Captain Carter was grim. "So they've bought him off, have they? Go bring him in here, Gregg. We'll have it out with him now."
Snap, Dr. Frank, Balch, our first officer, and I were in the Captain's chart room. It was fourp.m.Earth time. We were sixteen hours upon our voyage.
I found Johnson in his office in the lounge. "Captain wants to see you. Close up."
He closed his window upon an American woman passenger who was demanding the details of Martian currency, and followed me forward. "What is it, Gregg?"
"I don't know."
Captain Carter banged the slide upon us. The chart room was insulated. The hum of the current was obvious. Johnson noticed it. He stared at the hostile faces of the surgeon and Balch. And he tried to bluster.
"What's this? Something wrong?"
Carter wasted no words. "We have information, Johnson, that there's some undercover plot aboard. I want to know what it is. Suppose you tell us."
The purser looked blank. "What do you mean? We've gamblers aboard, if that's—"
"To hell with that," growled Balch. "You had a secret interview with that Martian,SetMiko, and with George Prince!"
Johnson scowled from under his heavy brows, and then raised them in surprise. "Did I? You mean changing their money? I don't like your tone, Balch. I'm not your under-officer!"
"But you're under me!" roared the Captain. "By God, I'm master here!"
"Well, I'm not disputing that," said the purser mildly. "This fellow—"
"We're in no mood for argument," Dr. Frank cut in. "Clouding the issue...."
"I won't let it be clouded," the Captain exclaimed.
I had never seen Carter so choleric. He added:
"Johnson, you've been acting suspiciously. I don't give a damn whether I've proof of it or not. Did you or did you not meet George Prince and that Martian, last night?"
"No, I did not. And I don't mind telling you, Captain Carter, that your tone also is offensive!"
"Is it?" Carter seized him. They were both big men. Johnson's heavy face went purplish red.
"Take your hands—!" They were struggling. Carter's hands were fumbling at the purser's pockets. I leaped, flung an arm around Johnson's neck, pinning him.
"Easy there! We've got you, Johnson!"
Snap tried to help me. "Go on! Bang him on the head, Gregg. Now's your chance!"
We searched him. A heat ray cylinder—that was legitimate. But we found a small battery and eavesdropping device similar to the one Venza had mentioned that Shac the gambler was carrying.
"What are you doing with that?" the Captain demanded.
"None of your business! Is it criminal? Carter, I'll have the line officials dismiss you for this! Take your hands off me—all of you!"
"Look at this!" exclaimed Dr. Frank.
From Johnson's breast pocket the surgeon drew a folded document. It was a scale drawing of thePlanetarainterior corridors, the lower control rooms and mechanisms. It was always kept in Johnson's safe. And with it, another document: the ship's clearance papers—the secret code passwords for this voyage, to be used if we should be challenged by any Interplanetary Police ship.
Snap gasped, "My God, that was in my radio room strong box! I'm the only one on this vessel except the Captain who's entitled to know those passwords!"
Out of the silence, Balch demanded, "Well, what about it, Johnson?"
The purser was still defiant. "I won't answer your questions, Balch. At the proper time, I'll explain—Gregg Haljan, you're choking me!"
I eased up. But I shook him. "You'd better talk."
He was exasperatingly silent.
"Enough!" exploded Carter. "He can explain when we get to port. Meanwhile I'll put him where he'll do no more harm. Gregg, lock him in the cage."
We ignored his violent protestations. The cage—in the old days of sea vessels on Earth, they called it the brig—was the ship's jail. A steel-lined, windowless room located under the deck in the peak of the bow. I dragged the struggling Johnson there, with the amazed watcher looking down from the observatory window at our lunging starlit forms.
"Shut up, Johnson! If you know what's good for you—"
He was making a fearful commotion. Behind us, where the deck narrowed at the superstructure, half a dozen passengers were gazing in surprise.
"I'll have you thrown out of the service, Gregg Haljan!"
I shut him up finally. And flung him down the ladder into the cage and sealed the deck trap door upon him. I was headed back for the chart room when from the observatory came the lookout's voice:
"An asteroid, Haljan! Officer Blackstone wants you."
I hurried to the turret bridge. An asteroid was in sight. We had nearly attained our maximum speed now. An asteroid was approaching, so dangerously close that our trajectory would have to be altered. I heard Blackstone's signals ringing in the control rooms; and met Carter as he ran to the bridge with me.
"That scoundrel! We'll get more out of him, Gregg. ByGod, I'll put the chemicals on him—torture him—illegal or not!"
We had no time for further discussion. The asteroid was rapidly approaching. Already, under the glass, it was a magnificent sight. I had never seen this tiny world before—asteroids are not numerous between the Earth and Mars, or in toward Venus.
At a speed of nearly a hundred miles a second the asteroid swept into view. With the naked eye, at first it was a tiny speck of star-dust unnoticeable in the gem-strewn black velvet of space. A speck. Then a gleaming dot, silver white, with the light of our Sun upon it.
I stood with Carter and Blackstone on the turret bridge. It was obvious, that unless we altered our course, the asteroid would pass too close for safety. Already we were feeling its attraction; from the control rooms came the report that our trajectory was disturbed by this new mass so near.
"Better make your calculations now, Gregg," Blackstone urged.
I cast up the rough elements from the observational instruments in the turret. When I had us upon our new course, with the attractive and repulsive plates in thePlanetara'shull set in their altered combinations, I went to the bridge again.
The asteroid hung over our bow quarter. No more than twenty or thirty thousand miles away. A giant ball now, filling all that quadrant of the heavens. The configurations of its mountains, its land and water areas, were plainly visible.
"Perfectly habitable," Blackstone said. "But I've searched all over the hemisphere with the glass. No sign of human life—certainly nothing civilized—nothing in the fashion of cities."
A fair little world, by the look of it. A tiny globe, come from the region beyond Neptune. We swept past the asteroid. The passengers were all gathered to view the passing little world. I saw, not far from me, Anita, standing with her brother; and the giant figure of Miko with them. Half an hour since this wandering little world had showed itself,it swiftly passed, began to dwindle behind us. A huge half moon. A thinner, smaller quadrant. A tiny crescent, like a silver barpin to adorn some lady's breast. And then it was a dot, a point of light indistinguishable among the myriad others hovering in this great black void.
