To the Galactic Rim: The John Grimes Saga (49 page)

Twelve men were outside the Cave now, advancing in a dance-like step. The crude, tree-stem trumpets were still sounding, like the plaint of tired machinery, and the noise of the knocking sticks was that of the cooling metal. The leader paused, stood upright. With his fingers in his mouth he gave a piercing whistle.

The women emerged, carrying bundles, hesitantly, two steps forward, one step back. Grimes gasped his disbelief. Surely that was Tanya, as naked as the others—and there was no mistaking Moira. He jumped to his feet, ignoring the protests of those behind him, trying to shake off Deane’s restraining hand. “Let go!” he snarled.

“Don’t interfere, Captain!” The telepath’s voice was urgent. “Don’t you see? They’ve gone native—no, that’s not right. But they’ve reverted. And there’s no law against it.”

“I can still drag them out of this. They’ll thank me after.” He turned around and shouted, “Come on, all of you! We must put a stop to this vile performance!”

“Captain Grimes!” This was the coach driver, his voice angry. “Sit down, sir! This sort of thing has happened before, and it’s nothing to worry about. The young ladies are in no danger!”

“It’s happened before,” agreed Deane, unexpectedly. “With neurotic exhibitionists, wanting to have their photographs taken among the savages. But not
this
way!”

Then, even more unexpectedly, it was Deane who was running out across the sand, and it was Najatira who advanced to meet him, not in hostility but in welcome. It was Grimes who, unheeded, yelled, “Come back, Spooky! Come back here!”

He didn’t know what was happening, but he didn’t like it. First of all those two silly bitches, and now one of his own officers. What the hell was getting into everybody? Followed by a half-dozen of the other men he ran towards the cave mouth. Their way was barred by a line of the tribesmen, holding their sticks now like spears (which they were)—not like make-believe guns. Najatira stood proudly behind the armed men, and on either side of him stood the two girls, a strange, arrogant pride in every line of their naked bodies. And there was Deane, a strange smile on his face. His face, too, was strange, seemed suddenly to have acquired lines of authority.

“Go back, John,” he ordered. “There is nothing that you can do.” He added softly, “But there is much that I can do.”

“What the hell are you talking about, Spooky?”

“I’m an Australian, like Moira and Tanya here. Like them, I have the Old Blood in my veins. Unlike them, I’m a spaceman. Do you think that after all these years in the Service I, with my talent, haven’t learned how to handle and navigate a ship, any ship? I shall take my people back to where they belong.”

And then Grimes
knew.
The knowledge came flooding into his mind, from the mind of Deane, from the minds of the others, whose ancestral memories had been awakened by the telepath. But he was still responsible. He must still try to stop this craziness.

“Mr. Deane!” he snapped as he strode forward firmly. He brushed aside the point of the spear that was aimed at his chest. He saw Tanya throw something, and sneered as it missed his head by inches. He did not see the cruciform boomerang returning, was aware of it only as a crashing blow from behind, as a flash of crimson light, then darkness.

He recovered slowly. He was stretched out on the sand beside the coach. Two of the nurses among the passengers were with him.

He asked, as he tried to sit up, “What happened?”

“They all went back into the cave,” the girl said. “The rock . . . The rock closed behind them. And there were lights. And a voice, it was Mr. Deane’s voice, but loud, loud, saying, ‘Clear the field! Clear the field! Get back, everybody. Get well back. Get well away!’ So we got well back.”

“And what’s happening now?” asked Grimes. The nurses helped him as he got groggily to his feet. He stared towards the distant Rock. He could hear the beat of mighty engines and the ground was trembling under the monolith. Even with the knowledge that Deane had fed into his mind he could not believe what he was seeing.

The Rock was lifting, its highest part suddenly eclipsing a bright constellation. It was lifting, and the skin of the planet protested as the vast ship, that for so long had been embedded in it, tore itself free. Tremors knocked the tourists from their feet, but somehow Grimes remained standing, oblivious to the shouts and screams. He heard the crash behind him as the coach was overturned, but did not look. At this moment it was only a minor distraction.

The Rock was lifting, had lifted. It was a deeper blackness against the blackness of the sky, a scattering of strange, impossible stars against the distant stars, a bright cluster (at first) that dimmed and diminished, that dwindled, faster and faster, and then was gone, leaving in its wake utter darkness and silence.

