Norton, Andre - Anthology (27 page)

 
          
 
The men were too thunderstruck by this strange
performance to make any move to delay their departure. With open mouths they
looked at each other, at the patient, and back at each other again.

 
          
 
"That's the strangest thing I've ever
seen." Schultz was the first to break the silence. "What do you
suppose that signified—a religious gesture, or what?"

 
          
 
"I don't think so," retorted Bob.
"Look at Slawson."

 
          
 
They looked at the still unconscious man.
Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the blue color was fading from his skin. And as
it faded, the labored, gasping respiration slowed down. He seemed to relax or
sink into a more comfortable and relaxed state. He no longer had to fight for
his oxygen and was now ready to rest and recuperate.

 
          
 
Tom felt the patient's pulse. "It's
slower," he said simply.
"One hundred twenty—no,
one hundred eight."
He put the stethoscope in his ears and listened
to the heart, then the lungs. "Heart action is full and strong and the
lungs are practically clear."

           
 
"What'll we do about those animals?"
asked
Livingston
. "Shouldn't we try to thank them, or .
. . or—" He broke off; how can you thank someone you can't talk to? How
can you do a return favor for a person whose needs or likes are totally beyond
your knowledge?

 
          
 
"Just skip it, for now," said Bob
slowly. "I have a hunch that those boys will be back after a while. And
we'll try to do something for them some day." And he left the room.

 
          
 
It wasn't until time for the last meal of the
day that Edwards rejoined the group. They were still talking about the
Minotaurans and their miraculous cure of an apparently hopeless disease when
Bob entered the room.

 
          
 
"You know, Tom," he began, "I'm
afraid that I'm going to have to retract some of my dogmatic statements. You
remember I told you that there couldn't be any exotic diseases. Well, I was
wrong; you all saw how wrong I was. Slawson wouldn't have lived, either, if it
hadn't been for the help of . . . of . . . shall we say, the natives. We were
helpless. But it still proves one of the oldest of medical beliefs— that for
every disease there is, somewhere, a cure, if only we can find it."

 
          
 
He smiled. "And maybe this also goes to
prove that old school of medical thought, homeopathy, was right when they said
'Similia similibus curantur! Like cures like; the disease caused by the pollen
of one flower can be cured by the pollen of another flower.

 
          
 
"Well, anyhow, Expedition III can now
land here with the assurance that they won't run the risk of turning blue. Of
course, something else might come up in the meantime— but let's hope not.

 
          
 
"We've got a lot of work lined up for
ourselves on this planet. We have to find out more about the natives, how they
live, what they die of—everything. And we have to help them in some way. We owe
them a debt we'll be a long time paying off.
Right?"

 
          
 
In the midst of the murmur of assent that
followed, Schultz walked in. "Slawson is just fine," he reported. "He
had a good meal and is apparently none the worse for his experience."

            
On our planet today
communication has become easier and swifter. Tel-Star sends a program around
the world in what seems snap-of-the-fingers time. This is well enough when the
message so conveyed is one devised by a mind similar to one's own, couched in a
language that can be translated if not at once understood. In this story two
planet-wrecked starmen can translate, but understanding is another and graver
matter. With a light touch the author deals with what might pose a formidable
and even dangerous problem in the future.

            
Hellman plucked the
last radish out of the can with a pair of dividers. He held it up for Casker to
admire,
then
laid it carefully on the workbench beside
the razor.

            
"Hell of a meal
for two grown men," Casker said, flopping down in one of the
ship's
padded crash chairs.

            
"If you'd like
to give up your share—" Hellman started to suggest.

            
Casker shook his head
quickly. Hellman smiled, picked up the razor, and examined its edge critically.

 
          
 
"Don't make a production out of it,"
Casker said, glancing at the ship's instruments. They were approaching a red
dwarf, the only planet-bearing sun in the vicinity. "We want to be through
with supper before we get much closer."

