XII.
The Shadow of Niflheim
The sun slid lower and lower toward the horizon behind them as theaircar bulleted south along the broad valley and dry bed of the HoorkRiver, nearing the zone of equal day and night. Hassan Bogdanoff drovewhile Harry Quong finished his lunch, then changed places to begin hisown. Von Schlichten got two bottles of beer from the refrigeratedsection of the lunch-hamper and opened one for Paula Quinton and onefor himself.
"What are we going to do with these geeks,"--she was using the nastyand derogatory word unconsciously and by custom, now--"after this isall over? We can't just tell them, 'Jolly well played, nice game,wasn't it?' and go back to where we were Wednesday evening."
"No, we can't. There's going to have to be a Terran seizure ofpolitical power in every part of this planet that we occupy, and assoon as we're consolidated around and north of Takkad Sea, we're goingto have to move in elsewhere," he replied. "Keegark, Konkrook, and theFree Cities, of course, will be relatively easy. They're in armsagainst us now, and we can take them over by force. We had to makethat deal with Jonkvank, or, rather, I did, so that will be a slowerprocess, but we'll get it done in time. If I know that pair as well asI think I do, Jonkvank and Yoorkerk will give us plenty of pretexts,before long. Then, we can start giving them government by law insteadof by royal decree, and real courts of justice; put an end to thehead-payment system, and to these arbitrary mass arrests andtax-delinquency imprisonments that are nothing but slave-raids by thegeek princes on their own people. And, gradually, abolish serfdom. Ina couple of centuries, this planet will be fit to admit to theFederation, like Odin and Freya."
"Well, won't that depend a lot on whom the Company sends here to takeHarrington's place?"
"Unless I'm much mistaken, the Company will confirm me," he replied."Administration on Uller is going to be a military matter for a longtime to come, and even the Banking Cartel and the mercantile interestsin the Company are going to realize that, and see the necessity fortaking political control. The Federation Government owns a biggerinterest in the Company than the public realizes, too; they've alwaysfavored it. And just to make sure, I'm sending Hid O'Leary to Terra onthe next ship, to make a full report on the situation."
"You think it'll be cleared up by then? The _City of Montevideo_ isdue in from Niflheim in a little under three months."
"It'll have to be cleared up by then. We can't keep this war goingmore than a month, at the present rate. Police-action, and mopping-up,yes, full-scale war, no."
"Ammunition?" she asked.
He looked at her in pleased surprise. "Your education has beenprogressing, at that," he said. "You know, a lot of professionalofficers, even up to field rank in the combat branches, seem to thinkthat ammo comes down miraculously from Heaven, in contragravitylorries, every time they pray into a radio for it. It doesn't; it hasto be produced as fast as it's expended, and we haven't been doingthat. So we'll have to lick these geeks before it runs out, because wecan't lick them with gunbutts and bayonets."
"Well, how about nuclear weapons?" Paula asked. "I hate to suggestit--I know what they did on Mimir, and Fenris, and Midgard, and whatthey did on Terra, during the First Century. But it may be our onlychance."
He finished his beer and shoved the bottle into the waste-receiver,then got out his cigarettes.
"I'd hate to have to make a decision like that, Paula," he told her."The military use of nuclear energy is the last--well, thenext-to-last--thing I'd want to see on Uller. Fortunately, orunfortunately, it's a decision I won't have to make. There isn't asingle nuclear bomb on the planet. The Company's always refused toallow them to be manufactured or stockpiled here."
"I don't think there'd be any criticism of your making them, now,general. And there's certainly plenty of plutonium. You could makeA-bombs, at least."
"There isn't anybody here who even knows how to make one. Most of ournuclear engineers could work one up, in about three months, when we'deither not need one or not be alive."
"Dr. Gomes, who came in on the _Pretoria_, two weeks ago, can makethem," she contradicted. "He built at least a dozen of them onNiflheim, to use in activating volcanoes and bringing ore-bearing lavato the surface."
Von Schlichten's hand, bringing his lighter to the tip of hiscigarette, paused for a second. Then he completed the operation,snapped it shut, and put it away.
"When did all this happen?"
She took time out for mental arithmetic; even a spaceship officer hadto do that, when a question of interstellar time-relations arose.
"About three-fifty days ago, Galactic Standard. They'd put off thefirst shot, six bombs, before I got in from Terra. I saw the secondshot a day or so before I left Niflheim on the _Canberra_. Dr. Gomeshad to stay over till the _Pretoria_ to put off the third shot. Why?"
