Collected short fiction, p.436
Collected Short Fiction, page 436
Shane imitated the salute. So this was Admiral Gluck! He had shaggy iron-gray hair, bushy white brows over sharp, dark, hollow eyes, and a luxuriant yellow-stained mustache. His face was lean and stern, brown as his uniform.
“At ease, Captain.” He sat down with a tinkle of medals. “Your report?”
Shane caught his breath and tried to remember all he had learned of this harsh, guttural accent. He let his lean body sag, yielding to the real exhaustion in him. He didn’t try to keep his voice from sounding weak and hoarse.
“The Friendship safely entered the Barrier as ordered, sir. On a small island of the Florida Corporation, I attempted to capture a member of the American defense force, which they call the Ring Guard.”
Admiral Gluck’s bright, sunken eyes narrowed.
“What’s wrong with your voice?” he shrilled impatiently. “I can hardly understand you.”
Shane made a hoarse, apologetic little laugh.
“I’m sorry, sir. An air-suit cold.” That was the diagnosis of his case that he had overheard. “And I’m afraid I’ve been practicing Americanese so long that it’s natural to me.”
Gluck shrugged impatiently. “Get on.”
“This American destroyed the Friendship,” Shane told him. “He used a hand weapon.”
Gluck’s mouth fell open, revealing yellow fangs.
“What hand weapon could destroy an armored rocket?” he blurted in amazement.
“It looked a little like a paralysis gun,” Shane said. “It didn’t make any beam that you could see, but the rocket crumbled. Hard steel turned to fine gray dust. I heard the weapon called a decoherer.”
“D—decoherer, eh?” Gluck’s voice stammered. His dark face turned darker with anger. “The pampered rats think they can defy the Black Star, do they?” His tiny eyes glittered shrewdly. “How is the Barrier Machine protected?”
Shane shook his bronzed head and looked solemn.
“They call it the Ring Cylinder,” he said. “It is surrounded with hidden batteries of decoherers. Not hand machines, but powerful projectors that can send the beam two thousand miles, all the way to the Ring—the Barrier.”
That was almost a slip. Shane felt a little tingle of dread, but Gluck hadn’t noticed. He pounded on the desk with a gnarled fist.
“The Black Star will smash them yet!” he shrilled.
“Certainly it will, sir.”
Gluck repeated that stiff-armed salute and Shane responded promptly.
“Get on,” the General urged sharply. “How did you escape?”
“I didn’t.” Shane imitated Clayton’s grin. He didn’t feel a bit like grinning, but he knew that Glenn Clayton would have enjoyed this situation. “The Americans set me free!”
GLUCK smiled grimly.
“So you tricked them?”
“No, I didn’t trick them,” Shane said quietly. “Enough of the Friendship was left for them to see I had come to destroy the Barrier. But their defenses are so sure, they weren’t afraid to let me go.”
He let Clayton’s laugh ring scornfully.
“They found the letter from Atlantis Lee and took it to their government. They don’t know the Black Star.” Shane attempted Clayton’s most wolfish grin. “They sent me back with a message of peace!”
He showed the gray envelope addressed to Atlantis Lee.
“You know what it says?” Gluck demanded.
“The American Corporation Control Board is willing to establish friendly relations. They suggest an exchange of ambassadors. They are willing to set up a joint commission, to discuss exchanging water for our oil, metals and power cells.”
“Fat fools!” shrilled Gluck viciously.
“They don’t know the Black Star!” Shane grinned, hoping that his hard, brown face didn’t show any of his alarmed bewilderment about what the Black Star really was. He offered the envelope. “Do you want it, sir?”
“Deliver it,” Gluck snapped impatiently. “Let your pretty friend play our game. Perhaps we should send an ambassador—to find a way for our bombers through these blasted d-de-coherers.”
“Yes, sir,” Shane said. “Your orders, sir?”
Gluck’s keen little eyes gave him a startled, stabbing look. Shane knew he had made a mistake. Clayton wouldn’t have asked for orders. He grinned and tried to chuckle, to make a little joke of it. But Gluck’s dark face remained bleak and grim.
