“If you will give me some crew,” he said, “we’ll move these inside. There’s two dollies over in the edge of the woods.”
Stabb looked to me and I nodded.
Very soon, with a lot of help from Heller, despite working in the dark, fifteen cases lay on a thick canvas he had put down to protect the dance floor.
A kerosene oil lamp spread a yellow glow across the ancient dance decorations and the Voltar cases. Heller was checking case markings.
“Where’s Box Number 5?” he said.
Before I could answer, he went trotting back to the ship. He got down in the hold again.
He came out. He opened up other doors to the rear and checked there. He locked everything up once more.
“There’s a box missing,” he said to Stabb.
Stabb shrugged. “I never been in that hold,” he said.
Heller checked the forward cabins and storage spaces. Then he left the ship. He re-entered the roadhouse. He once more verified the numbers and the count.
He beckoned to me to follow him. I went into instant alarm. I was carrying a blastick, a Colt Cobra in an ankle holster and a Knife Section knife behind my neck and he was apparently unarmed. But I did not feel comfortable. I turned. Captain Stabb was at the roadhouse door. He winked at me. I followed Heller.
He had a kitchen fire going. The night was somewhat chilly. He had cleaned up the place. There was a kitchen table and a couple of chairs. Heller sat down at the far end.
I sat down but I didn’t take my hand off the 800-kilovolt blastick in my pocket.
PART TWENTY-TWO
Chapter 6
Heller had taken some papers out of his pocket, a notebook and a pen. He began to look at the papers—they appeared to be old invoices. I didn’t see any sign of the letter.
I looked around. The kitchen was quite clean now. He had a fire going in the old iron cookstove: a wood fire, from the way it popped occasionally and from some wisps of pungent smoke.
The place was lit with a hanging kerosene lamp. Probably the electricity was not turned on. The light glowed and flickered on some old glass jars on a shelf.
A calendar was on the wall: big picture of an elk and the words Hartford Life Insurance. The year was 1932!
Ordinarily I might have been very interested in this place. But I had to get that letter! If I was lucky, in a few minutes Heller would be dead and we would be sailing away.
He was going over some invoices and writing things on the piece of paper. For some reason, seeing him so calm made me very nervous.
I imagined he was reconstructing the list of things in the box.
He wasn’t talking so I sort of felt I had to be talking. Maybe I could steer him around and hurry him up and get that letter. Maybe he was being silent because he suspected I had done something with the box. “I never saw those boxes,” I said. “I didn’t even know they were in the hold. If you remember, I was not aboard the tug at that time.”
He was consulting the invoice sheets again.
I said, “I do recall, though, a Fleet lorry driving away one day. It had a box on it. I asked the sentry at that time why they were removing a box. He said he didn’t know.”
He didn’t say anything. He was making some sort of a calculation. I wished he’d just give me that letter.
“I mailed the other letter on the first freighter out. It went just two or three days after you gave it to me,” I said.
He was trying to locate some item on an invoice. I wished he would speak.
“I know how important it is,” I said, “that I mail your letters to Captain Tars Roke. I know he tells the Emperor and the Grand Council. If they didn’t hear from you, I know they’d send an invasion fleet right away. They’d have to, to preserve the planet. I can see it is in very bad shape. So don’t think for a moment I’d let you down. I know both of us could be killed if this invasion hit. So it’s in my interest, too. I’ll sure make certain the letters get mailed.”
He was busy with his figures. No sign of the letter. Maybe he was upset about the telephone.
“I am sorry I had to cut you off on the phone. You see, the National Security Agency monitors all long-distance calls. It was my fault really. I didn’t give you a phone number you could call.”
I wrote the cover phone number in Afyon on a piece of paper of my own, torn from a notebook, and put it down on the table near him.
He just kept on working.
“I should have given you a mail address, too,” I said. I wrote the mail address he could use in Turkey on another piece of my own paper and laid it on the phone number. “Future reports can just be mailed to this. I’ll take the one you’ve got now.”
He was riffling through his papers. Sort of absently, he encountered a sheet and laid it on the table halfway between us. He went on working.
I picked it up. It was a request form. It said:
Mission requirement:
one professional cellologist
experienced in making spores.
“Oh, I can get this for you,” I said. “Just give me any note of anything you require. On this, I’ll get them to send the most competent cellologist I can find.” What a lie that was. “I’ll send this request right along with your current report. Yes, indeed. Right along with your current report.” (Bleep) you, where IS it!
He was writing more things down on the sheet. He was saying nothing.
I was getting pretty uneasy. “I know you are probably reconstructing the contents of the box. Well, you just reconstruct it and I’ll put it on special order on the very next freighter. You’ll have it all replaced within three months or so.” And that was an even bigger lie than the cellologist one. “I’ll send it out right with your current report!”
He was making a list of measurements. All I could see was his hand, arm and the top of his blond head. I didn’t know what mood he was in at all. I didn’t know what he intended, really. Maybe he had some other means or idea. I couldn’t be sure.