"Did you run into a geek named Gorkrink, while you were on Nif?" heasked her. "And what sort of work was he doing?"
"Gorkrink? I don't seem to remember.... Oh, yes! He was helping Dr.Murillo, the seismologist. His year was up after the second shot; hecame to Uller on the _Canberra_. Dr. Murillo was sorry to lose him. Heunderstood Lingua Terra perfectly; Dr. Murillo could talk to him, theway you do with Kankad, without using a geek-speaker."
"Well, but what sort of work ...?"
"Helping set and fire the A-bombs.... _Oh! Good Lord!_"
"You can say that again, and deal in Allah, Shiva, and Kali," vonSchlichten told her. "Especially Kali.... Harry! See if you can getsome more speed out of this can. I want to get to Konkrook while it'sstill there!"
* * * * *
It was full dark when Konkrook came in view beyond the East KonkMountains, a lurid smear on the underside of the clouds, and, atGongonk Island and at the Company farms to the south, a couple ofbunches of searchlights fingering about in the sky. When vonSchlichten turned on the outside sound-pickup, he could hear thedistant tom-tomming of heavy guns, and the crash of shells and bombs.Keeping the car high enough to be above the trajectories of incomingshells, Harry Quong circled over the city while Hassan Bogdanofftalked to Gongonk Island on the radio.
The city was in a bad way. There were seventy-five to a hundred bigfires going, and a new one started in a rising ball of thermoconcentrateflame while they watched. The three gun-cutters, _Elmoran_, _Gaucho_,and _Bushranger_, and about fifty big freight lorries converted tobombers, were shuttling back and forth between the island and the city.The Royal Palace was on fire from end to end, and the entire waterfrontand industrial district were in flames. Combat-cars and airjeeps werediving in to shell and rocket and machine-gun streets and buildings. Hesaw six big bomber-lorries move in dignified procession to unload, oneafter the other, on a row of buildings along what the Terrans calledSouth Tenth Street, and on the roofs of buildings a block away, red andblue flares were burning, and he could see figures, both human andUlleran, setting up mortars and machine-guns.
Landing on the top stage of Company House, on the island, they weremet by a Terran whom von Schlichten had seen, a few days ago, bossingnative-labor at the spaceport, but who was now wearing a major'sinsignia. He greeted von Schlichten with a salute which he must havelearned from some movie about the ancient French Foreign Legion. VonSchlichten seriously returned it in kind.
"Everybody's down in the Governor-General's office, sir," he said."Your office, that is. King Kankad's here with us, too."
He accompanied them to the elevator, then turned to a telephone; whenvon Schlichten and Paula reached the office, everybody was crowded atthe door to greet them: Themistocles M'zangwe, his arm in a sling;Hans Meyerstein, the Johannesburg lawyer, who seemed to have even moreBantu blood than the brigadier-general; Morton Buhrmann, theCommercial Superintendent; Laviola, the Fiscal Secretary; a dozen orso other officers and civil administrators. There was a hubbub ofgreetings, and he was pleased to detect as much real warmth from thecivil administration crowd as from the officers.
"Well, I'm glad to be back with you," he replied, generally. "And l
etme present Colonel Paula Quinton, my new adjutant; Hid O'Leary's onduty in the north.... Them, this was a perfectly splendid piece ofwork here; you can take this not only as a personal congratulation,but as a sort of unit citation for the whole crowd. You've all behavedsimply above praise." He turned to King Kankad, who was wearing a pairof automatics in shoulder-holsters for his upper hands and anotherpair in cross-body belt holsters for his lower. "And what I've saidfor anybody else goes double for you, Kankad," he added, clapping theKragan on the shoulder.
"All he did was save the lot of us!" M'zangwe said. "We were hangingon by our fingernails here till his people started coming in. Andthen, after you sent the _Aldebaran_...."
"Where is the _Aldebaran_, by the way? I didn't see her when I camein."
"Based on Kankad's, flying bombardment against Keegark, and keepingan eye out for those ships. Prinsloo caught the _De Wett_ in the docksthere and smashed her, but the _Jan Smuts_ got away, and we haven'tbeen able to locate the _Oom Paul Kruger_, either. They're probablyboth on the Eastern Shore, gathering up reenforcements for Orgzild,"M'zangwe said.
"Our ability to move troops rapidly is what's kept us on top thislong, and Orgzild's had plenty of time to realize it," von Schlichtensaid. "When we get _Procyon_ down here, I'm going to send her out,with a screen of light scout-vehicles, to find those ships and get ridof them.... How's Hid been making out, at Grank, by the way? I didn'thave my car-radio on, coming down."
