diff options
| author | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-05 09:33:02 -0800 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-05 09:33:02 -0800 |
| commit | e6b208078ed8eb934cf1c767a20d95f7c66a5e02 (patch) | |
| tree | 1151d19f0a2eb35e7bad93d4a6a02c2be48bd5b8 | |
| parent | ae450705895a9e0981d5cafa447b0b5adb3a76f5 (diff) | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 4 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/51310-h.zip | bin | 318598 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/51310-h/51310-h.htm | 2400 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/51310-h/images/cover.jpg | bin | 86334 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/51310-h/images/illus1.jpg | bin | 64242 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/51310-h/images/illus2.jpg | bin | 70049 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/51310-h/images/illus3.jpg | bin | 57282 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/51310.txt | 2264 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/51310.zip | bin | 39464 -> 0 bytes |
11 files changed, 17 insertions, 4664 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..dfe2bd1 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #51310 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51310) diff --git a/old/51310-h.zip b/old/51310-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index be3cbef..0000000 --- a/old/51310-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/51310-h/51310-h.htm b/old/51310-h/51310-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index a37d517..0000000 --- a/old/51310-h/51310-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,2400 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=us-ascii" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of My Lady Greensleeves, by Frederik Pohl. - </title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - h1,h2 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; -} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 33.5%; - margin-right: 33.5%; - clear: both; -} - -hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} -hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - -.caption {font-weight: bold;} - -/* Images */ -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -div.titlepage { - text-align: center; - page-break-before: always; - page-break-after: always; -} - -div.titlepage p { - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0em; - font-weight: bold; - line-height: 1.5; - margin-top: 3em; -} - -.ph1, .ph2, .ph3, .ph4 { text-align: center; text-indent: 0em; font-weight: bold; } -.ph1 { font-size: xx-large; margin: .67em auto; } -.ph2 { font-size: x-large; margin: .75em auto; } -.ph3 { font-size: large; margin: .83em auto; } -.ph4 { font-size: medium; margin: 1.12em auto; } - - - </style> - </head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of My Lady Greensleeves, by Frederik Pohl - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: My Lady Greensleeves - -Author: Frederik Pohl - -Release Date: February 27, 2016 [EBook #51310] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY GREENSLEEVES *** - - - - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/cover.jpg" width="379" height="500" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="titlepage"> -<h1>My Lady Greensleeves</h1> - -<p>By FREDERIK POHL</p> - -<p>Illustrated by GAUGHAN</p> - -<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br /> -Galaxy Science Fiction February 1957.<br /> -Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br /> -the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> - -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph3"><i>This guard smelled trouble and it could be<br /> -counted on to come—for a nose for trouble<br /> -was one of the many talents bred here!</i></p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph4">I</p> - -<p>His name was Liam O'Leary and there was something stinking in his -nostrils. It was the smell of trouble. He hadn't found what the trouble -was yet, but he would. That was his business. He was a captain of -guards in Estates-General Correctional Institution—better known to -its inmates as the Jug—and if he hadn't been able to detect the scent -of trouble brewing a cell-block away, he would never have survived to -reach his captaincy.</p> - -<p>And her name, he saw, was Sue-Ann Bradley, Detainee No. WFA-656R.</p> - -<p>He frowned at the rap sheet, trying to figure out what got a girl like -her into a place like this. And, what was more important, why she -couldn't adjust herself to it, now that she was in.</p> - -<p>He demanded: "Why wouldn't you mop out your cell?"</p> - -<p>The girl lifted her head angrily and took a step forward. The block -guard, Sodaro, growled warningly: "Watch it, auntie!"</p> - -<p>O'Leary shook his head. "Let her talk, Sodaro." It said in the <i>Civil -Service Guide to Prison Administration</i>: "Detainees will be permitted -to speak in their own behalf in disciplinary proceedings." And O'Leary -was a man who lived by the book.</p> - -<p>She burst out: "I never got a chance! That old witch Mathias never told -me I was supposed to mop up. She banged on the door and said, 'Slush -up, sister!' And then, ten minutes later, she called the guards and -told them I refused to mop."</p> - -<p>The block guard guffawed. "Wipe talk—that's what she was telling you -to do. Cap'n, you know what's funny about this? This Bradley is—"</p> - -<p>"Shut up, Sodaro."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Captain O'leary put down his pencil and looked at the girl. She was -attractive and young—not beyond hope, surely. Maybe she had got off -to a wrong start, but the question was, would putting her in the -disciplinary block help straighten her out? He rubbed his ear and -looked past her at the line of prisoners on the rap detail, waiting for -him to judge their cases.</p> - -<p>He said patiently: "Bradley, the rules are you have to mop out your -cell. If you didn't understand what Mathias was talking about, you -should have asked her. Now I'm warning you, the next time—"</p> - -<p>"Hey, Cap'n, wait!" Sodaro was looking alarmed. "This isn't a first -offense. Look at the rap sheet. Yesterday she pulled the same thing in -the mess hall." He shook his head reprovingly at the prisoner. "The -block guard had to break up a fight between her and another wench, -and she claimed the same business—said she didn't understand when the -other one asked her to move along." He added virtuously: "The guard -warned her then that next time she'd get the Greensleeves for sure."</p> - -<p>Inmate Bradley seemed to be on the verge of tears. She said tautly: "I -don't care. I don't care!"</p> - -<p>O'Leary stopped her. "That's enough! Three days in Block O!"</p> - -<p>It was the only thing to do—for her own sake as much as for his. He -had managed, by strength of will, not to hear that she had omitted -to say "sir" every time she spoke to him, but he couldn't keep it up -forever and he certainly couldn't overlook hysteria. And hysteria was -clearly the next step for her.</p> - -<p>All the same, he stared after her as she left. He handed the rap sheet -to Sodaro and said absently: "Too bad a kid like her has to be here. -What's she in for?"</p> - -<p>"You didn't know, Cap'n?" Sodaro leered. "She's in for conspiracy to -violate the Categoried Class laws. Don't waste your time with her, -Cap'n. She's a figger-lover!"</p> - -<p>Captain O'Leary took a long drink of water from the fountain marked -"Civil Service." But it didn't wash the taste out of his mouth, the -smell from his nose.</p> - -<p>What got into a girl to get her mixed up with that kind of dirty -business? He checked out of the cell blocks and walked across the -yard, wondering about her. She'd had every advantage—decent Civil -Service parents, a good education, everything a girl could wish for. If -anything, she had had a better environment than O'Leary himself, and -look what she had made of it.</p> - -<p>The direction of evolution is toward specialization and Man is no -exception, but with the difference that his is the one species that -creates its own environment in which to specialize. From the moment -that clans formed, specialization began—the hunters using the weapons -made by the flint-chippers, the food cooked in clay pots made by the -ceramists, over fire made by the shaman who guarded the sacred flame.</p> - -<p>Civilization merely increased the extent of specialization. From -the born mechanic and the man with the gift of gab, society evolved -to the point of smaller contact and less communication between the -specializations, until now they could understand each other on only the -most basic physical necessities—and not even always then.</p> - -<p>But this was desirable, for the more specialists, the higher the degree -of civilization. The ultimate should be the complete segregation -of each specialization—social and genetic measures to make them -breed true, because the unspecialized man is an uncivilized man, -or at any rate he does not advance civilization. And letting the -specializations mix would produce genetic undesirables: clerk-laborer -or Professional-GI misfits, for example, being only half specialized, -would be good at no specialization.</p> - -<p>And the basis of this specialization society was: "The aptitude groups -are the true races of mankind." Putting it into law was only the legal -enforcement of a demonstrable fact.</p> - -<p>"Evening, Cap'n." A bleary old inmate orderly stood up straight and -touched his cap as O'Leary passed by.</p> - -<p>"Evening."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>O'Leary noted, with the part of his mind that always noted those -things, that the orderly had been leaning on his broom until he'd -noticed the captain coming by. Of course, there wasn't much to -sweep—the spray machines and sweeperdozers had been over the -cobblestones of the yard twice already that day. But it was an inmate's -job to keep busy. And it was a guard captain's job to notice when they -didn't.</p> - -<p>There wasn't anything wrong with that job, he told himself. It was a -perfectly good civil-service position—better than post-office clerk, -not as good as Congressman, but a job you could be proud to hold. He -<i>was</i> proud of it. It was <i>right</i> that he should be proud of it. He was -civil-service born and bred, and naturally he was proud and content to -do a good, clean civil-service job.</p> - -<p>If he had happened to be born a fig—a <i>clerk</i>, he corrected -himself—if he had happened to be born a clerk, why, he would have been -proud of that, too. There wasn't anything wrong with being a clerk—or -a mechanic or a soldier, or even a laborer, for that matter.</p> - -<p>Good laborers were the salt of the Earth! They weren't smart, maybe, -but they had a—well, a sort of natural, relaxed joy of living. O'Leary -was a broad-minded man and many times he had thought almost with a -touch of envy how <i>comfortable</i> it must be to be a wipe—a <i>laborer</i>. -No responsibilities. No worries. Just an easy, slow routine of work and -loaf, work and loaf.</p> - -<p>Of course, he wouldn't <i>really</i> want that kind of life, because he was -Civil Service and not the kind to try to cross over class barriers that -weren't <i>meant</i> to be—</p> - -<p>"Evening, Cap'n."</p> - -<p>He nodded to the mechanic inmate who was, theoretically, in charge of -maintaining the prison's car pool, just inside the gate.</p> - -<p>"Evening, Conan," he said.</p> - -<p>Conan, now—he was a big buck greaser and he would be there for the -next hour, languidly poking a piece of fluff out of the air filter on -the prison jeep. Lazy, sure. Undependable, certainly. But he kept the -cars going—and, O'Leary thought approvingly, when his sentence was up -in another year or so, he would go back to his life with his status -restored, a mechanic on the outside as he had been inside, and he -certainly would never risk coming back to the Jug by trying to pass as -Civil Service or anything else. He knew his place.</p> - -<p>So why didn't this girl, this Sue-Ann Bradley, know hers?</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph4">II</p> - -<p>Every prison has its Greensleeves—sometimes they are called by -different names. Old Marquette called it "the canary;" Louisiana State -called it "the red hats;" elsewhere it was called "the hole," "the -snake pit," "the Klondike." When you're in it, you don't much care what -it is called; it is a place for punishment.</p> - -<p>And punishment is what you get.</p> - -<p>Block O in Estates-General Correctional Institution was the -disciplinary block, and because of the green straitjackets its -inhabitants wore, it was called the Greensleeves. It was a community of -its own, an enclave within the larger city-state that was the Jug. And -like any other community, it had its leading citizens ... two of them. -Their names were Sauer and Flock.</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann Bradley heard them before she reached the Greensleeves. She -was in a detachment of three unfortunates like herself, convoyed by an -irritable guard, climbing the steel steps toward Block O from the floor -below, when she heard the yelling.</p> - -<p>"Owoo-o-o," screamed Sauer from one end of the cell block and -"Yow-w-w!" shrieked Flock at the other.</p> - -<p>The inside deck guard of Block O looked nervously at the outside deck -guard. The outside guard looked impassively back—after all, he was on -the outside.</p> - -<p>The inside guard muttered: "Wipe rats! They're getting on my nerves."</p> - -<p>The outside guard shrugged.</p> - -<p>"Detail, <i>halt</i>!" The two guards turned to see what was coming in as -the three new candidates for the Greensleeves slumped to a stop at the -head of the stairs. "Here they are," Sodaro told them. "Take good care -of 'em, will you? Especially the lady—she's going to like it here, -because there's plenty of wipes and greasers and figgers to keep her -company." He laughed coarsely and abandoned his charges to the Block O -guards.</p> - -<p>The outside guard said sourly: "A woman, for God's sake. Now O'Leary -knows I hate it when there's a woman in here. It gets the others all -riled up."</p> - -<p>"Let them in," the inside guard told him. "The others are riled up -already."</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann Bradley looked carefully at the floor and paid them no -attention. The outside guard pulled the switch that turned on the -tanglefoot electronic fields that swamped the floor of the block -corridor and of each individual cell. While the fields were on, you -could ignore the prisoners—they simply could not move fast enough, -against the electronic drag of the field, to do any harm. But it was a -rule that, even in Block O, you didn't leave the tangler fields on all -the time—only when the cell doors had to be opened or a prisoner's -restraining garment removed.</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann walked bravely forward through the opened gate—and fell flat -on her face. It was her first experience of a tanglefoot field. It was -like walking through molasses.</p> - -<p>The guard guffawed and lifted her up by one shoulder. "Take it easy, -auntie. Come on, get in your cell." He steered her in the right -direction and pointed to a greensleeved straitjacket on the cell cot. -"Put that on. Being as you're a lady, we won't tie it up, but the rules -say you got to wear it and the rules—Hey. She's crying!" He shook his -head, marveling. It was the first time he had ever seen a prisoner cry -in the Greensleeves.</p> - -<p>However, he was wrong. Sue-Ann's shoulders were shaking, but not from -tears. Sue-Ann Bradley had got a good look at Sauer and at Flock as she -passed them by and she was fighting off an almost uncontrollable urge -to retch.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Sauer and Flock were what are called prison wolves. They were -laborers—"wipes," for short—or, at any rate, they had been once. -They had spent so much time in prisons that it was sometimes hard even -for them to remember what they really were, outside. Sauer was a big, -grinning redhead with eyes like a water moccasin. Flock was a lithe -five-footer with the build of a water moccasin—and the sad, stupid -eyes of a calf.</p> - -<p>Sauer stopped yelling for a moment. "Hey, Flock!"</p> - -<p>"What do you want, Sauer?" called Flock from his own cell.</p> - -<p>"We got a lady with us! Maybe we ought to cut out this yelling so -as not to disturb the lady!" He screeched with howling, maniacal -laughter. "Anyway, if we don't cut this out, they'll get us in trouble, -Flock!"</p> - -<p>"Oh, you think so?" shrieked Flock. "Jeez, I wish you hadn't said that, -Sauer. You got me scared! I'm so scared, I'm gonna have to yell!"</p> - -<p>The howling started all over again.</p> - -<p>The inside guard finished putting the new prisoners away and turned off -the tangler field once more. He licked his lips. "Say, you want to take -a turn in here for a while?"</p> - -<p>"Uh-uh." The outside guard shook his head.</p> - -<p>"You're yellow," the inside guard said moodily. "Ah, I don't know why I -don't quit this lousy job. Hey, you! Pipe down or I'll come in and beat -your head off!"</p> - -<p>"Ee-ee-ee!" screamed Sauer in a shrill falsetto. "I'm scared!" Then he -grinned at the guard, all but his water-moccasin eyes. "Don't you know -you can't hurt a wipe by hitting him on the head, Boss?"</p> - -<p>"Shut <i>up</i>!" yelled the inside guard.</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann Bradley's weeping now was genuine. She simply could not help -it. The crazy yowling of the hard-timers, Sauer and Flock, was getting -under her skin. They weren't even—even <i>human</i>, she told herself -miserably, trying to weep silently so as not to give the guards the -satisfaction of hearing her—they were animals!</p> - -<p>Resentment and anger, she could understand. She told herself doggedly -that resentment and anger were natural and right. They were perfectly -normal expressions of the freedom-loving citizen's rebellion against -the vile and stifling system of Categoried Classes. It was <i>good</i> that -Sauer and Flock still had enough spirit to struggle against the vicious -system—</p> - -<p>But did they have to scream so?</p> - -<p>The senseless yelling was driving her crazy. She abandoned herself to -weeping and she didn't even care who heard her any more. Senseless!</p> - -<p>It never occurred to Sue-Ann Bradley that it might not be senseless, -because noise hides noise. But then she hadn't been a prisoner very -long.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph4">III</p> - -<p>"I smell trouble," said O'Leary to the warden.</p> - -<p>"Trouble? Trouble?" Warden Schluckebier clutched his throat and his -little round eyes looked terrified—as perhaps they should have. Warden -Godfrey Schluckebier was the almighty Caesar of ten thousand inmates in -the Jug, but privately he was a fussy old man trying to hold onto the -last decent job he would have in his life.</p> - -<p>"Trouble? <i>What</i> trouble?"</p> - -<p>O'Leary shrugged. "Different things. You know Lafon, from Block A? This -afternoon, he was playing ball with the laundry orderlies in the yard."</p> - -<p>The warden, faintly relieved, faintly annoyed, scolded: "O'Leary, what -did you want to worry me for? There's nothing wrong with playing ball -in the yard. That's what recreation periods are for."</p> - -<p>"You don't see what I mean, Warden. Lafon was a professional on the -outside—an architect. Those laundry cons were laborers. Pros and wipes -don't mix; it isn't natural. And there are other things."</p> - -<p>O'Leary hesitated, frowning. How could you explain to the warden that -it didn't <i>smell</i> right?</p> - -<p>"For instance—Well, there's Aunt Mathias in the women's block. She's -a pretty good old girl—that's why she's the block orderly. She's a -lifer, she's got no place to go, she gets along with the other women. -But today she put a woman named Bradley on report. Why? Because she -told Bradley to mop up in wipe talk and Bradley didn't understand. Now -Mathias wouldn't—"</p> - -<p>The warden raised his hand. "Please, O'Leary, don't bother me about -that kind of stuff." He sighed heavily and rubbed his eyes. He poured -himself a cup of steaming black coffee from a brewpot, reached in a -desk drawer for something, hesitated, glanced at O'Leary, then dropped -a pale blue tablet into the cup. He drank it down eagerly, ignoring the -scalding heat.</p> - -<p>He leaned back, looking suddenly happier and much more assured.</p> - -<p>"O'Leary, you're a guard captain, right? And I'm your warden. You have -your job, keeping the inmates in line, and I have mine. Now your job is -just as important as my job," he said piously. "<i>Everybody's</i> job is -just as important as everybody else's, right? But we have to stick to -our own jobs. We don't want to try to <i>pass</i>."</p> - -<p>O'Leary snapped erect, abruptly angry. Pass! What the devil way was -that for the warden to talk to him?</p> - -<p>"Excuse the expression, O'Leary," the warden said anxiously. "I mean, -after all, 'Specialization is the goal of civilization,' right?" He was -a great man for platitudes, was Warden Schluckebier. "<i>You</i> know you -don't want to worry about <i>my</i> end of running the prison. And <i>I</i> don't -want to worry about <i>yours</i>. You see?" And he folded his hands and -smiled like a civil-service Buddha.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>O'Leary choked back his temper. "Warden, I'm telling you that there's -trouble coming up. I smell the signs."