‘You wouldn’t know, of course, that you’re carrying a package of Lonabarian jewelry, or would you?’ The question was elaborately skeptical.
‘I know damned well I’m not.’
‘We’ll take the package you haven’t got, then!’ the pirate
snapped. ‘Go inert and open up, or I’ll do it for you—like this.’
A needle-beam lashed out and expired. ‘That was through one
of your holds. The next one will be through your control room.’
Resistance being out of the question, the liner went inert.
37
While the intrinsic velocities of the two vessels were being matched, the pirate issued further instructions.
‘All officers now in the control room, stay there. All other officers, round up all passengers and herd them into the main saloon. Anybody that acts up or doesn’t do exactly what he’s told will be blasted.’
The pirates boarded. One squad went to the control room. Its leader, seeing that the communications officer was still trying to drive a call through the blanket of interference, beamed him down without a word. At this murder the captain and four or five other officers went for their guns and there was a brief but bloody battle. There were too many pirates.
A larger group invaded the main saloon. Most of them went through, only half a dozen or so posting themselves to guard the passengers. One of the guards, a hook-nosed individual wearing consciously an aura of authority, spoke.
‘Take it easy, folks, and nobody’ll get hurt. If any of you’ve got guns, don’t go for ’em. That’s a specialty that…’
One of his DeLameters flamed briefly. Cloud’s right arm, almost to the shoulder, vanished. The man behind him dropped— in two different places.
‘Take it easy, I said,’ the pirate chief went calmly on. ‘You can tie that arm up, fella, if you want to. It was in line with that guy who was trying to pull a gun. You nurse over there—take him to sick-bay and fix up his wing. If anybody stops you tell ’em Number One said to. Now, the rest of you, watch your step. I’ll cut down every damn one of you that so much as looks like he wanted to start something.’ They obeyed.
In a few minutes the looting parties returned to the saloon. ‘Did you get it, Six?’ ‘Yeah. In the mail, like you said.’ ‘The safe?’
‘Sure. Wasn’t much in it, but not too bad, at that.’ ‘QX. Control room! QX?’
‘Ten dead,’ the intercom blatted in reply. ‘Otherwise QX.’ ‘Fuse the panels?’ ‘Natch.’ ‘Let’s go!’
They went. Their vessel flashed away. The passengers rushed to their staterooms. Then:
‘Doctor Cloud!’ came from the speaker. ‘Doctor Neal Cloud! Control room calling Doctor Cloud!’ ‘Cloud speaking.’
‘Report to the control room, please.” ,
‘Oh—excuse me—I didn’t know you were wounded,’ the officer apologized as he saw the bandaged stump and the white, sweating face. ‘You’d better go to bed.’ ‘Doing nothing wouldn’t help. What did you want me for?’ ‘Do you know anything about communicators?’ ‘A little—what a nucleonics man has to know.’ ‘Good. They killed all our communications officers and blasted the panels, even in the lifeboats. You can’t do much with your left hand, of course, but you may be able to boss the job of rigging up a spare.’
‘I can do more than you think—I’m left-handed. Give me a couple of technicians and I’ll see what we can do.”
They set to work, but before they could accomplish anything a cruiser drove up, flashing its identification as a warship of the Galactic Patrol.
‘We picked up the partial call you got off,” its young commander said, briskly. ‘With that and the plotted center of interference we didn’t lose any time: Let’s make this snappy.’ He was itching to be off after the marauder, but he could not leave until he had ascertained the facts and had been given clearance. ‘You aren’t hurt much—don’t need to call a tug, do you?’ ‘No,’ replied the liner’s senior surviving officer. ‘QX,’ and a quick investigation followed. ‘Anybody who ships stuff like that open mail ought to lose it, but it’s tough on innocent bystanders. Anything else I can do for you?’
‘Not unless you can lend us some officers, particularly navigators and communications officers.’