The silence was broken by the coach driver. He said slowly, “I’ve had to cope with vandalism in my time, but nothing like this. What the Board will say when they hear that their biggest tourist attraction has gone I hate to think about . . .” He seemed to cheer up slightly. “But it was one
of your
officers, Captain Grimes, from
your
ship, that did it. I hope you enjoy explaining it!”

Grimes explained, as well as he was able, to Commander Lewin.

He said, “As we all know, sir, there are these odd races, human rather than humanoid, all through the Galaxy. It all ties in with the Common Origin of Mankind theories. I never used to have much time for them myself, but now . . .”

“Never mind that, Grimes. Get on with the washing.”

“Well, Deane was decent enough to let loose a flood of knowledge into my mind just before that blasted Tanya clonked me with her boomerang. It seems that millions of years ago these stone spaceships, these hollowed out asteroids, were sent to explore this Galaxy. I got only a hazy idea of their propulsive machinery, but it was something on the lines of our Inertial Drive, and something on the lines of our Mannschenn Drive, with auxiliary rockets for maneuvering in orbit and so forth. They were never meant to land, but they could, if they had to. Their power? Derived from the conversion of matter, any matter, with the generators or converters ready to start up when the right button was pushed—but the button had to be pushed psionically. Get me?”

“Not very well. But go on.”

“Something happened to the ship, to the crew and passengers of this ship. A disease, I think it was, wiping out almost all the adults, leaving only children and a handful of not very intelligent ratings. Somebody—it must have been one of the officers just before he died—got the ship down somehow. He set things so that it could not be re-entered until somebody with the right qualifications came along.”

“The right qualifications?”

“Yes. Psionic talents, more than a smattering of astronautics, and descended from the Old People . . .”

“Like your Mr. Deane. But what about the two girls?”

“They had the old Blood. And they were highly educated. And they could have been latent telepaths . . .”

“Could be.” Lewin smiled without much mirth. “Meanwhile, Lieutenant, I have to try to explain to the Olganan Government, with copies to Trans-Galactic Clippers
and
to our own masters, including
your
Commodore Damien. All in all, Grimes, it was a fine night’s work. Apart from the Rock, there were two TG passengers
and
a Survey Service officer . . .”

“
And
the tribe . . .”

“The least of the Olganan Government’s worries, and nothing at all to do with TG or ourselves. Even so . . .” This time his smile was tinged with genuine, but sardonic, humor.

“Even so?” echoed Grimes.

“What if those tribesmen and women decided to liberate—I suppose that’s the right word—those other tribespeople, the full-blooded ones who’re still living in the vicinity of the other stone spaceship? What if the Australians realize, one sunny morning, that their precious Ayers Rock has up and left them?”

“I know who’ll be blamed,” said Grimes glumly.

“How right you are,” concurred Lewin.

What You Know

Lieutenant John Grimes
, captain of the Serpent Class Courier
Adder,
was in a bitter and twisted mood. He had his reasons. To begin with, he had just been hauled over the coals by Commodore Damien, Officer Commanding Couriers, and still resented being blamed for the disappearance of Cragge Rock from Olgana. Then he had been told that his ship’s stay at Lindisfarne Base was to be a very short one—and Dr. Maggie Lazenby, with whom he hoped to achieve something warmer than mere friendship, was off planet and would not be returning until after his own departure. Finally, he had seen the latest Promotion List and had noted that officers junior to himself had been given their half rings, were now Lieutenant Commanders. And some of those same officers, in Grimes’s words, wouldn’t be capable of navigating a plastic duck across a bathtub.

Ensign Beadle, his first lieutenant, was sympathetic. He said, “But it isn’t what you do, Captain. It isn’t what you know, even. It’s whom you know . . .”

“You could be right, Number One,” admitted Grimes. “But in my case I’m afraid that it boils down to who knows me . . . Did you ever see that book,
How to Win Friends and Influence People?
I often think that I must have read the wrong half, the second half . . .”

