Produced by Greg Weeks and the Online DistributedProofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Comet, July, 1941.Extensive research did not reveal any evidence that the U.S. copyrighton this publication was renewed.
_In silence Negu Mah and Sliss stood silent gazingat the moon drenched field._]
The Indulgence of Negu Mah
by ROBERT ARTHUR
In his garden, Negu Mah, the Callisto uranium merchant, sat sipping aplatinum mug of molkai with his guest, Sliss the Venusian.
Nanlo, his wife, pushing before her the small serving cart with itsplatinum molkai decanter, paused for an instant as she entered theshell of pure vitrite which covered the garden, giving it the illusionof out-of-doorness.
Negu Mah sat at his ease, his broad, merry, half-Oriental facegood-humored, his features given a ruddy tinge by the light of risingJupiter, the edge of whose sphere was beginning to dominate thehorizon. Sliss, the intelligent amphibian, squatted across from him inthe portable tub of water which he carried with him whenever absentfrom the swamps of his native Venus.
The amphibian's popping eyes turned toward her, the wide frog-facesplit in a smile of appreciation as Nanlo approached. She refilledtheir mugs deftly and withdrew. But before she reentered the house shecould not resist hesitating to glance toward rising Jupiter and theslim shaft of the rocketship silhouetted now against its surface.
The ship was the cargo rocket Vulcan, newest and swiftest of Negu Mah'sfreighter fleet. Fully fueled and provisioned, storage space jammedwith refrigerated foods that in space the cold of the encompassing voidwould keep perfectly for generations were it necessary, she would takeoff in the morning from the close-by landing port for Jupiter's othersatellites, then go on to the Saturnian system, returning finally withfull holds of uranium for Negu Mah's refineries on Callisto.
She was a beautiful craft, the Vulcan, and one man could manage her,though her normal crew was seven. She had cost a great sum. But NeguMah was wealthy.
Nanlo's face, sylph-like in its beauty, hardened. Negu Mah was wealthyindeed. Had he not bought her, and had she not cost him more, muchmore, than the Vulcan?
But no, it was not quite accurate to say that Negu Mah had bought her.However, since time immemorial beautiful daughters had been, if notsold, yet urged into marriages to wealthy men for the benefit of theirimpoverished families. And though science had made great strides,conquering the realms of the telescope and invading those below thelevel of the microscope, finding cures for almost every disease theflesh of man was heir to, there was one ailment it had not yetconquered--poverty.
Nanlo's father had been a rocket port attendant. Once he had been apilot, but a crash had crippled him for life. Thereafter, his wages hadbeen quite insufficient to sustain him, his brood of half a dozenchildren, and their hard-working mother.
But Nanlo, growing up, had developed into a mature beauty that rivaledthe exotic loveliness of the wild orchids of Io. And in debarking atthe rocket port on a business trip to earth, because hurricanes hadforced him to land far south of New York, Negu Mah had seen her.
Thereafter--But that is a story as ancient as history too.
It was a truth Nanlo conveniently overlooked now that she had not beenunwilling to be Negu Mah's bride. It was true she had driven a sharpbargain with him--her father's debts paid, and sufficient more to easeher parents' life and educate her brothers and sisters. Plus a marriagesettlement for herself, and a sum in escrow in the Earth Union bank,should she ever divorce him for cruelty or mistreatment. But that hadbeen only innate shrewdness. She would still have married him had herefused her demands for her family. For his wealth fascinated her, andthe prospect of being a virtual queen, even of a distant outpost colonysuch as that on Callisto, appealed to her.
And she had thought that she was taking little risk, for if she weredissatisfied, the law these days was very lenient toward unhappymarital relationships. It required only definite proof of misconduct,mistreatment, or oppression of any kind to win freedom from an unwantedpartner. Nanlo had been confident that after a year or two she would beable to shake free of the bonds uniting her to Negu Mah and take flightfor herself into a world made vastly more pleasant by the marriagesettlement remaining to her.