</p> - -<p>"Handle it, then!" snapped the warden, irritated at last.</p> - -<p>"But suppose it's too big to handle. Suppose—"</p> - -<p>"It isn't," the warden said positively. "Don't borrow trouble with -all your supposing, O'Leary." He sipped the remains of his coffee, -made a wry face, poured a fresh cup and, with an elaborate show of not -noticing what he was doing, dropped three of the pale blue tablets into -it this time.</p> - -<p>He sat beaming into space, waiting for the jolt to take effect.</p> - -<p>"Well, then," he said at last. "You just remember what I've told you -tonight, O'Leary, and we'll get along fine. 'Specialization is the—' -Oh, curse the thing."</p> - -<p>His phone was ringing. The warden picked it up irritably.</p> - -<p>That was the trouble with those pale blue tablets, thought O'Leary; -they gave you a lift, but they put you on edge.</p> - -<p>"Hello," barked the warden, not even glancing at the viewscreen. "What -the devil do you want? Don't you know I'm—What? You did <i>what</i>? -You're going to WHAT?"</p> - -<p>He looked at the viewscreen at last with a look of pure horror. -Whatever he saw on it, it did not reassure him. His eyes opened like -clamshells in a steamer.</p> - -<p>"O'Leary," he said faintly, "my mistake."</p> - -<p>And he hung up—more or less by accident; the handset dropped from his -fingers.</p> - -<p>The person on the other end of the phone was calling from Cell Block O.</p> - -<p>Five minutes before, he hadn't been anywhere near the phone and it -didn't look as if his chances of ever getting near it were very good. -Because five minutes before, he was in his cell, with the rest of the -hard-timers of the Greensleeves.</p> - -<p>His name was Flock.</p> - -<p>He was still yelling. Sue-Ann Bradley, in the cell across from him, -thought that maybe, after all, the man was really in pain. Maybe the -crazy screams were screams of agony, because certainly his face was the -face of an agonized man.</p> - -<p>The outside guard bellowed: "Okay, okay. Take ten!"</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann froze, waiting to see what would happen. What actually did -happen was that the guard reached up and closed the switch that -actuated the tangler fields on the floors of the cells. The prison -rules were humanitarian, even for the dregs that inhabited the -Greensleeves. Ten minutes out of every two hours, even the worst case -had to be allowed to take his hands out of the restraining garment.</p> - -<p>"Rest period" it was called—in the rule book. The inmates had a less -lovely term for it.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>At the guard's yell, the inmates jumped to their feet.</p> - -<p>Bradley was a little slow getting off the edge of the steel-slat -bed—nobody had warned her that the eddy currents in the tangler fields -had a way of making metal smoke-hot. She gasped but didn't cry out. -Score one more painful lesson in her new language course. She rubbed -the backs of her thighs gingerly—and slowly, slowly, for the eddy -currents did not permit you to move fast. It was like pushing against -rubber; the faster you tried to move, the greater the resistance.</p> - -<p>The guard peered genially into her cell. "You're okay, auntie." She -proudly ignored him as he slogged deliberately away on his rounds. -He didn't have to untie her and practically stand over her while -she attended to various personal matters, as he did with the male -prisoners. It was not much to be grateful for, but Sue-Ann Bradley was -grateful. At least she didn't have to live <i>quite</i> like a fig—like an -underprivileged clerk, she told herself, conscience-stricken.</p> - -<p>Across the hall, the guard was saying irritably: "What the hell's -the matter with you?" He opened the door of the cell with an -asbestos-handled key held in a canvas glove.</p> - -<p>Flock was in that cell and he was doubled over.</p> - -<p>The guard looked at him doubtfully. It could be a trick, maybe. -Couldn't it? But he could see Flock's face and the agony in it was real -enough. And Flock was gasping, through real tears: "Cramps. I—I—"</p> - -<p>"Ah, you wipes always got a pain in the gut." The guard lumbered around -Flock to the draw-strings at the back of the jacket. Funny smell in -here, he told himself—not for the first time. And imagine, some people -didn't believe that wipes had a smell of their own! But this time, he -realized cloudily, it was a rather unusual smell. Something burning. -Almost like meat scorching.</p> - -<p>It wasn't pleasant. He finished untying Flock and turned away; let the -stinking wipe take care of his own troubles. He only had ten minutes to -get all the way around Block O and the inmates complained like crazy if -he didn't make sure they all got the most possible free time. He was -pretty good at snowshoeing through the tangler field. He was a little -vain about it, even; at times he had been known to boast of his ability -to make the rounds in two minutes, every time.</p> - -<p>Every time but this.</p> - -<p>For Flock moaned behind him, oddly close.</p> - -<p>The guard turned, but not quickly enough. There was -Flock—astonishingly, he was half out of his jacket; his arms hadn't -been in the sleeves at all! And in one of the hands, incredibly, there -was something that glinted and smoked.</p> - -<p>"All right," croaked Flock, tears trickling out of eyes nearly shut -with pain.</p> - -<p>But it wasn't the tears that held the guard; it was the shining, -smoking thing, now poised at his throat. A shiv! It looked as though -it had been made out of a bed-spring, ripped loose from its frame God -knows how, hidden inside the greensleeved jacket God knows how—filed, -filed to sharpness over endless hours.</p> - -<p>No wonder Flock moaned—the eddy currents in the shiv were slowly -cooking his hand; and the blister against his abdomen, where the shiv -had been hidden during other rest periods, felt like raw acid.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus1.jpg" width="600" height="363" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>"All right," whispered Flock, "just walk out the door and you won't get -hurt. Unless the other screw makes trouble, you won't get hurt, so tell -him not to, you hear?"</p> - -<p>He was nearly fainting with the pain.</p> - -<p>But he hadn't let go.</p> - -<p>He didn't let go. And he didn't stop.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph4">IV</p> - -<p>It was Flock on the phone to the warden—Flock with his eyes still -streaming tears, Flock with Sauer standing right behind him, menacing -the two bound deck guards.</p> - -<p>Sauer shoved Flock out of the way. "Hey, Warden!" he said, and the -voice was a cheerful bray, though the serpent eyes were cold and -hating. "Warden, you got to get a medic in here. My boy Flock, he hurt -himself real bad and he needs a doctor." He gestured playfully at the -guards with the shiv. "I tell you, Warden. I got this knife and I got -your guards here. Enough said? So get a medic in here quick, you hear?"</p> - -<p>And he snapped the connection.</p> - -<p>O'Leary said: "Warden, I told you I smelled trouble!"</p> - -<p>The warden lifted his head, glared, started feebly to speak, hesitated, -and picked up the long-distance phone. He said sadly to the prison -operator: "Get me the governor—fast."</p> - -<p><i>Riot!</i></p> - -<p>The word spread out from the prison on seven-league boots.</p> - -<p>It snatched the city governor out of a friendly game of Seniority -with his manager and their wives—and just when he was holding the -Porkbarrel Joker concealed in the hole.</p> - -<p>It broke up the Base Championship Scramble Finals at Hap Arnold Field -to the south, as half the contestants had to scramble in earnest to a -Red Alert that was real.</p> - -<p>It reached to police precinct houses and TV newsrooms and highway -checkpoints, and from there it filtered into the homes and lives of the -nineteen million persons that lived within a few dozen miles of the Jug.</p> - -<p>Riot. And yet fewer than half a dozen men were involved.</p> - -<p>A handful of men, and the enormous bulk of the city-state quivered in -every limb and class. In its ten million homes, in its hundreds of -thousands of public places, the city-state's people shook under the -impact of the news from the prison.</p> - -<p>For the news touched them where their fears lay. Riot! And not merely -a street brawl among roistering wipes, or a bar-room fight of greasers -relaxing from a hard day at the plant. The riot was down among the -corrupt sludge that underlay the state itself. Wipes brawled with wipes -and no one cared; but in the Jug, all classes were cast together.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Forty miles to the south, Hap Arnold Field was a blaze of light. The -airmen tumbled out of their quarters and dayrooms at the screech of -the alert siren, and behind them their wives and children stretched -and yawned and worried. An alert! The older kids fussed and complained -and their mothers shut them up. No, there wasn't any alert scheduled -for tonight; no, they didn't know where Daddy was going; no, the kids -couldn't get up yet—it was the middle of the night.</p> - -<p>And as soon as they had the kids back in bed, most of the mothers -struggled into their own airwac uniforms and headed for the briefing -area to hear.</p> - -<p>They caught the words from a distance—not quite correctly. "Riot!" -gasped an aircraftswoman first-class, mother of three. "The wipes! I -<i>told</i> Charlie they'd get out of hand and—Alys, we aren't safe. You -know how they are about GI women! I'm going right home and get a club -and stand right by the door and—"</p> - -<p>"Club!" snapped Alys, radarscope-sergeant, with two children -querulously awake in her nursery at home. "What in God's name is the -use of a club? You can't hurt a wipe by hitting him on the head. You'd -better come along to Supply with me and draw a gun—you'll need it -before this night is over."</p> - -<p>But the airmen themselves heard the briefing loud and clear over the -scramble-call speakers, and they knew it was not merely a matter of -trouble in the wipe quarters. The Jug! The governor himself had called -them out; they were to fly interdicting missions at such-and-such -levels on such-and-such flight circuits around the prison.</p> - -<p>The rockets took off on fountains of fire; and the jets took off with a -whistling roar; and last of all, the helicopters took off ... and they -were the ones who might actually accomplish something. They took up -their picket posts on the prison perimeter, a pilot and two bombardiers -in each 'copter, stone-faced, staring grimly alert at the prison below.</p> - -<p>They were ready for the breakout.</p> - -<p>But there wasn't any breakout.</p> - -<p>The rockets went home for fuel. The jets went home for fuel. The -helicopters hung on—still ready, still waiting.</p> - -<p>The rockets came back and roared harmlessly about, and went away again. -They stayed away. The helicopter men never faltered and never relaxed. -The prison below them was washed with light—from the guard posts on -the walls, from the cell blocks themselves, from the mobile lights of -the guard squadrons surrounding the walls.</p> - -<p>North of the prison, on the long, flat, damp developments of reclaimed -land, the matchbox row houses of the clerical neighborhoods showed -lights in every window as the figgers stood ready to repel invasion -from their undesired neighbors to the east, the wipes. In the crowded -tenements of the laborers' quarters, the wipes shouted from window to -window; and there were crowds in the bright streets.</p> - -<p>"The whole bloody thing's going to blow up!" a helicopter bombardier -yelled bitterly to his pilot, above the flutter and roar of the -whirling blades. "Look at the mobs in Greaserville! The first breakout -from the Jug's going to start a fight like you never saw and we'll be -right in the middle of it!"</p> - -<p>He was partly right. He would be right in the middle of it—for every -man, woman and child in the city-state would be right in the middle of -it. There was no place anywhere that would be spared. <i>No mixing.</i> That -was the prescription that kept the city-state alive. There's no harm in -a family fight—and aren't all mechanics a family, aren't all laborers -a clan, aren't all clerks and office workers related by closer ties -than blood or skin?</p> - -<p>But the declassed cons of the Jug were the dregs of every class; and -once they spread, the neat compartmentation of society was pierced. The -breakout would mean riot on a bigger scale than any prison had ever -known.</p> - -<p>But he was also partly wrong. Because the breakout wasn't seeming to -come.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The Jug itself was coming to a boil.</p> - -<p>Honor Block A, relaxed and easy at the end of another day, found itself -shaken alert by strange goings-on. First there was the whir and roar of -the Air Force overhead. <i>Trouble.</i> Then there was the sudden arrival -of extra guards, doubling the normal complement—day-shift guards, -summoned away from their comfortable civil-service homes at some urgent -call. <i>Trouble for sure.</i></p> - -<p>Honor Block A wasn't used to trouble. A Block was as far from the -Greensleeves of O Block as you could get and still be in the Jug. Honor -Block A belonged to the prison's halfbreeds—the honor prisoners, the -trusties who did guards' work because there weren't enough guards to go -around. They weren't Apaches or Piutes; they were camp-following Injuns -who had sold out for the white man's firewater. The price of their -service was privilege—many privileges.</p> - -<p>Item: TV sets in every cell. Item: Hobby tools, to make gadgets for -the visitor trade—the only way an inmate could earn an honest dollar. -Item: In consequence, an exact knowledge of everything the outside -world knew and put on its TV screens (including the grim, alarming -reports of "trouble at Estates-General"), and the capacity to convert -their "hobby tools" to—other uses.</p> - -<p>An honor prisoner named Wilmer Lafon was watching the TV screen with an -expression of rage and despair.</p> - -<p>Lafon was a credit to the Jug—he was a showpiece for visitors. -Prison rules provided for prisoner training—it was a matter of -"rehabilitation." Prisoner rehabilitation is a joke and a centuries-old -one at that; but it had its serious uses, and one of them was to keep -the prisoners busy. It didn't much matter at what.</p> - -<p>Lafon, for instance, was being "rehabilitated" by studying -architecture. The guards made a point of bringing inspection -delegations to his cell to show him off. There were his walls, covered -with pin-ups—but not of women. The pictures were sketches Lafon had -drawn himself; they were of buildings, highways, dams and bridges; they -were splendidly conceived and immaculately executed.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus2.jpg" width="403" height="500" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>"Looka that!" the guards would rumble to their guests. "There isn't an -architect on the outside as good as this boy! What do you say, Wilmer? -Tell the gentlemen—how long you been taking these correspondence -courses in architecture? Six years! Ever since he came to the Jug."</p> - -<p>And Lafon would grin and bob his head, and the delegation would go, -with the guards saying something like: "Believe me, that Wilmer could -design a whole skyscraper—and it wouldn't fall down, either!"</p> - -<p>And they were perfectly, provably right. Not only could Inmate Lafon -design a skyscraper, but he had already done so. More than a dozen of -them. And none had fallen down.</p> - -<p>Of course, that was more than six years back, before he was convicted -and sent to the Jug. He would never design another. Or if he did, it -would never be built. For the plain fact of the matter was that the -Jug's rehabilitation courses were like rehabilitation in every prison -since crime and punishment began. They kept the inmates busy. They -made a show of purpose for an institution that had never had a purpose -beyond punishment.</p> - -<p>And that was all.</p> - -<p>For punishment for a crime is not satisfied by a jail sentence. How -does it hurt a man to feed and clothe and house him, with the bills -paid by the state? Lafon's punishment was that he, as an architect, was -<i>through</i>.</p> - -<p>Savage tribes used to lop off a finger or an ear to punish a criminal. -Civilized societies confine their amputations to bits and pieces of the -personality. Chop-chop, and a man's reputation comes off; chop-chop -again, and his professional standing is gone; chop-chop, and he has -lost the respect and trust of his fellows.</p> - -<p>The jail itself isn't the punishment. The jail is only the shaman's -hatchet that performs the amputation. If rehabilitation in a jail -worked—if it were <i>meant</i> to work—it would be the end of jails.</p> - -<p>Rehabilitation? Rehabilitation for what?</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Wilmer Lafon switched off the television set and silently pounded his -fist into the wall.</p> - -<p>Never again to return to the Professional class! For, naturally, the -conviction had cost him his membership in the Architectural Society and -<i>that</i> had cost him his Professional standing.</p> - -<p>But still—just to be out of the Jug, that would be something! And his -whole hope of ever getting out lay not here in Honor Block A, but in -the turmoil of the Greensleeves, a hundred meters and more than fifty -armed guards away.</p> - -<p>He was a furious man. He looked into the cell next door, where a -con named Garcia was trying to concentrate on a game of Solitaire -Splitfee. Once Garcia had been a Professional, too; he was the closest -thing to a friend Wilmer Lafon had. Maybe he could now help to get -Lafon where he wanted—<i>needed!</i>—to be.</p> - -<p>Lafon swore silently and shook his head. Garcia was a spineless -milksop, as bad as any clerk—Lafon was nearly sure there was a touch -of the inkwell somewhere in his family. Shrewd and slippery enough, -like all figgers. But you couldn't rely on him in a pinch.</p> - -<p>Lafon would have to do it all himself.</p> - -<p>He thought for a second, ignoring the rustle and mumble of the other -honor prisoners of Block A. There was no help for it; he would have to -dirty his hands with physical activity.</p> - -<p>Outside on the deck, the guards were grumbling to each other. Lafon -wiped the scowl off his black face, put on a smile, rehearsed what he -was going to say, and politely rattled the door of his cell.</p> - -<p>"Shut up down there!" one of the screws bawled. Lafon recognized the -voice; it was the guard named Sodaro. That was all to the good. He knew -Sodaro and he had some plans for him.</p> - -<p>He rattled the cell door again and called: "Chief, can you come here a -minute, please?"</p> - -<p>Sodaro yelled: "Didn't you hear me? Shut up!" But he came wandering by -and looked into Lafon's tidy little cell.</p> - -<p>"What the devil do you want?" he growled.</p> - -<p>Lafon said ingratiatingly: "What's going on, Chief?"</p> - -<p>"Shut your mouth," Sodaro said absently and yawned. He hefted his -shoulder holster comfortably. That O'Leary, what a production he had -made of getting the guards back! And here he was, stuck in Block A on -the night he had set aside for getting better acquainted with that -little blue-eyed statistician from the Census office.</p> - -<p>"Aw, Chief. The television says there's something going on in the -Greensleeves. What's the score?"</p> - -<p>Sodaro had no reason not to answer him, but it was his unvarying -practice to make a con wait before doing anything the con wanted. He -gave Lafon a ten-second stare before he relented.</p> - -<p>"The score? Sauer and Flock took over Block O. What about it?"</p> - -<p>Much, much about it! But Lafon looked away to hide the eagerness in his -eyes. Perhaps, after all, it was not too late....</p> - -<p>He suggested humbly: "You look a little sleepy. Do you want some -coffee?"</p> - -<p>"Coffee?" Sodaro scratched. "You got a cup for me?"</p> - -<p>"Certainly! I've got one put aside—swiped it from the messhall—not -the one I use myself."</p> - -<p>"Um." Sodaro leaned on the cell door. "You know I could toss you in the -Greensleeves for stealing from the messhall."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>"Aw, chief!" Lafon grinned.</p> - -<p>"You been looking for trouble. O'Leary says you were messing around -with the bucks from the laundry detail," Sodaro said halfheartedly. -But he didn't really like picking on Lafon, who was, after all, an -agreeable inmate to have on occasion. "All right. Where's the coffee?"</p> - -<p>They didn't bother with tanglefoot fields in Honor Block A. Sodaro just -unlocked the door and walked in, hardly bothering to look at Lafon. He -took three steps toward the neat little desk at the back of the cell, -where Lafon had rigged up a drawing board and a table, where Lafon kept -his little store of luxury goods.</p> - -<p>Three steps.</p> - -<p>And then, suddenly aware that Lafon was very close to him, he turned, -astonished—a little too late. He saw that Lafon had snatched up a -metal chair; he saw Lafon swinging it, his black face maniacal; he saw -the chair coming down.</p> - -<p>He reached for his shoulder holster, but it was very much too late for -that.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph4">V</p> - -<p>Captain O'Leary dragged the scared little wretch into the warden's -office. He shook the con angrily. "Listen to this, Warden! The boys -just brought this one in from the Shops Building. Do you know what he's -been up to?"