“The Avenger is ready to take you back to New Dover tomorrow,” he said. “You can present this message from the plutocratic Americans to Atlantis Lee. No doubt you will take time to rest from the hardships of your expedition.”
The bushy eyebrows lifted knowingly.
“Thank you, sir,” Shane replied, grinning more widely.
He made the stiff-armed salute once more, but he was both puzzled and alarmed. Evidently there was something he didn’t know about the relationship between Clayton and Gluck. Somehow he had blundered.
He was anxious to meet Atlantis Lee, even though that meeting might be the gravest test of his masquerade—if, as he surmised, Clayton had been on close terms with the lovely girl of the picture.
Shane was a little surprised at himself. This was the sort of bold adventure that would appeal to the reckless audacity of Captain Clayton, yet he really meant that grin himself. There was something haunting about that picture of red-haired, violet-eyed Atlantis Lee.
Gluck’s next shrill words were a shock.
“I’m calling a general staff conference aboard the Nemesis. It will be necessary for you to give a detailed report of your expedition through the Barrier and to answer all questions about the defenses of America.”
“Yes, sir.”
Behind Clayton’s hard face, Shane felt a chill of dread. Did this mean that the little admiral suspected? A grilling by men who doubtless knew the real Clayton would be a difficult test.
He might never see Atlantis Lee.
CHAPTER XI
Enemy of the Ring
WHITEHALL’S office, in the gray old Ring Guard Headquarters building, was suddenly still. Even the clock on the plain military bareness of the wall seemed to pause in its muffled ticking.
Dr. Della Rand tried to breathe again, struggled to move her frozen face, to speak. But she could only stare at the old general, who stood so precise and straight behind the military neatness of his desk. She had thought that he was kind, but now his air of stern decision terrified her.
The eerie howl of rocket-jets broke that painful silence. Dully she looked out through the window. Something that looked like a rugged brown boulder dropped toward the flying field, cushioned on the hot blue flame of braking ion-jets. It settled to an easy landing and the shriek of jets was stilled.
“Clayton’s machine,” commented Whitehall. “The engineers are testing it today.” He looked back at Della Rand and she saw the dark shadow of pain in his eyes. “I’m sorry, Dr. Rand. It’s a long time since the death penalty has been necessary in civilized America, but that is our decision. In such a case, involving the safety of the Ring, no appeal is allowed.”
Della caught her breath with a little gasping sound.
“Perhaps he has to be killed.” Her voice sounded false and choked and strange. “But why must I be the one to do it?”
Behind his stern military mask, the slight old Guardsman looked uncomfortable.
“Secrecy is necessary,” he explained. “It is just possible that the Outsiders have sent another spy into the ring to find out what became of Clayton. Perhaps the risk is small, but we can’t afford to take chances. If the Outsiders learned that Clayton is dead, that would be the end of Lieutenant Shane’s masquerade.”
Della made a tiny nod of understanding.
“You are the only doctor who has been connected with the case,” Whitehall went on. “I don’t want to call in another. I am requesting you to administer euthanasia merely for Clayton’s sake. Of course you are free to refuse. In that case I’ll call a firing squad for Clayton.”
Her strong hands clenched.
“May I have time—time to think?”
He shook his head. “The sentence must be carried out at once. I’ve already sent for an ambulance to carry Clayton’s body to the Ring City crematory. If you wish to refuse, just say so.”
She tried to swallow the dry, harsh pain in her throat. With an effort, she shut Clayton’s reckless green-eyed grin out of her mind. Her duty seemed clear. In a faint hoarse whisper, she said:
“I’ll do it.”
Whitehall smiled grave approval.
“When you get to the crematory,” he added, “don’t put Clayton’s name on the death certifications. Designate him simply as an enemy of the Ring. I’ll notify the officials what to expect.”
Walking across toward the white hospital building, she paused to stare at the Friendship. The testing crew was just coming out through the valve. They climbed into a waiting car and drove away. Three or four guards were left about the disguised rocket-bomber.