That touched off another hubbub: "Haven't you heard, general?" ..."Oh, my God, this is simply out of this continuum!" ... "Well, tellhim, somebody!" ... "No, get Hid on the screen; it's his story!"
Somebody busied himself at the switchboard. The rest of them sat downat the long conference-table. Laviola and Meyerstein and Buhrmann wereespecially obsequious in seating von Schlichten in Sid Harrington'sold chair, and in getting a chair for Paula Quinton. After a while,the jumbled colors on the big screen resolved themselves into an imageof Hideyoshi O'Leary, grinning like a pussy-cat beside an emptygoldfish-bowl.
"Well, what happened?" von Schlichten asked, after they had exchangedgreetings. "How did Yoorkerk like the movies? And did you get the_Procyon_ and the _Northern Lights_ loose?"
"Yoorkerk was deeply impressed," O'Leary replied. "His story is thathe is and always was the true and ever-loving friend of the Company;he acted to prevent quote certain disloyal elements unquote fromharming the people and property of the Company. _Procyon's_ on the wayto Konkrook. I'm holding _Northern Lights_ here and _Northern Star_ atSkilk; where do you want them sent?"
"Leave _Northern Star_ at Skilk, for the time being. Tell theCompany's great and good friend King Yoorkerk that the Company expectshim to contribute some soldiers for the campaign here and againstKeegark, when that starts; be sure you get the best-armed andbest-trained regiments he has, and get them down here as soon aspossible. Don't send any of your Kragans or Karamessinis' troops here,though; hold them in Grank till we make sure of the quality ofYoorkerk's friendship."
"Well, general, I think we can be pretty sure, now. You see, he turnedRakkeed the Prophet over to me...."
"_What_?" Von Schlichten felt his monocle starting to slip and took afirmer grip on it. "Who?"
"Pay me, Them; he didn't drop it," Hideyoshi O'Leary said. "Why,Rakkeed the Prophet. Yoorkerk was holding our ships and our people incase we lost; he was also holding Rakkeed at the Palace in case wewon. Of course, Rakkeed thought he was an honored guest, right up tillYoorkerk's guards dragged him in and turned him over to us...."
"That geek," von Schlichten said, "is too smart for his own good. Someof these days he's going to play both ends against the middle and bothends'll fold in on him and smash him." A suspicion occurred to him."You sure this is Rakkeed? It would be just like Yoorkerk to try tosell us a ringer."
O'Leary shook his head solemnly. "I thought of that, right away. Thisis the real article; Karamessinis' Constabulary and Intelligenceofficers certified him for me. What do you want me to do, send himdown to Konkrook?"
Von Schlichten shook his head. "Get the priests of the locallyvenerated gods to put him on trial for blasphemy, heresy,impersonating a prophet, practicing witchcraft without a license, orany other ecclesiastical crimes you or they can think of. Then, afterhe's been given a scrupulously fair trial, have the soldiers of KingYoorkerk behead him, and stick his head up over a big sign, in allnative languages, 'Rakkeed the False Prophet.' And have audio-visualsmade of the whole business, trial and execution, and be sure that thepriests and Yoorkerk's officers are in the foreground and our peoplestay out of the pictures."
"Soap and towels, for General Pontius von Pilate!" Paula Quintoncalled out.
"That's an idea; I was wondering what to give Yoorkerk as atestimonial present," Hideyoshi O'Leary said. "A nice thirty-piecesilver set!"
"Quite appropriate," von Schlichten approved. "Well, you did a first-classjob. I want you back with us as soon as possible--incidentally, you're nowa brigadier-general--but not till the situation at Grank-Krink-Skilk isstabilized. And, eventually, you'll probably have to set up permanentheadquarters in the north."
After Hideyoshi O'Leary had thanked him and signed off, and the screenwas dark again, he turned to the others.
"Well, gentlemen, I don't think we need worry too much about thenorth, for the next few days. How long do you estimate this operationagainst Konkrook's going to take, to complete pacification, Them?"
"How complete is complete pacification, general?" ThemistoclesM'zangwe wanted to know. "If you mean to the end of organizedresistance by larger than squad-size groups, I'd say three days, giveor take twelve hours. Of course, there'll be small groups holding outfor a couple of weeks, particularly in the farming country and back inthe forest...."
"We can forget them; that's minor-tactics stuff. We'll need to keepsome kind of an occupation force here for some time; they can dealwith that. We'll have to get to work on Keegark, as soon as possible;after we've reduced Keegark, we'll be able to reorganize for acampaign against the Free Cities on the Eastern Shore."
