's wrong with your patient may not be magic, but germs?"
Thornvald blinked at me. "Well ... now wait a minute, Lloyd. Of course it's germs. We know that, if it's the Pneumonia Spell. But who sends the germs? And who puts enough magic in them to eat up my patient's mana? I tell you, Mumm can make germs more virulent than any Black President I ever heard of. I've used five different blessings on the aureomycin, and I still can't cancel Mumm's magic."
"Maybe your patient's a skeptic," I said.
"Now, Lloyd," he said, pulling on his air of solemnity.
"Come off it, Karl," I said. "You know there are skeptics."
"Yes, I suppose so, poor souls. I'm happy to say I never met one. I've sometimes wondered how I'd handle it if I did."
I'd never met one either, barring myself, but I gave him a wise grin and said, "I know one. Smart man, too. Skeptics have their own power, Karl, some of them. Did you ever think one skeptic might be able to cure another, if your methods fail?"
He looked very shocked. His pink face actually went pale with it. "Be careful, Lloyd," he said. "That's getting close to blasphemy."
"I'm just stating facts," I said.
"If you know a skeptic, you know your duty." His voice was prim. "As for saving a patient at the expense of his soul, I'd rather have the man die in a state of grace, and so would you, Lloyd."
"Even a key man? Somebody the Corporation can't afford to lose?"
"Of course, Lloyd."
"Even if it means letting Mumm score a win, and our reputation going down?"
"Lloyd, I don't understand you in this mood." He looked up at the Eagle Totem and his lips moved slightly.
I sighed and got up, draining my coffee. "Forget it, Karl," I said. "I was just kidding."
"I certainly hope so," he told me stiffly. "I understand you, but others might get wrong ideas. If you really know a confessed skeptic, Lloyd, you'll have to report him. For his own good."
"I told you I was kidding. Sorry, Karl. I've been worrying, too."
"Trouble? Maybe I can help."
I looked at him. He really had gone pale at the thought of blasphemy. It had to be genuine. You can't put on an act like that. I drew a deep breath and plunged.
"No, not trouble exactly. I got a soul-stealing order today and it's going to be embarrassing for me, that's all."
He gave me one of his keen looks and then demonstrated in one word that he's really well qualified to be White President, however much I may underestimate the man sometimes.
"Haliaia?" he asked.
It scared me a little. He's almost too quick. But I couldn't back down now without losing a chance that might not come again for months.
"That's it," I said. "Haliaia."
He looked down at his hands, and then up again. His prim lips were firm.
"I know how you feel, Lloyd. There'll be talk. But you'll have to bear it. You know your duty. As long as you and I have the facts straight, what does it matter how people gossip?"
I gave him a stalwart, resolute look, Black President to White President, and the world well lost for duty's sake.
"You're right, Karl. Dead right."
"I know I am. Now stop worrying and put the papers through with a clear conscience, Lloyd. It isn't always easy, being a President."
I thought, "There's nothing easier, Karl," but aloud I said, "All right, if you say so, I'll do it. I'll put them through right now."
I went back across the bridge, feeling exhilarated and only a little scared. I made the necessary changes in Rabb's request. Then I held Jake Haliaia over the slot and let go, and watched him go fluttering down the dark vacuum into infinity.
Afterward I turned and looked up at the Eagle Totem. It's just a stuffed bird. That's all.
-
Now there was no use in even trying to keep the secret. I sat down and put in a call to Florida. After a little while the wings of the stuffed eagle carried Communications Corporation's message across the continent and a woman's face appeared on the screen. She was looking lovelier than I had ever seen her look before. Her eyes were a little out of focus; obviously I wasn't registering yet on her screen. Or in her life, either, if you wanted to think about it that way.
A mechanical voice said, "Mr. Cole? We have Miami now. Mrs. Cole is on the screen."
Now the violet eyes focused. We looked at each other across many miles and enormous emotional distances that would never be bridged again.
