The Potter of Firsk and Other Stories (44 page)

“I didn’t ask to be brought aboard,” grumbled Smith.

Plum’s mouth compressed; his hand caught Smith a buffet on the cheek. Smith felt his teeth creak; before him came a vision of Lowell’s toothless mouth. He sat quietly, staring at Plum.

Plum grinned slowly. “Sure, I know what you’re thinking, that you’ll bide your time and come at me when I least expect it. Well, I say try ahead, try ahead. Better men than you have gone that path, and it keeps me lively. Now, young fellow, on your feet. And remember I’m a hard man to please; there can’t be a red cent over or under on the books; it all must come out so.”

Smith silently unfastened the belt at his waist. The cruiser that Bannister had ordered out, he thought, must surely run down Plum’s ship. But if there were a battle, he might easily be lost with the ship. And in the meantime—A threatening move by Plum cut short his reflections. “Are you done dreaming?” growled the giant.

Smith tried to rise to his feet; instead set himself floundering awkwardly into the air.

Plum’s guffaw stung him almost beyond endurance. He bit his lips, and steadying himself on a stanchion, turned to Plum. “What is it you want done?”

“Up forward, my lad, up in the chart room: that’s your nook. First you’ll sort out my old charts, arrange them in the projector. When I press for a sector, I want to get that sector and none somewhere fifty parsecs distant. Very important. That’s fair warning. Up forward!”

Smith pulled himself forward, aching in every joint. The
Dog
, he perceived, was a small advance ship, one of the exploration ‘terriers’ built for maneuverability, landing ease and cheap maintenance, a type in vogue among the sun-duckers of outer space. But no matter how fast, how shifty, how desperately Plum drove his ship, once the cruiser thrust out a magnetic finger it would never win free. Smith shot a look through the forward port, seeking Procyon, past which the course must lead.

Nowhere in the field of his vision was there such a star. The sky appeared more like the region north of Scorpio—the constellation of Ophiuchus, in a direction exactly opposite to Procyon. He stared. There was some dreadful mistake. “Where are we headed for?”

“None of your damn business,” snarled Plum. “Get forward into the chart room, and thank yourself I’m a merciful man.”

Smith pushed himself into the chart room, numbly began to sort the star-charts. This was death, he thought, and he was in hell. Before his eyes was a black and gray panel, a bank of dials, a mesh, a row of switches. Smith focussed his attention. Radio! Long-distance radio—launching its meaningful radiation in a parallel-sided bar, to take it hot and sparkling across space.

How far had they come? Little more than a light-week or two; he could hear the whir of motors still building up acceleration.

He glanced out into the bridge; Captain Plum stood by the door bellowing back toward the engine room.

With trembling hands Smith twisted dials, aimed the antenna dead astern, flipped the switch. In a fever of impatience he waited for the circuits to warm into full power, meanwhile listening to Captain Plum’s salty condemnations of the engine-room gang.

Once more he checked the direction of the beam. Dead astern, to hit Earth on the nose. He set the frequency to standard space-band. A hundred monitors were tuned to the frequency.

Now
.

He spoke into the mesh. “SOS—Star Control attention. SOS. This is Lieutenant Robert Smith aboard Plum’s ship the
Dog
. SOS. Attention, Bannister, Star Control Field Office Twelve. This is Lieutenant Smith. I have been kidnapped.” The edge of his attention sensed that Plum’s voice had quieted; he heard the rustle of heavy movement in the bridge. Desperately he bent to the mesh; he might not have another chance. Power on, direction right, frequency right. “SOS. This is Lieutenant Robert Smith, Star Control, kidnapped aboard Plum’s ship, headed toward Rho Ophiuchus.” He became aware of a great shadow in the doorway. “Kidnapped aboard Plum’s ship, headed toward Rho Ophiuchus, Robert Smith speaking—” He could bear it no longer; he looked up. Plum stood watching him from the doorway.

“Ratting on me, hey?”

Smith said with feeble bravado, “I got the message through. You’re washed up, Plum. If you’re smart you’ll pull about.”

“My, my, my,” Plum jeered mincingly. “Me and my Aunt Nellie. Go ahead, call again if you like.”