</p> - -<p>The warden wheezed sadly and looked away. He had stopped even answering -O'Leary by now. He had stopped talking to Sauer on the interphone when -the big convict called, every few minutes, to rave and threaten and -demand a doctor. He had almost stopped doing everything except worry -and weep. But—still and all, he was the warden. He was the one who -gave the orders.</p> - -<p>O'Leary barked: "Warden, this little greaser has bollixed up the whole -tangler circuit for the prison. If the cons get out into the yard now, -you won't be able to tangle them. You know what that means? They'll -have the freedom of the yard, and who knows what comes next?"</p> - -<p>The warden frowned sympathetically. "Tsk, tsk."</p> - -<p>O'Leary shook the con again. "Come on, Hiroko! Tell the warden what you -told the guards."</p> - -<p>The con shrank away from him. Sweat was glistening on his furrowed -yellow forehead. "I—I had to do it, Cap'n! I shorted the wormcan in -the tangler subgrid, but I had to! I got a signal—'Bollix the grid -tonight or some day you'll be in the yard and we'll static you!' What -could I do, Cap'n? I didn't want to—"</p> - -<p>O'Leary pressed: "Who did the signal come from?"</p> - -<p>The con only shook his head, perspiring still more.</p> - -<p>The warden asked faintly: "What's he saying?"</p> - -<p>O'Leary rolled his eyes to heaven. And this was the warden—couldn't -even understand shoptalk from the mouths of his own inmates!</p> - -<p>He translated: "He got orders from the prison underground to -short-circuit the electronic units in the tangler circuit. They -threatened to kill him if he didn't."</p> - -<p>The warden drummed with his fingers on the desk.</p> - -<p>"The tangler field, eh? My, yes. That is important. You'd better get it -fixed, O'Leary. Right away."</p> - -<p>"Fixed? Warden, who's going to fix it? You know as well as I do that -every mechanic in the prison is a con. Even if one of the guards would -do a thing like that—and I'd bust him myself if he did!—he wouldn't -know where to start. That's mechanic work."</p> - -<p>The warden swallowed. He had to admit that O'Leary was right. Naturally -nobody but a mechanic—and a specialist electrician from a particular -subgroup of the greaser class at that—could fix something like the -tangler field generators.</p> - -<p>He said absently: "Well, that's true enough. After all, 'Specialization -is the goal of civilization,' you know."</p> - -<p>O'Leary took a deep breath. He needed it.</p> - -<p>He beckoned to the guard at the door. "Take this greaser out of here!"</p> - -<p>The con shambled out, his head hanging.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>O'Leary turned to the warden and spread his hands.</p> - -<p>"Warden," he said, "don't you see how this thing is building up? Let's -not just wait for the place to explode in our faces! Let me take a -squad into Block O before it's too late."</p> - -<p>The warden pursed his lips thoughtfully and cocked his head, as though -he were trying to find some trace of merit in an unreasonable request.</p> - -<p>He said at last: "No."</p> - -<p>O'Leary made a passionate sound that was trying to be bad language, but -he was too raging mad to articulate it. He walked stiffly away from the -limp, silent warden and stared out the window.</p> - -<p>At least, he told himself, <i>he</i> hadn't gone to pieces. It was his -doing, not the warden's, that all the off-duty guards had been dragged -double-time back to the prison, his doing that they were now ringed -around the outer walls or scattered on extra-man patrols throughout the -prison.</p> - -<p>It was something, but O'Leary couldn't believe that it was enough. -He'd been in touch with half a dozen of the details inside the prison -on the intercom and each of them had reported the same thing. In all -of E-G, not a single prisoner was asleep. They were talking back and -forth between the cells and the guards couldn't shut them up. They -were listening to concealed radios and the guards didn't dare make a -shakedown to find them. They were working themselves up to something. -To what?</p> - -<p>O'Leary didn't want ever to find out what. He wanted to go in there -with a couple of the best guards he could get his hands on—shoot his -way into the Greensleeves if he had to—and clean out the infection.</p> - -<p>But the warden said no.</p> - -<p>O'Leary stared balefully at the hovering helicopters.</p> - -<p>The warden was the warden. He was placed in that position through -the meticulously careful operations of the Civil Service machinery, -maintained in that position year after year through the penetrating -annual inquiries of the Reclassification Board. It was <i>subversive</i> to -think that the Board could have made a mistake!</p> - -<p>But O'Leary was absolutely sure that the warden was a scared, -ineffectual jerk.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The interphone was ringing again. The warden picked up the handpiece -and held it bonelessly at arm's length, his eyes fixed glassily on the -wall. It was Sauer from the Greensleeves again. O'Leary could hear his -maddened bray.</p> - -<p>"I warned you, Warden!" O'Leary could see the big con's contorted face -in miniature, in the view screen of the interphone. The grin was broad -and jolly, the snake's eyes poisonously cold. "I'm going to give you -five minutes, Warden, you hear? Five minutes! And if there isn't a -medic in here in five minutes to take care of my boy Flock—your guards -have had it! I'm going to slice off an ear and throw it out the window, -you hear me? And five minutes later, another ear. And five minutes -later—"</p> - -<p>The warden groaned weakly. "I've called for the prison medic, Sauer. -Honestly I have! I'm sure he's coming as rapidly as he—"</p> - -<p>"Five minutes!" And the ferociously grinning face disappeared.</p> - -<p>O'Leary leaned forward. "Warden, let me take a squad in there!"</p> - -<p>The warden gazed at him for a blank moment "Squad? No, O'Leary. What's -the use of a squad? It's a medic I have to get in there. I have a -responsibility to those guards and if I don't get a medic—"</p> - -<p>A cold, calm voice from the door: "I am here, Warden."</p> - -<p>O'Leary and the warden both jumped up.</p> - -<p>The medic nodded slightly. "You may sit down."</p> - -<p>"Oh, Doctor! Thank heaven you're here!" The warden was falling all over -himself, getting a chair for his guest, flustering about.</p> - -<p>O'Leary said sharply: "Wait a minute, Warden. You can't let the doctor -go in alone!"</p> - -<p>"He isn't alone!" The doctor's intern came from behind him, scowling -belligerently at O'Leary. Youngish, his beard pale and silky, he was a -long way from his first practice. "I'm here to assist him!"</p> - -<p>O'Leary put a strain on his patience. "They'll eat you up in there, -Doc! Those are the worst cons in the prison. They've got two hostages -already. What's the use of giving them two more?"</p> - -<p>The medic fixed him with his eyes. He was a tall man and he wore his -beard proudly. "Guard, do you think you can prevent me from healing a -sufferer?" He folded his hands over his abdomen and turned to leave.</p> - -<p>The intern stepped aside and bowed his head.</p> - -<p>O'Leary surrendered. "All right, you can go. But I'm coming with -you—with a squad!"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Inmate Sue-Ann Bradley cowered in her cell. The Greensleeves -was jumping. She had never—no, <i>never</i>, she told herself -wretchedly—thought that it would be anything like this. She listened -unbelievingly to the noise the released prisoners were making, smashing -the chairs and commodes in their cells, screaming threats at the bound -guards.</p> - -<p>She faced the thought with fear, and with the sorrow of a murdered -belief that was worse than fear. It was bad that she was in danger -of dying right here and now, but what was even worse was that the -principles that had brought her to the Jug were dying, too.</p> - -<p>Wipes were <i>not</i> the same as Civil-Service people!</p> - -<p>A bull's roar from the corridor and a shocking crash of glass—that was -Flock, and apparently he had smashed the TV interphone.</p> - -<p>"What in the world are they <i>doing</i>?" Inmate Bradley sobbed to herself. -It was beyond comprehension. They were yelling words that made no sense -to her, threatening punishments on the guards that she could barely -imagine. Sauer and Flock were laborers; some of the other rioting cons -were clerks, mechanics—even Civil-Service or Professionals, for all -she could tell. But she could hardly understand any of them. Why was -the quiet little Chinese clerk in Cell Six setting fire to his bed?</p> - -<p>There did seem to be a pattern, of sorts. The laborers were rocketing -about, breaking things at random. The mechanics were pleasurably -sabotaging the electronic and plumbing installations. The white-collar -categories were finding their dubious joys in less direct ways—liking -setting fire to a bed. But what a mad pattern!</p> - -<p>The more Sue-Ann saw of them, the less she understood.</p> - -<p>It wasn't just that they <i>talked</i> differently. She had spent endless -hours studying the various patois of shoptalk and it had defeated her; -but it wasn't just that.</p> - -<p>It was bad enough when she couldn't understand the words—as when that -trusty Mathias had ordered her in wipe shoptalk to mop out her cell. -But what was even worse was not understanding the thought behind the -words.</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann Bradley had consecrated her young life to the belief that -all men were created free and equal—and alike. Or alike in all the -things that mattered, anyhow. Alike in hopes, alike in motives, alike -in virtues. She had turned her back on a decent Civil-Service family -and a promising Civil-Service career to join the banned and despised -Association for the Advancement of the Categoried Classes—</p> - -<p>Screams from the corridor outside.</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann leaped to the door of her cell to see Sauer clutching at one -of the guards. The guard's hands were tied, but his feet were free; he -broke loose from the clumsy clown with the serpent's eyes, almost fell, -ran toward Sue-Ann.</p> - -<p>There was nowhere else to run. The guard, moaning and gasping, tripped, -slid, caught himself and stumbled into her cell. "Please!" he begged. -"That crazy Sauer—he's going to cut my ear off! For heaven's sake, -ma'am—stop him!"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Sue-Ann stared at him, between terror and tears. Stop Sauer! If only -she could. The big redhead was lurching stiffly toward them—raging, -but not so angry that the water-moccasin eyes showed heat.</p> - -<p>"Come here, you figger scum!" he roared.</p> - -<p>The epithet wasn't even close—the guard was Civil Service through and -through—but it was like a reviving whip-sting to Sue-Ann Bradley.</p> - -<p>"Watch your language, Mr. Sauer!" she snapped incongruously.</p> - -<p>Sauer stopped dead and blinked.</p> - -<p>"Don't you dare hurt him!" she warned. "Don't you see, Mr. Sauer, -you're playing into their hands? They're trying to divide us. They -pit mechanic against clerk, laborer against armed forces. And you're -helping them! Brother Sauer, I beg—"</p> - -<p>The redhead spat deliberately on the floor.</p> - -<p>He licked his lips, and grinned an amiable clown's grin, and said in -his cheerful, buffoon bray: "Auntie, go verb your adjective adjective -noun."</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann Bradley gasped and turned white. She had known such words -existed—but only theoretically. She had never expected to <i>hear</i> -them. And certainly she would never have believed she would hear them, -applied to her, from the lips of a—a <i>laborer</i>.</p> - -<p>At her knees, the guard shrieked and fell to the floor.</p> - -<p>"Sauer! Sauer!" A panicky bellow from the corridor; the red-haired -giant hesitated. "Sauer, come on out here! There's a million guards -coming up the stairs. Looks like trouble!"</p> - -<p>Sauer said hoarsely to the unconscious guard: "I'll take care of -<i>you</i>." And he looked blankly at the girl, and shook his head, and -hurried back outside to the corridor.</p> - -<p>Guards were coming, all right—not a million of them, but half a dozen -or more. And leading them all was the medic, calm, bearded face looking -straight ahead, hands clasped before him, ready to heal the sick, -comfort the aged or bring new life into the world.</p> - -<p>"Hold it!" shrieked little Flock, crouched over the agonizing blister -on his abdomen, gun in hand, peering insanely down the steps. "Hold it -or—"</p> - -<p>"Shut up." Sauer called softly to the approaching group: "Let only the -doc come up. Nobody else!"</p> - -<p>The intern faltered; the guards stopped dead; the medic said calmly: "I -must have my intern with me." He glanced at the barred gate wonderingly.</p> - -<p>Sauer hesitated. "Well—all right. But no guards!"</p> - -<p>A few yards away, Sue-Ann Bradley was stuffing the syncoped form of the -guard into her small washroom.</p> - -<p>It was time to take a stand. No more cowering, she told herself -desperately. No more waiting. She closed the door on the guard, still -unconscious, and stood grimly before it. Him, at least, she would save -if she could. They could get him, but only over her dead body.</p> - -<p>Or anyway, she thought with a sudden throbbing in her throat, over her -body.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph4">VI</p> - -<p>After O'Leary and the medic left, the warden tottered to a chair—but -not for long. His secretary appeared, eyes bulging. "The governor!" he -gasped.</p> - -<p>Warden Schluckebier managed to say: "Why, Governor! How good of you to -come—"</p> - -<p>The governor shook him off and held the door open for the men who -had come with him. There were reporters from all the news services, -officials from the township governments within the city-state. There -was an Air GI with major's leaves on his collar—"Liaison, sir," he -explained crisply to the warden, "just in case you have any orders for -our men up there." There were nearly a dozen others.</p> - -<p>The warden was quite overcome.</p> - -<p>The governor rapped out: "Warden, no criticism of you, of course, but -I've come to take personal charge. I'm superseding you under Rule -Twelve, Paragraph A, of the Uniform Civil Service Code. Right?"</p> - -<p>"Oh, <i>right</i>!" cried the warden, incredulous with joy.</p> - -<p>"The situation is bad—perhaps worse than you think. I'm seriously -concerned about the hostages those men have in there. And I had a call -from Senator Bradley a short time ago—"</p> - -<p>"Senator Bradley?" echoed the warden.</p> - -<p>"Senator <i>Sebastian</i> Bradley. One of our foremost civil servants," the -governor said firmly. "It so happens that his daughter is in Block O as -an inmate."</p> - -<p>The warden closed his eyes. He tried to swallow, but the throat muscles -were paralyzed.</p> - -<p>"There is no question," the governor went on briskly, "about the -propriety of her being there. She was duly convicted of a felonious -act, namely conspiracy and incitement to riot. But you see the -position."</p> - -<p>The warden saw all too well.</p> - -<p>"Therefore," said the governor. "I intend to go in to Block O myself. -Sebastian Bradley is an old and personal friend—as well," he -emphasized, "as being a senior member of the Reclassification Board. I -understand a medic is going to Block O. I shall go with him."</p> - -<p>The warden managed to sit up straight. "He's gone. I mean they already -left, Governor. But I assure you Miss Brad—Inmate Bradley—that is, -the young lady is in no danger. I have already taken precautions," he -said, gaining confidence as he listened to himself talk. "I—uh—I -was deciding on a course of action as you came in. See, Governor, -the guards on the walls are all armed. All they have to do is fire -a couple of rounds into the yard and then the 'copters could start -dropping tear gas and light fragmentation bombs and—"</p> - -<p>The governor was already at the door. "You will <i>not</i>," he said; and: -"Now which way did they go?"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>O'Leary was in the yard and he was smelling trouble, loud and strong. -The first he knew that the rest of the prison had caught the riot fever -was when the lights flared on in Cell Block A.</p> - -<p>"That Sodaro!" he snarled, but there wasn't time to worry about that -Sodaro. He grabbed the rest of his guard detail and double-timed it -toward the New Building, leaving the medic and a couple of guards -walking sedately toward the Old. Block A, on the New Building's lowest -tier, was already coming to life; a dozen yards, and Blocks B and C -lighted up.</p> - -<p>And a dozen yards more and they could hear the yelling; and it wasn't -more than a minute before the building doors opened.</p> - -<p>The cons had taken over three more blocks. How? O'Leary didn't take -time even to guess. The inmates were piling out into the yard. He took -one look at the rushing mob. Crazy! It was Wilmer Lafon leading the -rioters, with a guard's gun and a voice screaming threats! But O'Leary -didn't take time to worry about an honor prisoner gone bad, either.</p> - -<p>"Let's get out of here!" he bellowed to the detachment, and they ran.</p> - -<p>Just plain ran. Cut and ran, scattering as they went.</p> - -<p>"Wait!" screamed O'Leary, but they weren't waiting. Cursing himself for -letting them get out of hand, O'Leary salvaged two guards and headed on -the run for the Old Building, huge and dark, all but the topmost lights -of Block O.</p> - -<p>They saw the medic and his escort disappearing into the bulk of the Old -Building and they saw something else. There were inmates between them -and the Old Building! The Shops Building lay between—with a dozen more -cell blocks over the workshops that gave it its name—and there was a -milling rush of activity around its entrance, next to the laundry shed—</p> - -<p>The laundry shed.</p> - -<p>O'Leary stood stock still. Lafon leading the breakout from Block A. The -little greaser who was a trusty in the Shops Building sabotaging the -yard's tangler circuit. Sauer and Flock taking over the Greensleeves -with a manufactured knife and a lot of guts.</p> - -<p>Did it fit together? Was it all part of a plan?</p> - -<p>That was something to find out—but not just then. "Come on," O'Leary -cried to the two guards, and they raced for the temporary safety of the -main gates.</p> - -<p>The whole prison was up and yelling now.</p> - -<p>O'Leary could hear scattered shots from the beat guards on the -wall—<i>Over their heads, over their heads!</i> he prayed silently. -And there were other shots that seemed to come from inside the -walls—guards shooting, or convicts with guards' guns, he couldn't -tell which. The yard was full of convicts now, in bunches and clumps; -but none near the gate. And they seemed to have lost some of their -drive. They were milling around, lit by the searchlights from the wall, -yelling and making a lot of noise ... but going nowhere in particular. -Waiting for a leader, O'Leary thought, and wondered briefly what had -become of Lafon.</p> - -<p>"You Captain O'Leary?" somebody demanded.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He turned and blinked. Good Lord, the governor! He was coming through -the gate, waving aside the gate guards, alone. "You him?" the governor -repeated. "All right, glad I found you. I'm going into Block O with -you."</p> - -<p>O'Leary swallowed and waved inarticulately at the teeming cons. True, -there were none immediately near by—but there were plenty in the -yard! Riots meant breaking things up; already the inmates had started -to break up the machines in the laundry shed and the athletic equipment -in the yard lockers. When they found a couple of choice breakables like -O'Leary and the governor, they'd have a ball!</p> - -<p>"But, Governor—"</p> - -<p>"But my foot! Can you get me in there or can't you?"</p> - -<p>O'Leary gauged their chances. It wasn't more than fifty feet to the -main entrance to the Old Building—not at the moment guarded, since all -the guards were in hiding or on the walls, and not as yet being invaded -by the inmates at large.</p> - -<p>He said: "You're the boss. Hold on a minute—" The searchlights were -on the bare yard cobblestones in front of them; in a moment, the -searchlights danced away.</p> - -<p>"Come on!" cried O'Leary, and jumped for the entrance. The governor was -with him and a pair of the guards came stumbling after.</p> - -<p>They made it to the Old Building.</p> - -<p>Inside the entrance, they could hear the noise from outside and the -yelling of the inmates who were still in their cells. But around them -was nothing but gray steel walls and the stairs going all the way up -to Block O.</p> - -<p>"Up!" panted O'Leary, and they clattered up the steel steps.</p> - -<p>They would have made it—if it hadn't been for the honor inmate, Wilmer -Lafon, who knew what he was after and had headed for the Greensleeves -through the back way. In fact, they did make it—but not the way -they planned. "Get out of the way!" yelled O'Leary at Lafon and -the half-dozen inmates with him; and "Go to hell!" screamed Lafon, -charging; and it was a rough-and-tumble fight, and O'Leary's party lost -it, fair and square.</p> - -<p>So when they got to Block O, it was with the governor marching before -a convict-held gun, and with O'Leary cold unconscious, a lump from a -gun-butt on the side of his head.