Life Sentence, Page 2

pushed it outof consciousness. And for each individual voice there was an individualface, staring up at his cell from the comparative safety of outside.Young Oliver Symmes could not see the faces from where he sat, waiting,but he could sense them.

  There came a feel of hands on his shoulder; his reverie was interrupted.Arms under his raised him to his feet. A face smiled, almost kindly, inunderstanding.

  "They're waiting for you, Mr. Symmes. It's time to go."

  More words. Walking from this place to that, mostly with a crowd ofpeople at his shoulders, pressing him in. Then a door ahead of him,ornate in carving, a replica of the doors to the Roman Palace of Justicemany centuries before. Again his mind catalogued the impressions.

  Then, like the faces of the people outside his cell, the pictures of thebas-relief faded away, melted and merged into a pelagic blackness.

  The doors opened and, with part of the crowd still at his side, he wentthrough. The people inside were standing; stick men, it seemed to him,with painted balloons for faces. The sound of the rapping of a gavelcaught his ear. The people sat, and the trial began.

  "This court will admit to evidence only those events and artifacts whichare proved true and relevant to the alleged crime."

  An obsequious clearing of throats. A coughing now and then.

  "... And did you see the defendant, Oliver Symmes, enter the apartmentof the deceased on the night of the Thirty-first of December, twothousand and ..."

  "I did. He was wearing a sort of orange tunic ..."

  Someone whispered in his ear. Oliver Symmes heard and shook his head.

  "... You are personally acquainted with the defendant?"

  "I am. We worked for United Anthropological Laboratories before he ..."

  "Objection."

  "Sustained."

  The blackness of the judge's robe puzzled him. A vestige, ananachronism, handed down from centuries before. White was the color oftruth, not black.

  "You swear that you found the defendant standing over the body of thedeceased woman on the night of ..."

  "Not standing, sir. He was bending over, kissing ..."

  "Your witness."

  * * * * *

  Days of it, back and forth, testimony and more testimony. Evidence andmore evidence and the lack of it. Smiling lawyers, grimacing lawyers,soothing lawyers and cackling lawyers. And witnesses.

  "You will please take the stand, Mr. Symmes."

  He walked to the chair and sat down. The courtroom leaned forward, thestick men bowed toward him slightly, as in eager applause of the comingmost dramatic moment of a spectacle.

  "You will please tell the court in your own words ..."

  He mouthed the words. The whole story, the New Year's crowd, his hungerfor her, his arrival, the other man and his babbling, the woman and howshe looked, his feelings, his transfigured passions, and the deaths. Hetold the story again and again until they seemed satisfied.

  "You understand, Mr. Symmes, that you have committed a most heinouscrime. You have killed two people in a passion that, while it used to beforgiven by the circumstances, is no longer tolerated by thisgovernment. You have killed, Mr. Symmes!"

  The face before him was intense. He looked at it, not understanding thereason for the frozen look of malice and hatred.

  "She was mine. When she betrayed me, I killed her. Is that wrong?"

  The stick men snorted and poked each other in the ribs with derisiveelbows.

  There were more words and more questions. He looked at the face of thejudge and wondered, for a moment, if perhaps the color of the robe wasto match the apparent disposition of the man.

  And then came the silence, a time of sitting and waiting. He sensed thewondering stares of the stick men, wide-eyed in apprehension, suspendedfrom the drabness of their own lives for the moment by the starkvisitation of tragedy in his. They gabbled among themselves and wageredon the verdict.

  The man next to him leaned over and tapped him on the arm. Everyonestood up and then, curiously, sat down again almost at once. He felt thetension present in the courtroom, but was strangely relaxed himself. Itwas peculiar that they were all so excited.

  "Your Honor, having duly considered the seriousness of the crime and theevidence presented ..."

  The balloon faces on the stick men stretched in anticipation.

  "... taking full cognizance of the admitted passion on the part of thedefendant and the circumstances ..."