The incident of the passing of the asteroid was over. I turned from the deck window. My heart leaped. The moment for which all day I had been subconsciously longing was at hand. Anita was sitting in a deck chair, momentarily alone. Her gaze was on me as I glanced her way, and she smiled an invitation for me to join her.
"But, Miss Prince, why are you and your brother going to Ferrok-Shahn? His business—"
Even as I voiced it, I hated myself for such a question. So nimble in the humble mind that mingled with my rhapsodies of love, was my need for information of George Prince.
"Oh," she said. "This is pleasure, not business, for George." It seemed to me that a shadow crossed her face. But it was gone in an instant, and she smiled. "We have always wanted to travel. We are alone in the world, you know—our parents died when we were children."
I filled in her pause. "You will like Mars. So many interesting things to see."
She nodded. "Yes, I understand so. Our Earth is so much the same all over, cast all in one mould."
"But a hundred or more years ago, it was not, Miss Prince. I have read how the picturesque Orient, differing from ... well, Greater New York or London, for instance—"
"Transportation did that," she interrupted eagerly. "Made everything the same—the people all look alike ... dress alike."
We discussed it. She had an alert, eager mind, childlike with its curiosity, yet strangely matured. And her mannerwas naïvely earnest. Yet this was no clinging vine, this Anita Prince. There was a firmness, a hint of masculine strength in her chin and in her manner.
"If I were a man, what wonders I could achieve in this marvelous age!" Her sense of humor made her laugh at herself. "Easy for a girl to say that," she added.
"You have greater wonders to achieve, Miss Prince," I said impulsively.
"Yes? What are they?" She had a very frank and level gaze, devoid of coquetry.
My heart was pounding. "The wonders of the next generation. A little son, cast in your own gentle image—"
What madness, this clumsy, brash talk! I choked it off.
But she took no offense. The dark rose-petals of her cheeks were mantled deeper red, but she laughed.
"That is true." She turned abruptly serious. "I should not laugh. The wonders of the next generation—conquering humans marching on...." Her voice trailed away. My hand went to her arm. Strange tingling something which poets call love! It burned and surged through my trembling fingers into the flesh of her forearm.
The starlight glowed in her eyes. She seemed to be gazing, not at the silver-lit deck, but away into distant reaches of the future.
Our moment. Just a breathless moment given us as we sat there with my hand burning her arm, as though we both might be seeing ourselves joined in a new individual—a little son, cast in his mother's gentle image and with the strength of his father. Our moment, and then it was over. A step sounded. I sat back. The giant gray figure of Miko came past, his great cloak swaying, with his clanking sword ornament beneath it. His bullet head, with its close-clipped hair, was hatless. He gazed at us, swaggering past, and turned the deck corner.
Our moment was gone. Anita said conventionally, "It has been pleasant to talk with you, Mr. Haljan."
"But we'll have many more," I said. "Ten days—"
"You think we'll reach Ferrok-Shahn on schedule?"
"Yes. I think so.... As I was saying, Miss Prince, you'll enjoy Mars. A strange, aggressively forward-looking people."
An oppression seemed on her. She stirred in her chair.
"Yes they are," she said vaguely. "My brother and I know many Martians in Greater New York." She checked herself abruptly. Was she sorry she had said that? It seemed so.
Miko was coming back. He stopped this time. "Your brother would see you, Anita. He sent me to bring you to his room."
The glance he shot me had a touch of insolence. I stood up and he towered a head over me.
Anita said, "Oh yes. I'll come."
I bowed. "I will see you again, Miss Prince. I thank you for a pleasant half-hour."
The Martian led her away. Her little figure was like a child with a giant. It seemed, as they passed the length of the deck, with me staring after them, that he took her arm roughly. And that she shrank from him in fear.
And they did not go inside. As though to show me that he had merely taken her from me, he stopped at a distant deck window and stood talking to her. Once he picked her up as one would pick up a child to show it some distant object through the window.
Was Anita afraid of this Martian's wooing? Yet was held to him by some power he might have over her brother? The vagrant thought struck me.
The rest of that afternoon and evening were a blank confusion to me. Anita's words, the touch of my hand on her arm, that vast realm of what might be for us, like the glimpse of a magic land of happiness which I had seen in her eyes, and perhaps she had seen in mine—all this surged within me.
After wandering about the ship, I had a brief consultation with Captain Carter. He was genuinely apprehensive now. ThePlanetaracarried only a half-dozen of the heat-ray projectors, no long range weapons, a few side arms, and some old-fashioned, practically antiquated weapons of explosives, plus hand projectors with the new Benson curve light.
The weapons were all in Carter's chart room, save the few we officers always carried. Carter was afraid, but of what, he was not sure. He had not thought that our plan to stop at the Moon could affect this outward voyage. He had thought that any danger would occur on the way back, and then thePlanetarawould have been adequately guarded and manned with police-soldiers.
But now we were practically defenseless. I had a moment with Venza, but she had nothing new to communicate. And for half an hour I chatted with George Prince. He seemed a gay, pleasant young man. I could almost have fancied I liked him. Or was it because he was Anita's brother? He told me how he looked forward to traveling with her on Mars. No, he had never been there before, he said.
He had a measure of Anita's earnest naïve personality. Or was he a very clever scoundrel, with irony lurking in his soft voice, and a chuckle that could so befool me?
"Well talk again, Haljan. You interest me—I've enjoyed it."
He sauntered away from me, joining the saturnine Ob Hahn, with whom presently I heard him discussing religion.
The arrest of Johnson had caused considerable discussion among the passengers. A few had seen me drag him forward to the cage. The incident had been the subject of discussion all afternoon. Captain Carter had posted a notice to the effect that Johnson's accounts had been found in serious error, and that Dr. Frank for this voyage would act in his stead.
It was near midnight when Snap and I closed and sealed the radio room and started for the chart room, where we were to meet with Captain Carter and the other officers.The passengers had nearly all retired. A game was in progress in the smoking room, but the deck was almost deserted.
Snap and I were passing along one of the interior corridors. The stateroom doors were all closed. The metal grid of the floor echoed our footsteps. Snap was in advance of me. His body suddenly rose in the air. He went like a balloon to the ceiling, struck it gently, and all in a heap came floating down and landed on the floor!