With one eye on Plum and suddenly anxious, Smith leaned toward the mesh. “This is Lieutenant Robert Smith, aboard Captain Plum’s ship,
Dog
, bound for Rho Ophiuchus—”

Plum moved carelessly forward. His hand struck Smith’s face with a sound like beef liver dropping on a butcher’s block.

Smith, crumpled in a corner, looked up at Plum, standing in his favorite pose, legs spraddled wide, arms behind him.

“Damn addle-brained snooper,” snarled Plum.

Smith said weakly, “It’ll go just so much the worse for you when you’re caught.”

“Who’s going to catch me? How am I going to be caught? Hey? Answer me that!” He prodded Smith with his toe.

Smith slowly drew himself to his feet. He said in a tired voice, “I sent the message three times. It’s bound to be picked up.”

Plum nodded. “You sent it out—dead astern. Sure the monitors will pick it up. At the speed we’re leaving Earth, the frequency they get will be so they can count the cycles on their fingers. That radio isn’t much good unless we’re stopped.”

Smith numbly considered the radio. The speed of the ship would make his message completely unintelligible.

“Now,” said Plum harshly, “get back to your work. And if I catch you fooling with the equipment again, I’ll treat you fairly rough.”

IV

It was as if the ship lay motionless, the center of all, and the galaxy flowed past in a clear dark syrup, the stars like phosphorescent motes in sea water—lost and lonesome sparks.

Two points were steady: a wan star astern and an orange-yellow glint ahead which gradually resolved into a doublet. So the days passed. Smith slunk about the ship as inconspicuously as possible, dreading the daily drubbing Captain Plum administered under the guise of calisthenics.

During the bouts both men wore magnetic slippers and twelve-ounce gloves, the exercise lasting until Captain Plum was winded or Smith too dazed to afford further entertainment.

As time went on, Smith became increasingly familiar with Plum’s style of combat: a full-chested prancing forward, arms thrashing. Perforce Smith learned the elemental tricks of defense, but in a sense this proficiency defeated its own purpose. The more adroitly he fended off the punches, the more cleverly he rolled and ducked with the blows, so did Captain Plum’s violence wax, and Smith saw clearly that the end would lie at one of two extremes: either he would achieve an impregnable defense or else Captain Plum would kill him with a single terrible blow.

To avoid such an impasse, Smith tentatively went on the offensive, jabbing at Plum after his tremendous swings had thrown him off balance. The ruse was successful to such an extent that when Captain Plum found himself unable to land effective blows, with Smith darting in at will to pummel his nose and eyes, he insisted on the exercise at ever-longer intervals. At the same time his aversion to Smith reached the point of obsession.

The last few bouts were terrible episodes, in which Captain Plum, red-eyed and roaring, charged like a bull, lashing out in wide roundhouse sweeps, any one of which would have broken Smith’s bones. Half-measures were worse than none, Smith now realized; he must either become a supine wad of flesh for Plum to pound at his pleasure, or he must hurt Plum badly enough to discourage him—again a dangerous undertaking.

The final bout lasted for half an hour. Both Smith and Plum reeked with blood and sweat. Plum’s nostrils flared like a boar’s, his great chin hung lax and limp. Smith, seizing an opportunity, struck as hard as he could, on a downward slant at the loose-hanging jaw. He felt a snap, a crush, and Plum staggered back clasping his face. Smith stood panting, half expecting Plum to go for his gun.

Plum rushed from the cargo hold, while Smith, full of foreboding, made his way to the cubby-hole which was his quarters.

Captain Plum appeared at the mess table, his jaw taped, his lips suffused with violet. He brushed Smith with his eyes, nodded with grim menace.

Later Smith was in the chart room, calculating fuel consumption against distance traveled. Plum lurched close up against him. Smith turned his head, looking close into the hairy face.

“You’re a mean son of a gun, ain’t you?” said Plum.

Smith saw that Plum was toying with an eight-inch blade. Smith said in a low voice, “Anybody’s mean when he’s driven to it.”

“You talking about me, young fellow?”

“Take it any way you want.”

“You’re walking on thin ice.”

