The SF Hall of Fame Volume Two B (56 page)

How long had he been here, anyway?

Great Patham, the captain thought, shocked. He'd lost count
of the days!

Or was it weeks?

He went in to find Toll.

"It's been a wonderful visit," he said, "but
I'll have to be leaving, I guess. Tomorrow morning, early—"

Toll put some fancy sewing she was working on back in a
glass basket, laid her thin, strong witch's hands in her lap, and smiled up at
him.

"We thought you'd be thinking that," she said,
"and so we— You know, captain, it was quite difficult to find a way to
reward you for bringing back the children?"

"It was?" said the captain, suddenly realizing
he'd also clean forgotten he was broke! And now the wrath of Onswud lay close
ahead.

"Gold and jewel stones would have been just right, of
course!" she said, "but unfortunately, while there's no doubt a lot
of it on Karres somewhere, we never got around to looking for it. And we
haven't money—none that you could use, that is!"

"No, I don't suppose you do," the captain agreed
sadly.

"However," said Toll, "we've all been talking
about it in the town, and so we've loaded a lot of things aboard your ship that
we think you can sell at a fine profit!"

"Well now," the captain said gratefully,
"that's fine of—"

"There are furs," said ToU, "the very finest
furs we could fix up —two thousand of them!"

"Oh!" said the captain, bravely keeping his smile.
"Well, that's wonderful!"

"And essences of perfume!" said Toll.
"Everyone brought one bottle of their own, so that's eight thousand three
hundred and twenty-three bottles of perfume essences—all different!"

"Perfume!" said the captain. "Fine, fine—but
you really shouldn't—"

"And the rest of it," Toll concluded happily,
"is the green Lepti liquor you like so much, and the Wintenberry
jellies!" She frowned.

"I forgot just how many jugs and jars," she
admitted, "but there were a lot. It's all loaded now. And do you think
you'll be able to sell all that?" she smiled.

"I certainly can!" the captain said stoutly.
"It's wonderful stuff, and there's nothing like it in the Empire."

Which was very true. They wouldn't have considered
miffel-furs for lining on Karres. But if he'd been alone he would have felt
like he wanted to burst into tears.

The witches couldn't have picked more completely unsalable
items if they'd tried! Furs, cosmetics, food and liquor—he'd be shot on sight
if he got caught trying to run that kind of merchandise into the Empire. For
the same reason that they couldn't use it on Nikkeldepain— they were that
scared of contamination by goods that came from uncleared worlds!

He breakfasted alone next morning. Toll had left a note
beside his plate, which explained in a large, not too legible script that she
had to run off and fetch the Leewit; and that if he was gone before she got
back she was wishing him good-by and good luck.

He smeared two more buns with Wintenberry jelly, drank a
large mug of cone-seed coffee, finished every scrap of the omelet of swan hawk
eggs and then, in a state of pleasant repletion, toyed around with his slice of
roasted Bollem liver. Boy, what food! He must have put on fifteen pounds since
he landed on Karres.

He wondered how Toll kept that sleek figure.

Regretfully, he pushed himself away from the table, pocketed
her note for a souvenir, and went out on the porch. There a tear-stained Maleen
hurled herself into his arms.

"Oh, captain!" she sobbed. "You're
leaving—"

"Now, now!" the captain murmured, touched and
surprised by the lovely child's grief. He patted her shoulders soothingly.
"I'll be back," he said rashly.

"Oh, yes, do come back!" cried Maleen. She
hesitated and added: "I become marriageable two years from now, Karres
time—"

"Well, well," said the captain, dazed. "Well,
now—"

He set off down the path a few minutes later, with a strange
melody tinkling in his head. Around the first curve, it changed abruptly to a
shrill keening which seemed to originate from a spot some two hundred feet
before him. Around the next curve, he entered a small, rocky clearing full of
pale, misty, early-morning sunlight and what looked like a slow-motion fountain
of gleaming rainbow globes. These turned out to be clusters of large, vari-hued
soap bubbles which floated up steadily from a wooden tub full of hot water,
soap and the Leewit. Toll was bent over the tub; and the Leewit was objecting
to a morning bath, with only that minimum of interruptions required to keep her
lungs pumped full of a fresh supply of air.

