there was another murmur, dying as a pulsing movement began near the back of the room: someone was forcing his way toward rack. in the stillness, another voice said thinly, "my demetrios ... my alexander ..." it was moulios, wailing for his two lost sons.

red-faced, with a lock of black hair hanging over his forehead, the painter vekshin squeezed through to the edge of the table on which rack stood. he shouted, "i'm a man, all right. what do you call yourself, you assassin? you come here with blood dripping from your jaws like a weasel fresh from a poultry yard, and we're supposed to feel sorry for you because they wouldn't let you go on killing! the great god rack! ptui!"

rack did not move. he said quietly, "i killed your enemies, while you sat at home and drank tea."

"enemies!" vekshin roared. "you're the enemy, rack." he put his big hands on the table-top and heaved himself up.

rack let him come. he waited until the russian was standing on the table; then he stepped forward with a motion so smooth it seemed casual. there was a flurry of blows, none of which landed except two: one in vekshin's midriff, the other on the point of his jaw. five men went down as vekshin's body hurtled into them.

rack stepped back. "i have very little patience left," he said, "but if there is anyone else here with a personal grudge, let him step up."

two men at the table's edge moved as if to climb up. rack put his hand to the gun at his belt. the two men stayed where they were.

rack stared out over the crowd. he looked suddenly very weary. it occurred to cudyk that he must have gone without sleep for a long time.

rack said: "this is the last call. i am not trying to deceive you. i promise you nothing, not glory, not your lives, not even that you will be able to spend your lives usefully. but if there is any man here who will serve aboard the armageddon, in the last fight for mankind—raise your hand!"

there was a long moment's silence. rack turned abruptly, with his hand still on his gun, and said to the men in front of cudyk: "stand back!"

the silence held for an instant, while the men at the table's end moved uncertainly away; then sound broke like an avalanche. as rack jumped down, the crowd surged toward him, no longer an audience but a mob. cudyk felt the pressure at his back, caught a glimpse of rack's face, then heard the deafening report of the gun as he went hurtling forward into the melee.

the gun did not fire again. cudyk was squeezed tightly in the center of the struggling mass. he saw seu, a few feet away. the mayor's mouth was open; he was shouting something, but the words were lost.

suddenly rack came into view again, charging straight toward cudyk, hurling bodies to either side. the lower half of his face was a smear of blood; his cap and jacket were gone, his shirt torn half away.

cudyk was half-aware of the constriction in his throat, the pounding of blood at his temples. he wrenched one arm free and, as rack came near, struck him full in the face.

he had one more glimpse of rack's white features, the pale eyes staring at him with a curiously detached expression: the eyes of a caesar or a christ, reproachful and sad. then the crowd surged once more, the door to the back stairway slammed open, and rack was gone.

cudyk found himself running through the doorway with half a dozen others. he caught sight of rack leaping down the stairs, just short of the landing where the narrow stairway doubled back on itself.

with a regretful sigh, feeling no surprise at what he was about to do, cudyk put both hands on the railing and swung himself over into vacancy. then there was an instant of wild, soaring flight, rack's foreshortened body drifting beneath him, and the shock.