 
          
 
Hellman made a practice incision in the
radish, squinting along the top of the razor. Casker bent closer, his mouth open.
Hellman poised the razor delicately and cut the radish cleanly in half.

 
          
 
"Will you say grace?" Hellman asked.

 
          
 
Casker growled something and popped a half in
his mouth. Hellman chewed more slowly. The sharp taste seemed to explode along
his disused tastebuds.

 
          
 
"Not much bulk value," Hellman said.

 
          
 
Casker didn't answer. He was busily studying
the red dwarf.

 
          
 
As he swallowed the last of his radish,
Hellman stifled a sigh. Their last meal had been three days ago ... if two
biscuits and a cup of water could be called a meal. This radish, now resting in
the vast emptiness of their stomachs, was the last gram of food on board ship.

 
          
 
"Two planets," Casker said.
"One's burned to a crisp."

 
          
 
"Then we'll land on the other."

 
          
 
Casker nodded and punched a deceleration
spiral into the ship's tape.

 
          
 
Hellman found himself wondering for the
hundredth time where the fault had been. Could he have made out the food
requisitions wrong when they took on supplies at Calao station? After all, he
had been devoting most of his attention to the mining equipment. Or had the
ground crew just forgotten to load those last precious cases?

 
          
 
He drew his belt in to the fourth new notch he
had punched.

 
          
 
Speculation was useless. Whatever the reason,
they were in a jam. Ironically enough, they had more than enough fuel to take
them back to Calao. But they would be a pair of singularly emaciated corpses by
the time the ship reached there.

 
          
 
"We're coming in now," Casker said.

 
          
 
And to make matters worse, this unexplored
region of space had few suns and fewer planets. Perhaps there was a slight
possibility of replenishing their water supply, but the odds were enormous
against finding anything they could eat.

 
          
 
"Look at that place," Casker
growled.

 
          
 
Hellman shook himself out of his reverie.

 
          
 
The planet was like a round gray-brown
porcupine. The spines of a million needle-sharp mountains glittered in the red
dwarfs feeble light. And as they spiraled lower, circling the planet, the
pointed mountains seemed to stretch out to meet them.

 
          
 
"It can't be all mountains," Hellman
said.

 
          
 
"It's not."

 
          
 
Sure enough, there were oceans and lakes, out
of which thrust jagged island-mountains. But no sign of level land, no hint of
civilization or even animal life.

 
          
 
"At least it's got an oxygen
atmosphere," Casker said.

 
          
 
Their deceleration spiral swept them around
the planet, cutting lower into the atmosphere, braking against it. And still
there was nothing but mountains and lakes and oceans and more mountains.

 
          
 
On the eighth run, Hellman caught sight of a
solitary building on a mountain top. Casker braked recklessly, and the hull
glowed red hot. On the eleventh run, they made a landing approach.

 
          
 
"Stupid place to build," Casker
muttered.

 
          
 
The building was doughnut-shaped and fitted
nicely over the top of the mountain. There was a wide, level lip around it,
which Casker scorched as he landed the ship.

           
 
From the air, the building had merely seemed
big. On the ground, it was enormous. Hellman and Casker walked up to it slowly.
Hellman had his burner ready, but there was no sign of life.

 
          
 
"This planet must be abandoned,"
Hellman said almost in a whisper.

 
          
 
"Anyone in his right mind would abandon
this place," Casker said. "There're enough good planets around,
without anyone trying to live on a needle point."

 
          
 
They reached the door. Hellman tried to open
it and found it locked. He looked back at the spectacular display of mountains.

 
          
 
"You know," he
said, "when this planet was still in a molten state, it must have been
affected by several gigantic moons that are now broken up.
The strains,
external and internal, wrenched it into its present spined appearance
and—"

 
          
 
"Come off it," Casker said
ungraciously. "You were a librarian before you decided to get rich on
uranium."

