R.W. III - The Dark Design

  "If I couldn't move, I could talk. I said, 'Who are you? What do you want?' I spoke loud enough to wake Howardine up, but she didn't stir during the whole parley. I figure she had been drugged, too, but worse man me.

  "The stranger spoke in a deep voice, answering me in English.

  " 'I don't have much time, so I won't go into much detail. My name doesn't matter. In any event, I couldn't tell you because they might find you and unreel your memory.'

  "I wondered what that meant, unreeling my memory. The whole business was beginning to look bizarre. I knew I wasn't dreaming. I wished I was.

  ' "If they should, they'll know everything that is said and done here,' the hombre said. 'It's like taking a movie of your mind. They can clip out what they don't want you to remember, and you won't. But if they should do that, I'll talk to you again.'

  "'Who's they?' I said.

  " 'The people who restructured this planet and who resurrected you,' he said. 'Now, listen, and don't talk until I'm finished.'

  "You know me, Kid. I don't take crap off nobody. But this guy spoke as if the whole world was a ranch he owned and I was just one of the hands. Anyway, what could I do?

  " 'They,' he said, 'live in the tower set in the middle of the north polar sea. You may have heard rumors about this. Some men actually did get through the mountains that surround the sea.'

  "Right there I would have asked him if he was the one who left that long rope so they could get up the cliff and bored that tunnel for them. But I didn't know about that story then.

  "He continued, 'But they did not get into the tower. One of their party, however, died when he fell off a mountain into the sea. He was allowed to be translated back into the Valley.' "

  Tom paused. "He must have had some way of knowing this.

  "The stranger continued, 'But the others were not. They . . . never mind.'

  "So," Tom said, grinning, "he did not know everything about the Egyptians. What he didn't know was that one of them escaped. Or, if he did, he wasn't telling me, for some reason. I don't think, however, he found out about it. Otherwise, he'd have never let him get away. Still . . . maybe he did.

  "Anyway, the stranger said, 'The swiftness of verbal communication in the Valley is amazing I believe you call it the grapevine. The man who fell off the mountain told his story after he was translated, and it has spread throughout the Valley. You may speak. Have you heard the story?'

  " 'Not until now,' I said.

  " 'Well, you will doubtless hear it in the future. You'll be going up-River and will surely encounter it in one distorted form or another. Its essence is true.

  " 'Doubtless, you have wondered why you were raised from the dead and placed here?'

  "I nodded, and he said, 'My people, the Ethicals, have done this purely as a scientific experiment. They have put all of you here, mixed the races and nations from different times, solely to study your reactions. To record them and to classify them.

  " 'Then!' – and here his voice rose to a pitch of great indignation – 'after they have subjected you to this experiment, after they have filled you with hope for an eternal life, they will close the project! You will die, forever! There will be no more resurrections for you! You will go down into dust, be dust forever!'

  " 'That seems almighty cruel,' I said, forgetting he'd not given me permission to speak.

  ' "It is inhumanly cruel,' he said. 'They have the power to give you life everlasting! At least, it would last as long as your sun lasted. Longer even, since you could always be transported to another planet with a living sun.

  ' "But no! They won't do that! They say that you do not deserve immortality!'

  " "That's downright unethical,' I said. 'In which case, how come they call themselves the Ethicals?'

  ' "That seemed to stop him for a moment. Then he said, 'Because they think it would be unethical to permit such a miserable, undeserving species to live forever.'

  " They sure don't have a good opinion of us," I said.

  " 'I don't either,'' the stranger said. 'But good or bad opinions of humanity, based on en masse consideration, have nothing to do with the ethical aspects.'

  " 'How can you love someone you despise?' I said.

  " 'It isn't easy,' he said. 'But nothing truly ethical is easy to do. However, this is wasting my time.'

