Chapter Chapter 8 · 第8章

"Anyway, that was only part of it. He knew that people who've been

retroed try to find out who they are, and that some of them succeed.

He didn't want that to happen. So he put an advertisement in the paper

that she'd see and answer. When she did, he began to use his machine

on her, intending to take her from the present to the past and back

again so often that her mind would refuse to accept anything, past or

present.

"But he'd just started when Starret showed up, and he knew he had to

get him too. So he pulled what looked like a deliberate slip and got

Starret interested, intending to take care of both of them in the same

way at the same time."

He leaned against the wall. It was over now and he knew what he could

expect.

"That's all, but it didn't work out the way Putsyn wanted it. Starret

was a guy who knew how to look after his own interests."

Except the biggest and most important one; there he'd failed.

Borgenese was tapping on the desk, but it wasn't really tapping--he

was pushing buttons. A policeman came in and the counselor motioned to

Putsyn: "Put him in the pre-trial cells."

"You can't prove it," said Putsyn. His face was sunken and frightened.

"I think we can," said the counselor indifferently. "You don't know

the efficiency of our laboratories. You'll talk."

* * * * *

When Putsyn had been removed, Borgenese turned. "Very good work, Luis.

I'm pleased with you. I think in time you'd make an excellent

policeman. Retro detail, of course."

Luis stared at him.

"Didn't you listen?" he said. "I'm Dorn Starret, a cheap crook."

In that mental picture of Starret he'd had, he should have seen it at

once. Left-handed? Not at all--that was the way a man normally saw

himself in a mirror. And in mirror images, the right hand becomes the

left.

The counselor sat up straight, not gentle and easygoing any longer.

"I'm afraid you can't prove that," he said. "Fingerprints? Will any of

Starret's past associates identify you? There's Putsyn, but he won't

be around to testify." He smiled. "As final evidence let me ask you

this: when he offered you a share in his crooked scheme, did you

accept? You did not. Instead, you brought him in, though you thought

you were heading into certain retrogression."

Luis blinked dazedly. "But--"

"There are no exceptions, Luis. For certain crimes there is a

prescribed penalty, retrogression. The law makes no distinction as to

how the penalty is applied, and for a good reason. If there was such a

person, Dorn Starret ceased to exist when Putsyn retroed him--and not

only legally."

Counselor Borgenese stood up. "You see, retroing a person wipes him

clean of almost everything he ever knew--_right and wrong_. It leaves

him with an adult body, and we fill his mind with adult facts. Given

half a chance, he acts like an adult."

Borgenese walked slowly to stand in front of his desk. "We protect

life. Everybody's life. _Including those who are not yet victims._ We

don't have the death penalty and don't want it. The most we can do to

anyone is give him a new chance, via retrogression. We have the same

penalty for those who deprive another of his memory as we do for those

who kill--with this difference: the man who retrogresses another knows

he has a good chance to get away with it. The murderer is certain that

he won't.

"That's an administrative rule, not a law--that we don't try to trace

retrogression victims. It channels anger and greed into

non-destructive acts. There are a lot of unruly emotions floating

around, and as long as there are, we have to have a safety valve for

them. Retrogression is the perfect instrument for that."

Luise tried to speak, but he waved her into silence.

"Do you know how many were killed last year?" he asked.

Luis shook his head.

"Four," said the counselor. "Four murders in a population of sixteen

billion. That's quite a record, as anyone knows who reads Twentieth

Century mystery novels." He glanced humorously at Luis. "You did,

didn't you?"

Luis nodded mutely.

Borgenese grinned. "I thought so. There are only three types of

people who know about fingerprints today, historians and policemen

being two. And I didn't think you were either."

Luise finally broke in. "Won't Putsyn's machine change things?"

"Will it?" The counselor pretended to frown. "Do you remember how to

build it?"

"I've forgotten," she confessed.

"So you have," said Borgenese. "And I assure you Putsyn is going to

forget too. As a convicted criminal, and he will be, we'll provide him

with a false memory that will prevent his prying into the past.

"That's one machine we don't want until humans are fully and

completely civilized. It's been invented a dozen times in the last

century, and it always gets lost."

He closed his eyes momentarily, and when he opened them, Luise was

looking at Luis, who was staring at the floor.

"You two can go now," he said. "When you get ready, there are jobs for

both of you in my department. No hurry, though; we'll keep them open."

Luis left, went out through the long corridors and into the night.

* * * * *

She caught up with him when he was getting off the belt that had taken

him back to the Shelters.

"There's not much you can say, I suppose," she murmured. "What can you

tell a girl when she learns you've stopped just short of killing her?"

He didn't know the answer either.

They walked in silence.

She stopped at her dwelling, but didn't go in. "Still, it's an

indication of how you felt--that you forgot your own name and took

mine." She was smiling now. "I don't see how I can do less for you."

Hope stirred and he moved closer. But he didn't speak. She might not

mean what he thought she did.

"Luis and Luise Obispo," she said softly. "Very little change for

me--just add Mrs. to it." She was gazing at him with familiar

intensity. "Do you want to come in?"

She opened the door.

Crime was sometimes the road to opportunity, and retrogression could

be kind.

--F. L. WALLACE

* * * * *