"Begging your pardon, general, but reduce is a mild word for what weought to do to Keegark," Hans Meyerstein said. "We ought to raze thatcity as flat as a football field, and then play football on it withKing Orgzild's head."
"Any special reason?" von Schlichten asked. "In addition to theBlount-Lemoyne massacre, that is?"
"I should say so, general!" Themistocles M'zangwe backed Meyersteinup. "Bob, you tell him."
Colonel Robert Grinell, the Intelligence officer, got up and took thecigar out of his mouth. He was short and round-bodied and bald-headed,but he was old Terran Federation Regular Army.
"Well, general, we've been finding out quite a bit about the genesisof this business, lately," he said. "From up north, it probably lookedlike an all-Rakkeed show; that's how it was supposed to look. But thewhole thing was hatched at Keegark, by King Orgzild. We've managed tocapture a few prominent Konkrookans"--he named half a dozen--"who'vebeen made to talk, and a number of others have come in voluntarily andfurnished information. Orgzild conceived the scheme in the beginning;Rakkeed was just the messenger-boy. My face gets the color of theCompany trademark every time I think that the whole thing was plannedfor over a year, right under our noses, even to the signal that was totouch the whole thing off...."
"The poisoning of Sid Harrington, and our announcement of his death?"von Schlichten asked.
"You figured that out yourself, sir? Well, that was it." Grinell wenton to elaborate, while von Schlichten tried to keep the impatience outof his face. Beside him, Paula Quinton was fidgeting, too; she wasthinking, as he was, of what King Orgzild and Prince Gorkrink weredoing now. "And I know positively that the order for the poisoning ofSid Harrington came from the Keegarkan Embassy here, and was passeddown through Gurgurk and Keeluk to this geek here who actually put thepoison in the whiskey."
"Yes. I agree that Keegark should be wiped out, and I'd like to havean immediate estimate on the time it'll take to build a nuclear bombto do the j
ob. One of the old-fashioned plutonium fission A-bombs willdo quite well."
Everybody turned quickly. There was a momentary silence, and thenColonel Evan Colbert, of the Fourth Kragan Rifles, the senior officerunder Themistocles M'zangwe, found his voice.
"If that's an order, general, we'll get it done. But I'd like toremind you, first, of the Company policy on nuclear weapons on thisplanet."
"I'm aware of that policy. I'm also aware of the reason for it. We'vebeen compelled, because of the lack of natural fuel on Uller, to setup nuclear power reactors and furnish large quantities of plutonium tothe geeks to fuel them. The Company doesn't want the natives herelearning of the possibility of using nuclear energy for destructivepurposes. Well, gentlemen, that's a dead issue. They've learned it,thanks to our people on Niflheim, and unless my estimate is entirelywrong, King Orgzild already has at least one First-CenturyNagasaki-type plutonium bomb. I am inclined to believe that he had atleast one such bomb, probably more, at the time when orders were sentto his embassy here, for the poisoning of Governor-GeneralHarrington."
With that, he selected a cigarette from his case, offered it to Paula,and snapped his lighter. She had hers lit, and he was puffing on hisown, when the others finally realized what he had told them.
"That's impossible!" somebody down the table shouted, as though thatwould make it so. Another--one of the civil administrationcrowd--almost exactly repeated Jules Keaveney's words at Skilk: "Whatthe hell was Intelligence doing, sleeping?"
"General von Schlichten," Colonel Grinell took oblique cognizance ofthe question, "you've just made, by implication, a most grave chargeagainst my department. If you're not mistaken in what you've justsaid, I deserve to be court-martialed."
"I couldn't bring charges against you, colonel; if it were acourt-martial matter, I'd belong in the dock with you," von Schlichtentold him. "It seems, though, that a piece of vital information waspossessed by those who were unable to evaluate it, and until thisafternoon, I was ignorant of its existence. Colonel Quinton, supposeyou repeat what you told me, on the way down from Skilk."
"Well, general, don't you think we ought to have Dr. Gomes do that?"Paula asked. "After all, he constructed those bombs on Niflheim, andit'll be he who'll have to build ours."
"That's right." He looked around. "Where's Dr. Lourenco Gomes, thenuclear engineer who came in on the _Pretoria_, two weeks ago? Sendout for him, and get him in here at once."
There was another awkward silence. Then Kent Pickering, the chief ofthe Gongonk Island power-plant, cleared his throat.
"Why, general, didn't you know? Dr. Gomes is dead. He was killedduring the first half hour of the uprising."