"What in the infernal—"
He was laughing as he picked himself up. But it was a brief laugh. We knew what had happened: the artificial gravity controls in the base of the ship, which by magnetic force gave us normality aboard, were being tampered with! For just this instant, this particular small section of this corridor had been cut off. The slight bulk of thePlanetara, floating in space, had no appreciable gravity pull on Snap's body, and the impulse of his step as he came to the unmagnetized area of the corridor had thrown him to the ceiling. The area was normal now. Snap and I tested it gingerly.
He gripped me. "That never went wrong by accident, Gregg! Someone—"
We rushed to the nearest descending ladder. In the deserted lower room the bank of dials stood neglected. A score of dials and switches were here, governing the magnetism of different areas of the ship. There should have been a night operator, but he was gone.
Than we saw him lying nearby, sprawled, face down on the floor! In the silence and dim, lurid glow of the fluorescent tubes, we stood holding our breaths, peering and listening. No one here.
The guard was not dead. He lay unconscious from a blow on the head. A brawny fellow. We had him revived in a few moments. A broadcast flash of the call buzz brought Dr. Frank from the chart room.
"What's the matter?"
"Someone was here," I said hastily, "experimenting with the magnetic switches. Evidently unfamiliar with them—pulling one or another to test their workings and so see their reactions on the dials."
We told him what had happened to Snap in the corridor; the guard here was no worse off for the episode, save a lump on the head by an invisible assailant. We left him nursing his head, sitting belligerent at his post, alert to any danger and armed now with my heat-ray cylinder.
"Strange doings this voyage," he told us. "All the crew knows it. I'll stick it out now, but when we get back home I'm done with this star travelin'. I belong on the sea anyway."
We hurried back to the upper level. We would indeed have to plan something at this chart room conference. This was the first tangible attack our adversaries had made.
We were on the passenger deck headed for the chart room when all three of us stopped short, frozen with horror. Through the silent passenger quarters a scream rang out! A girl's shuddering, gasping scream. Terror in it. Horror. Or a scream of agony. In the silence of the dully vibrating ship it was utterly horrible.... It lasted an instant—a single long scream; then was abruptly stilled.
And with blood pounding my temples and rushing like ice through my veins, I recognized it.
Anita!
"Good God, what was that?" Dr. Frank's face had gone white. Snap stood like a statue of horror.
The deck here was patched as always, with silver radiance from the deck ports. The empty deck chairs stood about. The scream was stilled, but now we heard a commotion inside—the rasp of opening cabin doors; questions from frightened passengers.
I found my voice. "Anita! Anita Prince!"
"Come on!" shouted Snap. "In her stateroom, A22!" He was dashing for the lounge archway.
Dr. Frank and I followed. I realized that we passed the deck door and window of A22. But they were dark, and evidently sealed on the inside. The dim lounge was in a turmoil; passengers standing at their cabin doors.
I shouted, "Go back to your rooms! We want order here—keep back!"
We came to the twin doors of A22 and A20. Both were closed. Dr. Frank was in advance of Snap and me now. He paused at the sound of Captain Carter's voice behind us.
"Was it from in there? Wait a moment!"
Carter dashed up. He had a large heat-ray projector in his hand. He shoved us aside. "Let me in first. Is the door sealed? Gregg, keep those passengers back!"
The door was not sealed. Carter burst into the room. I heard him gasp, "Good God!"
Snap and I shoved back three or four passengers. And in that instant Dr. Frank had been in the room and out again.
"There's been an accident! Get back, Gregg! Snap, help me keep the crowd away." He shoved me forcibly.
From within, Carter was shouting, "Keep them out! Where are you, Frank? Come back here! Send a flash for Balch!"
Dr. Frank went back into the room and banged the cabin door upon Snap and me. I was unarmed. Weapon in hand, Snap forced the panic-stricken passengers back to their rooms.
Snap reassured them glibly; but he knew no more about the facts than I. Moa, with a nightrobe drawn tight around her thin, tall figure, edged up to me.
"What has happened,SetHaljan?"
I gazed around for her brother Miko, but did not see him.
"An accident," I said shortly. "Go back to your room. Captain's orders."
She eyed me and then retreated. Snap was threateningeverybody with his cylinder. Balch dashed up. "What in hell! Where is Carter?"
"In there." I pounded on A22. It opened cautiously. I could see only Carter, but I heard the murmuring voice of Dr. Frank through the interior connecting door to A20.
The Captain rasped, "Get out, Haljan! Oh, is that you, Balch? Come in." He admitted the older officer and slammed the door upon me again. And immediately reopened it.
"Gregg, keep the passengers quieted. Tell them everything's all right. Miss Prince got frightened—that's all. Then go to the turret. Tell Blackstone what's happened."
"But I don't know what's happened."
Carter was grim and white. He whispered, "I think it may turn out to be murder, Gregg! No, not dead yet.... Dr. Frank is trying ... don't stand there like an ass, man. Get to the turret! Verify our trajectory—no—wait...."
The Captain was almost incoherent. "Wait a minute. I don't mean that! Tell Snap to watch his radio room. Arm yourselves and guard our weapons."
I stammered, "If ... if she dies ... will you flash us word?"
He stared at me strangely. "I'll be there presently, Gregg."
He slammed the door upon me.
I followed his orders but it was like a dream of horror. The turmoil of the ship gradually quieted. Snap went to the radio room; Blackstone and I sat in the tiny chart room; how much time passed, I do not know. I was confused. Anita hurt! She might die ... murdered.... But why? By whom? Had George Prince been in his own room when the attack came? I thought now I recalled hearing the low murmur of his voice in there with Dr. Frank.
Where was Miko? It stabbed at me. I had not seen him among the passengers in the lounge.
Carter came into the chart room. "Gregg, you get to bed. You look like a ghost."
"But—"
"She's not dead. She may live. Dr. Frank and her brotherare with her. They're doing all they can." He told us what had happened. Anita and George Prince had both been asleep, each in his respective room. Someone unknown had opened Anita's corridor door.
"Wasn't it sealed?"
"Yes. But the intruder opened it."
"Burst it? I didn't think it was broken."
"It wasn't broken. The assailant opened it somehow, and assaulted Miss Prince—shot her in the chest with a heat ray. Her left lung."