 
          
 
Hellman shrugged his shoulders and burned a
hole in the doorlock. They waited.

 
          
 
The only sound on the mountain top was the
growling of their stomachs.

 
          
 
They entered.

 
          
 
The tremendous wedge-shaped room was evidently
a warehouse of sorts. Goods were piled to the ceiling, scattered over the
floor, stacked haphazardly against the walls. There were boxes and containers
of all sizes and shapes, some big enough to hold an elephant, others the size
of thimbles.

 
          
 
Near the door was a dusty pile of books.
Immediately, Hellman bent down to examine them.

 
          
 
"Must be food somewhere in here,"
Casker said, his face lighting up for the first time in a week. He started to
open the nearest box.

 
          
 
"This is interesting," Hellman said,
discarding all the books except one.

 
          
 
"Let's eat first," Casker said,
ripping the top off the box. Inside was a brownish dust. Casker looked at it,
sniffed, and made a face.

 
          
 
"Very interesting indeed," Hellman
said, leafing through the book.

 
          
 
Casker opened a small can, which contained a
glittering green slime. He closed it and opened another. It contained a dull
orange slime.

 
          
 
"Hmm," Hellman said, still reading.

 
          
 
"Hellman! Will you kindly drop that book
and help me find some food?"

 
          
 
"Food?"
Hellman repeated, looking up. "What makes you think there's anything to
eat here? For all you know, this could be a paint factory."

 
          
 
"It's a warehouse!" Casker shouted.

 
          
 
He opened a kidney-shaped can and lifted out a
soft purple stick. It hardened quickly and crumpled to dust as he tried to
smell it. He scooped up a handful of the dust and brought it to his mouth.

 
          
 
"That might be extract of
strychnine," Hellman said casually.

 
          
 
Casker abruptly dropped the dust and wiped his
hands.

 
          
 
"After all," Hellman pointed out,
"granted that this is a warehouse—a cache, if you wish—we don't know what
the late inhabitants considered good fare. Paris
Green
salad, perhaps, with sulphuric acid as dressing."

 
          
 
"All right," Casker said, "but
we gotta eat. What're you going to do about all this?" He gestured at the
hundreds of boxes, cans and bottles.

           
 
"The thing to do," Hellman said
briskly, "is to make a qualitative analysis on four or five samples. We
could start out with a simple titration, sublimate the chief ingredient,
see
if it forms a precipitate, work out its molecular makeup
from—"

 
          
 
"Hellman, you don't know what you're
talking about. You're a librarian, remember? And I'm a correspondence school
pilot. We don't know anything about titrations and sublimations."

 
          
 
"I know," Hellman said, "but we
should. It's the right way to go about it."

 
          
 
"Sure. In the meantime, though, just
until a chemist drops in, what'll we do?"

 
          
 
"This might help us," Hellman said,
holding up the book. "Do you know what it is?"

 
          
 
"No," Casker said, keeping a tight
grip on his patience.

 
          
 
"It's a pocket dictionary and guide to
the Helg language."

 
          
 
"Helg?"

 
          
 
"The planet we're on. The symbols match
up with those on the boxes."

 
          
 
Casker raised an eyebrow.
"Never
heard of Helg."

 
          
 
"I don't believe the planet has ever had
any contact with Earth," Hellman said. "This dictionary isn't
Helg-English. It's Helg-Aloombrigian."

 
          
 
Casker remembered that Aloombrigia was the
home planet of a small, adventurous reptilian race, out near the center of the
Galaxy.

 
          
 
"How come you can read Aloombrigian?"
Casker asked.

 
          
 
"Oh, being a librarian isn't a completely
useless profession," Hellman said modestly. "In my spare time—"

 
          
 
"Yeah.
Now how
about—"

 
          
 
"Do you know," Hellman said,
"the Aloombrigians probably helped the Helgans leave their planet and find
another.

           
 
They sell services like that. In which case,
this building very likely is a food cache!"