"Hello, Lila," I said.
"What do you want?"
"Two things. First, congratulations. The divorce is final this week, isn't it?"
She simply waited.
I smiled at her. "Oh, yes," I said. "The other thing. Haliaia is going to die."
-
The ritual hallucination was the next step. It's meaningless, of course—a drug-induced dream which habit has shaped to an expected pattern. Thornvald goes through the same ritual for white magic, and he really believes the Eagle appears and talks to him. I'm not that gullible, but I follow the routine too. When I don't, it worries me, maybe because I feel if I vary in one thing I may get careless and vary in more public, and dangerous, ways.
This time I thought I'd skip the ritual. It hadn't even the validity of faith, now I'd broken the main taboo of my office. But I found I couldn't concentrate on my work. Habit, after all, was too strong for me. I made mistakes, punched the wrong buttons, got so irritated finally that I gave up and went ahead with the routine mumbo-jumbo. I entered the ritual room with an odd sense of relief. I burned the necessary herbs, gave myself a shot of the holy drug and said the usual prayer to the Eagle. After that it was the same hallucination I've had so often.
I dreamed. The Eagle flew with me to Miami. I found Haliaia in a casino playing chuck-a-luck. He was big and brown and handsome. I knew he was due to get enormously fat in later life, like most Polynesians. Lila would be spared this, and Jake. But they wouldn't thank me for it.
I stunned him with my sacred spear and dragged him to a dark place. With the spear I made a circle on his forehead. Then I drove the spear through his chest and dropped three drops of his heart's blood on the Eagle Totem which I carried. I touched him with the Eagle and the wound closed. I whirled the totem around his head. He opened his eyes and saw me.
I said to him, "You will live two weeks. For a day you will be well. Then you will be sick. On the fourteenth day you will die. The Eagle Totem will eat up your soul."
Then the dream ended.
-
What really happened was completely practical. Haliaia's sheaf of papers, sucked down into Administration, passed across various desks, were stamped, sorted, assigned, and then sat waiting my go-ahead. My assistants handle most of the black magic, but for a soul-stealing the Black President himself usually performs the honors.
So I sent down for the folder on Haliaia, made up some months ago by our spies in Haliaia's Corporation. He was a key man in the Food Company, and we try to keep folders on such people handy, just in case. I had to know just the right moment when the launching of a spell against the man would hit him where he lived.
Ordinary magic is easy to handle, run-of-the-mill stuff like bad luck, illness, accidents. You can handle it on the spiritual level as a rule, but you don't depend on that. Often you give a man a little push. You arrange to get him infected with a virus, say. You have spies in the restaurant where he eats to drop something mildly toxic in his soup. But you want to make sure he knows it. To make sure antibiotics won't lick the virus, you put a very public spell on the virus. Somehow, if the victim knows what you've done, the magic usually works. He's scared, and fear helps the bugs work. And of course if the bugs don't work, if antibiotics or something cure the victim, then everybody believes the black magic has been cured by white magic—the job of the White President of every clan.
But you have to study your victim carefully, his life charts and psychological patterns and the reports from trained observers working quietly in the enemy's office or his home. (I don't doubt that observers usually had an eye on me, making notes for the files of other Black Presidents. You just can't do anything about that situation. Our whole social pattern is based on it.)
So you study your victim's charts. You pick exactly the right time to publicize your spell against him. It's always a time when the man's already down—in an emotional depression, or sick with some mild infection, or under stress of some kind. Then you reinforce the stress, make sure he knows he's under a spell and that all his associates know it, and he's apt to cooperate even against his will.
But the really big magic, the soul-stealing—that has to be handled more carefully. Plenty of deaths have been diagnosed as soul-stealing when they're really a burst appendix or thrombosis, or something medicine can't help. The White President of the dead man's clan can't admit his magic's too weak to save the victim. So he takes the obvious out of claiming an enemy used the soul-stealing spell against him. For that there is no cure.