  The balloons were strained, contorted out of all proportion in theireagerness.

  "... we find the defendant guilty of murder, making no recommendationfor consideration by the Court."

  The balloons exploded!

  * * * * *

  Deafening and more than deafening, the uproar of the voices was beyondbelief. He threw his hands up over his ears to shut out the noise.

  The gavel crashed again and again, striking the polished oak in deadlycadence, stifling the voices. Over the stillness, one man spoke. Herecognized the black voice of the judge and took his hands from his earsand put them in his lap. He was told to stand and he obeyed.

  "Oliver Symmes, there has been no taking of human lives in this nationfor many years, until your shockingly primitive crime. We had takenpride in this record. Now you have broken it. We must not only punishyou adequately and appropriately, but we must also make of yourpunishment a warning to anyone who would follow your irrational example.

  "Naturally, we no longer have either the apparatus to execute anyone oran executioner. We do not believe that a stupidly unreasoning act shouldincite us to equally unreasoning reprisal, for we would then be asguilty of irrationality as you.

  "We must establish our own precedent, since there is no recent one andthe ancient punishments are not acceptable to us. Therefore, because weare humane and reasoning persons, the Court orders that the defendant,Oliver Symmes, be placed in the National Hospital for observation, studyand experimentation so that this crime may never again be repeated. Heis to be kept there under perpetual care until no possible human skillor resource can further sustain life in his body."

  Someone jumped erect beside him, quivering with horror and indignation.It was his lawyer.

  "Your Honor, we throw ourselves upon the mercy of the Court. No matterwhat the crime of the defendant, this is a greater one. For this is acrime not just against my client, but against all men. This sentencerobs all men of their most precious freedom--the right to die at theirappointed times. Nothing is more damaging to the basic dignity of thehuman race than this most hideous ..."

  "... This Court recognizes only the four freedoms. The freedom of deathis not one of these. The sentence stands. The Court is adjourned."

  There were tears in the eyes of his lawyer, although young Oliver Symmesdid not quite comprehend, as yet, their meaning. Hands, rougher thanbefore, grasped his arms with strange firmness and led him off into ...

  * * * * *

  Shadows. They come in cycles, each prompted to activity by the onepreceding it. They flutter in unbelievable clusters, wheel inuntranslatable formations through the cerebric wasteland that is theaged mind of Oliver Symmes. They have no meaning to him, save for afurtive spark of recognition that intrudes upon him once in a while.

  The woman in the green uniform, standing to one side of the window,smiled at him again. It was much simpler to care for him, she thought,if only one conceived of him as being a sort of sweet little worn-outteddy bear. Yes, that was what he was, a little teddy bear that hadgotten most of its stuffing lost and had shriveled and shrunk. And onecan easily love and pamper a teddy bear.

  "Can you see the crowd all right, Mr. Symmes? This is a good place towatch from, isn't it?"

  Her words fell upon his ears, setting up vibrations and oscillations inthe basilar membranes. Nerve cells triggered impulses that sped alongneural pathways to the withered cortex, where they lost themselves inthe welter of atrophy and disintegration. They emerged into hi
sconsciousness as part of a gestaltic confusion.

  "Isn't it exciting, watching from here?" she asked, showing enthusiasmat the sight of the crowd below. "You should be enjoying this immensely,you know. Not all the people here have windows to look out of likethis." There, now, that should make him feel a little better.

  His eyes, in their wandering, came to rest upon her uniform, so cool andcomforting in its greenness. A flicker of light gleamed from themetallic insignia on her sleeve: "To Care for the Aged." Somewhereinside him an association clicked, a brief fire of response to a pastevent kindled into a short-lived flame, lighting the way through cobwebsfor another _shadow_....

  * * * * *

  How many years he had been waiting for the opportunity, he did not know.It seemed like decades, although it might have been only a handful ofmonths. And all the time he had waited, he could feel himself growingolder, could sense the