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus3.jpg" width="600" height="378" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>As they came up the stairs, Sauer was howling at the medic: "You got to -fix up my boy! He's dying and all you do is sit there!"</p> - -<p>The medic said patiently: "My son, I've dressed his wound. He is under -sedation and I must rest. There will be other casualties."</p> - -<p>Sauer raged, but that was as far as it went. Even Sauer wouldn't attack -a medic. He would as soon strike an Attorney, or even a Director of -Funerals. It wasn't merely that they were Professionals. Even among -the Professional class, they were special; not superior, exactly, but -<i>apart</i>. They certainly were not for the likes of Sauer to fool with -and Sauer knew it.</p> - -<p>"Somebody's coming!" bawled one of the other freed inmates.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Sauer jumped to the head of the steps, saw that Lafon was leading the -group, stepped back, saw whom Lafon's helpers were carrying and leaped -forward again.</p> - -<p>"Cap'n O'Leary!" he roared. "Gimme!"</p> - -<p>"Shut up," said Wilmer Lafon, and pushed the big redhead out of the -way. Sauer's jaw dropped and the snake eyes opened wide.</p> - -<p>"Wilmer," he protested feebly. But that was all the protest he made, -because the snake's eyes had seen that Lafon held a gun. He stood back, -the big hands half outstretched toward the unconscious guard captain, -O'Leary, and the cold eyes became thoughtful.</p> - -<p>And then he saw who else was with the party. "Wilmer! You got the -governor there!"</p> - -<p>Lafon nodded. "Throw them in a cell," he ordered, and sat down on a -guard's stool, breathing hard. It had been a fine fight on the steps, -before he and his boys had subdued the governor and the guards, but -Wilmer Lafon wasn't used to fighting. Even six years in the Jug hadn't -turned an architect into a laborer; physical exertion simply was not -his metier.</p> - -<p>Sauer said coaxingly: "Wilmer, won't you leave me have O'Leary for a -while? If it wasn't for me and Flock, you'd still be in A Block and—"</p> - -<p>"Shut up," Lafon said again, gently enough, but he waved the gun -muzzle. He drew a deep breath, glanced around him and grinned. "If -it wasn't for you and Flock," he mimicked. "If it wasn't for you and -Flock! Sauer, you wipe clown, do you think it took <i>brains</i> to file -down a shiv and start things rolling? If it wasn't for <i>me</i>, you and -Flock would have beaten up a few guards, and had your kicks for half an -hour, and then the whole prison would fall in on you! It was me, Wilmer -Lafon, who set things up and you know it!"</p> - -<p>He was yelling and suddenly he realized he was yelling. And what was -the use, he demanded of himself contemptuously, of trying to argue -with a bunch of lousy wipes and greasers? They'd never understand the -long, soul-killing hours of planning and sweat. They wouldn't realize -the importance of the careful timing—of arranging that the laundry -cons would start a disturbance in the yard right after the Greensleeves -hard-timers kicked off the riot, of getting the little greaser Hiroko -to short-circuit the yard field so the laundry cons could start their -disturbances.</p> - -<p>It took a <i>Professional</i> to organize and plan—yes, and to make sure -that he himself was out of it until everything was ripe, so that if -anything went wrong, <i>he</i> was all right. It took somebody like Wilmer -Lafon—a <i>Professional</i>, who had spent six years too long in the Jug—</p> - -<p>And who would shortly be getting out.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph4">VII</p> - -<p>Any prison is a ticking bomb. Estates-General was in process of going -off.</p> - -<p>From the Greensleeves, where the trouble had started, clear out to the -trusty farms that ringed the walls, every inmate was up and jumping. -Some were still in their cells—the scared ones, the decrepit oldsters, -the short-termers who didn't dare risk their early discharge. But for -every man in his cell, a dozen were out and yelling.</p> - -<p>A torch, licking as high as the hanging helicopters, blazing up from -the yard—that was the laundry shed. Why burn the laundry? The cons -couldn't have said. It was burnable and it was there—burn it!</p> - -<p>The yard lay open to the wrath of the helicopters, but the helicopters -made no move. The cobblestones were solidly covered with milling men. -The guards were on the walls, sighting down their guns; the helicopter -bombardiers had their fingers on the bomb trips. There had been a few -rounds fired over the heads of the rioters, at first.</p> - -<p>Nothing since.</p> - -<p>In the milling mob, the figures clustered in groups. The inmates from -Honor Block A huddled under the guards' guns at the angle of the wall. -They had clubs—all the inmates had clubs—but they weren't using them.</p> - -<p>Honor Block A: On the outside, Civil Service and Professionals. On the -inside, the trusties, the "good" cons.</p> - -<p>They weren't the type for clubs.</p> - -<p>With all of the inmates, you looked at them and you wondered what -twisted devil had got into their heads to land them in the Jug. Oh, -perhaps you could understand it—a little bit, at least—in the -case of the figgers in Blocks B and C, the greasers in the Shop -Building—that sort. It was easy enough for some of the Categoried -Classes to commit a crime and thereby land in jail.</p> - -<p>Who could blame a wipe for trying to "pass" if he thought he could -get away with it? But when he didn't get away with it, he wound up in -the Jug and that was logical enough. And greasers liked Civil-Service -women—everyone knew that.</p> - -<p>There was almost a sort of logic to it, even if it was a sort of -inevitable logic that made decent Civil-Service people see red. You -<i>had</i> to enforce the laws against rape if, for instance, a greaser -should ask an innocent young female postal clerk for a date. But you -could understand what drove him to it. The Jug was full of criminals of -that sort. And the Jug was the place for them.</p> - -<p>But what about Honor Block A?</p> - -<p>Why would a Wilmer Lafon—a certified public architect, a Professional -by category—do his own car repairs and get himself jugged for -malpractice? Why would a dental nurse sneak back into the laboratory at -night and cast an upper plate for her mother? She must have realized -she would be caught.</p> - -<p>But she had done it. And she had been caught; and there she was, this -wild night, huddled under the helicopters, uncertainly waving the -handle of a floor mop. It was a club.</p> - -<p>She shivered and turned to the stocky convict next to her. "Why don't -they break down the gate?" she demanded. "How long are we going to hang -around here, waiting for the guards to get organized and pick us all -off one at a time?"</p> - -<p>The convict next to her sighed and wiped his glasses with a beefy hand. -Once he had been an Income-Tax Accountant, disbarred and convicted on -three counts of impersonating an attorney when he took the liberty of -making changes in a client's lease. He snorted: "They expect us to do -<i>their</i> dirty work."</p> - -<p>The two of them glared angrily and fearfully at the other convicts in -the yard.</p> - -<p>And the other convicts, huddled greaser with greaser, wipe with wipe, -glared ragingly back. It wasn't <i>their</i> place to plan the strategy of a -prison break.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Captain Liam O'Leary muttered groggily: "They don't want to escape. All -they want is to make trouble. I know cons!"</p> - -<p>He came fully awake and sat up and focused his eyes. His head was -hammering.</p> - -<p>That girl, that Bradley, was leaning over him. She looked scared and -sick. "Sit still! Sauer is just plain crazy—listen to them yelling out -there!"</p> - -<p>O'Leary sat up and looked around, one hand holding his drumming skull.</p> - -<p>"They <i>do</i> want to escape," said Sue-Ann Bradley. "Listen to what -they're saying!"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>O'Leary discovered that he was in a cell. There was a battle going on -outside. Men were yelling, but he couldn't see them.</p> - -<p>He jumped up, remembering. "The governor!"</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann Bradley said: "He's all right. I <i>think</i> he is, anyway. He's in -the cell right next to us, with a couple guards. I guess they came up -with you." She shivered as the yells in the corridor rose. "Sauer is -angry at the medic," she explained. "He wants him to fix Flock up so -they can—'crush out,' I think he said. The medic says he can't do it. -You see, Flock got burned pretty badly with a knife he made. Something -about the tanglefoot field—"</p> - -<p>"Eddy currents," said O'Leary dizzily.</p> - -<p>"Anyway, the medic—"</p> - -<p>"Never mind the medic. What's Lafon doing?"</p> - -<p>"Lafon? The Negro?" Sue-Ann Bradley frowned. "I didn't know his name. -He started the whole thing, the way it sounds. They're waiting for -the mob down in the yard to break out and then they're going to make a -break—"</p> - -<p>"Wait a minute," growled O'Leary. His head was beginning to clear. -"What about you? Are you in on this?"</p> - -<p>She hung between laughter and tears. Finally: "Do I <i>look</i> as if I am?"</p> - -<p>O'Leary took stock. Somehow, somewhere, the girl had got a length of -metal pipe—from the plumbing, maybe. She was holding it in one hand, -supporting him with the other. There were two other guards in the cell, -both out cold—one from O'Leary's squad, the other, O'Leary guessed, a -desk guard who had been on duty when the trouble started.</p> - -<p>"I wouldn't let them in," she said wildly. "I told them they'd have to -kill me before they could touch that guard."</p> - -<p>O'Leary said suspiciously: "You belonged to that Double-A-C, didn't -you? You were pretty anxious to get in the Greensleeves, disobeying -Auntie Mathias's orders. Are you sure you didn't know this was going -to—"</p> - -<p>It was too much. She dropped the pipe, buried her head in her hands. He -couldn't tell if she laughed or wept, but he could tell that it hadn't -been like that at all.</p> - -<p>"I'm sorry," he said awkwardly, and touched her helplessly on the -shoulder.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He turned and looked out the little barred window, because he couldn't -think of any additional way to apologize. He heard the wavering beat -in the air and saw them—bobbing a hundred yards up, their wide -metal vanes fluttering and hissing from the jets at the tips. The GI -'copters. Waiting—as everyone seemed to be waiting.</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann Bradley asked shakily: "Is anything the matter?"</p> - -<p>O'Leary turned away. It was astonishing, he thought, what a different -perspective he had on those helicopter bombers from inside Block O. -Once he had cursed the warden for not ordering at least tear gas to be -dropped.</p> - -<p>He said harshly: "Nothing. Just that the 'copters have the place -surrounded."</p> - -<p>"Does it make any difference?"</p> - -<p>He shrugged. Does it make a difference? The difference between trouble -and tragedy, or so it now seemed to Captain O'Leary. The riot was -trouble. They could handle it, one way or another. It was his job, any -guard's job, to handle <i>prison</i> trouble.</p> - -<p>But to bring the GIs into it was to invite race riot. Not prison -riot—race riot. Even the declassed scum in the Jug would fight back -against the GIs. They were used to having the Civil-Service guards over -them—that was what guards were for. Civil-Service guards guarded. -What else? It was their job—as clerking was a rigger's job, and -machines were a greaser's, and pick-and-shovel strong-arm work was a -wipe's.</p> - -<p>But the Armed Services—their job was to defend the country against -forces outside—in a world that had only inside forces. The cons -wouldn't hold still under attack from the GIs. <i>Race riot!</i></p> - -<p>But how could you tell that to a girl like this Bradley? O'Leary -glanced at her covertly. She <i>looked</i> all right. Rather nice-looking, -if anything. But he hadn't forgotten why she was in E-G. Joining a -terrorist organization, the Association for the Advancement of the -Categoried Classes.</p> - -<p>Actually getting up on street corners and proposing that greasers' -children be allowed to go to school with GIs, that wipes inter-marry -with Civil Service. Good Lord, they'd be suggesting that doctors eat -with laymen next!</p> - -<p>The girl said evenly: "Don't look at me that way. I'm not a monster."</p> - -<p>O'Leary coughed. "Sorry. I didn't know I was staring." She looked at -him with cold eyes. "I mean," he said, "you don't <i>look</i> like anybody -who'd get mixed up in—well, miscegenation."</p> - -<p>"Miscegenation!" she blazed. "You're all alike! You talk about the -mission of the Categoried Classes and the rightness of segregation, -but it's always just the one thing that's in your minds—sex! I'll tell -you this, Captain O'Leary—I'd rather many a decent, hard-working clerk -any day than the sort of Civil-Service trash I've seen around here!"</p> - -<p>O'Leary cringed. He couldn't help it. Funny, he told himself, I thought -I was shockproof—but this goes too far!</p> - -<p>A bull-roar from the corridor. Sauer.</p> - -<p>O'Leary spun. The big redhead was yelling: "Bring the governor out -here. Lafon wants to talk to him!"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>O'Leary went to the door of the cell, fast.</p> - -<p>A slim, pale con from Block A was pushing the governor down the hall, -toward Sauer and Lafon. The governor was a strong man, but he didn't -struggle. His face was as composed and remote as the medic's; if he was -afraid, he concealed it extremely well.</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann Bradley stood beside O'Leary. "What's happening?"</p> - -<p>He kept his eyes on what was going on. "Lafon is going to try to use -the governor as a shield, I think." The voice of Lafon was loud, but -the noises outside made it hard to understand. But O'Leary could make -out what the dark ex-Professional was saying: "—know damn well you -did something. But what? <i>Why don't they crush out?</i>"</p> - -<p>Mumble-mumble from the Governor. O'Leary couldn't hear the words.</p> - -<p>But he could see the effect of them in Lafon's face, hear the rage -in Lafon's voice. "Don't call me a liar, you civvy punk! You did -something. I had it all planned, do you hear me? The laundry boys were -going to rush the gate, the Block A bunch would follow—and then I -was going to breeze right through. But you loused it up somehow. You -must've!"</p> - -<p>His voice was rising to a scream. O'Leary, watching tautly from the -cell, thought: He's going to break. He can't hold it in much longer.</p> - -<p>"All <i>right</i>!" shouted Lafon, and even Sauer, looming behind him, -looked alarmed. "It doesn't matter what you did. I've got you now and -<i>you</i> are going to get me out of here. You hear? I've got this gun and -the two of us are going to walk right out, through the gate, and if -anybody tries to stop us—"</p> - -<p>"Hey," said Sauer, waking up.</p> - -<p>"—if anybody tries to stop us, you'll get a bullet right in—"</p> - -<p>"<i>Hey!</i>" Sauer was roaring loud as Lafon himself now. "What's this talk -about the <i>two</i> of you? You aren't going to leave me and Flock!"</p> - -<p>"Shut up," Lafon said conversationally, without taking his eyes off the -governor.</p> - -<p>But Sauer, just then, was not the man to say "shut up" to, and -especially he was not a man to take your eyes away from.</p> - -<p>"That's torn it," O'Leary said aloud. The girl started to say something.</p> - -<p>But he was no longer there to hear.</p> - -<p>It looked very much as though Sauer and Lafon were going to tangle. And -when they did, it was the end of the line for the governor.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Captain O'Leary hurtled out of the sheltering cell and skidded down the -corridor. Lafon's face was a hawk's face, gleaming with triumph. As he -saw O'Leary coming toward him, the hawk sneer froze. He brought the gun -up, but O'Leary was a fast man.</p> - -<p>O'Leary leaped on the lithe black honor prisoner. Lafon screamed and -clutched; and O'Leary's lunging weight drove him back against the wall. -Lafon's arm smacked against the steel grating and the gun went flying. -The two of them clinched and fell, gouging, to the floor.</p> - -<p>Grabbing the advantage, O'Leary hammered the con's head against the -deck, hard enough to split a skull. And perhaps it split Lafon's, -because the dark face twitched and froth appeared at the lips; and the -body slacked.</p> - -<p>One down!</p> - -<p>Now Sauer was charging. O'Leary wriggled sidewise and the big redhead -blundered crashing into the steel grate. Sauer fell and O'Leary caught -at him. He tried hammering the head as he swarmed on top of the huge -clown. But Sauer only roared the louder. The bull body surged under -O'Leary and then Sauer was on top and O'Leary wasn't breathing. Not at -all.</p> - -<p>Good-by, Sue-Ann, O'Leary said silently, without meaning to say -anything of the kind; and even then he wondered why he was saying it.</p> - -<p>O'Leary heard a gun explode beside his head.</p> - -<p>Amazing, he thought, I'm breathing again! The choking hands were gone -from his throat.</p> - -<p>It took him a moment to realize that it was Sauer who had taken the -bullet, not him. Sauer who now lay dead, not O'Leary. But he realized -it when he rolled over, and looked up, and saw the girl with the gun -still in her hand, staring at him and weeping.</p> - -<p>He sat up. The two guards still able to walk were backing Sue-Ann -Bradley up. The governor was looking proud as an eagle, pleased as a -mother hen.</p> - -<p>The Greensleeves was back in the hands of law and order.</p> - -<p>The medic came toward O'Leary, hands folded. "My son," he said, "if -your throat needs—"</p> - -<p>O'Leary interrupted him. "I don't need a thing, Doc! I've got -everything I want right now."</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="ph4">VIII</p> - -<p>Inmate Sue-Ann Bradley cried: "They're coming! O'Leary, they're coming!"</p> - -<p>The guards who had once been hostages clattered down the steps to -meet the party. The cons from the Greensleeves were back in their -cells. The medic, after finishing his chores on O'Leary himself, paced -meditatively out into the wake of the riot, where there was plenty to -keep him busy. A faintly guilty expression tinctured his carven face. -Contrary to his oath to care for all humanity in anguish, he had not -liked Lafon or Sauer.</p> - -<p>The party of fresh guards appeared and efficiently began re-locking the -cells of the Greensleeves.</p> - -<p>"Excuse me, Cap'n," said one, taking Sue-Ann Bradley by the arm. "I'll -just put this one back—"</p> - -<p>"I'll take care of her," said Liam O'Leary. He looked at her sideways -as he rubbed the bruises on his face.</p> - -<p>The governor tapped him on the shoulder. "Come along," he said, looking -so proud of himself, so pleased. "Let's go out in the yard for a -breath of fresh air." He smiled contentedly at Sue-Ann Bradley. "You, -too."</p> - -<p>O'Leary protested instinctively: "But she's an inmate!"</p> - -<p>"And I'm a governor. Come along."</p> - -<p>They walked out into the yard. The air was fresh, all right. A handful -of cons, double-guarded by sleepy and irritable men from the day shift, -were hosing down the rubble on the cobblestones. The yard was a mess, -but it was quiet now. The helicopters were still riding their picket -line, glowing softly in the early light that promised sunrise.</p> - -<p>"My car," the governor said quietly to a state policeman who appeared -from nowhere. The trooper snapped a salute and trotted away.</p> - -<p>"I killed a man," said Sue-Ann Bradley, looking a little ill.</p> - -<p>"You saved a man," corrected the governor. "Don't weep for that Lafon. -He was willing to kill a thousand men if he had to, to break out of -here."</p> - -<p>"But he never did break out," said Sue-Ann.</p> - -<p>The governor stretched contentedly. "He never had a chance. Laborers -and clerks join together in a breakout? It would never happen. They -don't even speak the same language—as you have discovered, my dear."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Sue-Ann blazed: "I still believe in the equality of Man!"</p> - -<p>"Oh, please do," the governor said, straight-faced. "There's nothing -wrong with that. Your father and I are perfectly willing to admit that -men are equal—but we can't admit that all men are the <i>same</i>. Use your -eyes! What you believe in is your business, but," he added, "when your -beliefs extend to setting fire to segregated public lavatories as a -protest move, which is what got you arrested, you apparently need to be -taught a lesson. Well, perhaps you've learned it. You were a help here -tonight and that counts for a lot."</p> - -<p>Captain O'Leary said, face furrowed: "What about the warden, Governor? -They say the category system is what makes the world go round; it fits -the right man to the right job and keeps him there. But look at Warden -Schluckebier! He fell completely apart at the seams. He—"</p> - -<p>"Turn that statement around, O'Leary."</p> - -<p>"Turn—?"</p> - -<p>The governor nodded. "You've got it reversed. Not the right man for the -job—the right job for the man! We've got Schluckebier on our hands, -see? He's been born; it's too late to do anything about that. He will -go to pieces in an emergency. So where do we put him?"