“Yes, he bees losed here in this time like others. And he foolishly works with them to overthrow Stasis.”
“Sad story. But how does it concern me? My papers be in order. Surely you can see that I be what I claim?”
The Stappers eyes fixed him sharply. “You be clever, John Brent. You doubtless traveled naked and clothed yourself as citizen of now to escape suspicion. That bees smartest way. How you getted papers I do not know. But communication with German Slanduch will disprove your story. You be losed, Brent, unless you be sensible.”
“Sensible? What the hell do you mean by that?”
The Stapper smiled slowly. “Article,” he drawled.
“I be sorry. But that proves nothing. You know how difficult it bees for us Slanduch to keep our speech entirely regular.”
“I know.” Suddenly a broad grin spread across the Stappers face and humanized it. “I have finded this Farthing speech hellishly difficult myself.”
“You mean you, too, be Slanduch?”
The Stapper shook his head. “I, too, Brent, be traveler.”
Brent was not falling for any such trap. “Ridiculous! How can traveler be Stapper?
“How can traveler be Slanduch envoy? I, too, traveled naked, and man whose clothes and identification I stealed beed Stapper. I have finded his identity most useful.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“You be stubborn, Brent. How to prove—” He gestured at his face. “Look at my skin. In my century facial hair haves disappeared; we have breeded away from it. Where in this time could you find skin like that?”
“A sport. Freak of chromosomes.”
The black eyes grew even larger and more glowing. “Brent, you must believe me. This bees no trap for you. I need you. You and I, we can do great things. But how to convince you—” he snapped his fingers. “I know!” He was still for a moment. The vast eyes remained opened but somehow veiled, as though secret calculations were going on behind them. His body shivered. For a moment of strange delusion Brent thought he could see the chair through the Stapper’s body. Then it was solid again.
“My name,” said the Stapper, with the patience of a professor addressing a retarded class, “bees Bokor. I come from tenth century after consummation of terrestrial unity, which bees, I believe, forty-third reckoning from date of birth of Christian god. I have traveled, not with machine, but solely by use of Vunmurd formula, and, therefore, I alone of all travelers stranded here can still move. Hysteresis of Barrier arrests me, but cannot destroy my formula as it shatters machines.”
“Pretty story.”
“Therefore I alone of travelers can still travel. I can go back by undestroyed formula and hit Barrier again. If I hit Barrier twice, I exist twice in that one point of time. Therefore each of two of me continues into present.”
“So now you be two?” Brent observed skeptically. “Obviously I be too sober. I seem to be seeing single.”
Bokor grinned again. Somehow this time it didn’t seem so humanizing. “Come in!” he called.
The Stapper in the doorway fixed Brent with his glowing black eyes and said, “Now do you believe that I be traveler?”
Brent gawped from one identical man to the other. The one in the doorway went on, “I need you.”
“It isn’t possible. It’s a gag. You’re twin Stappers, and you’re trying to—”
Bokor in the chair said, “Do I have to do it again?”
Brent said, “You may both be Stappers. You may turn out to be a whole damned regiment of identical multiple births. I don’t give a damn; I want some bond. How about you boys?”
The two Bokors downed their drinks and frowned. “Weak,” they said.
Brent shook his head feebly. “All right. We’ll skip that. Now what the sweet hell do you need me for?”
Bokor closed his eyes and seemed to doze. Bokor Sub-One said, “You have plans to liberate travelers and overthrow Stasis. As Stapper I have learned much. I worked on changing mind of one of your Underground friends.”
“And you want to throw your weight in with us? Good, we can use a Stapper. Or two. But won’t the Chief of Stappers be bothered when he finds he has two copies of one man?”
“He will never need to see more than one. Yes, I want to help you—up to a point. We will free travelers. But you be innocent, Brent. We will not overthrow Stasis. We will maintain it—as ours.”
Brent frowned. “I’m not sure I get you. And I don’t think I like it if I do.”
“Do not be fool, Brent. We have opportunity never before gived to man, we travelers. We come into world where already exists complete and absolute State control, but used stupidly and to no end. Among us all we have great knowledge and power. We be seed sowed upon fallow ground. We can spring up and ungulf all about us.” The eyes glowed with black intensity. “We take this Stasis and mold it to our own wishes. These dolts who now be slaves of Cosmos will be slaves of us. Stapper, whose identity I have, bees third in succession to Chief of Stappers. Chief and other two will be killed accidentally in revolt of travelers. With power of all Stappers behind me, I make you Head of State. Between us we control this State absolutely.”
“Nuts,” Brent snorted. “The State’s got too damned much control already. What this world needs is a return to human freedom and striving.”
“Innocent,” Bokor Sub-One repeated scornfully. “Who gives damn what world needs? Only needs which concern man be his own, and his strongest need bees always for power. Here it bees gived us. Other States be stupid and self-complacent like this. We know secrets of many weapons, we travelers. We turn our useless scholastic laboratories over to their production. Then we attack other States and subject them to us as vassals. And then the world itself bees ours, and all its riches.