But now she had been married, and had lived on Callisto, for a fullfive years, and her tolerance of Negu Mah had long since turned tobitter hate. Not because he was a bad husband, but because he was toogood a one!
* * * * *
There was an ironic humor in the situation, but Nanlo was not disposedto recognize it. Lenient as the law was, yet it required some groundsbefore it could free her. And she had no grounds whatever. Negu Mah wasat all times the model of courtesy and consideration toward her. Hegranted every reasonable wish and some that were unreasonable--althoughwhen he refused one of the latter, it was with a firmness asunshakeable as a rock.
Their home was as fine as any on earth. She had more than adequate helpin taking care of it. She had ample time for any pursuits thatinterested her. But she used it only to become more and more bitteragainst Negu Mah because she could find no excuse to divorce him.
So great had her bitterness become that, if she could have gotten offCallisto in any way, she would have deserted him. This would have meantforfeiting her marriage settlement and the sum that was in escrow. Itwould also have left her father in debt to Negu Mah for all that NeguMah had given him. But Nanlo's passionate rebellion had reached such astate of ferment in her breast that she would have accepted all this tostrike a blow at the plump, smiling man who now sat drinking molkai intheir garden with their guest from Venus.
The answer to that was--Negu Mah would not let her leave Callisto. Thejourney to earth, he logically argued, was still one containing a largeelement of danger. There was no reason for her to visit any otherplanet, and law and custom required that she look after their homewhile he himself was away on business.
In this he was unshakeable. There was a stern and unyielding side tohim, inherited perhaps from his Eastern ancestors, that left Nanloshaken and frightened when it appeared. She had seen it the one timeshe had seriously gone into a tantrum in an effort to make him let hertake a trip to earth. It had so startled and terrified her that she hadnever used those tactics again.
But now, as she wheeled away the molkai decanter and left Negu Mah andSliss to themselves, joy and exultation was singing in her. Doubly. Forshe was going to run away from Negu Mah, run away with the man sheloved, and in their flight they were going to steal the Vulcan. ThusNegu Mah would be doubly punished. He would be hurt in his pride and inhis pocketbook. And all through the Jupiter and Saturn systems, wherehis wealth, his position, and his beautiful wife were openly envied, hewould be laughed at and derided.
Humming lightly under her breath, Nanlo put the molkai decanter away ina little pantry and hurried on to her own apartment. Molkai was apowerful, though non-habit-forming drink. Under its influence onebecame talkative, but disinclined to movement. Sliss and her husbandwould remain as they were for hours, leaving her free to do as shewould. The servants were asleep in another part of the building, andthere was no one to note as she changed her clothes swiftly for alight, warm travelling suit, caught up two small bags, one holding herpersonal things, the other her jewels, and let herself out through herown private entrance into the darkness of the rear gardens.
Where in the shadows the tall, blonde young engineer, Hugh Neils, waswaiting for her....
* * * * *
Negu Mah, when his beautiful wife had left the garden, sighed and putto one side his mug of molkai.
"Sliss, my friend," he said to th
e Venusian, who was regarding him withlarge, unblinking pop-eyes, "I am troubled in my mind. Tonight I mustdispense justice. Justice to myself and justice to another. To be justis often to be terribly cruel."
Sliss blinked, once, a film moving horizontally across his large eyesand retracting, to show that he understood. Due to the difficulty ofusing his artificial speech mechanism, he refrained from speaking untilspeech was necessary.
"My wife, Nanlo," Negu Mah said heavily, "is unhappy. I have done allthat is in my power to make her happy, but I have failed. She has madesome requests that I have denied, namely, to be permitted freedom tovisit earth. That I denied because I knew the paths she intended totread would not have led her to happiness either, and I hoped that inthe end, here she would find contentment. I have hoped in vain. Tonightshe intends to take matters into her own hands."
Sliss blinked again, politely, to indicate that he was interested ifNegu Mah cared to tell him more. Negu Mah rose.
"My friend," he said, "if you will