Della felt a painful lump in her throat. Destructive as she knew that machine to be, it was still a symbol of soaring power. It stood for Clayton’s hard strength.
Now she was going to put Clayton to a nameless death as an enemy of the Ring.
THE ambulance startled her. It had come in under silent electric power, but its tires shrieked on the pavement as it stopped by the side door of the hospital. Two men carried a stretcher into the building, to wait for Clayton’s body.
She hurried on. The morning sunlight was suddenly devoid of warmth. Her body felt numb and a little shiver shook her. The world wasn’t quite real any longer. Her actions were stiff and mechanical.
She found her kit in the locker room downstairs. She went into the laboratory to mix crystal drops of instant death. With hands that were like skilful machines, no longer part of her, she filled the little needle.
The guards let her into Clayton’s room. The thick vitroid windows have a tantalizing view of the broad flying field, with the brown, jagged shape of the Friendship at the side of it. But they were stronger than steel plate. They needed no bars.
Clayton lay on a mattress on the floor. His hands were manacled in front of him. His ankles were fettered and a short length of chain secured them to a ring-bolt in the wall. Six Guardsmen stood in a row at the other end of the room. They carried no arms, lest the prisoner should secure one of them. But there were six more men in the corridor outside, with plenty of guns. The Ring Guard was taking no chances.
“Hello, beautiful.”
The chains made a soft little jingle as Clayton sat up on the mattress. He grinned at her. For the moment his hard, green eyes held only amusement. His voice was light and calm as ever.
Della merely stood there, the black kit clutched in her clammy hands. Her numb body ceased to exist. A darkness settled over the room. She couldn’t see anything but Clayton’s grinning face.
“Good-by,” Clayton said. “It was nice of you to come.”
She clung to his words and they steadied her. She breathed again. Sudden tears flooded her dry and aching eyes. Clayton knew that he was going to be killed and he wasn’t afraid.
“What’s the matter, beautiful?” he asked. “Aren’t you going to speak to me?”
She couldn’t speak. It was all that she could do to hold back hysteria. His eyes dropped from her face to the black bag in her tense hands.
“Oh,” he said softly. “You’re the executioner?”
Mute and ill, she nodded. Amazingly he grinned again. The chains tinkled as he made a cheerful shrug. His voice was softer than she had ever heard it.
“Don’t let it get you down,” he comforted. “I’d rather take the poison cup from you, beautiful, than any other girl I know.”
Something happened to her then. The agony of that conflict in her mind became more terrible than she could endure. Clayton’s reckless grin and that softness of his voice tipped a balance in her. The conflict was solved.
IT wasn’t an act of reason. Her tortured mind couldn’t reason any longer. It had been a conflict of emotions. Now, while Clayton grinned, one emotion won the victory. The other, for the time, was simply blotted out.
Suddenly her purpose was clear. All the numbness left her. Her senses and her mind were sharper than they had ever been. In one lightning instant the plan was made. Her hands were quick and sure.
She opened the black case. Discarding the needle that she had already filled with quick and painless death, she filled another with something else.
Clayton watched her from the mattress on the floor.
“Quite a treat, beautiful,” his hard voice mocked, “to see your own lovely hands mixing the fatal dose.”
But she thought that a change had come into his tone, for her alone to hear. It told her that he understood. It thanked her for what she was doing. It said that they were comrades now, boldly playing a desperate game.
“You’re a cool one, beautiful.” Admiration rang in his voice. “You’re the kind I like.” Cold steel tinkled as he waved her a kiss. “Good-by. I’m ready, when you are.”
The new needle was filled with its imitation death. The few fright drops were mixed without research or tests. She realized that any error might have made them fatal, but she knew she had made no error.
General Whitehall was in the doorway, watching silently. Clayton, grinning, managed to slip his own sleeves up. He held out his arms to wait for the needle. It seemed to Della that they were steady as iron. Her quick hands were steady, too. She thrust the tiny point into the vein and drove the little piston home.
