The Dark Design by Phillip Jose Farmer

The narrowness of the valleys and the height’ of the mountains made for conditions comparable to those in the glens of Scotland. Generally, it rained every day about 15:00 hours or 3 p.m. in the temperate areas. Usually, a thunderstorm accompanied by rain occurred about 03:00 hours or 3 A.M. in the equatorial zone. This was not a natural phenomenon in the tropics or at least it was believed that it was not. The Parolando scientists suspected that some sort of rain-making machines concealed in the mountains caused this on-schedule precipitation. The energy requirements for this would be enormous, colossal, in fact. But beings who could remake this planet into one Rivervalley, who could provide an estimated thirty-six billion people with three meals a day through energy-matter conversion, could undoubtedly shape the daily weather.

What was the energy source? No one knew, but the best suspect was the heat of the planet’s core.

There was speculation that some kind of metal shield lay between the crust of the earth and the deeper layers. That there was no volcanic activity or earthquakes tended to strengthen this hypothesis.

Since there were no vast ice or water masses making a tempera­ture differential comparable to that of Earth, the wind conditions could have been different. But, so far, the pattern seemed to be Terrestrial.

Firebrass decided to take the ship down to 3600 meters altitude, a little over 12,000feet. Perhaps the wind there might be weaker. The mountain tops were only 610 meters or about 2000 feet below the vessel, and the effect of the up- and downdrafts were strong at this time of the day. But the ability to change the angle of the propellers swiftly compensated somewhat for this roller-coaster motion. The ground speed increased.

Before 15:00, Firebrass ordered that the vessel be taken up above the rainclouds. He brought it back down at 16:00, and the Parseval rode majestically above the valleys. As the sun descended, both the horizontal and vertical winds would weaken, and the ship could plow through the air more evenly.

When night came, the hydrogen in the cells would cool, and the vessel would have to lift its nose even higher to give it more dynamic lift to compensate for the loss of buoyancy.

The pressurized control room was wanned by electric heaters. Its occupants were, however, in heavy cloths. Firebrass and Piscator were smoking cigars; most of the others, cigarettes. The fans sucked the smoke away but not quickly enough to remove the cigar odor which Jill so detested.

Hydrogen-emission detectors placed by the gas cells would trans­mit a warning if there were any leaks. Nevertheless, smoking was permitted only in five areas: the control gondola or bridge, a room halfway along the vessel’s axis, the auxiliary control room in the lower tail fin, and rooms attached to the quarters of the crew fore and aft.

Barry Thorn, first officer of the tail section, reported some magnetic readings. According to this, the North Pole of The River-world coincided with the north magnetic pole. The magnetic force itself was much weaker than that of Earth’s, so slight, in fact, that it would have been undetectable without the use of instruments known only in the late 1970’s.

“Which means,” Firebrass said, laughing, “that there are three poles on one spot. The North Pole, the magnetic pole, and the tower. Now, if only one of our crew was a Pole, we could have four on the same place.”

Radio reception was excellent today. The ship was high above the mountains, and the transceiver of the Mark Twain was carried by a balloon towed by the boat.

Aukuso said, “You can talk now, sir.”

Firebrass sat down by the Samoan’s side and said, “Firebrass here, Sam. We just got word from Greystock. He’s on the way, heading northeastward, ready to alter course the moment he gets wind of the location of the Rex.”

“In some ways I hope you don’t find Rotten John,” Sam said. “I’d like to catch up with him and so have the pleasure of sinking him myself. That’s not a very practical attitude, though it’s mighty satisfying. I’m not a vindictive man, Milt, but that hyena would make St. Francis himself long to kick him off a cliff.”