"Shot her?"
"Yes. But she did not see who did it. Nor did Prince. Her scream awakened him, but the intruder evidently fled out the corridor door of A22, the way he entered."
I stood weak and shaken at the chart room entrance. Anita—dying, perhaps; and all my dreams were fading into a memory of what might have been.
I was glad enough to get away. I would lie down for an hour and then go to Anita's stateroom. I'd demand that Dr. Frank let me see her.
I went to the stern deck where my cubby was located. My mind was confused but some instinct within me made me verify the seals of my door and window. They were intact. I entered cautiously, switched on the dimmer of the tube lights, and searched the room. It had only a bunk, my tiny desk, a chair and clothes robe. There was no evidence of any intruder here. I set my door and window alarm. Then I audiphoned to the radio room.
"Snap?"
"Yes."
I told him about Anita. Carter cut in on us from the chart room. "Stop that, you fools!"
We cut off. Fully dressed, I flung myself on my bed. Anita might die....
I must have fallen into a tortured sleep, I was awakened by the sound of my alarm buzzer. Someone was tampering with my door! Then the buzzer ceased; the marauder outside must have found a way of silencing it. But it had done its work—awakened me.
I had switched off the light; my cubby was Stygian black. A heat cylinder was in the bunk-bracket over my head. I searched for it, pried it loose softly.
I was fully awake. Alert. I could hear a faint sizzling—someone outside trying to unseal the door. In the darkness, cylinder in hand, I crept softly from the bunk. Crouched at the door. This time I would capture or kill this night prowler.
The sizzling was faintly audible. My door seal was breaking. Upon impulse I reached for the door, jerked it open.
No one there! The starlit segment of deck was empty. But I leaped and struck a solid body, crouching in the doorway. A giant man. Miko!
His electronized metallic robe burned my hands. I lunged against him—I was almost as surprised as he. I shot, but the stab of heat evidently missed him. The shock of my encounter, short-circuited his robe; he materialized in the starlight. A brief, savage encounter. He struck the weapon from my hand. He had dropped his hydrogen torch, and tried to grip me. But I twisted away from his hold.
"So it's you!"
"Quiet, Gregg Haljan! I only want to talk."
Without warning, a stab of radiance shot from a weapon in his hand. It caught me. Ran like ice through my veins. Seized and numbed my limbs.
I fell helpless to the deck. Nerves and muscles paralyzed. My tongue was thick and inert. I could not speak, nor move. But I could see Miko bending over me, and hear him:
"I don't want to kill you, Haljan. We need you."
He gathered me up like a bundle in his huge arms; carried me swiftly across the deserted deck.
Snap's radio room in the network under the dome was diagonally overhead. A white actinic light shot from it—caught us, bathed us. Snap had been awake; had heard the commotion of our encounter.
His voice rang shrilly: "Stop! I'll shoot!" His warning siren rang out to alert the ship. His spotlight clung to us.
Miko ran with me a few steps. Then he cursed and dropped me; fled away. I fell like a sack of carbide to the deck. My senses faded into blackness....
"He's all right now."
I was in the chart room with Captain Carter, Snap and Dr. Frank bending over me. The surgeon said,
"Can you speak now, Gregg?"
I tried it. My tongue was thick, but it moved. "Yes." I was soon revived. I sat up, with Dr. Frank vigorously rubbing me.
"I'm all right." I told them what had happened.
Captain Carter said, "Yes, we know that. And it was Miko also who killed Anita Prince. She told us before she died."
"Died!..." I leaped to my feet. "She ... died...."
"Yes, Gregg. An hour ago. Miko got into her stateroom and tried to force his love upon her. She repulsed him. He killed her...."
It struck me blank. And then with a rush came the thought, "He says Miko killed her"....
I heard myself stammering, "Why—why we must get him!" I gathered my wits; a surge of hate swept me; a wild desire for vengeance.
"Why, by God, where is he? Why don't you go get him? I'll get him—I'll kill him!"
"Easy, Gregg!" Dr. Frank gripped me.
The Captain said gently. "We know how you feel, Gregg. She told us before she died."
"I'll bring him in here to you! But I'll kill him, I tell you!"
"No you won't, lad. We don't want him killed, not attacked, even. Not yet. We'll explain later."
They sat me down, calming me....
Anita dead. The door of the shining garden was closed. A brief glimpse given to me and to her of what might have been. And now she was dead....
I had not been able at first to understand why Captain Carter wanted Miko left at liberty. Within me there was that cry of vengeance, as though to strike Miko down would somehow lessen my own grief. Whatever Carter's purpose, Snap had not known it. But Balch and Dr. Frank were in the Captain's confidence—all three of them working on some plan of action.
It was obvious that at least two of our passengers were plotting with Miko and George Prince; trying on this voyage to learn what they could about Grantline's activities on the Moon—scheming doubtless to seize the treasure when thePlanetarastopped at the Moon on the return voyage. I thought I could name those masquerading passengers. Ob Hahn, supposedly a Venus mystic. And Rance Rankin, who called himself an American magician. Those two, Snap and I agreed, seemed most suspicious. And there was the purser.
I sat for a time on the deck outside the chart room with Snap. Then Carter summoned us back, and we sat listening while he, Balch and Dr. Frank went on with their conference. Listening to them, I could not but agree that our best plan was to secure evidence which would incriminate all who were concerned in the plot. Miko, we were convinced, had been the Martian who followed Snap and me from Halsey's office in Greater New York. George Prince had doubtless been the invisible eavesdropper outside the radio room. He knew, and had told the others that Grantline had found that priceless metal on the Moon and that thePlanetarawould stop there on the way home.
But we could not incarcerate George Prince for being an eavesdropper. Nor had we the faintest possible evidenceagainst Ob Hahn or Rankin. And even the purser would probably be released by the Interplanetary Court of Ferrok-Shahn when it heard our evidence.
There was only Miko. We could arrest him for the murder of Anita. But if we did that now, the others would be put on their guard. It was Carter's idea to let Miko remain at liberty for a time and see if we could identify and incriminate his fellows. The murder of Anita obviously had nothing to do with any plot against Grantline Moon treasure.