“Really,” I said, “we shouldn’t wait around here too long. Those two sheriff’s deputies out there on the highway might have seen something. If you give me the report now, I’ll be going.”
He was adding up something. The awful thought came to me that he might be stalling me for some reason. I didn’t feel it took that long to figure out just one box.
“I know they are very friendly but you can’t ever trust sheriff’s deputies, no matter how much you’ve conned them. So if you’ll just give me the report, I’ll be going.”
Aha. I had it. He suspected that as soon as we got the report we’d kill him. That was it. He wasn’t going to give me the report! That raid on the Gracious Palms suite had tipped him off!
I better calm his fears! “Look, I didn’t have anything to do with the ransacking of your suite at the Gracious Palms. That happens all the time in New York. They were probably just looking for money. You can have every confidence in me, Jettero. You can trust me to faithfully mail that report for you. You can go in another room and write it. I won’t look.”
He was writing out a lot of figures on a new blank sheet of paper. Suddenly he handed it to me. It was the order for the replacement of Box Number 5. It had the manufacturer’s name and address on it.
“Oh,” I said. “I’ll get this right off. Now, if you give me your monthly report . . .”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out two large envelopes.
The report! It was addressed to Captain Tars Roke!
The other one was addressed to Snelz!
“Oh, I’ll get these right off for you,” I said. Then my eye caught sight of the old glass jars. “Listen, I know this has been very upsetting for you. I’ll make it up to you. I’ll go in the crew’s galley of the tug and get you some hot-jolt powder. Now you just sit there. We don’t want too much activity outside. Look, I’ll even thrash around and see if I can find some canisters of sparklewater in the crew’s stores—no reason to open up your own quarters in the back of the tug. I
know how tired you are of drinking Seven Up. You wait right there. Let me be some help for a change.”
I raced out.
With any luck, I had it and Heller would be dead in minutes! And my worries would be over!
PART TWENTY-TWO
Chapter 7
Aboard, I tore into my old cabin. I locked the door. I got out the tools necessary and in seconds had the Tars Roke letter open.
I read it avidly:
Dear Captain Tars,
Well, things are going along fair. It’s a nice planet. It’s too bad they don’t appreciate it more.
I am mostly involved currently with basic setup. They use a fossil fuel in a most inefficient manner, even though I am certain that, even with their primitive technology, they know better. I think they may even hide efficiency inventions, as nobody could be that stupid.
It is the wasteful method of using this fuel that is causing the bulk of their atmospheric and regolithic contamination. It is also, strangely enough, the basic cause of their financial inflation, which is planetwide. I am working on this. Technically, the fuel problem is simple.
The people are a lot of them very nice people. They do have rather odd leadership and seem to easily let themselves be led into false technologies. They have a thing called “psychology” which is ridiculous. They even force schoolchildren to learn it. You won’t believe this, but they think matter created life. This somehow tends to make them immoral and without honor. I have to be careful in dealing with them to keep my own honor clean. But I am making progress with people.
The political and economic aspects are under study. The job does not seem impossible. So please don’t recommend the second alternative unless you cease to authentically hear from me or I have obviously failed.
But speaking of study, do you recall Isto Blin? He said there was nothing wrong with learning a dead mathematics except it was liable to take him to the tomb with it.
Please remember me to your dear wife.
I trust Their Royal Majesties are well and that the State prospers.
With courteous salute,
Jettero Heller
It was written with uneven lines. Some of the words were cramped, some extended. A definite platen code.
I quickly got out the first letter copy. It was duplicated in the exact size. I laid the two large sheets over one another. I studied it for duplicate words and match.
I did it again.
I did it backwards.
I did it upside down!
Nothing matched!
My head was in a whirl. What was I holding here?
It was a platen code. But . . . Then I realized with a beaten sag that Heller was using a sequence of platens! He had a whole pad of them! I looked carefully into a corner. Yes, there it was! A number. It said “2.” So faint I could barely make it out in strong light.
Those Devils at the departure party had made up a series of platens!
Listlessly, I opened the second letter addressed to Snelz. It had, as I suspected, a letter in it to the Countess Krak. I scanned it without interest. Just a mushy love letter. He was looking forward to the moment they were reunited. Just mush.
A scratching came at the door. I quickly hid the letters and opened it.
Captain Stabb was there. “He’s come out on the porch over there. He’s a perfect target. Can we kill him now?”
I sighed. And I really was disappointed. “There’s been a hitch. It will have to wait until next time.”
That didn’t sit well with him at all.
I myself was so upset I almost forgot the glass jars. I went to the air lock door and emptied their moldy contents on the ground. I went back to the crew’s galley and found some packaged sweetbuns and some jolt powder. I put them in the jars.
Trying to seem cheerful, I went back to the roadhouse.
He was on the porch. I handed him the jars.
“I am sorry it was an upsetting trip,” I said. “Possibly this will help make up for it.”
He didn’t say anything.
“On my honor, I will send your letters, order you another box and a cellologist,” I said. “I certainly wish you every success in the mission. And I will be more attentive in the future.” I could have killed him with every word.
