“And where you can’t come up with a commonsense answer, you go oracular on them.”

Again the shrug. “It worked at Delphi and at Ephesus, Gordon. And honestly, where is the harm? The people of the Willamette have seen too many power-hungry monsters over the last twenty years to unite under any man or group of men. But oh, they remember the machines! As they recall that ancient uniform you wear, even though in better days they so often treated it with terrible disrespect.”

There were voices in the hall. They passed close by, then faded away. Gordon stirred, “I’ve got to get out of here.”

Lazarensky laughed. “Oh don’t worry about the others. They’re all talk and no action. They aren’t like you at all.”

“You don’t know me,” Gordon growled.

“No? As ‘Cyclops’ I spoke with you for some hours. And both my adopted daughter and young Peter Aage have talked of you at length. I know more about you than you might imagine.

“You’re a rarity, Gordon. Somehow, out there in the wilderness you managed to retain a modern mind, while gaining a strength suited for these times. Even if that bunch out there ever tried to harm you, you would outsmart them.”

Gordon moved to the door, then stopped. He turned and looked back one last time at the soft glow from the dead machine, the tiny lights rippling hopelessly over and over again.

“I’m not so smart.” His breath was hard in his throat. “You see, I believed!”

He met Lazarensky’s eyes, and finally the old man looked down, unable to answer. Gordon stumbled out then, leaving the death-chilled crypt and its corpses behind him.

12 OREGON

He made it back to where his horse was tethered just as faint glimmers of dawn were brightening the eastern sky. He remounted, and with his heels he guided the filly up the old service road to the north. Within he felt a hollow grief, as if a freezing cold had locked up his heart. Nothing within him could move, for fear of shattering something tottering, precarious.

He had to get away from this place. That much was clear. Let the fools have their myths. He was finished!

He would not return to Sciotown, where he had left the mailbags. All that was behind him now. He began unbuttoning the blouse of his uniform, intending to drop it in a roadside ditch — along, forever, with his share in all the lying.

Unbidden, a phrase echoed in his mind.

Who will take responsibility now… ?

What? He shook his head to clear it, but the words would not go away.

Who will take responsibility now, for these foolish children?

Gordon cursed and dug in his heels. The horse gamely sped northward, away from everything he had treasured only yesterday morning… but now knew to be a Potemkin facade. A cheap, dime store mannequin. Oz.

Who will take responsibility …

The words repeated over and over again within his head, firmly lodged like a tune that would not let go. It was the same rhythm — he realized at last — as the winking lights of the parity display on the face of the old, dead machine, lights that had rippled again and again.

… for these foolish children?

The filly trotted on in the dawnlight past orchards bordered by rows of ruined cars, and a strange thought suddenly occurred to Gordon. What if — at the end of its life, as the last drops of liquid helium evaporated away and the deadly heat rushed in — what if the final thought of the innocent, wise machine had somehow been caught in a loop, preserved in peripheral circuits, to flash forlornly over and over again?

Would that qualify as a ghost?

He wondered, what would Cyclops’s final thoughts, its last words, have been?

Can a man be haunted by the ghost of a machine?

Gordon shook his head. He was tired, or else he would not think up such nonsense. He didn’t owe anybody anything! Certainly not a scrap of ruined tin, or a desiccated specter found in a rusted jeep.

“Ghosts!” He spat on the side of the road and laughed dryly.

Still, the words echoed round and round inside. Who will take responsibility now …

So absorbed was he that it took a few moments at first for him to recognize the faint sounds of shouting behind him. Gordon pulled up on the reins and turned to look back, his hand resting on the butt of his revolver. Anyone who pursued him now did so at great peril. Lazarensky had been right about one thing. Gordon knew he was more than a match for this bunch.

In the distance he saw there was a flurry of frantic activity in front of the House of Cyclops, but… but the commotion apparently did not have to do with him,

Gordon shaded his eyes against the glare of the new sun, and saw steam rising from a pair of heavily lathered horses. One exhausted man stumbled up the steps of the House of Cyclops, shouting at those hurrying to his side.

Another messenger, apparently badly wounded, was being tended on the ground.

Gordon heard one word cried out loudly. It told all.

“Survivalists!”

He had one word to offer in reply.

“Shit.”

He turned his back on the noises and snapped the reins, sending the filly northward once again.

A day ago he would have helped. He’d been willing to lay down his life trying to save Cyclops’s dream, and probably would have done just that.

He would have died for a hollow farce, a ruse, a con game!

If the Holnist invasion had really begun, the villagers south of Eugene would put up a good fight. The raiders would turn north toward the front of least resistance. The soft north Willametters didn’t stand a chance against the Rogue River men.

Still, there probably weren’t enough Holnists to take the entire valley. Corvallis would fall, certainly, but there would be other places to go. Perhaps he might head east on Highway 22, and swing back around to Pine View, It would be nice to see Mrs. Thompson again. Maybe he could be there when Abby’s baby arrived.

The filly trotted on. The shouts died away behind him, like a bad memory slowly fading. It promised to be fair weather, the first in weeks without clouds. A good day for traveling.

As Gordon rode on, a cool breeze blew through his half open shirtfront. A hundred yards down the road he found his hand drifting to the buttons again, twisting one slowly, back and forth.

The pony sauntered, slowed, and came to a halt. Gordon sat, his shoulders hunched forward.

Who will take responsibility …

The words would not go away, lights pulsing in his mind.

The horse tossed her head and snorted, pawing at the ground.

Who… ?”

Gordon cried out, “Aw, hell!” He wheeled the filly about, sending her cantering southward again.

A babbling, frightened crowd of men and women stepped back in hushed silence as he clattered up to the portico of the House of Cyclops. His spirited mount danced and blew as he stared down at the people for a long, silent moment.

Finally, Gordon threw his poncho back. He rebuttoned his shirt and set the postman’s cap on his head so the bright brass rider shone in the light of the rising sun.

He took a deep breath. Then he began pointing, giving terse commands.

In the name of survival — and in the name of the “Restored United States” — the people of Corvallis and the Servants of Cyclops all hurried to obey.