</p> - -<p>O'Leary stubbornly clamped his jaw, frowning.</p> - -<p>"We put him," the governor went on gently, "where the best thing -to <i>do</i> in a crisis is to go to pieces! Why, O'Leary, you get some -hot-headed man of action in here, and every time an inmate sneezes, -you'll have bloodshed! And there's no harm in a prison riot. Let the -poor devils work off steam. I wouldn't have bothered to get out of bed -for it—except I was worried about the hostages. So I came down to make -sure they were protected in the best possible way."</p> - -<p>O'Leary's jaw dropped. "But you were—"</p> - -<p>The governor nodded. "I was a hostage myself. That's one way to protect -them, isn't it? By giving the cons a hostage that's worth more to them."</p> - -<p>He yawned and looked around for his car. "So the world keeps going -around," he said. "Everybody is somebody else's outgroup and maybe it's -a bad thing, but did you ever stop to realize that we don't have wars -any more? The categories stick tightly together. Who is to say that -that's a bad thing?"</p> - -<p>He grinned. "Reminds me of a story, if you two will pay attention to -me long enough to listen. There was a meeting—this is an old, <i>old</i> -story—a neighborhood meeting of the leaders of the two biggest -women's groups on the block. There were eighteen Irish ladies from -the Church Auxiliary and three Jewish ladies from B'nai B'rith. The -first thing they did was have an election for a temporary chairwoman. -Twenty-one votes were cast. Mrs. Grossinger from B'nai B'rith got three -and Mrs. O'Flaherty from the Auxiliary got eighteen. So when Mrs. -Murphy came up to congratulate Mrs. O'Flaherty after the election, she -whispered: 'Good for you! But isn't it terrible, the way these Jews -stick together?'"</p> - -<p>He stood up and waved a signal as his long official car came poking -hesitantly through the gate.</p> - -<p>"Well," he declared professionally, "that's that. As we politicians -say, any questions?"</p> - -<p>Sue-Ann hesitated. "Yes, I guess I do have a question," she said. -"What's a Jew?"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>It was full dawn at last. The recall signal had come and the -helicopters were swooping home to Hap Arnold Field.</p> - -<p>A bombardier named Novak, red-eyed and grumpy, was amusing himself -on the homeward flight by taking practice sights on the stream of -work-bound mechanics as they fluttered over Greaserville.</p> - -<p>"Could pick 'em off like pigeons," he said sourly to his pilot, as he -dropped an imaginary bomb on a cluster of a dozen men. "For two cents, -I'd do it, too. The only good greaser is a dead greaser."</p> - -<p>His pilot, just as weary, said loftily: "Leave them alone. The best way -to handle them is to leave them alone."</p> - -<p>And the pilot was perfectly right; and that was the way the world went -round, spinning slowly and unstoppably toward the dawn.</p> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of My Lady Greensleeves, by Frederik Pohl - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY GREENSLEEVES *** - -***** This file should be named 51310-h.htm or 51310-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/1/3/1/51310/ - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no - restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it - under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this - eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org - - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - - - -</pre> - -</body> -</html> diff --git a/old/51310-h/images/cover.jpg b/old/51310-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index e112f4e..0000000 --- a/old/51310-h/images/cover.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/51310-h/images/illus1.jpg b/old/51310-h/images/illus1.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 089d6f2..0000000 --- a/old/51310-h/images/illus1.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/51310-h/images/illus2.jpg b/old/51310-h/images/illus2.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index a41b8a0..0000000 --- a/old/51310-h/images/illus2.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/51310-h/images/illus3.jpg b/old/51310-h/images/illus3.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 6ce78d0..0000000 --- a/old/51310-h/images/illus3.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/51310.txt b/old/51310.txt deleted file mode 100644 index c1e5a4d..0000000 --- a/old/51310.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,2264 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of My Lady Greensleeves, by Frederik Pohl - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: My Lady Greensleeves - -Author: Frederik Pohl - -Release Date: February 27, 2016 [EBook #51310] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY GREENSLEEVES *** - - - - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - - - - - - My Lady Greensleeves - - By FREDERIK POHL - - Illustrated by GAUGHAN - - [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from - Galaxy Science Fiction February 1957. - Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that - the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] - - - - - This guard smelled trouble and it could be - counted on to come--for a nose for trouble - was one of the many talents bred here! - - -I - -His name was Liam O'Leary and there was something stinking in his -nostrils. It was the smell of trouble. He hadn't found what the trouble -was yet, but he would. That was his business. He was a captain of -guards in Estates-General Correctional Institution--better known to -its inmates as the Jug--and if he hadn't been able to detect the scent -of trouble brewing a cell-block away, he would never have survived to -reach his captaincy. - -And her name, he saw, was Sue-Ann Bradley, Detainee No. WFA-656R. - -He frowned at the rap sheet, trying to figure out what got a girl like -her into a place like this. And, what was more important, why she -couldn't adjust herself to it, now that she was in. - -He demanded: "Why wouldn't you mop out your cell?" - -The girl lifted her head angrily and took a step forward. The block -guard, Sodaro, growled warningly: "Watch it, auntie!" - -O'Leary shook his head. "Let her talk, Sodaro." It said in the _Civil -Service Guide to Prison Administration_: "Detainees will be permitted -to speak in their own behalf in disciplinary proceedings." And O'Leary -was a man who lived by the book. - -She burst out: "I never got a chance! That old witch Mathias never told -me I was supposed to mop up. She banged on the door and said, 'Slush -up, sister!' And then, ten minutes later, she called the guards and -told them I refused to mop." - -The block guard guffawed. "Wipe talk--that's what she was telling you -to do. Cap'n, you know what's funny about this? This Bradley is--" - -"Shut up, Sodaro." - - * * * * * - -Captain O'leary put down his pencil and looked at the girl. She was -attractive and young--not beyond hope, surely. Maybe she had got off -to a wrong start, but the question was, would putting her in the -disciplinary block help straighten her out? He rubbed his ear and -looked past her at the line of prisoners on the rap detail, waiting for -him to judge their cases. - -He said patiently: "Bradley, the rules are you have to mop out your -cell. If you didn't understand what Mathias was talking about, you -should have asked her. Now I'm warning you, the next time--" - -"Hey, Cap'n, wait!" Sodaro was looking alarmed. "This isn't a first -offense. Look at the rap sheet. Yesterday she pulled the same thing in -the mess hall." He shook his head reprovingly at the prisoner. "The -block guard had to break up a fight between her and another wench, -and she claimed the same business--said she didn't understand when the -other one asked her to move along." He added virtuously: "The guard -warned her then that next time she'd get the Greensleeves for sure." - -Inmate Bradley seemed to be on the verge of tears. She said tautly: "I -don't care. I don't care!" - -O'Leary stopped her. "That's enough! Three days in Block O!" - -It was the only thing to do--for her own sake as much as for his. He -had managed, by strength of will, not to hear that she had omitted -to say "sir" every time she spoke to him, but he couldn't keep it up -forever and he certainly couldn't overlook hysteria. And hysteria was -clearly the next step for her. - -All the same, he stared after her as she left. He handed the rap sheet -to Sodaro and said absently: "Too bad a kid like her has to be here. -What's she in for?" - -"You didn't know, Cap'n?" Sodaro leered. "She's in for conspiracy to -violate the Categoried Class laws. Don't waste your time with her, -Cap'n. She's a figger-lover!" - -Captain O'Leary took a long drink of water from the fountain marked -"Civil Service." But it didn't wash the taste out of his mouth, the -smell from his nose. - -What got into a girl to get her mixed up with that kind of dirty -business? He checked out of the cell blocks and walked across the -yard, wondering about her. She'd had every advantage--decent Civil -Service parents, a good education, everything a girl could wish for. If -anything, she had had a better environment than O'Leary himself, and -look what she had made of it. - -The direction of evolution is toward specialization and Man is no -exception, but with the difference that his is the one species that -creates its own environment in which to specialize. From the moment -that clans formed, specialization began--the hunters using the weapons -made by the flint-chippers, the food cooked in clay pots made by the -ceramists, over fire made by the shaman who guarded the sacred flame. - -Civilization merely increased the extent of specialization. From -the born mechanic and the man with the gift of gab, society evolved -to the point of smaller contact and less communication between the -specializations, until now they could understand each other on only the -most basic physical necessities--and not even always then. - -But this was desirable, for the more specialists, the higher the degree -of civilization. The ultimate should be the complete segregation -of each specialization--social and genetic measures to make them -breed true, because the unspecialized man is an uncivilized man, -or at any rate he does not advance civilization. And letting the -specializations mix would produce genetic undesirables: clerk-laborer -or Professional-GI misfits, for example, being only half specialized, -would be good at no specialization. - -And the basis of this specialization society was: "The aptitude groups -are the true races of mankind." Putting it into law was only the legal -enforcement of a demonstrable fact. - -"Evening, Cap'n." A bleary old inmate orderly stood up straight and -touched his cap as O'Leary passed by. - -"Evening." - - * * * * * - -O'Leary noted, with the part of his mind that always noted those -things, that the orderly had been leaning on his broom until he'd -noticed the captain coming by. Of course, there wasn't much to -sweep--the spray machines and sweeperdozers had been over the -cobblestones of the yard twice already that day. But it was an inmate's -job to keep busy. And it was a guard captain's job to notice when they -didn't. - -There wasn't anything wrong with that job, he told himself. It was a -perfectly good civil-service position--better than post-office clerk, -not as good as Congressman, but a job you could be proud to hold. He -_was_ proud of it. It was _right_ that he should be proud of it. He was -civil-service born and bred, and naturally he was proud and content to -do a good, clean civil-service job. - -If he had happened to be born a fig--a _clerk_, he corrected -himself--if he had happened to be born a clerk, why, he would have been -proud of that, too. There wasn't anything wrong with being a clerk--or -a mechanic or a soldier, or even a laborer, for that matter. - -Good laborers were the salt of the Earth! They weren't smart, maybe, -but they had a--well, a sort of natural, relaxed joy of living. O'Leary -was a broad-minded man and many times he had thought almost with a -touch of envy how _comfortable_ it must be to be a wipe--a _laborer_. -No responsibilities. No worries. Just an easy, slow routine of work and -loaf, work and loaf. - -Of course, he wouldn't _really_ want that kind of life, because he was -Civil Service and not the kind to try to cross over class barriers that -weren't _meant_ to be-- - -"Evening, Cap'n." - -He nodded to the mechanic inmate who was, theoretically, in charge of -maintaining the prison's car pool, just inside the gate. - -"Evening, Conan," he said. - -Conan, now--he was a big buck greaser and he would be there for the -next hour, languidly poking a piece of fluff out of the air filter on -the prison jeep. Lazy, sure. Undependable, certainly. But he kept the -cars going--and, O'Leary thought approvingly, when his sentence was up -in another year or so, he would go back to his life with his status -restored, a mechanic on the outside as he had been inside, and he -certainly would never risk coming back to the Jug by trying to pass as -Civil Service or anything else. He knew his place. - -So why didn't this girl, this Sue-Ann Bradley, know hers? - - -II - -Every prison has its Greensleeves--sometimes they are called by -different names. Old Marquette called it "the canary;" Louisiana State -called it "the red hats;" elsewhere it was called "the hole," "the -snake pit," "the Klondike." When you're in it, you don't much care what -it is called; it is a place for punishment. - -And punishment is what you get. - -Block O in Estates-General Correctional Institution was the -disciplinary block, and because of the green straitjackets its -inhabitants wore, it was called the Greensleeves. It was a community of -its own, an enclave within the larger city-state that was the Jug. And -like any other community, it had its leading citizens ... two of them. -Their names were Sauer and Flock. - -Sue-Ann Bradley heard them before she reached the Greensleeves. She -was in a detachment of three unfortunates like herself, convoyed by an -irritable guard, climbing the steel steps toward Block O from the floor -below, when she heard the yelling. - -"Owoo-o-o," screamed Sauer from one end of the cell block and -"Yow-w-w!" shrieked Flock at the other. - -The inside deck guard of Block O looked nervously at the outside deck -guard. The outside guard looked impassively back--after all, he was on -the outside. - -The inside guard muttered: "Wipe rats! They're getting on my nerves." - -The outside guard shrugged. - -"Detail, _halt_!" The two guards turned to see what was coming in as -the three new candidates for the Greensleeves slumped to a stop at the -head of the stairs. "Here they are," Sodaro told them. "Take good care -of 'em, will you? Especially the lady--she's going to like it here, -because there's plenty of wipes and greasers and figgers to keep her -company." He laughed coarsely and abandoned his charges to the Block O -guards. - -The outside guard said sourly: "A woman, for God's sake. Now O'Leary -knows I hate it when there's a woman in here. It gets the others all -riled up." - -"Let them in," the inside guard told him. "The others are riled up -already." - -Sue-Ann Bradley looked carefully at the floor and paid them no -attention. The outside guard pulled the switch that turned on the -tanglefoot electronic fields that swamped the floor of the block -corridor and of each individual cell. While the fields were on, you -could ignore the prisoners--they simply could not move fast enough, -against the electronic drag of the field, to do any harm. But it was a -rule that, even in Block O, you didn't leave the tangler fields on all -the time--only when the cell doors had to be opened or a prisoner's -restraining garment removed. - -Sue-Ann walked bravely forward through the opened gate--and fell flat -on her face. It was her first experience of a tanglefoot field. It was -like walking through molasses. - -The guard guffawed and lifted her up by one shoulder. "Take it easy, -auntie. Come on, get in your cell." He steered her in the right -direction and pointed to a greensleeved straitjacket on the cell cot. -"Put that on. Being as you're a lady, we won't tie it up, but the rules -say you got to wear it and the rules--Hey. She's crying!" He shook his -head, marveling. It was the first time he had ever seen a prisoner cry -in the Greensleeves. - -However, he was wrong. Sue-Ann's shoulders were shaking, but not from -tears. Sue-Ann Bradley had got a good look at Sauer and at Flock as she -passed them by and she was fighting off an almost uncontrollable urge -to retch. - - * * * * * - -Sauer and Flock were what are called prison wolves. They were -laborers--"wipes," for short--or, at any rate, they had been once. -They had spent so much time in prisons that it was sometimes hard even -for them to remember what they really were, outside. Sauer was a big, -grinning redhead with eyes like a water moccasin. Flock was a lithe -five-footer with the build of a water moccasin--and the sad, stupid -eyes of a calf. - -Sauer stopped yelling for a moment. "Hey, Flock!" - -"What do you want, Sauer?" called Flock from his own cell. - -"We got a lady with us! Maybe we ought to cut out this yelling so -as not to disturb the lady!" He screeched with howling, maniacal -laughter. "Anyway, if we don't cut this out, they'll get us in trouble, -Flock!" - -"Oh, you think so?" shrieked Flock. "Jeez, I wish you hadn't said that, -Sauer. You got me scared! I'm so scared, I'm gonna have to yell!" - -The howling started all over again. - -The inside guard finished putting the new prisoners away and turned off -the tangler field once more. He licked his lips. "Say, you want to take -a turn in here for a while?" - -"Uh-uh." The outside guard shook his head. - -"You're yellow," the inside guard said moodily. "Ah, I don't know why I -don't quit this lousy job. Hey, you! Pipe down or I'll come in and beat -your head off!" - -"Ee-ee-ee!" screamed Sauer in a shrill falsetto. "I'm scared!" Then he -grinned at the guard, all but his water-moccasin eyes. "Don't you know -you can't hurt a wipe by hitting him on the head, Boss?" - -"Shut _up_!" yelled the inside guard. - -Sue-Ann Bradley's weeping now was genuine. She simply could not help -it. The crazy yowling of the hard-timers, Sauer and Flock, was getting -under her skin. They weren't even--even _human_, she told herself -miserably, trying to weep silently so as not to give the guards the -satisfaction of hearing her--they were animals! - -Resentment and anger, she could understand. She told herself doggedly -that resentment and anger were natural and right. They were perfectly -normal expressions of the freedom-loving citizen's rebellion against -the vile and stifling system of Categoried Classes. It was _good_ that -Sauer and Flock still had enough spirit to struggle against the vicious -system-- - -But did they have to scream so? - -The senseless yelling was driving her crazy. She abandoned herself to -weeping and she didn't even care who heard her any more. Senseless! - -It never occurred to Sue-Ann Bradley that it might not be senseless, -because noise hides noise. But then she hadn't been a prisoner very -long. - - -III - -"I smell trouble," said O'Leary to the warden. - -"Trouble? Trouble?" Warden Schluckebier clutched his throat and his -little round eyes looked terrified--as perhaps they should have. Warden -Godfrey Schluckebier was the almighty Caesar of ten thousand inmates in -the Jug, but privately he was a fussy old man trying to hold onto the -last decent job he would have in his life. - -"Trouble? _What_ trouble?" - -O'Leary shrugged. "Different things. You know Lafon, from Block A? This -afternoon, he was playing ball with the laundry orderlies in the yard." - -The warden, faintly relieved, faintly annoyed, scolded: "O'Leary, what -did you want to worry me for? There's nothing wrong with playing ball -in the yard. That's what recreation periods are for." - -"You don't see what I mean, Warden. Lafon was a professional on the -outside--an architect. Those laundry cons were laborers. Pros and wipes -don't mix; it isn't natural. And there are other things." - -O'Leary hesitated, frowning. How could you explain to the warden that -it didn't _smell_ right? - -"For instance--Well, there's Aunt Mathias in the women's block. She's -a pretty good old girl--that's why she's the block orderly. She's a -lifer, she's got no place to go, she gets along with the other women. -But today she put a woman named Bradley on report. Why? Because she -told Bradley to mop up in wipe talk and Bradley didn't understand. Now -Mathias wouldn't--" - -The warden raised his hand. "Please, O'Leary, don't bother me about -that kind of stuff." He sighed heavily and rubbed his eyes. He poured -himself a cup of steaming black coffee from a brewpot, reached in a -desk drawer for something, hesitated, glanced at O'Leary, then dropped -a pale blue tablet into the cup. He drank it down eagerly, ignoring the -scalding heat. - -He leaned back, looking suddenly happier and much more assured. - -"O'Leary, you're a guard captain, right? And I'm your warden. You have -your job, keeping the inmates in line, and I have mine. Now your job is -just as important as my job," he said piously. "_Everybody's_ job is -just as important as everybody else's, right? But we have to stick to -our own jobs. We don't want to try to _pass_." - -O'Leary snapped erect, abruptly angry. Pass! What the devil way was -that for the warden to talk to him? - -"Excuse the expression, O'Leary," the warden said anxiously. "I mean, -after all, 'Specialization is the goal of civilization,' right?" He was -a great man for platitudes, was Warden Schluckebier. "_You_ know you -don't want to worry about _my_ end of running the prison. And _I_ don't -want to worry about _yours_. You see?" And he folded his hands and -smiled like a civil-service Buddha. - - * * * * * - -O'Leary choked back his temper. "Warden, I'm telling you that there's -trouble coming up. I smell the signs." - -"Handle it, then!" snapped the warden, irritated at last. - -"But suppose it's too big to handle. Suppose--" - -"It isn't," the warden said positively. "Don't borrow trouble with -all your supposing, O'Leary." He sipped the remains of his coffee, -made a wry face, poured a fresh cup and, with an elaborate show of not -noticing what he was doing, dropped three of the pale blue tablets into -it this time. - -He sat beaming into space, waiting for the jolt to take effect. - -"Well, then," he said at last. "You just remember what I've told you -tonight, O'Leary, and we'll get along fine. 