Frank Herbert The Dosadi Experiment

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"Stay close."
They were climbing an inside stairway now and McKie, hurrying to keep up,
found his thoughts locked on that pentrate in the hands of one of Jedrik's
people. The speed with which they'd copied and enlarged it dazzled him. It
was another demonstration of why Aritch feared Dosadi.
At the top of the stairs, Jedrik rapped briefly at a door. A male voice said,
"Come in."
The door swung open, and McKie found himself presently in a small, unoccupied
room with an open portal at the far wall into what appeared to be a larger,
well-lighted area. Voices speaking so softly as to be unintelligible came
from there. A low table and five cramped chairs occupied the small room.
There were no windows, but a frosted overhead fixture provided shadowless
illumination. A large sheet of paper with colored graph lines on it covered
the low table.
A swish of fabric brought McKie's attention to the open portal. A short,
slender woman in a white smock, grey hair, and the dark, penetrating stare of
someone accustomed to command entered, followed by a slightly taller man in
the same white. He looked older than the woman, except his hair remained a
lustrous black. His eyes, too, held that air of command. The woman spoke.
"Excuse the delay, Jedrik. We've been changing the summation. There's now no
point where Broey can anticipate and change the transition from riots to full-
scale warfare."
McKie was surprised by the abject deference in her voice. This woman
considered herself to be far below Jedrik. The man took the same tone,
gesturing to chairs.
"Sit down, please. This chart is our summation."
As the woman turned toward him, McKie caught a strong whiff of something
pungent on her breath, a not unfamiliar smell. He'd caught traces of it
several times in their passage through the Warrens. She went on speaking as
Jedrik and McKie slipped into chairs.
"This is not unexpected." She indicated the design on the paper.
The man intruded.
"We've been telling you for some time now that Tria is ready to come over."
"She's trouble," Jedrik said.
"But Gar . . ."
It was the woman, arguing, but Jedrik cut her off.
"I know: Gar does whatever she tells him to do. The daughter runs the
father. He thinks she's the most wonderful thing that ever happened, able to
. . ."
"Her abilities are not the issue," the man said.
The woman spoke eagerly.
"Yes, it's her influence on Gar that . . ."
"Neither of them anticipated my moves," Jedrik said, "but I anticipated their
moves."
The man leaned across the table, his face close to Jedrik's. He appeared
suddenly to McKie like a large, dangerous animal -- dangerous because his
actions could never be fully predicted. His hands twitched when he spoke.
"We've told you every detail of our findings, every source, every conclusion.
Now, are you saying you don't share our assessment of . . ."
"You don't understand," Jedrik said.
The woman had drawn back. Now, she nodded.
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Jedrik said:
"It isn't the first time I've had to reassess your conclusions. Hear me:
Tria will leave Broey when she's ready, not when he's ready. It's the same
for anyone she serves, even Gar."
They spoke in unison:
"Leave Gar?"
"Leave anyone. Tria serves only Tria. Never forget that. Especially don't
forget it if she comes over to us."
The man and woman were silent.
McKie thought about what Jedrik had said. Her words were another indication
that someone on Dosadi might have other than personal aims. Jedrik's tone was
unmistakable: she censured and distrusted Tria because Tria served only
selfish ambition. Therefore, Jedrik (and this other pair by inference) served
some unstated mutual purpose. Was it a form of patriotism they served,
species-oriented? BuSab agents were always alert for this dangerous form of
tribal madness, not necessarily to suppress it, but to make certain it did not
explode into a violence deadly to the ConSentiency.
The white-smocked woman, after mulling her own thoughts, spoke:
"If Tria can't be enlisted for . . . what I mean is, we can use her own self-
serving to hold her." She corrected herself. "Unless you believe we cannot
convince her we'll overcome Broey." She chewed at her lip, a fearful
expression in her eyes.
A shrewd look came over Jedrik's face.
"What is it you suspect?"
The woman pointed to the chart on the table.
"Gar still shares in the major decisions. That shouldn't be, but it is. If he
. . ."
The man spoke with subservient eagerness.
"He has some hold on Broey!"
The woman shook her head.
"Or Broey plays a game other than the one we anticipated."
Jedrik looked at the woman, the man, at McKie. She spoke as though to McKie,
but McKie realized she was addressing the air.
"It's a specific thing. Gar has revealed something to Broey. I know what
he's revealed. Nothing else could force Broey to behave this way." She
nodded at the chart. "We have them!"
The woman ventured a question.
"Have we done well?"
"Better than you know."
The man smiled, then:
"Perhaps this is the time to ask if we could have larger rooms. The damn'
children are always moving the furniture. We bump . . ."
"Not now!"
Jedrik arose. McKie followed her example.
"Let me see the children," Jedrik said.
The man turned to the open portal.
"Get out here, you! Jedrik wants you!"
Three children came scurrying from the other room. The woman didn't even look
at them. The man favored them with an angry glare. He spoke to Jedrik.
"They've brought no food into this house in almost a week."
McKie studied the children carefully as he saw Jedrik was doing. They stood
in a row just inside the room and, from their expressions, it was impossible
to tell their reaction to the summons. They were two girls and a boy. The
one on the right, a girl, was perhaps nine; on the left, another girl, was
five or six. The boy was somewhat older, perhaps twelve or thirteen. He
favored McKie with a glance. It was the glance of a predator who recognizes
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ready prey, but who already has eaten. All three bore more resemblance to the
woman than to the man, but the parentage was obvious: the eyes, the set of
the ears, nose . . .
Jedrik had completed her study. She gestured to the boy.
"Start sending him to the second training team."
"About time," the woman said. "We'll be glad to get him out of here."
"Come along, McKie."
In the hall, Jedrik said:
"To answer your question, they're pretty typical." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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