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.And this flabby middle—ought to exercise more.Through my office window I can see the world’s ugliest water tower, one of Cambridge’s distinguishing landmarks.Mountains, that’s what should be out there.The solid rock walls of the Himalayas.And the temple of gold is tucked in them somewhere.Pure gold! Din was telling the truth.It’s all gold.And I’m stuck here, like Cary Grant in the stockade.Get me out of here, Din.Get me out.—Please, sahib, don’t take away bugle.Bugle only joy for poor bhisti.—He only wants to be one of us.Wants to be a soldier, like the rest of us.A bugler.McLaglen would laugh at him.Fairbanks would be sympathetic.Let him keep the bugle.He’s going to need it.—Tonight, when everyone sleeping.I go back to temple.—Not now, Din.Not now.Got some soldiering to do.Down in the lab.Test out the new batch of PMD.A soldier’s got to do his duty.The phone.Don’t answer it.It’s only some civilian who wants to make trouble.Leave it ringing and get down to the lab.Wife, sister, mother, they’re all alike.Yes, I’m a man, but I’m a soldier first.You don’t want a man, you want a coward who’d run out on his friends.Well, that’s not me and never was.No, wait—that’s Fairbanks’ speech.He’s Ballantine.And who was the girl? Olivia de Haviland or her sister?The halls are crawling with stockholders.Fat and old.Civilians.Visiting the frontier, inspecting the troops.We’re the only thing standing between you and the darkness, but you don’t know it.Or if you do, you wouldn’t dare admit it.The lab’s always cold as ice.Got to keep it chilled down.If even a whiff of PMD gets out.Elmer, hey, why isn’t the spectrometer ready to go?—You said I could go to the stockholders’ meeting.—Yes, but we’ve still got work to do.When does the meeting start?—Ten sharp.—Well, we’ve still got lots of time.—It’s ten of ten.—What? Can’t be.Is that clock right?—Yep.—He wouldn’t have tampered with the clock; stop being so suspicious.O.K., go on to the meeting.I’ll set it up myself.—O.K., thanks.—But I’m not by myself, of course.Good old grinnin’ gruntin’ Gunga Din.You lazarushin leather Gunga Din.He’s not much help, naturally.What does an actor know about biochemistry? But he talks, and I talk, and the work gets done.—Satisfactory, sahib?—Very regimental, Din.Very regimental.He glows with pride.White teeth against black skin.He’ll die for us.They’ll kill him, up there atop the temple of gold.The Thugees, the wild ones.The cult of death, worshippers of heathen idols.Kali, the goddess of blood.Up to the roof for lunch.The stockholders are using the cafeteria.Let them.It’s better up here, alone.Get the sun into your skin.Let the heat sink in and the glare dazzle your eyes.My god, there they are! The heathens, the Thugees.Swarms of them grumbling outside the gate.Dirty, unkempt.Stranglers and murderers.Already our graves are dug.Their leader, he’s too young to be Cianelli.And he’s bearded; the guru should be clean-shaven.The guards look scared.He’s got a bullhorn.He’s black enough to be the guru, all right.What’s he telling the crowd? I know what he’s saying, even though he tries to disguise the words.Cianelli didn’t hide it, he said it straight out: Kill lest you be killed yourselves.Kill for the love of killing.Kill for the love of Kali.Kill! Kill! Kill!They howl and rush the gate.The guards are bowled over.Not a chance for them.The swarming heathen boil across the parking lot and right into the lab building itself.They’re all over the place.Savages.I can smell smoke.Glass is shattering somewhere down there.People screaming.One of the guards comes puffing up here.Uniform torn and sweaty, face red.—Hey, Doc, better get down the emergency stairs right away.It ain’t safe up here.They’re burning your lab.—I’m a soldier of Her Majesty the Queen.I don’t bow before no heathen!His eyes go wide.He’s scared.Scared of rabble, of heathen rabble.—I’ll.I’ll get somebody to help you, Doc.The fire engines oughtta be here any minute.—Let him run.We can handle it.The Scotties will be here soon.I can hear their bagpipes now, or is it just the heat singing in my ears?They’ll be here.Get up on top of the temple dome, Din.Warn them.Sound your trumpet.The colonel’s got to know! These dark incoherent forces of evil can’t be allowed to win.You know that.Snake worshippers, formless, nameless shadows of death.The Forces of Light and Order have to win out in the end.Western organization and military precision always triumph.It will kill you, Din, I know.But that’s the price of admission.We’ll make you an honorary corporal in the regiment, Din.Your name will be written on the rolls of our honored dead.They’re coming; I know they’re coming.The whole bloomin’ regiment! Climb the golden dome and warn them.Warn them.Warn them!The System“Not just research,” Gorman said, rocking smugly in his swivel chair, “Organized research.”Hopler, the cost-time analyst, nodded agreement.“Organized,” Gorman continued, “and carefully controlled—from above.The System—that’s what gets results.Give the scientists their way and they’ll spend you deaf, dumb, and blind on butterfly sex-ways or sub-subatomic particles.Damned nonsense.”Sitting on the front inch of the visitor’s chair, Hopler asked meekly, “I’m afraid I don’t see what this has to do.”“With the analysis you turned in?” Gorman glanced at the ponderous file that was resting on a corner of his desk
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