  "A bluish fight glowed, and by its light I could see that he had taken his right hand out from under his cloak. Around its wrist was a device larger man a man's pocket watch, and it was emitting the bluish light. I couldn't see what was on its face, but it was also talking, softly, like a radio turned way down.

  "I couldn't hear the words, but it all sounded to me like some foreign language I never heard before. And the blue light showed me the globe, which was black and looked glassy. His hand was a big one, broad, but with long, slim fingers.

  " 'My time is up,' he said, and he put his hand under the cloak, and the hut was dark again, except for a lightning bolt now and then.

  " 'I can't tell you now why I chose you,' he said, 'except to say that your aura shows you're a likely candidate for the job.'

  "What's on aura? I thought. I knew what it meant according to the dictionary, but I had the feeling he meant something else. And what job? I thought.

  "Suddenly, as if he'd been reading my thought, his hand came out from under the cloak again. The bluish light was bright, very bright, so bright I could hardly see him. But I could see both his hands now, and they lifted the globe off. I though I'd be able to see at least the outlines of his head, maybe something of his features if I squinted hard enough. But all I could see was the big globe above his head. Not the glass globe, because he held that to one side. The thing above his head was whirling, shot with many colors, and was so bright I could see only that It put out feelers from time to time, feelers that shot out and men shrank back into the whirling thing.

  "I don't mind admitting that I was scared men. Well, not really so much scared as awed. It was like seeing an angel face to face, and there's no shame in being afraid of an angel."

  "Lucifer was an angel," Frigate said.

  "Yeah, I know. I've read the Bible. Shakespeare, too. Maybe I didn't get through grammar school, but I'm self-educated."

  "I wasn't intimating that you were ignorant," Frigate said.

  Martin snorted, and he said, "You two don't really believe in angels, do you?"

  "Not me," Tom said, "But he sure seemed like one. Anyway, I don't think that aura is ordinarily visible. I think he showed me it by means of that thing he wore on his wrist. It suddenly disappeared, and the bluish glow died immediately. Too soon for me to see his face. Another lightning flash silhouetted him men, and I saw he'd put the glass globe back over his head.

  "Now I knew what he meant by an aura. I figured from what he said that I had one, too. And it was invisible."

  "Next you'll be claiming to be an angel," Martin said.

  " 'You can, you must, be of help to me,' the stranger said. 'I want you to start up-River, toward the tower. But first, you must tell this Jack London what has happened here tonight. And you must convince him that you are telling the truth. And get him to accompany you.

  " 'But under no circumstances are you to tell anyone else that I have talked to you. No one. We Ethicals are few and seldom venture from the tower. But my enemies have agents among you. Not many, compared to you. But they are disguised as resurrectees, and they will be looking for me.

  " 'Some day, they may even suspect that I have recruited help from you Riverdwellers. So they will be trying to find you. If they do, they will take you to the tower, unroll your memories, read them, and excise the parts relevant to me. And return you to the Valley.

  ' "London has a tiger-aura, too. So you must convince him to go with you. Tell him that I will see both of you again, and then he will believe. And you two will learn more of what this is all about.'

  "He rose, and he said, 'Until then.'

  "I watched him as another flash of lightning outl
ined his dark figure, the cloak, and the globe. I was wondering if I was crazy. I tried to get up but couldn't. After about half an hour, the paralysis wore off, and I went outside. The storm was over then, the clouds were starting to break up. But I couldn't see any sign of him."

  Martin took up the story. Tom had come to him the next evening and made him promise to keep silent about what he was going to tell him. Martin did not know whether or not to believe him. What convinced him that he was not lying was that there was no reason for Tom to make up such a fantastic tale.

  The incident had happened, but was it a hoax by some unknown party?

  Tom thought about that and men wondered if perhaps London himself was the stranger, playing a joke on him. They soon realized that neither they nor anybody else they knew could have had the glass globe or the instrument he'd used. And how could anybody fake that blazing aura?

