hunch that we ought to be investigating that alien galaxy of DuQuesne’s. Whatever it is,
I want to go somewhere and I haven’t the faintest idea where.”
“Oh? Listen!” Dorothy’s eyes widened. “I’ll bet you’re getting an answer to that message
we sent out!”
He shook his head. “Uh-uh. Can’t be. Telepathy has got to be something you can
understand.”
“Who besides you ever said it would have to be telepathy? And who knows what
telepathy would have to be like? Come on, let’s go tell Martin and Peggy!”
“Huh?” he yelped. “Tell M. Reynolds Crane, the hardest boiled skeptic that event went
unhung, that I want to go skyshooting to hellangone off into the wild blue yonder just
because I’ve got an itch that I can’t scratch?”
“Why not?” She looked him steadily in the eye. “We’re exploring terra incognita, Dick.
How much do you really know about that mind of yours, the way it is now?”
“Okay. Maybe they’ll buy it; you did. Let’s go.”
They went; and, a little to Seaton’s surprise, Crane agreed with Dorothy. So did
Margaret. Hence three hours later, the big sky-rover was on her way.
Four days out, however, Seaton said, “This isn’t the answer, I don’t think. The itch is still
there. So what?”
There was silence for a couple of minutes, then Dorothy chuckled suddenly. Sobering
quickly, she said, with a perfectly straight face, “I’ll bet it’s that new department head
girl-friend of yours, Dick; the pistol-packing mama with the wiggle. She wants to see the
big, bold, handsome Earthman again. And if it is, I’ll scratch . . .”
Seaton jumped almost out of his chair. “You’re not kidding half as much as you think
you are, pet. That crack took a good scratch at exactly where it itches.” He put on his
remote-control helmet and changed course. “And that helps still more.” He thought for
minutes, then shrugged his shoulders and said, “I’m not getting a thing . . . not anything
more at all. How many of you remember either ReeToe Prenk or the girl well enough to
picture either of them accurately in your minds?”
They all remembered one or both of the Rayseenians.
“Okay. This’ll sound silly. It is silly, for all the tea in China, but let’s try something. All join
hands, picture either or both of them, and think at them as hard as we can. The thought
is simply `we’re coming.’ Okay?”
More than half sheepishly, they tried it-and it worked. At least Seaton said, “Well, it
worked, I guess. Anyway, for the first time in weeks, it’s gone. But I didn’t get a thing.
Nothing whatever. Not even a hint either that we were being paged or that our reply was
being received. Did any of you?”
None of them had.
“Huh!” Seaton snorted. “If this is telepathy they can keep it-I’ll take Morse’s original
telegraph!”
A week or so after the Skylark of Valeron left the neighborhood of Ray-See-Nee, that
planet’s new government began to have trouble. Ree-Toe Prenk had said and had
believed that whoever controlled the capital controlled the world, but that was not true in
his case. It had always been true previously because the incoming powers had always
been of the same corrupt-to-the-core stripe as those who were ousted-and when
corruption has been the way of life for generations it is deep-rooted indeed.
There were, of course, other factors behind the unrest. But neither Prenk nor any other
human knew about them -then:
All the district bosses had always gone along with the Big Boss as a matter of course.
Not one of them cared a whit who ran the world, as long as his own privileges and
perquisites and powers and takes were not affected. Prenk, however, was strictly
honest and strictly just. If he should succeed in taking over Ray-See-Nee’s government
in full, every crook and boodler on the planet would lose everything he had; possibly
even his life. Thus, while the new Premier held the capital-in a rapidly deteriorating grip-
his influence outside that city’s limits varied inversely as about the fourth power of the
distance.
This resistance, while actual enough, was in no sense overt. Every order was ostensibly
obeyed to the letter; but everything deteriorated at an accelerating rate and Prenk could
do nothing whatever about it. Whenever and wherever Prenk was not looking, business
went on as usual gambling, drugs, prostitution, crime and protection-but he could not
prove any of it. Neither uniformed police nor detectives could find anything much amiss.
