The Dark Design by Phillip Jose Farmer

“Has it ever occurred to you that maybe stopping them wasn’t the original plan-whatever that is?”

“You mean, somebody threw a monkey wrench in the machin­ery? And that blew the fuse and left everybody in the dark?”

“Yes. And the agents don’t know what’s going on any more than me and you.”

“Which could mean that Pete here is an agent. He’s just trying to get home.”

” You mean he might’ve found us but couldn’ t do anything about it? So he went along for the ride? And he proposed this blimp idea because it’d help him, not us, get there faster?”

“Something like that.”

“So that puts us back where we were. Pete could be one of Them.”

“If he is, it’s like I said. We won’t be telling him anything he don’t know.”

“Yeah, but he could tell us plenty. Plenty!”

“You going to beat it out of him? What if he really is Frigate?”

“I wouldn’t, anyway. Not unless I knew the stakes were really high.. Oh, hell, not even then.”

“We could just sail on and leave him behind,” Farringtbn said.

Tom smiled crookedly and said, “Yeah? You’d like that, wouldn’t you? You wouldn’t have to trust your quivering flesh and beating heart to a sky boat.”

“You’re getting awful close to making me mad, Tom.”

“Okay. I won’t ever say another word about that subject. Be­sides, I know you ain’t got a cowardly bone in your body.

“So, what’ll we do? Remember, if we did sail on, by the time we got to the North Pole-if we ever did-Pete here would have the whole thing solved.”

“Oh, hell,” Farrington said. “How could he be one of Them? They’re superior to human beings, right? And Pete sure isn’t no superman. No offense, Pete.”

Tom glanced narrow-eyed at Frigate.

“He could be pretending to be only human. But I don’t think anybody could put up a front like that for twenty-six years.”

“Let’s tell him then. What do we have to lose? Besides, I’m tired of keeping a secret for twenty-nine years.”

“You always did talk too much.”

“Look who’s talking, Old Chief Run-off-at-the-mouth himself.”

Farrington lit another cigarette. Rider followed his example, then said, “You want to light up too, Pete?”

“You’re trying to kill me with smoke,” Frigate said. He drew a cigar out of his over-the-shoulderbag.

“I think I need a drink, too.”

“We all do. Tom, you do the honors. Then we’ll tell all. God, what a relief!”

55

” ‘Twas a dark and stormy night,” Tom said. he smiled to acknowledge that he knew he was deliberately imitating the classical opening line of ghost stories.

“Jack and I…”

“Keep it Martin, Tom. Remember? Even when in private.”

“Sure, but you were Jack men. Anyway, I knew the Kid here, but we weren’t good friends yet. Our huts were close together, both of us were sailors on a patrol sloop in the navy of a local warlord.

“One night, when I was off duty, sleeping in my hut, I suddenly woke up. It wasn’t the thunder and lightning that woke me up, either. It was a tap on my shoulder.

“At first, I thought it was Howardine, my woman. You remem­ber her, Kid?”

“She was a beauty,” Martin said to Frigate. “A red-headed Scotchwoman.”

Frigate stirred, and he said, “I’m anxious to get to the heart of the matter.”

“Okay, no frills then. It wasn’t her, because she was sound asleep. Then a flash of lightning showed me a dark figure squatting by me. I started to rear up, my hand going under my pillow for my tomahawk. But I couldn’t move.

“I guess I was drugged or under a spell of some kind. I thought, Oh, oh! This guy has got it in for me, and he’s paralyzed me somehow and now yours truly is going to get it.

“Of course, I’d wake up someplace else, but I didn’t feel like leaving.

“Then a couple of flashes showed the outline of the guy in detail. I was startled. Not scared, you realize, just startled. His body was covered in a big black cloak. And the head! There wasn’t any. I mean, it was covered by a big globe, like a fishbowl. It was all black so I couldn’t see his face. But somehow he could see me.