Beadle made a noncommittal noise. Then, “We’re ready to lift ship, Captain. Mechanically, that is. Mr. Hollister, the new psionic radio officer, has yet to join—and, of course, there are the passengers . . .” Grimes allowed himself a sardonic smile. “I wonder what the Commodore has against
them!
”

Beadle took the question literally. “We’re the only Courier in port, Captain, and it’s essential that the Commissioner reaches Dhartana as soon as possible . . .”

“ . . . if not before,” finished Grimes. “Mphm. All right, Number One. Is the V.I.P. suite swept and garnished?”

“I . . . I’ve been busy with the
important
preparations for space, Captain . . .”

Grimes scowled. “I sincerely hope, Number One, that Mrs. Commissioner Dalwood never hears you implying that she’s unimportant. We’ll make a tour of the accommodation
now.
”

Followed by Beadle he strode up the ramp into the airlock of his little ship, his “flying darning needle.” The V.I.P. suite took up almost the entire compartment below the officers’ flat. As he passed through the sliding door into the sitting room Grimes’s prominent ears reddened; with him it was a sign of anger as well as of embarrassment. “Damn it all, Number One,” he exploded, “don’t you realize that this woman is one of the civilian big wheels on the Board of Admiralty? You may not want promotion—but I do. Look at that table top! Drinking glass rings—and it must have been something sweet and sticky!—and bloody nearly an inch of cigarette ash! And the ashtrays! They haven’t been emptied since Christ was a pup!”

“The suite hasn’t been used since we carried Mr. Alberto . . .”

“I know that. Am I to suppose that you’ve kept it the way he left it in loving memory of him?”

“You did say, sir, that bearing in mind the circumstances of his death we should leave everything untouched in case his department wanted to make a thorough investigation . . .”

“And his department did check just to make sure that he’d left nothing of interest on board when he disembarked on Doncaster. But that was months ago. And this bedroom . . . The way it is now I wouldn’t put a dog into it. Get on the blower at once to Maintenance, ask them? no,
tell
them—to send a cleaning detail here immediately.”

Grimes became uncomfortably aware that there was somebody behind him. He turned slowly, reluctantly, looked into the hard, steel-grey eyes of the woman who was standing just inside the doorway. She returned his stare coldly. She was tall, and she was handsome, with short-cut platinum blonde hair, wearing a beautifully tailored grey costume that looked like a uniform but wasn’t, that looked more like a uniform than a deliberately casual rig of the day affected by Grimes and Beadle in common with all Courier Service officers. Her figure seemed to be that of a girl—but her face, although unlined, was old. There were no physical marks of age, but it was somehow obvious that she had seen too much, experienced too much. Grimes thought,
If she smiles, something will crack.

She didn’t smile.

She said—and her voice, although well modulated, was hard as the rest of her—“Mr. Grimes . . .”

“Ma’am?”

“I am Commissioner Dalwood.”

She did not extend her hand. Grimes bowed stiffly. “Honored to have you aboard, Ma’am.”

“The honor is all yours, Mr. Grimes. Tell me, is the rest of your ship like this pigsty?”

“We’re having the suite put to rights, Mrs. Dalwood.”

“Pray do not put yourself out on my behalf, Mr. Grimes. My lady’s maid and my two robot servants are at this moment bringing my baggage aboard. The robots are versatile. If you will let them have the necessary cleaning gear they will soon have these quarters fit for human occupancy.”

“Mr. Beadle,” ordered Grimes, “belay that call to Maintenance. See that Mrs. Dalwood’s servants are issued with what they need.”

“Very good, sir,” replied Beadle smartly, glad of the chance to make his escape.

“And now, Mr. Grimes, if I may sit down somewhere in less squalid surroundings . . .”

“Certainly, Ma’am. If you will follow me . . .”

Grimes led the way out of the suite. The two humanoid robots, with expensive-looking baggage piled at their feet, stared at him impassively. The maid—small, plump, pert, and darkly brunette—allowed a flicker of sympathy to pass over her rosy face. Grimes thought that she winked, but couldn’t be sure. On the way up to his own quarters Grimes was relieved to see that Beadle had kept the rest of the ship in a reasonably good state of cleanliness, although he did hear one or two disapproving sniffs from his passenger. His own day cabin was, he knew, untidy. He liked it that way. He was not surprised when Mrs. Dalwood said, “Your
desk,
Mr. Grimes. Surely some of those papers are of such a confidential nature that they should be in your safe.”