"Why," exclaimed Balch, "there might be—probably are—huge Martian interests concerned in this thing. These men aboard are only emissaries, making this voyage to learn what they can. When they get to Ferrok-Shahn, they'll make their report, and then we'll have a real danger on our hands. Why, an outlaw ship could be launched from Ferrok-Shahn that would beat us back to the Moon—and Grantline is entirely without warning of any danger!"
It seemed obvious. Unscrupulous criminals in Ferrok-Shahn would be dangerous indeed, once these details of Grantline were given them. So now it was decided that in the remaining nine days of our outward voyage, we would attempt to secure enough evidence to arrest all these plotters.
"I'll have them all in the cage when we land," declared Carter grimly. "They'll make no report to their principals!"
Ah, the futile plans of men!
Yet, at the time, we thought it practical. We were all doubly armed now. Bullet projectors and heat ray cylinders. And we had several eavesdropping microphones which we planned to use whenever occasion offered.
Only twenty-eight hours of this eventful voyage had passed. ThePlanetarawas some six million miles from the Earth; it blazed behind us, a tremendous giant.
The body of Anita was being made ready for burial. George Prince was still in his stateroom. Glutz, effeminate little hairdresser, who waxed rich acting as beauty doctor for the women passengers, and who, in his youth, had beenan undertaker, had gone with Dr. Frank to prepare the body.
Gruesome details. I tried not to think of them. I sat, numbed, in the chart room.
An astronomical burial—there was little precedent for it. I dragged myself to the stern deck where, at fivea.m., the ceremony took place.
We were a solemn little group, gathered there in the checkered starlight with the great vault of the heavens around us. A dismantled electronic projector—necessary when a long range gun was mounted—had been rigged up in one of the deck ports.
They brought out the body. I stood apart, gazing reluctantly at the small bundle, wrapped like a mummy in a dark metallic screen-cloth. A patch of black silk rested over her face. Four cabin stewards carried her; and beside her walked George Prince. A long black robe covered him, but his head was bare. And suddenly he reminded me of the ancient play-character of Hamlet. His black, wavy hair; his finely chiseled, pallid face, set now in a stern patrician cast. And staring, I realized that however much of the villain this man might be, at this instant, walking beside the body of his dead sister, he was stricken with grief. He loved that sister with whom he had lived since childhood; and to see him now no one could doubt it.
The little procession stopped in a patch of starlight by the port. They rested the body on a bank of chairs. The black-robed chaplain, roused from his bed and still trembling from excitement of this sudden, inexplicable death on board, said a brief, solemn little prayer. An appeal: That the Almighty Ruler of all these blazing worlds might guard the soul of this gentle girl whose mortal remains were now to be returned to Him.
Ah, if ever God seemed hovering close, it was now at this instant, on this starlit deck floating in the black void of space.
Then Carter for just a moment removed the black shroud from her face. I saw her brother gaze silently; saw him stoopand implant a kiss—and turn away. I did not want to look, but I found myself moving slowly forward.
She lay, so beautiful. Her face, white and calm and peaceful in death. My sight blurred.
"Easy Gregg," Snap was whispering to me. He had his arm around me. "Come on away."
They tied the shroud over her face. I did not see them as they put the body in the tube, sent it through the exhaust chamber and dropped it.
But a moment later I saw it, a small black, oblong bundle hovering beside us. It was perhaps a hundred feet away, circling us. Held by thePlanetara'sbulk, it had momentarily become our satellite. It swung around us like a moon. Gruesome satellite, by nature's laws forever to follow us.
Then from another tube at the bow, Blackstone operated a small zed-co-ray projector. Its dull light caught the floating bundle, neutralizing its metallic wrappings.
It swung off at a tangent. Speeding. Falling free in the dome of the heavens. A rotating black oblong. But in a moment distance dwindled it to a speck. A dull silver dot with the sunlight on it. A speck of human Earth dust, falling free....
It vanished. Anita—gone.
I turned from the deck. Miko was near me! So he had dared show himself here among us! But I realized he could not be aware we knew he was the murderer. George Prince had been asleep, had not seen Miko with Anita. Miko, with impulsive rage had shot the girl and escaped. No doubt now he was cursing himself for having done it. And he could very well assume that Anita had died without regaining consciousness to tell who had killed her.
He gazed at me now. I thought for an instant he was coming over to talk with me. Though he probably consideredhe was not suspected of the murder of Anita, he realized, of course, that his attack on me was known. He must have wondered what action would be taken.
But he did not approach me. He moved away and went inside. Moa had been near him; and as though by prearrangement with him she now accosted me.
"I want to speak to you,SetHaljan."
"Go ahead."
I felt an instinctive aversion to this Martian girl. Yet she was not unattractive. Over six feet tall, straight and slim. Sleek blond hair. Rather a handsome face; not gray, like the burly Miko, but pink and white; stern lipped, but feminine, too. She was smiling gravely now. Her blue eyes regarded me keenly. She said gently:
"A sad occurrence, Gregg Haljan. And mysterious. I would not question you—"
"Is that all you have to say?" I demanded.
"No. You are a handsome man, Gregg—attractive to women—to any Martian woman."
She said it impulsively. Admiration for me was on her face, in her eyes—a man cannot miss it.
"Thank you."
"I mean, I would be your friend. My brother Miko is so sorry about what happened between you and him this morning. He only wanted to talk to you, and he came to your cubby door—"
"With a torch to break its seal," I interjected.
She waved that away. "He was afraid you would not admit him. He told you he would not harm you."
"And so he struck me with one of your Martian paralyzing rays!"
"He is sorry...."
She seemed gauging me, trying, no doubt, to find out what reprisal would be taken against her brother. I felt sure that Moa was as active as a man in any plan that was under way to capture the Grantline treasure. Miko, with his ungovernable temper, was doing things that put their plans in jeopardy.
I demanded, "What did your brother want to talk to me about?"
"Me," she said surprisingly. "I sent him. A Martian girl goes after what she wants. Did you know that?"
She swung on her heel and left me. I puzzled over it. Was that why Miko struck me down and was carrying me off? I did not think so. I could not believe that all these incidents were so unrelated to what I knew was the main undercurrent They wanted me, had tried to capture me for something else.
Dr. Frank found me mooning alone. "Go to bed, Gregg. You look awful."
"I don't want to go to bed."
"Where's Snap?"