  The Frisco Kid was getting itchy, anyway. He liked the idea of building a sailboat and going on. Whatever the story was, true or not, it gave him an incentive, a meaning to life. Tom felt the same way. The Tower became for them a sort of Holy Grail.

  "I felt kind of lousy leaving Howardine without a word. The Kid wasn't getting along too well with his woman, a tall plain jane with a chip on her shoulder – I don't know what he ever saw in her – so he had no regrets about leaving,

  "We scooted on up-River for a couple of hundred stones, and then we started to build our schooner. Nur came along and helped us build it. He's the only original member of the crew still with us.''

  Tom, holding his finger to his lips, walked softly to the door. His ear against it, he listened for a moment. Then he yanked it open.

  The little Moor, Nur el-Musafir, was standing by the door.

  Chapter 56

  * * *

  Nur did not seem startled or afraid. He said, in English, "May I come in?"

  "Damn right you will!" Tom roared. He did not offer to drag him in, however. Something about the dark little man promised dire results if he were attacked.

  Nur entered. Farrington, glowering, was on his feet.

  "You were eavesdropping?"

  "Obviously."

  "Why?" Tom said.

  "Because, when you three went to the ship, I could tell from your expressions that something was wrong. Peter was in danger."

  "Thanks, Nur," Frigate said.

  Tom Rider closed the door. Martin said, "I need another drink."

  Nur sat down upon the top of a cabinet. Martin downed two shots of whiskey. Tom said, "You heard everything?"

  Nur nodded.

  Martin shouted, "We might as well stand on a deck with a megaphone and tell the whole world!"

  Tom said, "For Chrissakes! Now we got another problem on our hands!"

  "There's no more need to kill me than there was to kill Peter," Nur said. He removed a cigar from his shoulderbag and lit it.

  "I overheard your women saying they'd be coming back soon. We don't have much time."

  "He's a cool one, ain't he?" Tom said to Martin.

  "Like an experienced agent.''

  Nur laughed, and he said, "No. More like one who's been chosen by an Ethical!"

  Nur said, "You may well stare. But you should have wondered a long time ago why I joined you from the beginning and have stuck with you through such a wearying journey."

  Martin and Tom both opened their mouths.

  Nur said, "Yes, I know what you're thinking. If I were an agent, I'd pretend to be one of the Ethicals' recruits. Believe me, I am not an agent."

  "How do we know you're not? Can you prove it?"

  "How do I know you two aren't agents? Can you prove it?"

  The captain and the first mate were flabbergasted.

  Frigate said, "When did the mysterious stranger talk to you? And why didn't he tell Tom that you were in oh this?"

  Nur shrugged thin shoulders.

  "He appeared shortly after his visit to Tom. I don't know exactly when. As for the second question, I don't know the answer.

  "I do suspect that the Ethical may not be telling the truth. He may be lying in that he is telling us only a part of the real situation. Why, I don't know. But I am intrigued."

  Martin said, "Maybe we should just leave these two behind."

  "If you do," Nur said, "Peter and I will take the high road, and we'll be at the tower afore ye."

  "He's paraphrasing Bobby Burns's song, the one you sing so often," Tom said to Martin.

  Martin grunted, and he said, "They wouldn't be agents of the enemies of your visitor, Tom. Otherwise, we'd have been turned in long ago. So, we have to believe them. I still don't understand why the Ethical didn't tell us about Nur."

  Tom proposed a toast to their newfound band, and they drank. By then, they heard the women on deck. The men were laughing at one of Martin's jokes when the women came into the cabin, but they had had time to arrange a meeting later in the hills.

  The next day they met with Podebrad, who introduced them to his engineering staff. They launched at once into the specifications of the blimp.

  Frigate pointed out that what they would build depended on their goal. If they just wished to get near the headwaters, they would need an airship large enough to carry enough fuel to take them there. It wouldn't have to have a ceiling of more than 4572 meters or 15,000 feet. If they wished to get over the mountains that ringed the polar sea, they'd have to build one which could rise 9144 meters.