'Specialization is the--' -Oh, curse the thing." - -His phone was ringing. The warden picked it up irritably. - -That was the trouble with those pale blue tablets, thought O'Leary; -they gave you a lift, but they put you on edge. - -"Hello," barked the warden, not even glancing at the viewscreen. "What -the devil do you want? Don't you know I'm--What? You did _what_? -You're going to WHAT?" - -He looked at the viewscreen at last with a look of pure horror. -Whatever he saw on it, it did not reassure him. His eyes opened like -clamshells in a steamer. - -"O'Leary," he said faintly, "my mistake." - -And he hung up--more or less by accident; the handset dropped from his -fingers. - -The person on the other end of the phone was calling from Cell Block O. - -Five minutes before, he hadn't been anywhere near the phone and it -didn't look as if his chances of ever getting near it were very good. -Because five minutes before, he was in his cell, with the rest of the -hard-timers of the Greensleeves. - -His name was Flock. - -He was still yelling. Sue-Ann Bradley, in the cell across from him, -thought that maybe, after all, the man was really in pain. Maybe the -crazy screams were screams of agony, because certainly his face was the -face of an agonized man. - -The outside guard bellowed: "Okay, okay. Take ten!" - -Sue-Ann froze, waiting to see what would happen. What actually did -happen was that the guard reached up and closed the switch that -actuated the tangler fields on the floors of the cells. The prison -rules were humanitarian, even for the dregs that inhabited the -Greensleeves. Ten minutes out of every two hours, even the worst case -had to be allowed to take his hands out of the restraining garment. - -"Rest period" it was called--in the rule book. The inmates had a less -lovely term for it. - - * * * * * - -At the guard's yell, the inmates jumped to their feet. - -Bradley was a little slow getting off the edge of the steel-slat -bed--nobody had warned her that the eddy currents in the tangler fields -had a way of making metal smoke-hot. She gasped but didn't cry out. -Score one more painful lesson in her new language course. She rubbed -the backs of her thighs gingerly--and slowly, slowly, for the eddy -currents did not permit you to move fast. It was like pushing against -rubber; the faster you tried to move, the greater the resistance. - -The guard peered genially into her cell. "You're okay, auntie." She -proudly ignored him as he slogged deliberately away on his rounds. -He didn't have to untie her and practically stand over her while -she attended to various personal matters, as he did with the male -prisoners. It was not much to be grateful for, but Sue-Ann Bradley was -grateful. At least she didn't have to live _quite_ like a fig--like an -underprivileged clerk, she told herself, conscience-stricken. - -Across the hall, the guard was saying irritably: "What the hell's -the matter with you?" He opened the door of the cell with an -asbestos-handled key held in a canvas glove. - -Flock was in that cell and he was doubled over. - -The guard looked at him doubtfully. It could be a trick, maybe. -Couldn't it? But he could see Flock's face and the agony in it was real -enough. And Flock was gasping, through real tears: "Cramps. I--I--" - -"Ah, you wipes always got a pain in the gut." The guard lumbered around -Flock to the draw-strings at the back of the jacket. Funny smell in -here, he told himself--not for the first time. And imagine, some people -didn't believe that wipes had a smell of their own! But this time, he -realized cloudily, it was a rather unusual smell. Something burning. -Almost like meat scorching. - -It wasn't pleasant. He finished untying Flock and turned away; let the -stinking wipe take care of his own troubles. He only had ten minutes to -get all the way around Block O and the inmates complained like crazy if -he didn't make sure they all got the most possible free time. He was -pretty good at snowshoeing through the tangler field. He was a little -vain about it, even; at times he had been known to boast of his ability -to make the rounds in two minutes, every time. - -Every time but this. - -For Flock moaned behind him, oddly close. - -The guard turned, but not quickly enough. There was -Flock--astonishingly, he was half out of his jacket; his arms hadn't -been in the sleeves at all! And in one of the hands, incredibly, there -was something that glinted and smoked. - -"All right," croaked Flock, tears trickling out of eyes nearly shut -with pain. - -But it wasn't the tears that held the guard; it was the shining, -smoking thing, now poised at his throat. A shiv! It looked as though -it had been made out of a bed-spring, ripped loose from its frame God -knows how, hidden inside the greensleeved jacket God knows how--filed, -filed to sharpness over endless hours. - -No wonder Flock moaned--the eddy currents in the shiv were slowly -cooking his hand; and the blister against his abdomen, where the shiv -had been hidden during other rest periods, felt like raw acid. - -"All right," whispered Flock, "just walk out the door and you won't get -hurt. Unless the other screw makes trouble, you won't get hurt, so tell -him not to, you hear?" - -He was nearly fainting with the pain. - -But he hadn't let go. - -He didn't let go. And he didn't stop. - - -IV - -It was Flock on the phone to the warden--Flock with his eyes still -streaming tears, Flock with Sauer standing right behind him, menacing -the two bound deck guards. - -Sauer shoved Flock out of the way. "Hey, Warden!" he said, and the -voice was a cheerful bray, though the serpent eyes were cold and -hating. "Warden, you got to get a medic in here. My boy Flock, he hurt -himself real bad and he needs a doctor." He gestured playfully at the -guards with the shiv. "I tell you, Warden. I got this knife and I got -your guards here. Enough said? So get a medic in here quick, you hear?" - -And he snapped the connection. - -O'Leary said: "Warden, I told you I smelled trouble!" - -The warden lifted his head, glared, started feebly to speak, hesitated, -and picked up the long-distance phone. He said sadly to the prison -operator: "Get me the governor--fast." - -_Riot!_ - -The word spread out from the prison on seven-league boots. - -It snatched the city governor out of a friendly game of Seniority -with his manager and their wives--and just when he was holding the -Porkbarrel Joker concealed in the hole. - -It broke up the Base Championship Scramble Finals at Hap Arnold Field -to the south, as half the contestants had to scramble in earnest to a -Red Alert that was real. - -It reached to police precinct houses and TV newsrooms and highway -checkpoints, and from there it filtered into the homes and lives of the -nineteen million persons that lived within a few dozen miles of the Jug. - -Riot. And yet fewer than half a dozen men were involved. - -A handful of men, and the enormous bulk of the city-state quivered in -every limb and class. In its ten million homes, in its hundreds of -thousands of public places, the city-state's people shook under the -impact of the news from the prison. - -For the news touched them where their fears lay. Riot! And not merely -a street brawl among roistering wipes, or a bar-room fight of greasers -relaxing from a hard day at the plant. The riot was down among the -corrupt sludge that underlay the state itself. Wipes brawled with wipes -and no one cared; but in the Jug, all classes were cast together. - - * * * * * - -Forty miles to the south, Hap Arnold Field was a blaze of light. The -airmen tumbled out of their quarters and dayrooms at the screech of -the alert siren, and behind them their wives and children stretched -and yawned and worried. An alert! The older kids fussed and complained -and their mothers shut them up. No, there wasn't any alert scheduled -for tonight; no, they didn't know where Daddy was going; no, the kids -couldn't get up yet--it was the middle of the night. - -And as soon as they had the kids back in bed, most of the mothers -struggled into their own airwac uniforms and headed for the briefing -area to hear. - -They caught the words from a distance--not quite correctly. "Riot!" -gasped an aircraftswoman first-class, mother of three. "The wipes! I -_told_ Charlie they'd get out of hand and--Alys, we aren't safe. You -know how they are about GI women! I'm going right home and get a club -and stand right by the door and--" - -"Club!" snapped Alys, radarscope-sergeant, with two children -querulously awake in her nursery at home. "What in God's name is the -use of a club? You can't hurt a wipe by hitting him on the head. You'd -better come along to Supply with me and draw a gun--you'll need it -before this night is over." - -But the airmen themselves heard the briefing loud and clear over the -scramble-call speakers, and they knew it was not merely a matter of -trouble in the wipe quarters. The Jug! The governor himself had called -them out; they were to fly interdicting missions at such-and-such -levels on such-and-such flight circuits around the prison. - -The rockets took off on fountains of fire; and the jets took off with a -whistling roar; and last of all, the helicopters took off ... and they -were the ones who might actually accomplish something. They took up -their picket posts on the prison perimeter, a pilot and two bombardiers -in each 'copter, stone-faced, staring grimly alert at the prison below. - -They were ready for the breakout. - -But there wasn't any breakout. - -The rockets went home for fuel. The jets went home for fuel. The -helicopters hung on--still ready, still waiting. - -The rockets came back and roared harmlessly about, and went away again. -They stayed away. The helicopter men never faltered and never relaxed. -The prison below them was washed with light--from the guard posts on -the walls, from the cell blocks themselves, from the mobile lights of -the guard squadrons surrounding the walls. - -North of the prison, on the long, flat, damp developments of reclaimed -land, the matchbox row houses of the clerical neighborhoods showed -lights in every window as the figgers stood ready to repel invasion -from their undesired neighbors to the east, the wipes. In the crowded -tenements of the laborers' quarters, the wipes shouted from window to -window; and there were crowds in the bright streets. - -"The whole bloody thing's going to blow up!" a helicopter bombardier -yelled bitterly to his pilot, above the flutter and roar of the -whirling blades. "Look at the mobs in Greaserville! The first breakout -from the Jug's going to start a fight like you never saw and we'll be -right in the middle of it!" - -He was partly right. He would be right in the middle of it--for every -man, woman and child in the city-state would be right in the middle of -it. There was no place anywhere that would be spared. _No mixing._ That -was the prescription that kept the city-state alive. There's no harm in -a family fight--and aren't all mechanics a family, aren't all laborers -a clan, aren't all clerks and office workers related by closer ties -than blood or skin? - -But the declassed cons of the Jug were the dregs of every class; and -once they spread, the neat compartmentation of society was pierced. The -breakout would mean riot on a bigger scale than any prison had ever -known. - -But he was also partly wrong. Because the breakout wasn't seeming to -come. - - * * * * * - -The Jug itself was coming to a boil. - -Honor Block A, relaxed and easy at the end of another day, found itself -shaken alert by strange goings-on. First there was the whir and roar of -the Air Force overhead. _Trouble._ Then there was the sudden arrival -of extra guards, doubling the normal complement--day-shift guards, -summoned away from their comfortable civil-service homes at some urgent -call. _Trouble for sure._ - -Honor Block A wasn't used to trouble. A Block was as far from the -Greensleeves of O Block as you could get and still be in the Jug. Honor -Block A belonged to the prison's halfbreeds--the honor prisoners, the -trusties who did guards' work because there weren't enough guards to go -around. They weren't Apaches or Piutes; they were camp-following Injuns -who had sold out for the white man's firewater. The price of their -service was privilege--many privileges. - -Item: TV sets in every cell. Item: Hobby tools, to make gadgets for -the visitor trade--the only way an inmate could earn an honest dollar. -Item: In consequence, an exact knowledge of everything the outside -world knew and put on its TV screens (including the grim, alarming -reports of "trouble at Estates-General"), and the capacity to convert -their "hobby tools" to--other uses. - -An honor prisoner named Wilmer Lafon was watching the TV screen with an -expression of rage and despair. - -Lafon was a credit to the Jug--he was a showpiece for visitors. -Prison rules provided for prisoner training--it was a matter of -"rehabilitation." Prisoner rehabilitation is a joke and a centuries-old -one at that; but it had its serious uses, and one of them was to keep -the prisoners busy. It didn't much matter at what. - -Lafon, for instance, was being "rehabilitated" by studying -architecture. The guards made a point of bringing inspection -delegations to his cell to show him off. There were his walls, covered -with pin-ups--but not of women. The pictures were sketches Lafon had -drawn himself; they were of buildings, highways, dams and bridges; they -were splendidly conceived and immaculately executed. - -"Looka that!" the guards would rumble to their guests. "There isn't an -architect on the outside as good as this boy! What do you say, Wilmer? -Tell the gentlemen--how long you been taking these correspondence -courses in architecture? Six years! Ever since he came to the Jug." - -And Lafon would grin and bob his head, and the delegation would go, -with the guards saying something like: "Believe me, that Wilmer could -design a whole skyscraper--and it wouldn't fall down, either!" - -And they were perfectly, provably right. Not only could Inmate Lafon -design a skyscraper, but he had already done so. More than a dozen of -them. And none had fallen down. - -Of course, that was more than six years back, before he was convicted -and sent to the Jug. He would never design another. Or if he did, it -would never be built. For the plain fact of the matter was that the -Jug's rehabilitation courses were like rehabilitation in every prison -since crime and punishment began. They kept the inmates busy. They -made a show of purpose for an institution that had never had a purpose -beyond punishment. - -And that was all. - -For punishment for a crime is not satisfied by a jail sentence. How -does it hurt a man to feed and clothe and house him, with the bills -paid by the state? Lafon's punishment was that he, as an architect, was -_through_. - -Savage tribes used to lop off a finger or an ear to punish a criminal. -Civilized societies confine their amputations to bits and pieces of the -personality. Chop-chop, and a man's reputation comes off; chop-chop -again, and his professional standing is gone; chop-chop, and he has -lost the respect and trust of his fellows. - -The jail itself isn't the punishment. The jail is only the shaman's -hatchet that performs the amputation. If rehabilitation in a jail -worked--if it were _meant_ to work--it would be the end of jails. - -Rehabilitation? Rehabilitation for what? - - * * * * * - -Wilmer Lafon switched off the television set and silently pounded his -fist into the wall. - -Never again to return to the Professional class! For, naturally, the -conviction had cost him his membership in the Architectural Society and -_that_ had cost him his Professional standing. - -But still--just to be out of the Jug, that would be something! And his -whole hope of ever getting out lay not here in Honor Block A, but in -the turmoil of the Greensleeves, a hundred meters and more than fifty -armed guards away. - -He was a furious man. He looked into the cell next door, where a -con named Garcia was trying to concentrate on a game of Solitaire -Splitfee. Once Garcia had been a Professional, too; he was the closest -thing to a friend Wilmer Lafon had. Maybe he could now help to get -Lafon where he wanted--_needed!_--to be. - -Lafon swore silently and shook his head. Garcia was a spineless -milksop, as bad as any clerk--Lafon was nearly sure there was a touch -of the inkwell somewhere in his family. Shrewd and slippery enough, -like all figgers. But you couldn't rely on him in a pinch. - -Lafon would have to do it all himself. - -He thought for a second, ignoring the rustle and mumble of the other -honor prisoners of Block A. There was no help for it; he would have to -dirty his hands with physical activity. - -Outside on the deck, the guards were grumbling to each other. Lafon -wiped the scowl off his black face, put on a smile, rehearsed what he -was going to say, and politely rattled the door of his cell. - -"Shut up down there!" one of the screws bawled. Lafon recognized the -voice; it was the guard named Sodaro. That was all to the good. He knew -Sodaro and he had some plans for him. - -He rattled the cell door again and called: "Chief, can you come here a -minute, please?" - -Sodaro yelled: "Didn't you hear me? Shut up!" But he came wandering by -and looked into Lafon's tidy little cell. - -"What the devil do you want?" he growled. - -Lafon said ingratiatingly: "What's going on, Chief?" - -"Shut your mouth," Sodaro said absently and yawned. He hefted his -shoulder holster comfortably. That O'Leary, what a production he had -made of getting the guards back! And here he was, stuck in Block A on -the night he had set aside for getting better acquainted with that -little blue-eyed statistician from the Census office. - -"Aw, Chief. The television says there's something going on in the -Greensleeves. What's the score?" - -Sodaro had no reason not to answer him, but it was his unvarying -practice to make a con wait before doing anything the con wanted. He -gave Lafon a ten-second stare before he relented. - -"The score? Sauer and Flock took over Block O. What about it?" - -Much, much about it! But Lafon looked away to hide the eagerness in his -eyes. Perhaps, after all, it was not too late.... - -He suggested humbly: "You look a little sleepy. Do you want some -coffee?" - -"Coffee?" Sodaro scratched. "You got a cup for me?" - -"Certainly! I've got one put aside--swiped it from the messhall--not -the one I use myself." - -"Um." Sodaro leaned on the cell door. "You know I could toss you in the -Greensleeves for stealing from the messhall." - - * * * * * - -"Aw, chief!" Lafon grinned. - -"You been looking for trouble. O'Leary says you were messing around -with the bucks from the laundry detail," Sodaro said halfheartedly. -But he didn't really like picking on Lafon, who was, after all, an -agreeable inmate to have on occasion. "All right. Where's the coffee?" - -They didn't bother with tanglefoot fields in Honor Block A. Sodaro just -unlocked the door and walked in, hardly bothering to look at Lafon. He -took three steps toward the neat little desk at the back of the cell, -where Lafon had rigged up a drawing board and a table, where Lafon kept -his little store of luxury goods. - -Three steps. - -And then, suddenly aware that Lafon was very close to him, he turned, -astonished--a little too late. He saw that Lafon had snatched up a -metal chair; he saw Lafon swinging it, his black face maniacal; he saw -the chair coming down. - -He reached for his shoulder holster, but it was very much too late for -that. - - -V - -Captain O'Leary dragged the scared little wretch into the warden's -office. He shook the con angrily. "Listen to this, Warden! The boys -just brought this one in from the Shops Building. Do you know what he's -been up to?" - -The warden wheezed sadly and looked away. He had stopped even answering -O'Leary by now. He had stopped talking to Sauer on the interphone when -the big convict called, every few minutes, to rave and threaten and -demand a doctor. He had almost stopped doing everything except worry -and weep. But--still and all, he was the warden. He was the one who -gave the orders. - -O'Leary barked: "Warden, this little greaser has bollixed up the whole -tangler circuit for the prison. If the cons get out into the yard now, -you won't be able to tangle them. You know what that means? They'll -have the freedom of the yard, and who knows what comes next?" - -The warden frowned sympathetically. "Tsk, tsk." - -O'Leary shook the con again. "Come on, Hiroko! Tell the warden what you -told the guards." - -The con shrank away from him. Sweat was glistening on his furrowed -yellow forehead. "I--I had to do it, Cap'n! I shorted the wormcan in -the tangler subgrid, but I had to! I got a signal--'Bollix the grid -tonight or some day you'll be in the yard and we'll static you!' What -could I do, Cap'n? I didn't want to--" - -O'Leary pressed: "Who did the signal come from?" - -The con only shook his head, perspiring still more. - -The warden asked faintly: "What's he saying?" - -O'Leary rolled his eyes to heaven. And this was the warden--couldn't -even understand shoptalk from the mouths of his own inmates! - -He translated: "He got orders from the prison underground to -short-circuit the electronic units in the tangler circuit. They -threatened to kill him if he didn't." - -The warden drummed with his fingers on the desk. - -"The tangler field, eh? My, yes. That is important. You'd better get it -fixed, O'Leary. Right away." - -"Fixed? Warden, who's going to fix it? You know as well as I do that -every mechanic in the prison is a con. Even if one of the guards would -do a thing like that--and I'd bust him myself if he did!