"I don't know. He was here a little while ago." I had not seen him since the burial of Anita.
"The Captain wants him," he said.
Within an hour the morning siren would arouse the passengers. I was seated in a secluded corner of the deck, when George Prince came along. He went past me, a slight, somber, dark-robed figure. He had on high, thick boots. A hood was over his head, but as he saw me he pushed it back and dropped down beside me.
For a moment he did not speak. His face showed pallid in the dim starlight.
"She said you loved her." His soft voice was throaty with emotion.
"Yes." I said it almost against my will. There seemed a bond springing between this bereaved brother and me. He added, so softly I could barely hear him: "That makes you, I think, almost my friend. And you thought you were my enemy."
I held my answer. An incautious tongue running under emotion is a dangerous thing. And I was sure of nothing.
He went on, "Almost my friend. Because—we both loved her, and she loved us both." He was hardly more than whispering. "And there is aboard one whom we both hate."
"Miko!" It burst from me.
"Yes. But do not say it."
Another silence fell between us. He brushed back the black curls from his forehead. "Have you an eavesdropping microphone, Haljan?"
I hesitated. "Yes."
"I was thinking...." He leaned closer. "If, in half an hour, you could use it upon Miko's cabin—I would rather tell you than anyone else. The cabin will be insulated, but I shall find a way of cutting off that insulation so that you can hear."
So George Prince had turned with us. The shock of his sister's death—himself allied with her murderer—had been too much for him. He was with us!
Yet his help must be given secretly. Miko would kill him instantly if it became known. He had been watchful of the deck. He stood up now.
"I think that is all."
As he turned away, I murmured, "But I do thank you...."
The nameSetMiko glowed upon the door. It was in a transverse corridor similar to A22. The corridor was forward of the lounge: it opened off the small circular library.
The library was unoccupied and unlighted, dim with only the reflected lights from the nearby passages. I crouched behind a cylinder case. The door of Miko's room was in sight.
I waited perhaps five minutes. No one entered. Then I realized that doubtless the conspirators were already there. I set my tiny eavesdropper on the library floor beside me; connected its little battery; focused its projector. Was Miko's room insulated? I could not tell. There was a small ventilating grid above the door. Across its opening, if the room was insulated, a blue sheen of radiance would be showing. And there would be a faint hum. But from this distance I could not see or hear such details, and I was afraid to approach closer. Once in the transverse corridor, I would haveno place to hide, no way of escape. If anyone approached Miko's door, I would be trapped.
I threw the current into my apparatus. I prayed, if it met interference, that the slight sound would pass unnoticed. George Prince had said that he would make opportunity to disconnect the room's insulation. He had evidently done so. I picked up the interior sounds at once; my headphone vibrated with them. And with trembling fingers on the little dial between my knees as I crouched in the darkness behind the cylinder case, I synchronized.
"Johnson is a fool." It was Miko's voice. "We must have the passwords."
"He got them from the radio room." A man's voice: I puzzled over it at first, then recognized it. Rance Rankin.
Miko said, "He is a fool. Walking around this ship as though with letters blazoned on his forehead, 'Watch me.... I need watching.' Hah! No wonder they apprehended him!"
Rankin's voice said: "He would have turned the papers over to us. I would not blame him too much. What harm—"
"Oh, I'll release him," Miko declared. "What harm? That braying ass did us plenty of harm. He has lost the passwords. Better he had left them in the radio room."
Moa was in the room. Her voice said, "We've got to have them. ThePlanetara, upon such an important voyage as this, might be watched."
"No doubt it is," Rankin said quietly. "We ought to have the passwords. When we are in control of this ship...."
It sent a shiver through me. Were they planning to try and seize thePlanetara? Now? It seemed so.
"Johnson undoubtedly memorized them," Moa was saying. "When we get him out—"
"Hahn is to do that, at the signal." Miko added, "George could do it better, perhaps."
And then I heard George Prince for the first time, "I'll try."
"No need," Miko said unexpectedly.
I could not see what had happened. A look, perhaps,which Prince could not avoid giving this man he had come to hate. Miko doubtless saw it, and the Martian's hot anger leaped.
Rankin said hurriedly, "Stop that!"
And Moa, "Let him alone, you fool! Sit down!"
I could hear the sound of a scuffle. A blow—a cry, half suppressed, from George Prince.
Then Miko: "I will not hurt him. Craven coward! Look at him! Hating me—frightened!"
I could fancy George Prince sitting there with murder in his heart, and Miko taunting him:
"Hates me now, because I shot his sister!"
Moa: "Hush!"
"I will not! Why should I not say it? I will tell you something else, George Prince. It was not Anita I shot at, but you! I meant nothing for her but love. If you had not interfered—"
This was different from what we had figured. George Prince had come in from his own room, had tried to rescue his sister, and in the scuffle, Anita had taken the shot instead of George.
"I did not even know I had hit her," Miko was saying. "Not until I heard she was dead." He added sardonically, "I hoped it was you I had hit, George. And I will tell you this: you hate me no more than I hate you. If it were not for your knowledge of ores—"
"Is this to be a personal wrangle?" Rankin interrupted. "I thought we were here to plan—"
"It is planned," Miko said shortly. "I give orders, I do not plan. I am waiting now for the moment—" He checked himself.
Moa said, "Does Rankin understand that no harm is to come to Gregg Haljan?"
"Yes," Rankin said. "And Dean. We need them, of course. But you cannot make Dean send messages if he refuses, nor make Haljan navigate."
"I know enough to check on them," Miko said grimly."They will not fool me. And they will obey me, have no fear. A little touch of sulphuric—" His laugh was gruesome. "It makes the most stubborn, very willing."
"I wish," said Moa, "we had Haljan safely hidden. If he is hurt—killed—"
So that was why Miko had tried to capture me? To keep me safe so that I might navigate the ship.
It occurred to me that I should get Carter at once. A plot to seize thePlanetara—but when?
I froze with startled horror.
The diaphragms at my ears rang with Miko's words: "I have set the time for now—two minutes—"
It seemed to startle Rankin and George Prince as much as it did me. Both exclaimed: "No!"
"No? Why not? Everyone is at his post!"
Prince repeated, "No!"
And Rankin, "But can we trust them? The stewards—the crew?"
