realize that Joe must also be perfectly well aware of this fact.
The walls around them, though occasionally faced with concrete, were mostly bare rock. It was dear to Stormgren that he was in some disused mine, and he could think of few more effective prisons. Until now the fact of his kidnapping had failed to worry him greatly. He had felt that, whatever happened, the immense resources of the Overlords would soon locate and rescue him. Now he was not so sure. He had already been gone several days—and nothing had happened. There must be a limit even to Karellen's power, and if he were indeed buried in some remote continent, all the science of the Overlords might be unable to trace him.
There were two other men sitting at the table in the bare, dimly lit room. They looked up with interest, and more than a little respect, as Stormgren entered. One of them pushed across a bundle of sandwiches which Stormgren accepted eagerly. Though he felt extremely hungry, he could have done with a more interesting meal, but it was probable that his captors had dined no better. As he ate, he glanced quickly at the three men around him.
Joe was by far the most outstanding character, and not merely In the matter of physical bulk. The others were clearly his assistants—nondescript individuals, whose origins Stormgren would be able to place when he heard them talk. Some wine had been produced in a not-too-aseptic glass, and Stormgren washed down the last of the sandwiches.
Feeling now more fully in command of the situation, he turned to the huge Pole. 'Well,” he said evenly, “perhaps you'll tell me what all this Is about, and just what you hope to get out of it.”
Joe cleared his throat.
“I'd like to make one thing straight,” he said. “This is nothing to do with Wainwright. He'll be as surprised as anyone.”
Stormgren had half expected this, though he wondered why Joe was confirming his suspicions. He had long suspected the existence of an extremist movement inside—or on the frontiers of—the Freedom League.
“As a matter of interest,” he said, “how did you kidnap me?” He hardly expected a reply to this, and was somewhat taken aback by the other's readiness—even eagerness—to answer.
“It was all rather like a Hollywood thriller,” said Joe cheerfully. “We weren't sure if Karellen kept a watch on you, so we took somewhat elaborate precautions. You were knocked out by gas in the air-conditioner—that was easy. Then we carried you out into the car—no trouble at all. All this, I might say, wasn't done by any of our people. We hired—er—professionals for the job. Karellen may get them—in fact, he's supposed to—but he'll be no wiser. When it left your house, the car drove into a long road tunnel not a thousand kilometres from New York. It came out again on schedule at the opposite end, still carrying a drugged man extraordinarily like the Secretary- General. Quite a while later a large truck loaded with metal cases emerged in the opposite direction and drove to a certain airfield where the cases were loaded aboard a freighter on perfectly legitimate business. I'm sure the owners of those cases would be horrified to know how we employed them.
“Meanwhile the car that had actually done the job continued elaborate evasive action towards the Canadian border. Perhaps Karellen's caught it by now; I don't know or care. As you'll see—I do hope you appreciate my frankness—our whole plan depended on one thing. We're pretty sure that Karellen can see and hear everything that happens on the surface of the Earth—but unless he uses magic, not science, he can't see underneath it. So he won't know about the transfer in the tunnel—at least until it's too late. Naturally we've taken a risk, but there were also one or two other safeguards I won't go into now. We may want to use them again, and it would be a pity to give them away.”
Joe had related the whole story with such obvious gusto that Stormgren could hardly help smiling. Yet he also felt very disturbed. The plan was an ingenious one, and it was quite possible that Karellen had been deceived. Stormgren was not even certain that the Overlord kept any form of protective surveillance over him. Nor, clearly, was Joe. Perhaps that was why he had been so frank—he wanted to test Stormgren's reactions. Well, he would try and appear confident, whatever his real feelings might be.
“You must be a lot of fools,” said Stormgren scornfully, “if you think you can trick the Overlords as easily as this. In any case, what conceivable good will it do?”
Joe offered him a cigarette, which Stormgren refused, then lit one himself and sat on the edge of the table. There was an ominous creaking and he jumped off hastily.
“Our motives,” he began, “should be pretty obvious. We've found arguments useless, so we have to take other measures. There have been underground movements before, and even Karellen, whatever powers he's got, won't find it easy to deal with us. We're out to fight for our independence. Don't misunderstand me. There'll be nothing violent—at first, anyway—but the Overlords have to use human agents, and we can make it mighty uncomfortable for them.”
Starting with me, I suppose, thought Stormgren. He wondered if the other had given him more than a fraction of the whole story. Did they really think that these gangster methods would Influence Karellen in the slightest? On the other hand, it was quite true that a well-organized resistance movement could make life very difficult. For Joe had put his finger on the one weak spot in the Overlords' rule. Ultimately, all their orders were carried out by human agents. If these were terrorized into disobedience, the whole system might collapse. It was only a faint possibility, for Stormgren felt confident that Karellen would soon find some solution.
“What do you intend to do with me?” asked Stormgren at length. “Am I a hostage, or what?”
“Don't worry—we'll look after you. We expect some visitors in a few days, and until then we'll entertain you as well as we can.” He added some words in his own language, and one of the others produced a brand-new pack of cards.
“We got these especially for you,” explained Joe. “I read in Time the other day that you were a good poker player.” His voice suddenly became grave. “I hope there's plenty of cash in your wallet,” he said anxiously. 'We never thought of looking. After all, we can hardly accept cheques.”
Quite overcome, Stormgren stared blankly at his captors.
Then, as the true humour of the situation sank into his mind, it suddenly seemed to him that all the cares and worries of office had lifted from his shoulders. From now on, it was van Ryberg's show. Whatever happened, there was absolutely nothing he could do about it—and now these fantastic criminals were anxiously waiting to play poker with him.
Abruptly, he threw back his head and laughed as he had not done for years. There was no doubt, thought van Ryberg morosely, that Wainwright was telling the truth. He might have his suspicions, but he did not know who had kidnapped Stormgren. Nor did he approve of the kidnapping itself. Van Ryberg had a shrewd idea that for some tune extremists in the Freedom League had been putting pressure on Wainwright to make him adopt a more active policy. Now they were taking matters into their own hands.
The kidnapping had been beautifully organized, there was no doubt of that. Stormgren might be anywhere on Earth, and there seemed little hope of tracing him. Yet something must be done, decided van Ryberg, and done quickly. Despite the jests he had so often made, his real feeling towards Karellen was one of overwhelming awe. The thought of approaching the Supervisor directly filled him with dismay, but there seemed no alternative.
The communications section occupied the entire top floor of the great building. Lines of facsimile machines, some silent, some clicking busily, stretched away into the distance. Through them poured endless streams of statistics: production figures, census returns, and all the book-keeping of a world economic system. Somewhere up in Karellen's ship must lie the equivalent of this great room—and van Ryberg wondered, with a tingling of the spine, what shapes moved to and fro collecting the messages that Earth was sending to the Overlords.
But today he was not interested in these machines and the routine business they handled. He walked to the little private room that only Stormgren was supposed to enter. At his instructions, the lock had been forced and the Chief Communications Officer was waiting there for him.
“It's an ordinary teleprinter—standard typewriter keyboard,” he was told.
“There's a facsimile machine as well if you want to send any pictures or tabular information—but you said you wouldn't be needing that.”
Van Ryberg nodded absently. “That's all. Thanks,” he said. “I don't expect to be here very long. Then get the place locked up again and give me all the keys.”
He waited until the Communications Officer had left, and then sat down at the machine. It was, he knew, very seldom used, since nearly all business between Karellen and Stormgren was dealt with at their weekly meetings. Since this was something of an emergency circuit, he expected a reply fairly quickly.
After a moment's hesitation, he began to tap out his message with unpracticed fingers. The machine
