Astounding Science Fiction Stories Vol 1

by Anthology

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean that you'd condemn the ship, no matter what you found inside. You couldn't O.K. a ship without airfoils, could you?"

  "Of course not," said Feldstein, "that's obvious, in the face of--"

  "All right, then give me the notification and forget the rest of the inspection." Porter held out his hand.

  Feldstein hesitated. "Well, now, without a complete inspection--"

  Again Porter interrupted. "You're not going to get a complete inspection, Buster," he said with a wolfish grin. "Either serve that paper or get off my back."

  Feldstein slammed the paper into Porter's hand. "That's your official notification! If necessary, Mr. Porter, we will be back with a Federal marshal! Good day, Mr. Porter. Let's go, Granby."

  The two of them marched back to their aircar and climbed inside. The car lifted with a roar of blowers and headed back over the mountains toward Albuquerque.

  But long before they were out of sight over the ridge, Malcom Porter had turned on his heel and started back toward the cluster of buildings. He was swearing vilely in a rumbling monotone, and had apparently forgotten all about Elshawe.

  The reporter followed in silence for a dozen paces, then he asked: "What's your next step, Mr. Porter?"

  Porter came to an abrupt stop, turned, and looked at Elshawe. "I'm going to phone General Fitzsimmons in Washington! I'm--" He stopped, scowling. "No, I guess I'd better phone my lawyer first. I'll find out what they can do and what they can't." Then he turned again and strode rapidly toward the nearest of the buildings.

  * * * * *

  Seventy-two hours later, Terry Elshawe was in Silver City, talking to his boss over a long-distance line.

  "... And that's the way it lines up, Ole. The CAA won't clear his ship for take-off, and the Space Force won't either. And if he tries it without the O.K. of both of them, he'll be right back in Alcatraz."

  "He hasn't violated his parole yet, though?" Winstein's voice came distantly.

  "No." Elshawe cursed the fact that he couldn't get a vision connection with New York. "But, the way he's acting, he's likely to. He's furious."

  "Why wouldn't he let the Space Force officers look over his ship?" Winstein asked. "I still don't see how that would have hurt him if he's really got something."

  "It's on the recording I sent you," Elshawe said.

  "I haven't played it yet," Winstein said. "Brief me."

  "He wouldn't let the Space Force men look at his engine or whatever it is because he doesn't trust them," Elshawe said. "He claims to have this new drive, but he doesn't want anyone to go nosing around it. The Space Force colonel ... what's his name? ... Manetti, that's it. Manetti asked Porter why, if he had a new invention, he hadn't patented it. Porter said that he wasn't going to patent it because that would make it available to every Tom, Dick, and Harry--his very words--who wanted to build it. Porter insists that, since it's impossible to patent the discovery of a new natural law, he isn't going to give away his genius for nothing. He said that Enrico Fermi was the prime example of what happened when the Government got hold of something like that when the individual couldn't argue."

  "Fermi?" Winstein asked puzzledly. "Wasn't he a physicist or something, back in the Forties?"

  "Right. He's the boy who figured out how to make the atomic bomb practical. But the United States Government latched onto it, and it took him years to get any compensation. He never did get the money that he was entitled to.

  "Porter says he wants to make sure that the same thing doesn't happen to him. He wants to prove that he's got something and then let the Government pay him what it's worth and give him the recognition he deserves. He says he has discovered a new natural law and devised a machine that utilizes that law. He isn't going to let go of his invention until he gets credit for everything."

  There was a long silence from the other end. After a minute, Elshawe said: "Ole? You there?"

  "Oh. Yeah ... sure. Just thinking. Terry, what do you think of this whole thing? Does Porter have something?"

  "Damned if I know. If I were in New York, I'd say he was a complete nut, but when I talk to him, I'm halfway convinced that he knows what he's talking about."

  There was another long pause. This time, Elshawe waited. Finally, Oler Winstein said: "You think Porter's likely to do something drastic?"

  "Looks like it. The CAA has already forbidden him to lift that ship. The Space Force flatly told him that he couldn't take off without permission, and they said he wouldn't get permission unless he let them look over his gizmo ... whatever it is."

