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Monkey On His Back By: Charles V. De Vet (1911-1997) |
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[Illustration] By CHARLES V. DE VET monkey on his back
Under the cloud of cast off identities
lay the shape of another man
was it himself? Illustrated by DILLON
He was walking endlessly down a long, glass walled corridor. Bright
sunlight slanted in through one wall, on the blue knapsack across his
shoulders. Who he was, and what he was doing here, was clouded. The
truth lurked in some corner of his consciousness, but it was not reached
by surface awareness. The corridor opened at last into a large high domed room, much like a
railway station or an air terminal. He walked straight ahead. At the sight of him a man leaning negligently against a stone pillar, to
his right but within vision, straightened and barked an order to him,
"Halt!" He lengthened his stride but gave no other sign. Two men hurried through a doorway of a small anteroom to his left,
calling to him. He turned away and began to run. Shouts and the sound of charging feet came from behind him. He cut to
the right, running toward the escalator to the second floor. Another
pair of men were hurrying down, two steps at a stride. With no break in
pace he veered into an opening beside the escalator. At the first turn he saw that the aisle merely circled the stairway,
coming out into the depot again on the other side. It was a trap. He
glanced quickly around him. At the rear of the space was a row of lockers for traveler use. He
slipped a coin into a pay slot, opened the zipper on his bag and pulled
out a flat briefcase. It took him only a few seconds to push the case
into the compartment, lock it and slide the key along the floor beneath
the locker. There was nothing to do after that except wait. The men pursuing him came hurtling around the turn in the aisle. He
kicked his knapsack to one side, spreading his feet wide with an
instinctive motion. Until that instant he had intended to fight. Now he swiftly reassessed
the odds. There were five of them, he saw. He should be able to
incapacitate two or three and break out. But the fact that they had been
expecting him meant that others would very probably be waiting outside.
His best course now was to sham ignorance. He relaxed. He offered no resistance as they reached him. They were not gentle men. A tall ruffian, copper brown face damp with
perspiration and body oil, grabbed him by the jacket and slammed him
back against the lockers. As he shifted his weight to keep his footing
someone drove a fist into his face. He started to raise his hands; and a
hard flat object crashed against the side of his skull. The starch went out of his legs.
"Do you make anything out of it?" the psychoanalyst Milton Bergstrom,
asked. John Zarwell shook his head. "Did I talk while I was under?" "Oh, yes. You were supposed to. That way I follow pretty well what
you're reenacting." "How does it tie in with what I told you before?" Bergstrom's neat boned, fair skinned face betrayed no emotion other than
an introspective stillness of his normally alert gaze. "I see no
connection," he decided, his words once again precise and meticulous.
"We don't have enough to go on. Do you feel able to try another
comanalysis this afternoon yet?" "I don't see why not." Zarwell opened the collar of his shirt. The day
was hot, and the room had no air conditioning, still a rare luxury on
St. Martin's. The office window was open, but it let in no freshness,
only the mildly rank odor that pervaded all the planet's habitable area... Continue reading book >>
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Fiction |
Literature |
Science |
Short stories |
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