"Eight of them are our own men! You didn't know that, Rankin? They've been aboard thePlanetarafor several voyages. Oh, this is no quickly planned affair, even though we let you in on it so recently. You and Johnson.... By God!"
There was a commotion in the stateroom. I crouched, tense. Miko had discovered that his insulation had been cut off! He had evidently leaped to his feet. I heard a chair overturn. And the Martian's roar: "It's off! Did you do that, Prince? By God, if I thought—"
My apparatus went suddenly dead as Miko flung on his insulation. I lost my wits in the confusion: I should have instantly taken off my vibrations. There was interference: it showed in the dark space of the ventilator grid over Miko's doorway, a snapping in the air, there—a swirl of sparks.
I heard with my unaided ears Miko's roar over his insulation: "By God, they're listening!"
The scream of hand sirens sounded from his stateroom. It rang over the ship. His signal! I heard it answered fromsome distant point. And then a shot: a commotion in the lower corridors....
The attack upon thePlanetarahad begun!
I was on my feet. The shouts of startled passengers sounded, a turmoil beginning everywhere.
I stood momentarily transfixed. The door of Miko's stateroom burst open. He stood there, with Rankin, Moa and George Prince crowding him.
He saw me. "You, Gregg Haljan!"
He came leaping at me.
I was taken wholly by surprise. There was an instant when I stood numbed, fumbling for a weapon at my belt, undecided whether to run or stand my ground. Miko was no more than twenty feet from me. He checked his forward rush. The light from an overhead tube was on him: I saw in his hand the cylinder projector of his paralyzing ray.
I plucked my heat cylinder from my belt, and fired without taking aim. My tiny heat beam flashed. I must have grazed Miko's hand. His roar of anger and pain rang out over the turmoil. He dropped his weapon; then stooped to pick it up. But Moa forestalled him. She leaped and seized it.
"Careful! Fool, you promised not to harm him!"
A confusion of swift action. Rankin had turned and darted away. I saw George Prince stumbling half in front of the struggling Miko and Moa. And I heard footsteps beside me. A hand gripped me, jerked at me.
Over the turmoil, Prince's voice sounded: "Gregg Haljan!"
I recall that I had the impression that Prince was frightened; he had half fallen in front of Miko. And there was Miko's voice: "Let go of me!"
It was Balch gripping me. "Gregg! This way—run! Get out of here! He'll kill you with that ray!"
Miko's ray flashed, but George Prince had knocked his arm.I did not dare fire again. Prince was in the way. Balch, who was unarmed, shoved me violently back.
"Gregg! The chart room!"
I turned and ran, with Balch after me. Prince had fallen or been felled by Miko. A flash followed me from Miko's weapon, but again it missed. He did not pursue me. Instead he ran the other way, through the portside door of the library.
Balch and I found ourselves in the library. Shouting, frightened passengers were everywhere. The place was in wild confusion, the whole ship ringing now with shouts.
"To the chart room, Gregg!"
I called to the passengers, "Go back to your rooms!"
I followed Balch. We ran through the archway to the deck. In the starlight I saw figures scurrying aft, but none were near us. The deck forward was dim with heavy shadows. The oval windows and door of the chart room were blue-yellow from the tube lights inside. No one seemed on the deck there. And then as we approached, I saw further forward in the bow, the trap door to the cage standing open. Johnson had been released.
From one of the chart room windows a heat ray sizzled. It barely missed us. Balch shouted, "Carter—don't!"
The Captain called, "Oh you, Balch—and Haljan—"
He came out on the deck as we rushed up. His left arm was dangling limp.
"God—this—" He got no further. From the turret overhead a tiny search beam came down and disclosed us. Blackstone was supposed to be on duty up there, with a course master at the controls. But, glancing up, I saw, illumined by the turret lights, the figure of Ob Hahn in his purple-white robe, and Johnson, the purser. And on the turret balcony, two fallen men—Blackstone and the course master.
Johnson was training the spotlight on us. And Hahn fired a Martian ray. It struck Balch beside me. He dropped.
Carter was shouting, "Inside—Gregg! Get inside!"
I stopped to raise up Balch. Another beam came down. A heat ray this time. It caught the fallen Balch full on thechest, piercing him through. The smell of his burning flesh rose to sicken me. He was dead. I dropped his body. Carter shoved me into the chart room.
In the small, steel-lined room, Carter and I slid the door closed. We were alone here. The thing had come so quickly it had taken Captain Carter, like us all, wholly unawares. We had anticipated spying eavesdroppers, but not this open brigandage. No more than a minute or two had passed since Miko's siren in his stateroom had given the signal for attack. Carter had been in the chart room. Blackstone was in the turret. At the outbreak of confusion, Carter dashed out to see Hahn releasing Johnson from the cage. From the forward chart room window now I could see where Hahn with a torch had broken the cage seal. The torch lay on the deck. There had been an exchange of shots; Carter's arm was paralyzed; Johnson and Hahn had escaped.
Carter was as confused as I. There had simultaneously been an encounter up in the turret. Blackstone and the course master were killed. The lookout had been shot from his post in the forward observatory. The body dangled now, twisted half in and half out the window.
We could see several of Miko's men—erstwhile members of our crew and steward corps—scurrying from the turret along the upper bridge toward the dark and silent radio room. Snap was up there. But was he? The radio room glowed suddenly with dim light, but there was no evidence of a fight there. The fighting seemed mostly below the deck, down in the hull corridors. A blended horror of sounds came up to us. Screams, shouts and the hissing and snapping of ray weapons. Our crew—such of them as were loyal—were making a stand below. But it was brief. Within a minute it died away. The passengers, amidships in the superstructure, were still shouting. Then above them Miko's roar sounded.
"Be quiet! Go in your rooms—you will not be harmed."
The brigands in these few minutes were in control of the ship. All but this little chart room, where, with most of the ship's weapons, Carter and I were entrenched.
"God, Gregg, that this should come upon us!"
Carter was fumbling with the chart room weapons. "Here, Gregg. Help me. What have you got? Heat ray? That's all I had ready."
It struck me then as I helped him make the connections that Carter in this crisis was at best an inefficient commander. His red face had gone splotchy purple; his hands were trembling. Skilled as Captain of a peaceful liner, he was at a loss now. But I could not blame him. It is easy to say we might have taken warning, done this or that, and come triumphant through the attack. But only the fool looks backward and says, "I would have done better."