‘Sorry, but we’re short there ourselves—four of my best are in sick-bay. Sign this clearance, please, and I’ll get on that fellow’s tail. I’ll send your copy of my report to your head office. Clear ether!’
The cruiser shot away. Temporary repairs were made and the
liner, with Cloud and a couple of electronics technicians as
communications officers, finished the voyage to Dekanore III
without more interruption.
The Vortex Blaster was met at the dock by Works Manager
38
39
Graves himself. The fat man was effusively sorry that Cloud had lost an arm, but assured him that the accident wouldn’t lay him up very long. He, Graves, would get a Posenian surgeon over here so fast that…
If the manager was taken aback to learn that Cloud had already had a Phillips treatment, he did not show it. He escorted the specialist to Deka’s best hotel, where he introduced him largely and volubly. Graves took him to supper. Graves took him to a theater and showed him the town. Graves told the hotel management to give the scientist the best rooms and the best valet they had, and that Cloud was not to be allowed to spend any of his own money. All of his activities, whatever their nature, purpose, or extent, were to be charged to Tellurian Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Graves was a grand guy.
Cloud broke loose, finally, and went to the dock to see about getting his flitter.
It had not been unloaded. There would be a slight delay, he was informed, because of the insurance inspections necessitated by the damage—and Cloud had not known that there had been any! When he had learned what had been done to his little ship he swore bitterly and sought out the liner’s senior officer. ‘Why didn’t you tell me we got holed?” he demanded. ‘Why, I don’t know … just that you didn’t ask, is all, I guess. I don’t suppose it occurred to anybody—I know it didn’t me— that you might be interested.’
And that was, Cloud knew, strictly true. Passengers were not informed of such occurrences. He had been enough of an officer so that he could have learned anything he wished; but not enough of one to have been informed of such matters as routine. Nor was it surprising that it had not come up in conversation. Damage to cargo meant nothing whatever to the liner’s overworked officers, standing double watches; a couple of easily-patched holes in the hull were not worth mentioning. From their standpoint the only damage was done to the communicators, and Cloud himself had set them to rights. This delay was his own fault as much as anybody else’s. Yes, more.
‘You won’t lose anything, though,’ the officer said, helpfully. ‘Everything’s covered, you know.’
‘It isn’t the money I’m yowling about—it’s the time. That apparatus can’t be duplicated anywhere except on Tellus, and even there it’s all special-order stuff. OH DAMN!’ and Cloud
40
strode away toward his hotel.
During the following days TPI entertained him royally. Not insistently—Graves was an expert in such matters—but simply by giving him the keys to the planet. He could do anything he pleased. He could have all the company he wanted, male or female, to help him to do it. Thus he did—within limits—just about what Graves wanted him to do; and, in spite of the fact that he did not want to enjoy life, he liked it.
One evening, however, he refused to play a slot machine, explaining to his laughing companion that the laws of chance were pretty thoroughly shackled in such mechanisms—and the idle remark backfired. What was the mathematical probability that all the things that had happened to him could have happened by pure chance?
That night he analyzed his data. Six incidents; the probability was extremely small. Seven, if he counted his arm. If it had been his left arm—jet back! Since he wrote with his right hand, very few people knew that he was left-handed. Seven it was; and that made it virtually certain. Accident was out.
But if he was being delayed and hampered deliberately, who was doing it, and why? It didn’t make sense. Nevertheless, the idea would not down.
He was a trained observer and an analyst second to none. Therefore he soon found out that he was being shadowed wherever he went, but he could not get any really significant leads. Wherefore:
‘Graves, have you got a spy-ray detector?’ he asked boldly— and watchfully.
The fat man did not turn a hair. ‘No, nobody would want to spy on me. Why?’
‘I feel jumpy. I don’t know why anybody would be spying on me, either, but—I’m neither a Lensman nor an esper, but I’d swear that somebody’s peeking over my shoulder half the time. I think I’ll go over to the Patrol station and borrow one.’