  "And he refused?"

  "Well, he did let Colonel Manetti look it over, but the colonel said that, whatever the drive principle was, it wouldn't operate a ship. He said the engines didn't make any sense. What it boils down to is that the CAA thinks Porter has rockets in the ship, and the Space Force does, too. So they've both forbidden him to take off."

  "Are there any rocket motors in the ship?" Winstein asked.

  "Not as far as I can see," Elshawe said. "He's got two big atomic-powered DC generators aboard--says they have to be DC to avoid electromagnetic effects. But the drive engines don't make any more sense to me than they do to Colonel Manetti."

  Another pause. Then: "O.K., Terry; you stick with it. If Porter tries to buck the Government, we've got a hell of a story if his gadget works the way he says it does. If it doesn't--which is more likely--then we can still get a story when they haul him back to the Bastille."

  "Check-check. I'll call you if anything happens."

  * * * * *

  He hung up and stepped out of the phone booth into the lobby of the Murray Hotel. Across the lobby, a glowing sign said cocktail lounge in lower-case script.

  He decided that a tall cool one wouldn't hurt him any on a day like this and ambled over, fumbling in his pockets for pipe, tobacco pouch, and other paraphernalia as he went. He pushed open the door, spotted a stool at the bar of the dimly-lit room, went over to it and sat down.

  He ordered his drink and had no sooner finished than the man to his left said, "Good afternoon, Mr. Elshawe."

  The reporter turned his head toward his neighbor. "Oh, hello, Mr. Skinner. I didn't know you'd come to town."

  "I came in somewhat earlier. Couple, three hours ago." His voice had the careful, measured steadiness of a man who has had a little too much to drink and is determined not to show it. That surprised Elshawe a little; Skinner had struck him as a middle-aged accountant or maybe a high school teacher--the mild kind of man who doesn't drink at all, much less take a few too many.

  "I'm going to hire a 'copter and fly back," Elshawe said. "You're welcome if you want to come along."

  Skinner shook his head solemnly. "No. Thank you. I'm going back to Los Angeles this afternoon. I'm just killing time, waiting for the local plane to El Paso."

  "Oh? Well, I hope you have a good trip." Elshawe had been under the impression that Skinner had come to New Mexico solely to see the test of Porter's ship. He had wondered before how the man fitted into the picture, and now he was wondering why Skinner was leaving. He decided he might as well try to find out. "I guess you're disappointed because the test has been called off," he said casually.

  "Called off? Hah. No such thing," Skinner said. "Not by a long shot. Not Porter. He'll take the thing up, and if the Army doesn't shoot him down, the CAA will see to it that he's taken back to prison. But that won't stop him. Malcom Porter is determined to go down in history as a great scientist, and nothing is going to stop him if he can help it."

  "You think his spaceship will work, then?"

  "Work? Sure it'll work. It worked in '79; it'll work now. The way that drive is built, it can't help but work. I just don't want to stick around and watch him get in trouble again, that's all."

  Elshawe frowned. All the time that Porter had been in prison, his technicians had been getting together the stuff to build the so-called "spaceship," but none of them knew how it was put together or how it worked. Onl
y Porter knew that, and he'd put it together after he'd been released on parole.

  But if that was so, how come Skinner, who didn't even work for Porter, was so knowledgeable about the drive? Or was that liquor talking?

  "Did you help him build it?" the reporter asked smoothly.

  "Help him build it? Why, I--" Then Skinner stopped abruptly. "Why, no," he said after a moment. "No. I don't know anything about it, really. I just know that it worked in '79, that's all." He finished his drink and got off his stool. "Well, I've got to be going. Nice talking to you. Hope I see you again sometime."

  "Sure. So long, Mr. Skinner." He watched the man leave the bar.

  Then he finished his own drink and went back into the lobby and got a phone. Ten minutes later, a friend of his who was a detective on the Los Angeles police force had promised to check into Mr. Samuel Skinner. Elshawe particularly wanted to know what he had been doing in the past three years and very especially what he had been doing in the past year. The cop said he'd find out. There was probably nothing to it, Elshawe reflected, but a reporter who doesn't follow up accidentally dropped hints isn't much of a reporter.