As the captain paused beside the little family group, her
red, wrathful face came up over the rim of the tub and looked at him.

"Well, Ugly," she squealed, in a renewed outburst
of rage, "who you staring at?" Then a sudden determination came into
her eyes. She pursed her lips.

Toll up-ended her promptly and smacked the Leewit's bottom.

"She was going to make some sort of a whistle at
you," she explained hurriedly. "Perhaps you'd better get out of range
while I can keep her head under. And good luck, captain!"

Karres seemed even more deserted than usual this morning. Of
course, it was quite early. Great banks of fog lay here and there among the
huge dark trees and the small bright houses. A breeze sighed sadly far
overhead. Faint, mournful bird-cries came from still higher up—it could have
been swan hawks reproaching him for the omelet.

Somewhere in the distance, somebody tootled on a
wood-instrument, very gently.

He had gone halfway up the path to the landing field, when
something buzzed past him like an enormous wasp and went
CLUNK!
into the
bole of a tree just before him.

It was a long, thin, wicked-looking arrow. On its shaft was
a white card; and on the card was printed in red letters:

STOP, MAN OF NIKKELDEPAES!

The captain stopped and looked around slowly and cautiously.
There was no one in sight. What did it mean?

He had a sudden feeling as if all of Karres were rising up
silently in one stupendous, cool, foggy trap about him. His skin began to
crawl. What was going to happen?

"Ha-ha!" said Goth, suddenly visible on a rock
twelve feet to his left and eight feet above him. "You did stop!"

The captain let his breath out slowly.

"What else did you think I'd do?" he inquired. He
felt a little faint.

She slid down from the rock like a lizard and stood before
him. "Wanted to say good-by!" she told him.

Thin and brown, in jacket, breeches, boots, and cap of gray-green
rock-lichen color, Goth looked very much in her element. The brown eyes looked
up at him steadily; the mouth smiled faintly; but there was no real expression
on her face at all. There was a quiverful of those enormous arrows slung over
her shoulder, and some arrow-shooting gadget—not a bow—in her left hand.

She followed his glance.

"Bollem hunting up the mountain," she explained.
"The wild ones. They're better meat—"

The captain reflected a moment. That's right, he recalled;
they kept the tame Bollem herds mostly for milk, butter, and cheese. He'd
learned a lot of important things about Karres, all right!

"Well," he said, "good-by, Goth!"

They shook hands gravely. Goth was the real Witch of Karres,
he decided—more so than her sisters, more so even than Toll. But he hadn't
actually learned a single thing about any of them.

Peculiar people!

He walked on, rather glumly.

"Captain!" Goth called after him. He turned.

"Better watch those take-offs," Goth called,
"or you'll kill yourself yet!"

The captain cussed softly all the way up to the
Venture.

And the take-off was terrible! A few swan hawks were
watching but, he hoped, no one else.

V

There wasn't the remotest possibility, of course, of
resuming direct trade in the Empire with the cargo they'd loaded for him. But
the more he thought about it now, the less likely it seemed that Councilor
Onswud was going to let a genuine fortune slip through his hands on a mere
technicality of embargoes. Nikkeldepain knew all the tricks of interstellar
merchandising; and the councilor himself was undoubtedly the slickest unskinned
miffel in the Republic.

More hopefully, the captain began to wonder whether some
sort of trade might not be made to develop eventually between Karres and
Nikkeldepain. Now and then, he also thought of Maleen growing marriageable two
years hence, Karres time. A handful of witch-notes went tinkling through his
head whenever that idle reflection occurred.

The calendric chronometer informed him he'd spent three
weeks there. He couldn't remember how their year compared with the standard
one.

He found he was getting remarkably restless on this homeward
run; and it struck him for the first time that space travel could also be
nothing much more than a large hollow period of boredom. He made a few attempts
to resume his sessions of small-talk with Illyla, via her picture; but the
picture remained aloof.

The ship seemed unnaturally quiet now—that was the trouble!
The captain's cabin, particularly, and the hall leading past it had become as
dismal as a tomb.