He didn’t say anything. He was looking out at where the tug was, just a blacker blackness, only a faint glow where the air lock was open.
“Then it’s goodbye for now,” I said.
I raced back to the ship. I jumped in the air lock.
Stabb took off at once. He didn’t even sweep the grass upright. I knew he was making Heller do that.
In the flight deck, even though I got in their way, I threw a spare viewscreen into the night band. I couldn’t see the house or porch or Heller because of the trees.
We soared on upward at speed, a blackness in the blackness.
What an unlucky trip! I wished to the Gods I had been able to add his ghost to those which must be haunting that place.
To say that I was upset was an understatement.
When I had fastened myself into a gimbal bunk, I tried to take an assessment of my situation.
Although the nights were much longer than they had been a month before, and although we had plenty of time to get back while it was still dark in Turkey, Captain Stabb had the tug going at a savage speed. And jerking it about, too! He was in no pleasant mood. He had been denied his prey. I would somehow have to cope with that.
In a minor way, however, I had been successful. I certainly, on no account, would send for any replacement box. I had stalled him to that degree, whatever he had planned to do.
It was only then that I began to worry about his attitude. He had been busy with figures, true. But he had not said goodbye. Was his attitude one of hostility? Or was it just one of preoccupation?
Of course, the denial of that box had upset his plans. Had he just been making new plans or was he antagonistic to me?
Did he suspect something?
I began to shiver. Suppose he had seen through it all! Suppose he had realized we intended to kill him. Would that make him act that way?
But no. He had not been armed. He hadn’t even worn those deadly spikes.
He had stood on the porch and he must have known that with a night sight he would have been an easy target. So he didn’t know.
Or did his silence mean that he DID know?
Speeding back against the dawn to the base in Turkey, I vowed to carefully watch what he had done after we had left. Maybe that would give me a clue. I HAD to know!!!
PART TWENTY-TWO
Chapter 8
Safely landed down through the mountaintop in the dark, I made speed through the tunnel to my secret room.
Stabb had really pushed it. It was well before dawn. But in the United States, by Eastern Standard Time, it was only 9:00 PM.
I was very anxious to gauge his reactions. Did he know?
I ignored the current picture and backtracked to the moment of our departure. I proceeded with spot checks, ignoring unimportant bits.
He had gone inside and locked the door. With a dolly he had taken the boxes one by one into the bar. With a little block and tackle, he had lowered them through the concealed trap at the end of the bar and down into the old mine.
Evidently he had been working there before we arrived. There was a precisely measured hole in one of the galleries. Into it, he put all boxes but one.
He took two small objects out of one box and put them in a rucksack. Then he added that box to the rest. Bad light. I couldn’t see the number.
He threw down the canvas and covered it with dirt. He took a machine and made some cobwebs over that gallery and one or two others.
Heller was working very fast. I could hardly follow what he was doing. The light was awful. But it showed he was being very secret. It was a bad sign. He did suspect something!
With water from a bottle, he put out the fire in the iron stove. He turned out the kerosene lanterns. He lock
ed everything up. The care with which he did that indicated to me that he probably knew.
Playing a light over the landing place, he found a couple of weeds that had been crushed. He simply pulled them up.
He ran up the road about a hundred yards. There was an old white van standing there. Aha, he had had an escape route planned! So he did have suspicions!
He tossed the rucksack into the front seat. He got into the van and began to drive rapidly back to the road. The speed he was going showed his anxiety.
The van eventually came out on the highway. He turned south. Very shortly, his lights picked up the sheriff’s car. He swung in. Aha! He had had them posted as a trap!
He got out and leaned into the window of the sheriff’s car. It was Ralph and George. They looked half asleep. Deceptive!
George said, “Everything go all right, young feller?” Aha! So they had been alerted!
Ralph said, “You get your measurements?”
“Yes,” said Heller.
George said, “You know, you can drive down there. You don’t have to leave your car at the highway and walk. You can get a car all the way in there—I didn’t know it myself until t’other day.”
Ralph said, “Say, young feller, you being an engineer and all, deer season is coming right up. Sometimes we like to hunt over that way. Do you suppose the consul would mind if we hunted across that property?”
“I’m sure he’d be quite happy about it,” said Heller. “He spoke very highly of you both.”
George said, “You can tell your boss, Rangletangle Bowja, we’re on the job.”
Aha. Heller was suspicious that we’d been there to kill him. He had cunningly arranged to get the place patrolled by sheriffs posing as deer hunters! Oh, we’d better stay away from there!
When Heller pulled away, heading south, the sheriff’s car pulled out and headed north. He had even arranged a rearguard action!
Suddenly I realized I had neglected another clue. I scanned back. In my hasty perusal the first time I had missed an important point. The glass jars!
He had put them down on the counter in the dance hall when he first re-entered the house. Just as he removed the last box, he had picked them up and looked at them and then scraped at the inside mold. He had dumped the contents in the old iron stove. That was why it was blazing so when he had put it out. Very significant! He had been sure we were trying to poison him!