  He came out of the phone booth, fired up his pipe again, and strolled back to the bar for one more drink before he went back to Porter's ranch.

  * * * * *

  Malcom Porter took one of the darts from the half dozen he held in his left hand and hurled it viciously at the target board hung on the far wall of the room.

  Thunk!

  "Four ring at six o'clock," he said in a tight voice.

  Thunk! Thunk! Thunk! Thunk! Thunk!

  The other five darts followed in rapid succession. As he threw each one, Porter snapped out a word. "They ... can't ... stop ... Malcom ... Porter!" He glared at the board "Two bull's-eyes; three fours, and a three. Twenty-five points. You owe me a quarter, Elshawe."

  The reporter handed him a coin. "Two bits it is. What can you do, Porter? They've got you sewed up tight. If you try to take off, they'll cart you right back to The Rock--if the Army doesn't shoot you down first. Do you want to spend the next ten years engrossed in the scenic beauties of San Francisco Bay?"

  "No. And I won't, either."

  "Not if the Army gets you. I can see the epitaph now:

  Malcom Porter, with vexation, Thought he could defy the nation. He shot for space with great elation-- Now he's dust and radiation.

  Beneath it, they'll engrave a spaceship argent with A-bombs rampant on a field sable."

  Porter didn't take offense. He grinned. "What are you griping about? It would make a great story."

  "Sure it would," Elshawe agreed. "But not for me. I don't write the obituary column."

  "You know what I like about you, Elshawe?"

  "Sure. I lose dart games to you."

  "That, yes. But you really sound worried. That means two things. One: You like me. Two: You believe that my ship actually will take off. That's more than any of those other reporters who have been prowling around and phoning in do."

  Elshawe shrugged silently and puffed at his pipe. Malcom Porter's ego was showing through. He was wrong on two counts. Elshawe didn't like him; the man's arrogance and his inflated opinion of himself as a scientific genius didn't sit well with the reporter. And Elshawe didn't really believe there was anything but a rocket motor in that hull outside. A new, more powerful kind of rocket perhaps--otherwise Porter wouldn't be trying to take a one-stage rocket to the Moon. But a rocket, nonetheless.

  "I don't want to go back to prison," Porter continued, "but I'll risk that if I have to. But I won't risk death just yet. Don't worry; the Army won't know I'm even gone until I'm halfway to the Moon."

  "Foo!" said Elshawe. "Every radar base from Albuquerque to the Mexican border has an antenna focused on the air above this ranch. The minute you get above those mountains, they'll have a fix on you, and a minute after that, they'll have you bracketed with Cobras.

  "Why don't you let the Government inspectors look it over and give you an O.K.? What makes you think they're all out to steal your invention?"

  "Oh, they won't steal it," Porter said bitterly. "Heaven's-to-Betsy no! But this invention of mine will mean that the United States of America will be in complete control of the planets and the space between. When the Government wants a piece of property, they try to buy it at their price; if they can't do that, they condemn it and pay the owner what they think it's worth--not what the owner thinks it's worth. The same thing applies here; they'd give me what they thought I ought to have--in ten years or so. Look what happened to Fermi.

  "No, Elshawe; when the Government comes begging to me for this invention, they can have it--on my terms."

  "Going to keep it a secret, eh? You can't keep a thing like that secret. Look what happened with atomic energy after World War Two. We kept it a secret from the Russians, didn't we? Fine lot of good that did us. As soon as they knew it was possible, they went to work on it. Nature answers any questions you ask her if you ask her the right way. As soon as the Government sees that your spaceship works, they'll put some of their bright physicists to work on it, and you'll be in the same position as you would have been if you'd showed it to them in the first place. Why risk your neck?"

  Porter shook his head. "The analogy isn't valid. Suppose someone had invented the A-bomb in 1810. It would have been a perfectly safe secret because there wasn't a scientist on Earth who included such a thing as atomic energy in his philosophy. And, believe me, this drive of mine is just as far ahead of contemporary scientific philosophy as atomic energy was ahead of Napoleon's scientists.

