Lucifer's Hammer - Larry Niven [223]
"Hold it right there or we shoot!" Hooker yelled.
"Peace be with you, brothers," the man called. He turned back toward those who were following him. "Be not afraid. Stay here, and I will talk with these angels of the Lord."
"A crazy," Hooker said. "Lot of crazies!" He'd seen plenty of them before. He cocked the submachine gun. No point in letting the old goon get too close.
But the man walked in steadily, not afraid at all, facing Hooker's gun and not afraid of it, and certainly there wasn't any threat in his eyes. "You need not fear me," the man said.
"What do you want?" Hooker demanded.
"To talk with you. To bring you the message of the Lord God of Hosts."
"Aw, fuck that shit," Hooker said. His finger tightened on the trigger, but now the old man was too close. Two of Hooker's own people were near enough to the line of fire that Hooker didn't want to risk it. And the man looked harmless enough. Maybe there'd be some fun in this. And what could it hurt to let him come in? "The rest of you stay out there," Hooker yelled. "Gillings, get a squad and check them out."
"Right," Gillings called.
The white-haired man strode to the campfire as if he owned it. He looked into the stewpot and at the others around the fire. "Rejoice," he said. "Your sins are forgiven."
"Now just what do you want?" Hooker demanded. "And don't give me crap about angels and the Lord. Angels." Hooker snorted.
"But you can be angels," the man said. "You were saved from the holocaust. The Hammer of God has fallen upon this wicked world, and you have been spared. Don't you want to know why?"
"Who are you?" Alim Nassor demanded.
"I am the Reverend Henry Armitage," the man said. "A prophet. I know, I know. At the moment I do not look much like a prophet of God. But I am, just the same."
Alim thought Armitage looked very much like a prophet, with his beard and white hair, and that long flowing raincoat, and glittering eyes.
"I know who you are, my brothers," Armitage said. "I know what you have done, and I know it is not easy in your hearts. You have done all manner of sins. You have eaten forbidden foods. But the Lord of Hosts will forgive you, for He has spared you to work His will. You are to be His angels, and to you nothing shall be forbidden!"
"You're crazy," Hooker said.
"Am I?" Armitage chuckled. "Am I? Then you can listen for amusement. Surely a madman cannot harm you, and perhaps I will say something funny."
Alim felt Jackie come up alongside him. "He's good that one," Jackie said. "Notice how he's got the sisters listening? And us, too."
Alim shrugged. There was a compelling quality about the man's voice, and the way he kept shifting, from that preachy jive to just talk, that was good. Just when you thought he was nuts, he'd talk like anybody else.
"What is this mission God has for us?" Jackie called.
"The Hammer of God has fallen to destroy an evil world," Armitage said. "An evil world. God gave us this Earth, and the fruits thereof, and we filled it with corruption. We divided mankind into nations, and within nations we divided men into rich and poor, black and white, and created ghettos for our brothers. 'And if any man has this world's goods and sees his brother in want, and shares not with his brother, that man hath no life.' The Lord gave this world's goods and those who had them knew Him not. They piled bricks upon bricks, they built their fancy houses and palaces, they covered the Earth with the belch and stink of their factories, until the Earth itself was a stench in the nostrils of God!"
"Amen," someone shouted.
"And so His Hammer came to punish the wicked," Armitage said. "It fell, and the wicked died."
"We're not dead," Alim Nassor said.
"And yet you were wicked," Armitage answered. "But we were all wicked, all of us! The Lord God Jehovah held us in the hollow of His hand. He judged us and found us wanting. And yet we live. Why? Why has He spared us?"
Alim was silent