Smith shrugged. “I don’t see how I’ve anything to gain by being polite. I don’t expect much out of this trip.”

The speech seemed to appease Plum; he slowly put his knife up. “You asked for it when you started that schoolboy Star Control stuff.”

“I don’t see it that way. Somebody’s got to be at the top. In this case it’s Star Control. You’d be better off if you’d turn back and make an honest report on this planet, whatever it is.”

“And lose all that money? What do I care for Star Control? What have they done for me?”

Smith leaned back against his workbench, with a curious sense of speaking in an incomprehensible language. “Don’t you care for your fellow-men?”

Plum vented a gruff bark of a laugh. “Humanity never bust itself open working for me. And even supposing I did, what difference does it make what goes on out here eighty miles past nowhere? Just a bunch of fuzzy yellow things.”

“Do you really want to know what difference it makes?”

“Go ahead, spill it.”

Smith gathered his thoughts. “Well, in the first place, human knowledge is only a small fraction of what can be learned about the universe; we’ve concentrated on the subjects which fit our kind of minds. If we find another civilized race, we’d meet an entirely different complex of sciences.”

Plum used a coarse expression. “We know too much as it is; if we knew any more we’d be clogging our brains. Anyhow, there’s nothing out here on Rho that we don’t know already.”

“Maybe yes, maybe no. But if there’s a civilized race, men with the proper knowledge ought to be the first to make contact.”

“Then where’d my cut be? I’ve gone through lots to get where I am. I’ve taken it on and I’ve given it back, just to get a crack at a chance like this. Those jewels are novelties, worth plenty on Earth. I can get out to Rho, I can clip the fuzz-balls loose of the jewels, I can get back to Earth—and my fortune’s made. If the scientists found Rho, they wouldn’t tell me, would they? Why should I spill my guts to them? You got things twisted all screw-wise, young fellow.”

“If these things are intelligent, perhaps they’re on their guard now. You’ll find it dangerous taking any more of the jewels.”

Captain Plum threw back his head, then winced at the wrench to his jaw. “Not a chance. We’re safe on Rho as we are in our own bunks. And why? It’s easy. These fuzz-balls is blind, deaf and dumb. They walk around holding up jewels like they was offering ’em to us on velvet pillows. A clip of the knife, fuzz-ball flips over, the jewel comes rolling home. And that’s the way it goes.”

Leaving Smith chewing his lip nervously, Captain Plum slapped the chart table with the flat of his knife and turned away.

The
Dog
coasted up at the big orange sun, with the small yellow sun hanging beyond, no more than a cusp visible. Nearby were the planets, yellow motes—one, two, three, four.

Through the port Smith watched the fourth planet, a world smaller than Earth, with an oily yellow atmosphere, and which possessed an arid surface.

From the bridge came the voices of Plum and Jack Fetch, disputing where best to set the ship down. Fetch was inclined to caution. “Put yourself in their shoes, make as if it’s Earth.”

“Cripes, man, this ain’t Earth. This is Rho Ophiuchus.”

“Sure, but think of it like this: a few months ago there’s an epidemic of heists; if they’ve got the brains of a turtle, they’ll take precautions. Suppose we set down beside one of the big castles. Suppose they come along, discover the ship. Then the jig is up.”

Plum spat disgustedly. “Hell, them fuzz-balls live in a dream world. They come along, feel the ship, they think it’s a new kind of rock. They don’t even know they’ve got a sun or that there’s other stars; like that lightheaded supercargo says, they got a way of looking at things that’s different from ours.”

“That’s right. And maybe they’ll know we’re back by some different kind of sense, and then there’ll be hell to pay. Why take the risk? Set down out in that little desert; then we can work up to the castles in the boat.”

“Too complicated,” growled Plum. “There’d be men getting lost and the boat breaking down.”

Compromise was reached: the ship would be landed in desolate country as near as possible to the castles, close enough to allow its use as a base of operations.

The greasy yellow atmosphere swirled up around the ship. Jack Fetch sat at the controls while Plum stood spraddle-legged at the telescopic viewer. “Slow,” he called to Fetch. “We’re getting low. Take her north a bit, I see a whole settlement of big castles. Now straight down; we’ll land in that little arm of desert.”