  "Suppose I told you that the fuel my ship uses is a gas lighter than hydrogen. It isn't, but suppose I told you so. Do you think any scientist today could figure out how it worked? No. They know that there's no such thing as a gas with a lighter atomic weight than hydrogen. They know it so well that they wouldn't even bother to consider the idea.

  "My invention is so far ahead of present-day scientific thought that no scientists except myself could have even considered the idea."

  "O.K.; O.K.," Elshawe said. "So you're going to get yourself shot down to prove your point."

  Porter grinned lopsidedly. "Not at all. You're still thinking in terms of a rocket. Sure--if I used a rocket, they'd knock me down fast, just as soon as I lifted above the mountains. But I don't have to do that. All I have to do is get a few feet of altitude and hug the ground all the way to the Pacific coast. Once I get out in the middle of the Pacific, I can take off straight up without being bothered at all."

  "All right. If your machine will do it," the reporter said, trying to hide his skepticism.

  "You still think I've got some kind of rocket, don't you?" Porter asked accusingly. He paused a moment, then, as if making a sudden decision, he said: "Look, Elshawe, I trust you. I'm going to show you the inside of that ship. I won't show you my engines, but I will prove to you that there are no rocket motors in her. That way, when you write up the story, you'll be able to say that you have first-hand knowledge of that fact. O.K.?"

  "It's up to you," the reporter said. "I'd like to see it."

  "Come along," said Malcom Porter.

  * * * * *

  Elshawe followed Porter out to the field, feeling rather grateful that he was getting something to work on. They walked across the field, past the two gun-toting men in Levis that Porter had guarding the ship. Overhead, the stars were shining brightly through the thin mountain air. Elshawe glanced at his wrist watch. It was a little after ten p.m.

  He helped Porter wheel the ramp up to the door of the ship and then followed him up the steps. Porter unlocked the door and went inside. The Grumman had been built to cruise in the high stratosphere, so it was as air-tight as a submarine.

  Porter switched on the lights. "Go on in."

  The reporter stepped into the cabin of the ship and looked around. It had been rebuilt, all right; it didn't look anything like the inside of a normal stratojet.

  "Elshawe."

  "Yeah?" The rep
orter turned to look at Porter, who was standing a little behind him. He didn't even see the fist that arced upward and smashed into his jaw. All he saw was a blaze of light, followed by darkness.

  The next thing he knew, something was stinging in his nostrils. He jerked his head aside, coughing. The smell came again. Ammonia.

  "Wake up, Elshawe," Porter was saying. "Have another whiff of these smelling salts and you'll feel better."

  Elshawe opened his eyes and looked at the bigger man. "I'm awake. Take that stuff away. What's the idea of slugging me?"

  "I was afraid you might not come willingly," Porter said apologetically. "I needed a witness, and I figured you'd do better than anyone else."

  Elshawe tried to move and found that he was tied to the seat and strapped in with a safety belt. "What's this for?" he asked angrily. His jaw still hurt.

  "I'll take that stuff off in a few minutes. I know I can trust you, but I want you to remember that I'm the only one who can pilot this ship. If you try anything funny, neither one of us will get back alive. I'll let you go as soon as we get up to three hundred miles."

  Elshawe stared at him. "Where are we?"

  "Heading out toward mid-Pacific. I headed south, to Mexico, first. We're over open water now, headed toward Baja California, so I put on the autopilot. As soon as we get out over the ocean, we can really make time. You can watch the sun come up in the west."

  "And then?" Elshawe felt dazed.

  "And then we head straight up. For empty space."

  Elshawe closed his eyes again. He didn't even want to think about it.

  * * * * *

  "... As you no doubt heard," Terrence Elshawe dictated into the phone, "Malcom Porter made good his threat to take a spaceship of his own devising to the Moon. Ham radios all over North America picked up his speech, which was made by spreading the beam from an eighty-foot diameter parabolic reflector and aiming it at Earth from a hundred thousand miles out. It was a collapsible reflector, made of thin foil, like the ones used on space stations. Paragraph.

  "He announced that the trip was made with the co-operation of the United States Space Force, and that it represented a major breakthrough in the conquest of space. He--"