I tried to summon my wits. The ship was lost to us unless Carter and I could do something. Our futile weapons! They were all here—four or five heat ray hand projectors that could send a pencil ray a hundred feet or so. I shot one diagonally up at the turret where Johnson was leering down at our rear window, but he saw my gesture and dropped back out of sight. The heat beam flashed harmlessly up and struck the turret room. Then across the turret window came a sheen of radiance—an electrobarrage. And behind it, Hahn's suave, evil face appeared. He shouted down:
"We have orders to spare you, Gregg Haljan—or you would have been killed long ago!"
My answering shot hit his barrage with a shower of sparks, behind which he stood unmoved.
Carter handed me another weapon. "Gregg, try this."
I leveled the old explosive projector; Carter crouched beside me. But before I could press the trigger, from somewhere down the starlit deck an electro beam hit me. The little rifle exploded, broke its breech. I sank back to the floor, tingling from the shock of the hostile current. My hands were blackened from the exploded powder.
Carter seized me. "No use. Hurt?"
"No."
The stars through the dome windows were swinging. A long swing—the shadows and patterns on the starlit deckwere all shifting. ThePlanetarawas turning. The heavens revolved in a great round sweep of movement, then settled as we took our new course.
Hahn at the turret controls had swung us. The Earth and the Sun showed over our bow quarter. The sunlight mingled red-yellow with the brilliant starlight. Hahn's signals were sounding; I heard them answered from the mechanism rooms down below. Brigands there—in full control. The gravity plates were being set to the new positions: We were on our new course. Headed a point or two off the Earthline. Not headed for the Moon? I wondered.
Carter and I were planning nothing. What was there to plan? We were under observation. A Martian paralyzing ray—or an electronic beam, far more deadly than our own puny weapons—would have struck us the instant we tried to leave the chart room.
My thoughts were interrupted by a shout from down the deck. At a corner of the cabin superstructure some fifty feet from our windows the figure of Miko appeared. A radiance barrage hung about him like a shimmering mantle. His voice sounded: "Gregg Haljan, do you yield?"
Carter leaped up from where he and I were crouching. Against all reason of safety he leaned from the low window, waving his hamlike fist.
"Yield? No! I am in command here, you pirate! Brigand—murderer!"
I dragged him back sharply. "For God's sake—"
He was spluttering; and over it Miko's sardonic laugh sounded. "Shall we argue about it?"
I stood up. "What do you want to say, Miko?"
Behind him the tall, thin figure of his sister showed. She was plucking at him. He turned violently. "I won't harm him! Gregg Haljan—is this a truce? You will not shoot?" He was shielding Moa.
"No," I called. "For a moment, no. A truce. What is it you want to say?"
I could hear the babble of passengers who were herded inthe cabin with brigands guarding them. George Prince, bare-headed, but shrouded in his cloak, showed in a patch of light behind Moa. He looked my way and then retreated.
Miko called, "You must yield. We want you, Haljan."
"No doubt," I jeered.
"Alive. It is easy to kill you."
I could not doubt that. Carter and I were little more than rats in a trap. But Miko wanted to take me alive: that was not so simple. He added persuasively:
"We want you to navigate us. Will you?"
"No."
"Will you help us, Captain Carter? Tell your cub, this Haljan, to yield."
Carter roared, "Get back from there. There is no truce!"
I shoved aside his leveled projector. "Wait a minute, Miko. Navigate where?"
"That is our business. When you come out here, I will give you the course."
I realized that all this parley was a ruse of Miko's to take me alive. He had made a gesture. Hahn, watching him from the turret window, doubtless flashed a signal down to the hull corridors. The magnetizer control under the chart room was altered, our artificial gravity cut off. I felt the sudden lightness: I gripped the window casement and clung. Carter was startled into incautious movement. It flung him out into the room, his arms and legs flailing.
And across the chart room, in the opposite window, I felt rather than saw the shape of something. A figure, almost invisible but not quite, was trying to climb in! I flung the empty rifle I was holding. It hit something solid in the window. In a flare of sparks a blackhooded figure materialized. A man climbing in! His weapon spat. There was a tiny electronic flash, deadly silent. The intruder had shot at Carter: struck him. Carter gave one queer scream. He had floated to the floor; his convulsive movement when he was hit hurled him to the ceiling. His body struck; twitched;bounced back and sank inert on the floor grid almost at my feet.
I clung to the casement. Across the room of the weightless room the hooded intruder was also clinging. His hood fell back. It was Johnson.
"Killed him, the bully! Now for you, Mr. Third Officer Haljan!"
But he did not dare fire at me. Miko had forbidden it. I saw him reach under his robe, doubtless for a low-powered paralyzing ray. But he never got it out. I had no weapon within reach. I leaned into the room, still holding the casement, and doubled my legs under me. I kicked out from the window.
The force catapulted me across the space across the room like a volplane. I struck the purser. We gripped. Our locked, struggling bodies bounced out into the room. We struck the floor, surged up like balloons to the ceiling, struck it with a flailing arm or leg and floated back.
Grotesque, abnormal combat! Like fighting in weightless water. Johnson clutched his weapon, but I twisted his wrist, held his arm outstretched so that he could not aim it. I was aware of Miko's voice shouting on the deck outside.
Johnson's left hand was gouging at my face, his fingers digging at my eyes. We lunged down.
I twisted his wrists. He dropped the weapon and it sank away, I tried to reach it but could not.... Then I had him by the throat. I was stronger than he, and more agile. I tried choking him, I had his thick bull neck within my fingers. He kicked, scrambled, tore and gouged at me. Tried to shout, but it ended in a gurgle. And then, as he felt his breath stopped, his hands came up in an effort to tear mine loose.
We sank again to the floor. We were momentarily upright. I felt my feet touch. I bent my knees. We sank further. And then I kicked violently upward. Our locked bodies shot to the ceiling. Johnson's head was above me. It struck the steel roof of the chart room. A violent blow. I felt him gosuddenly limp. I cast him off and, doubling my body, I kicked at the ceiling. It sent me diagonally downward to the window, where I clung.
And I saw Miko standing on the deck with a weapon leveled at me!