But at long last, Nikkeldepain II swam up on the screen
ahead. The captain put the
Venture 7333
on orbit, and broadcast the
ship's identification number. Half an hour later, Landing Control called him.
He repeated the identification number, and added the ship's name, his name,
owner's name, place of origin and nature of cargo.

The cargo had to be described in detail.

"Assume Landing Orbit 21,203 on your instruments,"
Landing Control instructed him. "A customs ship will come out to
inspect."

He went on the assigned orbit and gazed moodily from the
vision ports at the flat continents and oceans of Nikkeldepain II as they
drifted by below. A sense of equally flat depression overcame him unexpectedly.
He shook it off and remembered Illyla.

Three hours later, a ship ran up next to him; and he shut
off the orbital drive. The communicator began buzzing. He switched it on.

"Vision, please!" said an official-sounding voice.
The captain frowned, located the vision-stud of the communicator screen and
pushed it down. Four faces appeared in vague outline on the screen, looking at
him.

"Illyla!" the captain said.

"At least," young Councilor Rapport said
unpleasantly, "he's brought back the ship, Father Onswud!"

"Illyla!" said the captain.

Councilor Onswud said nothing. Neither did Illyla. They both
seemed to be staring at him, but the screen wasn't good enough to permit the
study of expression in detail.

The fourth face, an unfamiliar one above a uniform collar,
was the one with the official-sounding voice.

"You are instructed to open the forward lock, Captain
Pausert," it said, "for an official investigation."

It wasn't till he was releasing the outer lock to the
control room that the captain realized it wasn't Customs who had sent a boat
out to him, but the police of the Republic.

However, he hesitated for only a moment. Then the outer lock
gaped wide.

He tried to explain. They wouldn't listen. They had come on
board in contamination-proof repulsor suits, all four of them; and they
discussed the captain as if he weren't there. Ulyla looked pale and angry and
beautiful, and avoided looking at him.

However, he didn't want to speak to her before the others
anyway.

They strolled back to the storage and gave the Karres cargo
a casual glance.

"Damaged his lifeboat, too!" Councilor Rapport
remarked.

They brushed past him down the narrow hallway and went back
to the control room. The policeman asked to see the log and commercial records.
The captain produced them.

The three men studied them briefly. Ulyla gazed stonily out
at Nikkeldepain II.

"Not too carefully kept!" the policeman pointed
out.

"Surprising he bothered to keep them at all!" said
Councilor Rapport.

"But it's all clear enough!" said Councilor
Onswud.

They straightened up then and faced him in a line. Councilor
Onswud folded his arms and projected his craggy chin. Councilor Rapport stood
at ease, smiling faintly. The policeman became officially rigid.

Ulyla remained off to one side, looking at the three.

"Captain Pausert," the policeman said, "the
following charges-substantiated in part by this preliminary investigation—are
made against you—"

"Charges?" said the captain.

"Silence, please!" rumbled Councilor Onswud.

"First: material theft of a quarter-million value of
maels of jewels and jeweled items from a citizen of the Imperial Planet of
Porlumma—"

"They were returned!" the captain protested.

"Restitution, particularly when inspired by fear of
retribution, does not affect the validity of the original charge,"
Councilor Rapport quoted, gazing at the ceiling.

"Second," continued the policeman. "Purchase
of human slaves, permitted under Imperial law but prohibited by penalty of ten
years to lifetime penal servitude by the laws of the Republic of
Nikkeldepain—"

"I was just taking them back where they belonged!"
said the captain.

"We shall get to that point presently," the
policeman replied. "Third, material theft of sundry items in the value of
one hundred and eighty thousand maels from a ship of the Imperial Planet of
Lepper, accompanied by threats of violence to the ship's personnel—"

"I might add in explanation of the significance of this
particular charge," added Councilor Rapport, looking at the floor,
"that the Regency of Sirius, containing Lepper, is allied to the Republic
of Nikkeldepain by commercial and military treaties of considerable value. The
Regency has taken the trouble to point out that such hostile conduct by a
citizen of the Republic against citizens of the Regency is likely to have an
adverse effect on the duration of the treaties. The charge thereby becomes
compounded by the additional charge of a treasonable act against the
Republic—"