The Other World

What followed freedom was inevitably an anticlimax. There were some of the freedmen who—their vengeance sated—demanded immediate return to Earth. There were others—especially women—who bitterly protested against return. Many men, also, were ashamed. And the number who felt that their vengeance was complete grew smaller as hours passed. Most found themselves still lusting to kill more ruhks and overseers, and there were not a few who hungrily discussed the fact that there were other villas in the Other World. There was one up the Hudson near Albany. There was one near Philadelphia, and one near Boston. There were other men in slave pens-

Then Dick Blair showed the translation of the message in hieroglyphic script he had gotten from a messenger sent to take it up-river. The translation was explicit.

From Zozer, son of Haton, of the race of lords of men and ruhks, to Khafre, son of Siut, the son of Zozer’s uncle, greeting:

There is a slave from the land of slaves (Earth, or New York) at large in my land. He came from the land of the slaves by his own contrivance, not by being enslaved. There is one other who remains in the land of the slaves who knows of his coming.

I have sent ruhks and servants to seize him and to bring his companion from the land of the slaves for questioning. Do you have the news writings of the slave-people near you brought to your interpreters each day to be searched for word of this event or of the discovery by the slave-people of our world.

If such news should appear, tell all of our race, that they may spread fire and death and pestilence in the land of the slaves, in every house and every city, so that they will forget to think of our land in their study of their own griefs. Do this in the manner arranged in the time of our fathers.

Do not do this unless the news writings speak of our world.

Farewell.

Zozer, the son of Haton, of the race of lords of ruhks and men, to Khafre, son of Siut the son of Zozer’s uncle.

Dick said bluntly:

“There are other villas and certainly other slaves. This business started in Egypt, and it spread. And the one thing these masters are afraid of is that on our Earth the people will find out about them and come and wipe them out. So if they’re spoken of on Earth, they’ll start to work to destroy it. They won’t wipe out humanity, of course. But they can put a fire in every cellar of every house, in every warehouse, every building, every fuel store, every petroleum tank. They can put germs into all drinking water, foul all food, and spread disease beyond any possibility of our stopping them. They could steal bombs from any store of bombs on earth, and introduce and explode them anywhere they pleased.

“Nobody could stop them. The price of our going back to Earth is just that sort of catastrophe everywhere there are villas on this world. They wouldn’t destroy humanity, but they’d come damn near destroying civilization before they were through. So—let’s start smashing them up from here. We’ll go upriver and smash the villa up there. We’ll have more men, then. We’ll smash the villas at Boston and Philadelphia. We’ll spread out, smashing the slave pens and killing the ruhks until at least our own country’s safe from their revenge! And maybe we’ll carry on past that. If we destroy every slave pen and free every slave on this world, we can go back to Earth as conquerors instead of victims—”

He glared about him. The argument was hot. But before sunset of the day of victory, he saw men carrying bodies out of the villa and arranging to bury them, as if there were no question but that life was to go on here. He became busy planning the expedition up-river. It would be a good deal simpler than the affair here had been. For one thing, it would be an absolute surprise. A hundred armed men with the master-scent upon them would be ample. No ruhk would give warning of their coming. No force of overseers would be gathered to oppose them ...

The tall man who had been a professor of physics stopped him as he left a conference where Sam had made it clear that he was going to be in the expedition up-river.

“Nobody really plans to go back to Earth,” he told Dick dryly. “I don’t. No man or woman who’s ever been a slave will want to go back. They’d be ashamed. The thing to do is to arrange, very discreetly, for someone to buy bulldozers and tractors and clothes and books and safety razors and canned goods and get them through some doorway to here. There’s gold and jewelry enough in the palace yonder to pay for everything we need. And send us some bismuth. I’ve been talking to your friend Maltby. We can make doorways we can even get small ocean-going craft through. We’ve a job here that’s worth doing. In five thousand years those devils have set up villas in maybe hundreds and possibly thousands of places. They’ve got to be cleared out!”

Dick said, “Still, if people want to go back ...”

“They can’t go back right away!” said the tall man. “We put it to a vote. No question. Everybody stays, at least for a while. Actually, I doubt that any of us will ever go. We’ll get to realizing what will happen if Earth ever learns about this planet. Can you picture the stampede of the nations for pieces of this world? Can you picture them dumping bombs through doorways on us, or piling into this world to go dump bombs back on Earth?”

Dick winced. Then the tall man said:

“We can stop any war on Earth. I think we will. We’ve had enough of killing and cruelty. I think—”

“I’ve been talking to several people,” admitted Dick. “They are inclined to think as you do.”

“Surely,” said the tall man. “But for the time- being we’ll just tell ourselves we’re staying here until we free all the other slaves, and make sure there’s no interdimensional attack on Earth in case we want to go back. We’ll need somebody to buy things for us, and maybe to advise us from time to time. We’ll need somebody around who never was a slave. We’re apt to be pretty extreme.”

“To tell the truth,” said Dick, “I thought I’d go back with Maltby and arrange for buying the sort of stuff we need here, and—well—get married, and come back ...”

The tall man nodded.

That was the way it was. They returned the spidery device to its former storage-place in the villa. It would never again be used to rob Earth. They began to clean up the bloodstains. There were hundreds of things to be done. Dick, himself, had a list of literally thousands of items that would somehow, without creating curiosity, have to be bought for this Other World.

A cutter rowed them across to the Manhattan shore just at sundown. There was a doorway there which they would ultimately set up in a closet in the house Dick and Nancy would presently acquire for the benefit of the people in the Other World.

None of the brawny figures with them showed any sign of wanting to go back to New York with them. They were going up-river in the morning, to attack another villa. They grinned when Maltby went back to Earth. He had borrowed Sam Todd’s clothes; Sam was wearing a loincloth and a riot gun and enjoying it. Nancy went through. Kelly went through, with a parcel. Dick went through and they were in New York, in a narrow, smelly small alley only feet from a well-frequented street.

“Wedding present,” said Kelly. “I picked it up at the first slave pen we took. Thought you might like it.”

“What is it?” asked Nancy.

“A crux ansata,” said Dick. “On Earth it belongs to Maltby, but Kelly rates it as spoils of war. He’s right. It is. Maltby shan’t have it. I’ll turn it into a hand-mirror for you to look at yourself in.”

“Kelly,” said Nancy. “Don’t you want to stay for the wedding?”

“No,” said Kelly laconically. “I got a date up-river.”

Maltby went out of the alley into the street.

“See you next week,” said Dick.

“Okay,” said Kelly. “Good luck.”

He vanished in a pool of quicksilver. There didn’t seem to be anything else to say. Dick took Nancy’s hand and went out of the alley. He held up three fingers and whistled at a passing vehicle.

“Taxi!” said Dick.