--he wouldn't -know where to start. That's mechanic work." - -The warden swallowed. He had to admit that O'Leary was right. Naturally -nobody but a mechanic--and a specialist electrician from a particular -subgroup of the greaser class at that--could fix something like the -tangler field generators. - -He said absently: "Well, that's true enough. After all, 'Specialization -is the goal of civilization,' you know." - -O'Leary took a deep breath. He needed it. - -He beckoned to the guard at the door. "Take this greaser out of here!" - -The con shambled out, his head hanging. - - * * * * * - -O'Leary turned to the warden and spread his hands. - -"Warden," he said, "don't you see how this thing is building up? Let's -not just wait for the place to explode in our faces! Let me take a -squad into Block O before it's too late." - -The warden pursed his lips thoughtfully and cocked his head, as though -he were trying to find some trace of merit in an unreasonable request. - -He said at last: "No." - -O'Leary made a passionate sound that was trying to be bad language, but -he was too raging mad to articulate it. He walked stiffly away from the -limp, silent warden and stared out the window. - -At least, he told himself, _he_ hadn't gone to pieces. It was his -doing, not the warden's, that all the off-duty guards had been dragged -double-time back to the prison, his doing that they were now ringed -around the outer walls or scattered on extra-man patrols throughout the -prison. - -It was something, but O'Leary couldn't believe that it was enough. -He'd been in touch with half a dozen of the details inside the prison -on the intercom and each of them had reported the same thing. In all -of E-G, not a single prisoner was asleep. They were talking back and -forth between the cells and the guards couldn't shut them up. They -were listening to concealed radios and the guards didn't dare make a -shakedown to find them. They were working themselves up to something. -To what? - -O'Leary didn't want ever to find out what. He wanted to go in there -with a couple of the best guards he could get his hands on--shoot his -way into the Greensleeves if he had to--and clean out the infection. - -But the warden said no. - -O'Leary stared balefully at the hovering helicopters. - -The warden was the warden. He was placed in that position through -the meticulously careful operations of the Civil Service machinery, -maintained in that position year after year through the penetrating -annual inquiries of the Reclassification Board. It was _subversive_ to -think that the Board could have made a mistake! - -But O'Leary was absolutely sure that the warden was a scared, -ineffectual jerk. - - * * * * * - -The interphone was ringing again. The warden picked up the handpiece -and held it bonelessly at arm's length, his eyes fixed glassily on the -wall. It was Sauer from the Greensleeves again. O'Leary could hear his -maddened bray. - -"I warned you, Warden!" O'Leary could see the big con's contorted face -in miniature, in the view screen of the interphone. The grin was broad -and jolly, the snake's eyes poisonously cold. "I'm going to give you -five minutes, Warden, you hear? Five minutes! And if there isn't a -medic in here in five minutes to take care of my boy Flock--your guards -have had it! I'm going to slice off an ear and throw it out the window, -you hear me? And five minutes later, another ear. And five minutes -later--" - -The warden groaned weakly. "I've called for the prison medic, Sauer. -Honestly I have! I'm sure he's coming as rapidly as he--" - -"Five minutes!" And the ferociously grinning face disappeared. - -O'Leary leaned forward. "Warden, let me take a squad in there!" - -The warden gazed at him for a blank moment "Squad? No, O'Leary. What's -the use of a squad? It's a medic I have to get in there. I have a -responsibility to those guards and if I don't get a medic--" - -A cold, calm voice from the door: "I am here, Warden." - -O'Leary and the warden both jumped up. - -The medic nodded slightly. "You may sit down." - -"Oh, Doctor! Thank heaven you're here!" The warden was falling all over -himself, getting a chair for his guest, flustering about. - -O'Leary said sharply: "Wait a minute, Warden. You can't let the doctor -go in alone!" - -"He isn't alone!" The doctor's intern came from behind him, scowling -belligerently at O'Leary. Youngish, his beard pale and silky, he was a -long way from his first practice. "I'm here to assist him!" - -O'Leary put a strain on his patience. "They'll eat you up in there, -Doc! Those are the worst cons in the prison. They've got two hostages -already. What's the use of giving them two more?" - -The medic fixed him with his eyes. He was a tall man and he wore his -beard proudly. "Guard, do you think you can prevent me from healing a -sufferer?" He folded his hands over his abdomen and turned to leave. - -The intern stepped aside and bowed his head. - -O'Leary surrendered. "All right, you can go. But I'm coming with -you--with a squad!" - - * * * * * - -Inmate Sue-Ann Bradley cowered in her cell. The Greensleeves -was jumping. She had never--no, _never_, she told herself -wretchedly--thought that it would be anything like this. She listened -unbelievingly to the noise the released prisoners were making, smashing -the chairs and commodes in their cells, screaming threats at the bound -guards. - -She faced the thought with fear, and with the sorrow of a murdered -belief that was worse than fear. It was bad that she was in danger -of dying right here and now, but what was even worse was that the -principles that had brought her to the Jug were dying, too. - -Wipes were _not_ the same as Civil-Service people! - -A bull's roar from the corridor and a shocking crash of glass--that was -Flock, and apparently he had smashed the TV interphone. - -"What in the world are they _doing_?" Inmate Bradley sobbed to herself. -It was beyond comprehension. They were yelling words that made no sense -to her, threatening punishments on the guards that she could barely -imagine. Sauer and Flock were laborers; some of the other rioting cons -were clerks, mechanics--even Civil-Service or Professionals, for all -she could tell. But she could hardly understand any of them. Why was -the quiet little Chinese clerk in Cell Six setting fire to his bed? - -There did seem to be a pattern, of sorts. The laborers were rocketing -about, breaking things at random. The mechanics were pleasurably -sabotaging the electronic and plumbing installations. The white-collar -categories were finding their dubious joys in less direct ways--liking -setting fire to a bed. But what a mad pattern! - -The more Sue-Ann saw of them, the less she understood. - -It wasn't just that they _talked_ differently. She had spent endless -hours studying the various patois of shoptalk and it had defeated her; -but it wasn't just that. - -It was bad enough when she couldn't understand the words--as when that -trusty Mathias had ordered her in wipe shoptalk to mop out her cell. -But what was even worse was not understanding the thought behind the -words. - -Sue-Ann Bradley had consecrated her young life to the belief that -all men were created free and equal--and alike. Or alike in all the -things that mattered, anyhow. Alike in hopes, alike in motives, alike -in virtues. She had turned her back on a decent Civil-Service family -and a promising Civil-Service career to join the banned and despised -Association for the Advancement of the Categoried Classes-- - -Screams from the corridor outside. - -Sue-Ann leaped to the door of her cell to see Sauer clutching at one -of the guards. The guard's hands were tied, but his feet were free; he -broke loose from the clumsy clown with the serpent's eyes, almost fell, -ran toward Sue-Ann. - -There was nowhere else to run. The guard, moaning and gasping, tripped, -slid, caught himself and stumbled into her cell. "Please!" he begged. -"That crazy Sauer--he's going to cut my ear off! For heaven's sake, -ma'am--stop him!" - - * * * * * - -Sue-Ann stared at him, between terror and tears. Stop Sauer! If only -she could. The big redhead was lurching stiffly toward them--raging, -but not so angry that the water-moccasin eyes showed heat. - -"Come here, you figger scum!" he roared. - -The epithet wasn't even close--the guard was Civil Service through and -through--but it was like a reviving whip-sting to Sue-Ann Bradley. - -"Watch your language, Mr. Sauer!" she snapped incongruously. - -Sauer stopped dead and blinked. - -"Don't you dare hurt him!" she warned. "Don't you see, Mr. Sauer, -you're playing into their hands? They're trying to divide us. They -pit mechanic against clerk, laborer against armed forces. And you're -helping them! Brother Sauer, I beg--" - -The redhead spat deliberately on the floor. - -He licked his lips, and grinned an amiable clown's grin, and said in -his cheerful, buffoon bray: "Auntie, go verb your adjective adjective -noun." - -Sue-Ann Bradley gasped and turned white. She had known such words -existed--but only theoretically. She had never expected to _hear_ -them. And certainly she would never have believed she would hear them, -applied to her, from the lips of a--a _laborer_. - -At her knees, the guard shrieked and fell to the floor. - -"Sauer! Sauer!" A panicky bellow from the corridor; the red-haired -giant hesitated. "Sauer, come on out here! There's a million guards -coming up the stairs. Looks like trouble!" - -Sauer said hoarsely to the unconscious guard: "I'll take care of -_you_." And he looked blankly at the girl, and shook his head, and -hurried back outside to the corridor. - -Guards were coming, all right--not a million of them, but half a dozen -or more. And leading them all was the medic, calm, bearded face looking -straight ahead, hands clasped before him, ready to heal the sick, -comfort the aged or bring new life into the world. - -"Hold it!" shrieked little Flock, crouched over the agonizing blister -on his abdomen, gun in hand, peering insanely down the steps. "Hold it -or--" - -"Shut up." Sauer called softly to the approaching group: "Let only the -doc come up. Nobody else!" - -The intern faltered; the guards stopped dead; the medic said calmly: "I -must have my intern with me." He glanced at the barred gate wonderingly. - -Sauer hesitated. "Well--all right. But no guards!" - -A few yards away, Sue-Ann Bradley was stuffing the syncoped form of the -guard into her small washroom. - -It was time to take a stand. No more cowering, she told herself -desperately. No more waiting. She closed the door on the guard, still -unconscious, and stood grimly before it. Him, at least, she would save -if she could. They could get him, but only over her dead body. - -Or anyway, she thought with a sudden throbbing in her throat, over her -body. - - -VI - -After O'Leary and the medic left, the warden tottered to a chair--but -not for long. His secretary appeared, eyes bulging. "The governor!" he -gasped. - -Warden Schluckebier managed to say: "Why, Governor! How good of you to -come--" - -The governor shook him off and held the door open for the men who -had come with him. There were reporters from all the news services, -officials from the township governments within the city-state. There -was an Air GI with major's leaves on his collar--"Liaison, sir," he -explained crisply to the warden, "just in case you have any orders for -our men up there." There were nearly a dozen others. - -The warden was quite overcome. - -The governor rapped out: "Warden, no criticism of you, of course, but -I've come to take personal charge. I'm superseding you under Rule -Twelve, Paragraph A, of the Uniform Civil Service Code. Right?" - -"Oh, _right_!" cried the warden, incredulous with joy. - -"The situation is bad--perhaps worse than you think. I'm seriously -concerned about the hostages those men have in there. And I had a call -from Senator Bradley a short time ago--" - -"Senator Bradley?" echoed the warden. - -"Senator _Sebastian_ Bradley. One of our foremost civil servants," the -governor said firmly. "It so happens that his daughter is in Block O as -an inmate." - -The warden closed his eyes. He tried to swallow, but the throat muscles -were paralyzed. - -"There is no question," the governor went on briskly, "about the -propriety of her being there. She was duly convicted of a felonious -act, namely conspiracy and incitement to riot. But you see the -position." - -The warden saw all too well. - -"Therefore," said the governor. "I intend to go in to Block O myself. -Sebastian Bradley is an old and personal friend--as well," he -emphasized, "as being a senior member of the Reclassification Board. I -understand a medic is going to Block O. I shall go with him." - -The warden managed to sit up straight. "He's gone. I mean they already -left, Governor. But I assure you Miss Brad--Inmate Bradley--that is, -the young lady is in no danger. I have already taken precautions," he -said, gaining confidence as he listened to himself talk. "I--uh--I -was deciding on a course of action as you came in. See, Governor, -the guards on the walls are all armed. All they have to do is fire -a couple of rounds into the yard and then the 'copters could start -dropping tear gas and light fragmentation bombs and--" - -The governor was already at the door. "You will _not_," he said; and: -"Now which way did they go?" - - * * * * * - -O'Leary was in the yard and he was smelling trouble, loud and strong. -The first he knew that the rest of the prison had caught the riot fever -was when the lights flared on in Cell Block A. - -"That Sodaro!" he snarled, but there wasn't time to worry about that -Sodaro. He grabbed the rest of his guard detail and double-timed it -toward the New Building, leaving the medic and a couple of guards -walking sedately toward the Old. Block A, on the New Building's lowest -tier, was already coming to life; a dozen yards, and Blocks B and C -lighted up. - -And a dozen yards more and they could hear the yelling; and it wasn't -more than a minute before the building doors opened. - -The cons had taken over three more blocks. How? O'Leary didn't take -time even to guess. The inmates were piling out into the yard. He took -one look at the rushing mob. Crazy! It was Wilmer Lafon leading the -rioters, with a guard's gun and a voice screaming threats! But O'Leary -didn't take time to worry about an honor prisoner gone bad, either. - -"Let's get out of here!" he bellowed to the detachment, and they ran. - -Just plain ran. Cut and ran, scattering as they went. - -"Wait!" screamed O'Leary, but they weren't waiting. Cursing himself for -letting them get out of hand, O'Leary salvaged two guards and headed on -the run for the Old Building, huge and dark, all but the topmost lights -of Block O. - -They saw the medic and his escort disappearing into the bulk of the Old -Building and they saw something else. There were inmates between them -and the Old Building! The Shops Building lay between--with a dozen more -cell blocks over the workshops that gave it its name--and there was a -milling rush of activity around its entrance, next to the laundry shed-- - -The laundry shed. - -O'Leary stood stock still. Lafon leading the breakout from Block A. The -little greaser who was a trusty in the Shops Building sabotaging the -yard's tangler circuit. Sauer and Flock taking over the Greensleeves -with a manufactured knife and a lot of guts. - -Did it fit together? Was it all part of a plan? - -That was something to find out--but not just then. "Come on," O'Leary -cried to the two guards, and they raced for the temporary safety of the -main gates. - -The whole prison was up and yelling now. - -O'Leary could hear scattered shots from the beat guards on the -wall--_Over their heads, over their heads!_ he prayed silently. -And there were other shots that seemed to come from inside the -walls--guards shooting, or convicts with guards' guns, he couldn't -tell which. The yard was full of convicts now, in bunches and clumps; -but none near the gate. And they seemed to have lost some of their -drive. They were milling around, lit by the searchlights from the wall, -yelling and making a lot of noise ... but going nowhere in particular. -Waiting for a leader, O'Leary thought, and wondered briefly what had -become of Lafon. - -"You Captain O'Leary?" somebody demanded. - - * * * * * - -He turned and blinked. Good Lord, the governor! He was coming through -the gate, waving aside the gate guards, alone. "You him?" the governor -repeated. "All right, glad I found you. I'm going into Block O with -you." - -O'Leary swallowed and waved inarticulately at the teeming cons. True, -there were none immediately near by--but there were plenty in the -yard! Riots meant breaking things up; already the inmates had started -to break up the machines in the laundry shed and the athletic equipment -in the yard lockers. When they found a couple of choice breakables like -O'Leary and the governor, they'd have a ball! - -"But, Governor--" - -"But my foot! Can you get me in there or can't you?" - -O'Leary gauged their chances. It wasn't more than fifty feet to the -main entrance to the Old Building--not at the moment guarded, since all -the guards were in hiding or on the walls, and not as yet being invaded -by the inmates at large. - -He said: "You're the boss. Hold on a minute--" The searchlights were -on the bare yard cobblestones in front of them; in a moment, the -searchlights danced away. - -"Come on!" cried O'Leary, and jumped for the entrance. The governor was -with him and a pair of the guards came stumbling after. - -They made it to the Old Building. - -Inside the entrance, they could hear the noise from outside and the -yelling of the inmates who were still in their cells. But around them -was nothing but gray steel walls and the stairs going all the way up -to Block O. - -"Up!" panted O'Leary, and they clattered up the steel steps. - -They would have made it--if it hadn't been for the honor inmate, Wilmer -Lafon, who knew what he was after and had headed for the Greensleeves -through the back way. In fact, they did make it--but not the way -they planned. "Get out of the way!" yelled O'Leary at Lafon and -the half-dozen inmates with him; and "Go to hell!" screamed Lafon, -charging; and it was a rough-and-tumble fight, and O'Leary's party lost -it, fair and square. - -So when they got to Block O, it was with the governor marching before -a convict-held gun, and with O'Leary cold unconscious, a lump from a -gun-butt on the side of his head. - -As they came up the stairs, Sauer was howling at the medic: "You got to -fix up my boy! He's dying and all you do is sit there!" - -The medic said patiently: "My son, I've dressed his wound. He is under -sedation and I must rest. There will be other casualties." - -Sauer raged, but that was as far as it went. Even Sauer wouldn't attack -a medic. He would as soon strike an Attorney, or even a Director of -Funerals. It wasn't merely that they were Professionals. Even among -the Professional class, they were special; not superior, exactly, but -_apart_. They certainly were not for the likes of Sauer to fool with -and Sauer knew it. - -"Somebody's coming!" bawled one of the other freed inmates. - - * * * * * - -Sauer jumped to the head of the steps, saw that Lafon was leading the -group, stepped back, saw whom Lafon's helpers were carrying and leaped -forward again. - -"Cap'n O'Leary!" he roared. "Gimme!" - -"Shut up," said Wilmer Lafon, and pushed the big redhead out of the -way. Sauer's jaw dropped and the snake eyes opened wide. - -"Wilmer," he protested feebly. But that was all the protest he made, -because the snake's eyes had seen that Lafon held a gun. He stood back, -the big hands half outstretched toward the unconscious guard captain, -O'Leary, and the cold eyes became thoughtful. - -And then he saw who else was with the party. "Wilmer! You got the -governor there!" - -Lafon nodded. "Throw them in a cell," he ordered, and sat down on a -guard's stool, breathing hard. It had been a fine fight on the steps, -before he and his boys had subdued the governor and the guards, but -Wilmer Lafon wasn't used to fighting. Even six years in the Jug hadn't -turned an architect into a laborer; physical exertion simply was not -his metier. - -Sauer said coaxingly: "Wilmer, won't you leave me have O'Leary for a -while? If it wasn't for me and Flock, you'd still be in A Block and--" - -"Shut up," Lafon said again, gently enough, but he waved the gun -muzzle. He drew a deep breath, glanced around him and grinned. "If -it wasn't for you and Flock," he mimicked. "If it wasn't for you and -Flock! Sauer, you wipe clown, do you think it took _brains_ to file -down a shiv and start things rolling? If it wasn't for _me_, you and -Flock would have beaten up a few guards, and had your kicks for half an -hour, and then the whole prison would fall in on you! It was me, Wilmer -Lafon, who set things up and you know it!" - -He was yelling and suddenly he realized he was yelling. And what was -the use, he demanded of himself contemptuously, of trying to argue -with a bunch of lousy wipes and greasers? They'd never understand the -long, soul-killing hours of planning and sweat. They wouldn't realize -the importance of the careful timing--of arranging that the laundry -cons would start a disturbance in the yard right after the Greensleeves -hard-timers kicked off the riot, of getting the little greaser Hiroko -to short-circuit the yard field so the laundry cons could start their -disturbances. - -It took a _Professional_ to organize and plan--yes, and to make sure -that he himself was out of it until everything was ripe, so that if -anything went wrong, _he_ was all right. It took somebody like Wilmer -Lafon--a _Professional_, who had spent six years too long in the Jug-- - -And who would shortly be getting out. - - -VII - -Any prison is a ticking bomb. Estates-General was in process of going -off. - -From the Greensleeves, where the trouble had started, clear out to the -trusty farms that ringed the walls, every inmate was up and jumping. -Some were still in their cells--the scared ones, the decrepit oldsters, -the short-termers who didn't dare risk their early discharge. But for -every man in his cell, a dozen were out and yelling. - -A torch, licking as high as the hanging helicopters, blazing up from -the yard--that was the laundry shed. Why burn the laundry? The cons -couldn't have said. It was burnable and it was there--burn it! - -The yard lay open to the wrath of the helicopters, but the helicopters -made no move. The cobblestones were solidly covered with milling men. -The guards were on the walls, sighting down their guns; the helicopter -bombardiers had their fingers on the bomb trips. There had been a few -rounds fired over the heads of the rioters, at first. - -Nothing since. - -In the milling mob, the figures clustered in groups. The inmates from -Honor Block A huddled under the guards' guns at the angle of the wall. -They had clubs--all the inmates had clubs--but they weren't using them. - -Honor Block A: On the outside, Civil Service and Professionals. On the -inside, the trusties, the "good" cons. - -They weren't the type for clubs. - -With all of the inmates, you looked at them and you wondered what -twisted devil had got into their heads to land them in the Jug. Oh, -perhaps you could understand it--a little bit, at least--in the -case of the figgers in Blocks B and C, the greasers in the Shop -Building--that sort. It was easy enough for some of the Categoried -Classes to commit a crime and thereby land in jail. - -Who could blame a wipe for trying to "pass" if he thought he could -get away with it? But when he didn't get away with it, he wound up in -the Jug and that was logical enough. And greasers liked Civil-Service -women--everyone knew that. - -There was almost a sort of logic to it, even if it was a sort of -inevitable logic that made decent Civil-Service people see red. You -_had_ to enforce the laws against rape if, for instance, a greaser -should ask an innocent young female postal clerk for a date. But you -could understand what drove him to it. The Jug was full of criminals of -that sort. And the Jug was the place for them. - -But what about Honor Block A? - -Why would a Wilmer Lafon--a certified public architect, a Professional -by category--do his own car repairs and get himself jugged for -malpractice? Why would a dental nurse sneak back into the laboratory at -night and cast an upper plate for her mother? She must have realized -she would be caught. - -But she had done it. And she had been caught; and there she was, this -wild night, huddled under the helicopters, uncertainly waving the -handle of a floor mop. It was a club. - -She shivered and turned to the stocky convict next to her. "Why don't -they break down the gate?" she demanded. "How long are we going to hang -around here, waiting for the guards to get organized and pick us all -off one at a time?" - -The convict next to her sighed and wiped his glasses with a beefy hand. -Once he had been an Income-Tax Accountant, disbarred and convicted on -three counts of impersonating an attorney when he took the liberty of -making changes in a client's lease. He snorted: "They expect us to do -_their_ dirty work." - -The two of them glared angrily and fearfully at the other convicts in -the yard. - -And the other convicts, huddled greaser with greaser, wipe with wipe, -glared ragingly back. It wasn't _their_ place to plan the strategy of a -prison break. - - * * * * * - -Captain Liam O'Leary muttered groggily: "They don't want to escape. All -they want is to make trouble. I know cons!" - -He came fully awake and sat up and focused his eyes. His head was -hammering. - -That girl, that Bradley, was leaning over him. She looked scared and -sick. "Sit still! Sauer is just plain crazy--listen to them yelling out -there!" - -O'Leary sat up and looked around, one hand holding his drumming skull. - -"They _do_ want to escape," said Sue-Ann Bradley. "Listen to what -they're saying!" - - * * * * * - -O'Leary discovered that he was in a cell. There was a battle going on -outside. Men were yelling, but he couldn't see them. - -He jumped up, remembering. "The governor!" - -Sue-Ann Bradley said: "He's all right. I _think_ he is, anyway. He's in -the cell right next to us, with a couple guards. I guess they came up -with you." She shivered as the yells in the corridor rose. "Sauer is -angry at the medic," she explained. "He wants him to fix Flock up so -they can--'crush out,' I think he said. The medic says he can't do it. -You see, Flock got burned pretty badly with a knife he made. Something -about the tanglefoot field--" - -"Eddy currents," said O'Leary dizzily. - -"Anyway, the medic--" - -"Never mind the medic. What's Lafon doing?" - -"Lafon? The Negro?" Sue-Ann Bradley frowned. "I didn't know his name. -He started the whole thing, the way it sounds. They're waiting for -the mob down in the yard to break out and then they're going to make a -break--" - -"Wait a minute," growled O'Leary. His head was beginning to clear. -"What about you? Are you in on this?" - -She hung between laughter and tears. Finally: "Do I _look_ as if I am?" - -O'Leary took stock. Somehow, somewhere, the girl had got a length of -metal pipe--from the plumbing, maybe. She was holding it in one hand, -supporting him with the other. There were two other guards in the cell, -both out cold--one from O'Leary's squad, the other, O'Leary guessed, a -desk guard who had been on duty when the trouble started. - -"I wouldn't let them in," she said wildly. "I told them they'd have to -kill me before they could touch that guard." - -O'Leary said suspiciously: "You belonged to that Double-A-C, didn't -you? You were pretty anxious to get in the Greensleeves, disobeying -Auntie Mathias's orders. Are you sure you didn't know this was going -to--" - -It was too much. She dropped the pipe, buried her head in her hands. He -couldn't tell if she laughed or wept, but he could tell that it hadn't -been like that at all. - -"I'm sorry," he said awkwardly, and touched her helplessly on the -shoulder. - - * * * * * - -He turned and looked out the little barred window, because he couldn't -think of any additional way to apologize. He heard the wavering beat -in the air and saw them--bobbing a hundred yards up, their wide -metal vanes fluttering and hissing from the jets at the tips. The GI -'copters. Waiting--as everyone seemed to be waiting. - -Sue-Ann Bradley asked shakily: "Is anything the matter?" - -O'Leary turned away. It was astonishing, he thought, what a different -perspective he had on those helicopter bombers from inside Block O. -Once he had cursed the warden for not ordering at least tear gas to be -dropped. - -He said harshly: "Nothing. Just that the 'copters have the place -surrounded." - -"Does it make any difference?" - -He shrugged. Does it make a difference? The difference between trouble -and tragedy, or so it now seemed to Captain O'Leary. The riot was -trouble. They could handle it, one way or another. It was his job, any -guard's job, to handle _prison_ trouble. - -But to bring the GIs into it was to invite race riot. Not prison -riot--race riot. Even the declassed scum in the Jug would fight back -against the GIs. They were used to having the Civil-Service guards over -them--that was what guards were for. Civil-Service guards guarded. -What else? It was their job--as clerking was a rigger's job, and -machines were a greaser's, and pick-and-shovel strong-arm work was a -wipe's. - -But the Armed Services--their job was to defend the country against -forces outside--in a world that had only inside forces. The cons -wouldn't hold still under attack from the GIs. _Race riot!_ - -But how could you tell that to a girl like this Bradley? O'Leary -glanced at her covertly. She _looked_ all right. Rather nice-looking, -if anything. But he hadn't forgotten why she was in E-G. Joining a -terrorist organization, the Association for the Advancement of the -Categoried Classes. - -Actually getting up on street corners and proposing that greasers' -children be allowed to go to school with GIs, that wipes inter-marry -with Civil Service. Good Lord, they'd be suggesting that doctors eat -with laymen next! - -The girl said evenly: "Don't look at me that way. I'm not a monster." - -O'Leary coughed. "Sorry. I didn't know I was staring." She looked at -him with cold eyes. "I mean," he said, "you don't _look_ like anybody -who'd get mixed up in--well, miscegenation." - -"Miscegenation!" she blazed. "You're all alike! You talk about the -mission of the Categoried Classes and the rightness of segregation, -but it's always just the one thing that's in your minds--sex! I'll tell -you this, Captain O'Leary--I'd rather many a decent, hard-working clerk -any day than the sort of Civil-Service trash I've seen around here!" - -O'Leary cringed. He couldn't help it. Funny, he told himself, I thought -I was shockproof--but this goes too far! - -A bull-roar from the corridor. Sauer. - -O'Leary spun. The big redhead was yelling: "Bring the governor out -here. Lafon wants to talk to him!" - - * * * * * - -O'Leary went to the door of the cell, fast. - -A slim, pale con from Block A was pushing the governor down the hall, -toward Sauer and Lafon. The governor was a strong man, but he didn't -struggle. His face was as composed and remote as the medic's; if he was -afraid, he concealed it extremely well. - -Sue-Ann Bradley stood beside O'Leary. "What's happening?" - -He kept his eyes on what was going on. "Lafon is going to try to use -the governor as a shield, I think." The voice of Lafon was loud, but -the noises outside made it hard to understand. But O'Leary could make -out what the dark ex-Professional was saying: "--know damn well you -did something. But what? _Why don't they crush out?_" - -Mumble-mumble from the Governor. O'Leary couldn't hear the words. - -But he could see the effect of them in Lafon's face, hear the rage -in Lafon's voice. "Don't call me a liar, you civvy punk! You did -something. I had it all planned, do you hear me? The laundry boys were -going to rush the gate, the Block A bunch would follow--and then I -was going to breeze right through. But you loused it up somehow. You -must've!" - -His voice was rising to a scream. O'Leary, watching tautly from the -cell, thought: He's going to break. He can't hold it in much longer. - -"All _right_!" shouted Lafon, and even Sauer, looming behind him, -looked alarmed. "It doesn't matter what you did. I've got you now and -_you_ are going to get me out of here. You hear? I've got this gun and -the two of us are going to walk right out, through the gate, and if -anybody tries to stop us--" - -"Hey," said Sauer, waking up. - -"--if anybody tries to stop us, you'll get a bullet right in--" - -"_Hey!_" Sauer was roaring loud as Lafon himself now. "What's this talk -about the _two_ of you? You aren't going to leave me and Flock!" - -"Shut up," Lafon said conversationally, without taking his eyes off the -governor. - -But Sauer, just then, was not the man to say "shut up" to, and -especially he was not a man to take your eyes away from. - -"That's torn it," O'Leary said aloud. The girl started to say something. - -But he was no longer there to hear. - -It looked very much as though Sauer and Lafon were going to tangle. And -when they did, it was the end of the line for the governor. - - * * * * * - -Captain O'Leary hurtled out of the sheltering cell and skidded down the -corridor. Lafon's face was a hawk's face, gleaming with triumph. As he -saw O'Leary coming toward him, the hawk sneer froze. He brought the gun -up, but O'Leary was a fast man. - -O'Leary leaped on the lithe black honor prisoner. Lafon screamed and -clutched; and O'Leary's lunging weight drove him back against the wall. -Lafon's arm smacked against the steel grating and the gun went flying. -The two of them clinched and fell, gouging, to the floor. - -Grabbing the advantage, O'Leary hammered the con's head against the -deck, hard enough to split a skull. And perhaps it split Lafon's, -because the dark face twitched and froth appeared at the lips; and the -body slacked. - -One down! - -Now Sauer was charging. O'Leary wriggled sidewise and the big redhead -blundered crashing into the steel grate. Sauer fell and O'Leary caught -at him. He tried hammering the head as he swarmed on top of the huge -clown. But Sauer only roared the louder. The bull body surged under -O'Leary and then Sauer was on top and O'Leary wasn't breathing. Not at -all. - -Good-by, Sue-Ann, O'Leary said silently, without meaning to say -anything of the kind; and even then he wondered why he was saying it. - -O'Leary heard a gun explode beside his head. - -Amazing, he thought, I'm breathing again! The choking hands were gone -from his throat. - -It took him a moment to realize that it was Sauer who had taken the -bullet, not him. Sauer who now lay dead, not O'Leary. But he realized -it when he rolled over, and looked up, and saw the girl with the gun -still in her hand, staring at him and weeping. - -He sat up. The two guards still able to walk were backing Sue-Ann -Bradley up. The governor was looking proud as an eagle, pleased as a -mother hen. - -The Greensleeves was back in the hands of law and order. - -The medic came toward O'Leary, hands folded. "My son," he said, "if -your throat needs--" - -O'Leary interrupted him. "I don't need a thing, Doc! I've got -everything I want right now." - - -VIII - -Inmate Sue-Ann Bradley cried: "They're coming! O'Leary, they're coming!" - -The guards who had once been hostages clattered down the steps to -meet the party. The cons from the Greensleeves were back in their -cells. The medic, after finishing his chores on O'Leary himself, paced -meditatively out into the wake of the riot, where there was plenty to -keep him busy. A faintly guilty expression tinctured his carven face. -Contrary to his oath to care for all humanity in anguish, he had not -liked Lafon or Sauer. - -The party of fresh guards appeared and efficiently began re-locking the -cells of the Greensleeves. - -"Excuse me, Cap'n," said one, taking Sue-Ann Bradley by the arm. "I'll -just put this one back--" - -"I'll take care of her," said Liam O'Leary. He looked at her sideways -as he rubbed the bruises on his face. - -The governor tapped him on the shoulder. "Come along," he said, looking -so proud of himself, so pleased. "Let's go out in the yard for a -breath of fresh air." He smiled contentedly at Sue-Ann Bradley. "You, -too." - -O'Leary protested instinctively: "But she's an inmate!" - -"And I'm a governor. Come along." - -They walked out into the yard. The air was fresh, all right. A handful -of cons, double-guarded by sleepy and irritable men from the day shift, -were hosing down the rubble on the cobblestones. The yard was a mess, -but it was quiet now. The helicopters were still riding their picket -line, glowing softly in the early light that promised sunrise. - -"My car," the governor said quietly to a state policeman who appeared -from nowhere. The trooper snapped a salute and trotted away. - -"I killed a man," said Sue-Ann Bradley, looking a little ill. - -"You saved a man," corrected the governor. "Don't weep for that Lafon. -He was willing to kill a thousand men if he had to, to break out of -here." - -"But he never did break out," said Sue-Ann. - -The governor stretched contentedly. "He never had a chance. Laborers -and clerks join together in a breakout? It would never happen. They -don't even speak the same language--as you have discovered, my dear." - - * * * * * - -Sue-Ann blazed: "I still believe in the equality of Man!" - -"Oh, please do," the governor said, straight-faced. "There's nothing -wrong with that. Your father and I are perfectly willing to admit that -men are equal--but we can't admit that all men are the _same_. Use your -eyes! What you believe in is your business, but," he added, "when your -beliefs extend to setting fire to segregated public lavatories as a -protest move, which is what got you arrested, you apparently need to be -taught a lesson. Well, perhaps you've learned it. You were a help here -tonight and that counts for a lot." - -Captain O'Leary said, face furrowed: "What about the warden, Governor? -They say the category system is what makes the world go round; it fits -the right man to the right job and keeps him there. But look at Warden -Schluckebier! He fell completely apart at the seams. He--" - -"Turn that statement around, O'Leary." - -"Turn--?" - -The governor nodded. "You've got it reversed. Not the right man for the -job--the right job for the man! We've got Schluckebier on our hands, -see? He's been born; it's too late to do anything about that. He will -go to pieces in an emergency. So where do we put him?" - -O'Leary stubbornly clamped his jaw, frowning. - -"We put him," the governor went on gently, "where the best thing -to _do_ in a crisis is to go to pieces! Why, O'Leary, you get some -hot-headed man of action in here, and every time an inmate sneezes, -you'll have bloodshed! And there's no harm in a prison riot. Let the -poor devils work off steam. I wouldn't have bothered to get out of bed -for it--except I was worried about the hostages. So I came down to make -sure they were protected in the best possible way." - -O'Leary's jaw dropped. "But you were--" - -The governor nodded. "I was a hostage myself. That's one way to protect -them, isn't it? By giving the cons a hostage that's worth more to them." - -He yawned and looked around for his car. "So the world keeps going -around," he said. "Everybody is somebody else's outgroup and maybe it's -a bad thing, but did you ever stop to realize that we don't have wars -any more? The categories stick tightly together. Who is to say that -that's a bad thing?" - -He grinned. "Reminds me of a story, if you two will pay attention to -me long enough to listen. There was a meeting--this is an old, _old_ -story--a neighborhood meeting of the leaders of the two biggest -women's groups on the block. There were eighteen Irish ladies from -the Church Auxiliary and three Jewish ladies from B'nai B'rith. The -first thing they did was have an election for a temporary chairwoman. -Twenty-one votes were cast. Mrs. Grossinger from B'nai B'rith got three -and Mrs. O'Flaherty from the Auxiliary got eighteen. So when Mrs. -Murphy came up to congratulate Mrs. O'Flaherty after the election, she -whispered: 'Good for you! But isn't it terrible, the way these Jews -stick together?'" - -He stood up and waved a signal as his long official car came poking -hesitantly through the gate. - -"Well," he declared professionally, "that's that. As we politicians -say, any questions?" - -Sue-Ann hesitated. "Yes, I guess I do have a question," she said. -"What's a Jew?" - - * * * * * - -It was full dawn at last. The recall signal had come and the -helicopters were swooping home to Hap Arnold Field. - -A bombardier named Novak, red-eyed and grumpy, was amusing himself -on the homeward flight by taking practice sights on the stream of -work-bound mechanics as they fluttered over Greaserville. - -"Could pick 'em off like pigeons," he said sourly to his pilot, as he -dropped an imaginary bomb on a cluster of a dozen men. "For two cents, -I'd do it, too. The only good greaser is a dead greaser." - -His pilot, just as weary, said loftily: "Leave them alone. The best way -to handle them is to leave them alone." - -And the pilot was perfectly right; and that was the way the world went -round, spinning slowly and unstoppably toward the dawn. - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of My Lady Greensleeves, by Frederik Pohl - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY LADY GREENSLEEVES *** - -***** This file should be named 51310.txt or 51310.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/1/3/1/51310/ - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no - restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it - under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this - eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org - - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - diff --git a/old/51310.zip b/old/51310.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 5302c0c..0000000 --- a/old/51310.zip +++ /dev/null |