They made arrests, but no suspect was ever convicted: The prosecution’s cases were
weak. The juries brought in verdicts of “innocent”, usually, without leaving the box.
Even when, in desperation, Prenk went-supposedly top secretly-to an outlying city, fully
prepared to stage a questioning that would have made Torquemada blush, he did
nothing and he learned nothing. Every person on his list had vanished tracelessly and
every present incumbent had abundant proof of innocence. Nor did any of them know
why they had been promoted so suddenly. They were just lucky, they guessed.
It was indeed baffling. It would have been less so if Prenk had had any notion of the
universe-wide stir of mighty events just beginning to bubble-if he had been able, as we
are now able, to fit together all these patchwork stories into one nearly Norlaminian
fabric of universal history.
But he wasn’t-and, for his peace of mind, perhaps that was just as well!
Premier Ree-Toe Prenk sat at his desk in the Room of State. Kay-Lee Barlo, shapely
legs crossed and pistol at hip, sat at his left. Sy-By Takeel, the new Captain-General of
the Guard, stood at ease at his right.
“Whoever is doing this is a smooth, shrewd operator,” Prenk said. “So much so that you
two are the only people I can trust. And I don’t suppose either of you will ever be
approached. Probably neither of you would be bought even if you offered yourselves
ever so deftly for sale.”
“I wouldn’t be, certainly,” Takeel said. “Captains general of mercenaries don’t sell out. I
wouldn’t answer for any of my lieutenants, though, if there’s loot to be had. There is
here, I take it?”
“Unlimited quantities, apparently. So you, too, are subject to assassination?” ‘
The soldier shrugged. “Oh, yes, it’s an occupational hazard. How about you, Exalted
Barlo? No chance either, I’d say?”
“None at all. My stand is too well known. Half my people would stab me in the back if
they dared to and they all look me in the eye and lie in their Mi-Ko-Ta-cursed teeth. I
wish Ky-El Mokak and his people would get back here quick,” Kay-Lee said wistfully.
“So do I,” Prenk said, glumly. “But even if we had a sixth-order tightbeamer and could
use it, we haven’t the slightest idea of where he came from or where he went to.”
“That’s true.” She nibbled at her lip. “But listen. I’m a psychic. It runs in the women of
some families, you know, being . . . well, what most people call witches, kind of. My
talent isn’t fully developed yet, but mother and I together could witch-wish at him to
come back here as fast as he can and I’m sure he would.”
The soldier’s face showed quite plainly what he thought of the idea, but Prenk nodded-if
more than somewhat dubiously. “I’ve heard of that `witch-wishing’ business, and that it
sometimes works. So go home right now and get at it, Kay-Lee, and give it everything
you and your mother both can put out.”
Kay-Lee went home forthwith and went into executive session with her mother; a
handsome, black-haired woman of forty-odd. “And I have positive identification,” the girl
concluded. “His blood was all over the place-positively quarts of it-and I saved some
just in case.” And, of course, she had-prudently, wisely and, as it turned out, luckily for
all concerned!
The older woman’s face cleared. “That’s good. Without a positive, I’m afraid it would be
hopeless at what the distance probably is by this time. Run and get the witch-holly,
dear, while I fix the incense.”
They each ate seven ritually preserved witch-holly berries and inhaled seven deep
drafts of aromatic smoke. While they were waiting for the powerful drugs to take effect,
Kay-Lee asked, “How much of this rigamarole is chemistry, do you suppose, mother,
and how much is just hocus-pocus?”
“No one knows. Some day, whatever it is that we have will be recognized as having
existence and will be really studied. Until then, all we can do is follow the ancient ritual.”
“I think I’ll talk to Ky-El about it. But listen. Witches with any claim at all to decency
simply don’t put geases on people. But what if he’s so far away that we can’t reach him
any other way?”
The older woman frowned, then said, “In that case, my dear, we’ll never, never tell
anyone a thing about it.”