“Good-by, beautiful,” Clayton murmured wearily.
The hard grin faded. Her heart swelled with tenderness when she saw the face of a tired, bewildered child. He went to sleep. The fetters jingled as he fell back on the mattress. Della put away the needle and found her stethoscope.
Clayton’s heart made two faint beats and stopped. She gave the instrument to General Whitehall. He listened, then nodded at the guards. They removed the fetters. The men from the crematory came in and unrolled their stretcher on the floor. Guards lifted Clayton’s limp body upon it.
Della followed down the stairs to the waiting ambulance. That march seemed to take a thousand years. She was afraid Clayton would stir too soon. The drug should keep his heart and breath slowed beyond detection for four or five minutes. After that—
She started at Whitehall’s quietvoiced statement.
“Thank you, Doctor. Remember about the certificate.”
“Of course, General.” She asked the ambulance driver, who was waiting by the open doors at the back of the vehicle: “May I ride to the crematory with you?”
“Sure, Doctor.” He nodded at the cab. “Get in.”
She walked slowly to the cab and climbed into the seat. The key, she saw, was in the lock. She knew she must look tense and pale. But if these men noticed, they must think it was because she had just killed a man, not because she hadn’t killed him.
THE watched them slide the stretcher into the vehicle behind her. Silently she slipped behind the wheel, turned the key. Her foot found the accelerator. She waited. She could scarcely breathe. Her heart paused. At last the doors were closed. The driver and the two others came around toward the cab.
“Hang on.” She caught part of Whitehall’s low-voiced order to two of the guards. “See him into the furnace. We can’t take—”
She stepped on the accelerator, hard. Tires screamed beneath the sudden drive of electric power. The ambulance lunged out of the startled group. A breathless shout faded away.
The ambulance turned on two wheels, jolted across the hospital lawn and burst through a white-painted wooden fence. Lurching and bouncing, it careered across the flying field toward the jagged, brown hull of the Friendship.
She started the siren. An ambulance racing across the airport was not a novelty. The guards stationed about the disguised rocket-bomber looked about for the crack-up.
“Thanks, beautiful.”
Clayton’s hard voice was still breathless from the temporary effect of the drug. A little pale, he climbed up into the front seat beside her, but he kept grinning at the startled and bewildered guards about the Friendship.
“Neat work, beautiful.”
Swiftly searching the glove compartment, he found a heavy automatic. They didn’t need it and they had no time to use it.
One of the guards made a gesture to wave them away. A bullet drilled a neat hole in the windshield. Then he and the man beyond had to fling themselves desperately out of the way.
Della didn’t set the brakes until she was a few yards from the Friendship. Its steel hull finished the task of stopping the ambulance. Clayton had flung open the door of the cab. They stumbled toward the open air-lock.
Guards were running across the field. Stray bullets had begun to ping on the rocket’s steel hull, but in another second they were aboard. Clayton slammed the valve and ran to the controls.
“They’ve got armored cars,” gasped Della. “Three of them—under tarpaulins in the hangars—with cannon.”
“Don’t worry, beautiful.” Clayton raised his voice above the mounting scream of rockets. “We’ll be a hundred miles high before they can get them uncovered. We’ll be dive-bombing the Ring Cylinder before they know what has happened!”
CHAPTER XII
Atlantis Lee
IT seemed to Barry Shane that he spent a thousand hours at the long metal table in the wardroom of the Nemesis, surrounded with the brown-uniformed officers of Admiral Gluck’s general staff. From his long trek across the dry sea-floor and the strain of his interview with Admiral Gluck, Shane was near the limit of exhaustion. He didn’t try to conceal that. It gave him some excuse for not mentioning names, or promptly recognizing faces.
But that exhaustion was real. His faculties were slowed and dulled with it. Once again he spoke of the Barrier as the Ring and heavy Captain Barlow challenged him harshly.
“Forgive me, Barlow,” he said lamely. “I’ve been drilling myself for years to think like an American. That was necessary to prevent unconscious slips, but the habit persists.”