  That is, if the stories of their height were true. No one really knew.

  It would take much longer to design and build a rigid dirigible for the longer, higher flight. It would require a much larger crew and, hence, more training. At higher altitudes, the engines would need supercharging. Besides, the winds there would probably be stronger than the lower winds. Too strong. The zeppelin would have to carry oxygen supplies for personnel and engines. That made the load heavier. And there was. the problem of the engine freezing.

  It would be nice if they could use jet engines. These, however, were inefficient at low altitudes and speeds. Airships couldn't use them unless they went to higher attitudes. Unfortunately, the metals needed for jet engines were lacking. "

  Podebrad coldly replied that a big rigid dirigible was out. He was interested only in the smaller nonrigid type. This would go over the mountains, keeping at a height of +3962.4 meters or 13,000 feet. He understood that the mountains sometimes rose to 6096 meters. The ship would just go along them until it came to those of lesser height.

  "That would require more fuel, because it would make the trip longer," Frigate said.

  "Obviously," Podebrad said. "The ship will have to be big enough to be prepared for that."

  It was clear that Sinjoro Podebrad was the boss.

  The next day Project Airship was started. It was completed in eight months, four less than estimated. Podebrad was a hard driver.

  Nur asked Podebrad how he would find Virolando without charts.

  The Czech replied that he'd talked to several missionaries who'd originated mere. According to their accounts, Virolando was near the arctic region in which The River flowed downstream. It was an estimated 50,000 kilometers from the headwaters and shouldn't be too difficult to identify from the air. Since it was on the shores of a very large lake with a rough hourglass shape, and it contained exactly one hundred tall rock spires, it would be impossible to mistake it for another lake.

  That is, it would be unless it had a duplicate somewhere else.

  Afterward, Frigate said, "I got my doubts about his being a Chancer. Those I've met have been very warm, very compassionate. This guy could give a refrigerator lessons in freezing."

  "Perhaps he is an agent," Nur said.

  The others went numb at the thought.

  "If he were, however," Nur said, "wouldn't he want to build a high-altitude zeppelin to get over the polar mountains?"

  "I don't think an airship could get that high," Frigate said.

  Whatever he was, Podebrad was efficient. Though b
e failed to find any airship pilots, he did have enough engineers to man a dozen vessels. And he decided that the pilots would train themselves.

  Three crews were picked so that if any person dropped out for any reason, there would be enough replacements. If was during the ground training that Frigate, Nur, Farrington, Rider, and Pogaas began to have their doubts. None of them knew much about engines, which meant they'd have to be trained. Why should Podebrad use them when he had experienced engineers and mechanics?

  He planned on a crew of only eight. But, true to his promise, the five from the Razzle Dazzle were assigned to the first crew. Podebrad went along on every trip, though ostensibly only as an observer. Frigate was nervous when he took his first flight, but his experience as a balloonist helped him overcome his stage fright.

  One after the other, the crews trained. Then the big, semirigid blimp took several shakedown flights of 600 kilometers roundtrip. It went over the four ranges of mountains, enabling them to see valleys they had never seen before though they were practically next door.

  The night before the flight, the crews attended a big party given in their honor. The crew of the Razzle Dazzle, minus the women of the captain, first mate, and Frigate, were there. The women had gotten angry, understandably so, because they were being forsaken. Though they had already taken other lovers, they hadn't forgiven their former cabinmates.

  Nur had arrived at New Bohemia without a woman, so he had nothing to feel bad about.

  Shortly before midnight, Podebrad sent everybody home. The ascent was to be made just before dawn, and the crew had to be up even earlier. Farrington's party bedded down in a hut near the huge bamboo hangar, and, after some chatter, went to sleep. They had expected Podebrad to announce his resignation and departure at the party. But it was obvious now that he intended to wait until he was in the ship.

  "Maybe he thought he'd be lynched," Martin said.