Infinity One by Robert Hoskins (Ed.) Page A

these events had not come in his period of religious revival.
    He had never been much for religion: men who become captains of reconnaissance patrols in major wars were not, after all, profoundly religious types. They accept what they are told, and seldom, if ever, think beyond the conventional wisdom of their millieux.
    But Hawkins had begun to feel twinges of remorse and fear from the moment he landed on the planet—probably helped along by his first view of the caged alien at the entry port. Just as indoctrination had warned, the aliens looked exactly like our own troops.
    Then, too, the more he became aware of the death rate, to say nothing of the fact that the aliens were out to kill all of mankind, the more he began to feel convulsions, succumb to dim, vague fits of gloom in which he visualized himself taking complicated vows of withdrawal. It had some subtly demoralizing effect upon his work. Still, he might have reached some fragile accommodation if it had not been for the business of the dead nun which coalesced all his thinking and began to lead him to the distinct feeling that he was going insane.
    On the sixth night after the removal of the body and the erection of the wooden block, Hawkins cleaned up after he had returned to the area and, in what was the best approximation of dress uniform he could make in the terrain, wandered to the rear where the nuns were; stood idly outside the huts for a time, holding his helmet in one hand; and wondering exactly what he was going to do.

V
    Remember, they had been instructed; the fate of mankind depends upon your showing here, but do not feel in any way that you are under pressure.

VI
    The old nun’s face seemed strangely dull and full. It passed from one of the huts toward another and then, for some reason, stopped and asked him what he wanted.
    “I want to pay my respects to the dead one. To the dead . . In his embarrassment, Hawkins was unable to think of the word. “To the dead female priest,” he said, finally.
    “That would be Teresa,” said the nun. “She never understood what was happening—she always talked of flowers and trees; but she had wanted to come so badly because it was the decision of the order that all of us were to come, without, exception. She said she was afraid, but all things could be part of heaven if they were observed so; and then, of course, she died. You were the one who arranged for her removal?”
    Hawkins nodded dumbly.
    The old nun touched him lightly, two fingers spread to accommodate his wrist, and then led him toward the hut. “It was quite kind of you,” she said. “We wanted to send for Teresa, but they wouldn’t let us. They said it wasn’t permitted. We had to think of how she lay there in indignity—and then you returned her to us.”
    “Well, I tried,” Hawkins said.
    “We couldn’t manage stone, so we used wood. We had to sneak the marker in. She was very unlucky, Teresa. No luck at all.”
    “Unlucky?” Hawkins said. He had always believed that religious people made their own luck, uneven but connected.
    They were at the door of the hut now, that door being comprised of a series of burlap sacks which had been strung together, and she pushed them aside to lead him in.
    “Sit down,” she said, pointing at some spot in the flickering darkness where he could sense a low slung chair. “You’ll want to talk to the Mother Superior.”
    “That wouldn’t be necessary.”
    “It’s the way we do things. But she isn’t prepared yet.”
    “Do you think I could pray here?” Hawkins asked pointlessly. “Would you mind?”
    “If you want to. It doesn’t do much good, though. But we can give you a book.”
    “No books,” Hawkins said. “No books. I want to make up the words all by myself.”
    “Of course,” the nun said, and went away. Hawkins clasped his hands and began to mumble words like FATHER and KYRIE ELEISON and HOLY MARY, which were about all he could remember of the things he had picked up about