It made Dane think of his managing editor. He would have had a field day with the flying saucers. From a continuing story like that the legended Telford Ames would have extracted a million dollars’ worth of rich red sustenance for the common man and ramrodded the arteries and the lesser vessels of Amalgamated Press full of it to the bursting, down to the farthest, most insignificant capillary.
Well, Ames had brought Amalgamated more major beats and cash-ringing features than Dane had written stories for it, but his parting counsel made him squirm to suppose, say, Noel listening in on it. “Dane,” he had led off, “I had to go to the White House to get you on the Far Venture. Over your old friend Colonel Cragg’s dead body. He’s back down to size all right now, but he was very positively averse to you under any circumstances. He put it rather too strongly for us, so that it reflected on Amalgamated. We couldn’t tolerate that. Not by a damn sight. We were able to put it up to them rather successfully that if only one journalist could be included in the party, then as an impartial representative of all the news interests he undoubtedly must be from Amalgamated. Whence else? Naturally we could not submit to coercion in our choice among our own men. We must appoint to the task whichever one we ourselves considered our most suitable representative. It was a neat piece of work, and your colonel may be rash but he is no fool. He still deeply resents your war dispatches about him, and I must say I don’t blame him, although from our point of view they were good. They were news with a capital N. Properly good. A hero is just a very ordinary sort of fellow caught up in events he triumphs over. Very good thematic stuff, but Cragg still doesn’t care for it. Good reader identification for the common man. Damn good. Every man a daydream hero to himself, if the circumstances could just somehow be right for him. Brought you to my attention.”
He had poked the spatulate finger at Dane. “Now here’s the story for Amalgamated. Our subscriber editors will want the science copy, just as much as all the other members of the pool. That’s your official reason for going along. Just the same, I don’t want you to forget it’s not your primary job for Amalgamated. Our Amalgamated readers want to bleed over the flight of the Far Venture, not study a lot of professor data that might be collected. Sure, they are interested in the climate and the terrain. They want to hear about the biological forms on Mars. They even have some curiosity about the weather there and maybe the chemistry of the atmosphere. A few photographs and graphs and charts with captions will take care of all that.”
He jabbed the paragraphing finger again. “What our readers really want to do, though, is bleed over a man standing on another world and knowing his wife and kids are a hundred million miles away. They want to know how he sleeps nights and how he eats his meals in the daytime on Mars. They want to know that the bravest of the crew was not ashamed to be afraid, because he was sustained by the spirit. Wave the flag, man, and don’t forget the church for the old-timers.
“They want to know what the men look forward to doing first after they get back to Earth. Go to the fights? Go out on a picnic with the kids? Marry the girl friend? Buy a home with the bonus money for down payment? You want to tell our readers how it feels to climb out into the planetary cold and walk around in an air-conditioned pressure suit. But most of all they want to bleed over the daily life of one of the crew. Give them a young, clean-cut American boy brought up by his mother’s teachings. Show them Mars through his eyes and how his upbringing helps him. I want every mother in America to bleed for the mothers with boys on the Far Venture. And every wife to suffer with the wives suffering at home. There’s a woman behind every man on that space ship. There’s your news with a capital N. I want every woman in America to feel down deep inside what it is to give a man to the Far Venture and sacrifice so much to meet this challenge to the spirit of man triumphing over unbelievable odds. Now give it to me from there. All the way.”
Not one precious paragraph had he yet set down to glorify the brave little nation builders whose travail brings forth strong men children. But the chore lay in wait. Fifty thousand words of it. A hundred thousand driveling words of it. If the return to Earth was accomplished. Daily installments. Exclusive. An Amalgamated Exclusive: “Men on Mars.” Only the fact that radio to Earth was out had saved him so far.
Work three years for Amalgamated and success. Endure for three years and success guaranteed. Please the great Ames and be anointed pimp for the bravely suppressed snivelling of fifty million frumps. He went into the toilet and relieved himself. In the spotless mirror over the lavatory the face that looked back was sharply outlined, the jaw line unblurred and reasonably uncompromising. He smote his belly. Not too much physical softness. It was in the mind, agreeing to connive and scheme like an ad man for the attention of idiot dreamers.
He splashed his face with the flat, manufactured water and dampened his close-cut hair, knowing he wasn’t going to do it. Even saying it aloud to the gurgle of the drain. For whoever came and found it, he was going to write about how long and unheroic it was to die shut in a can—even unafraid once it had become inevitable—just as it was for an infantry soldier of a defeated army in one of the old wars, dying near the end in a confused woods from unaimed fire, after years of shrewd personal dealings with tanks and automatic weapons and probing patrols. It was no different on Mars. Not by a damn sight.
In the morning he woke to a bad taste from the brandy and a reluctance to get out of the bed. In the act of throwing back the sheet he remembered. He smiled caustically at the bottle of calvados he had brought with him for a last one-for-the-road.
Even so, he felt good. Considering the situation of the spacecraft, it was unlikely that Amalgamated would soon, if ever, know that he had resigned, but he could feel better about it.
20
ERNIE HEILEMAN was in the main-deck mess hall, his long legs jack-knifed around the corner of one of the tables and his wide blond mustache bowed in devotion over a plate of scrambled eggs.
He grinned and kicked a chair around for Dane. “Since I am unable to pronounce ‘eggs’ in French, you will have to read the menu for yourself, my boy. The ham is not bad. As a matter of fact you may bring me another slice. Not to speak of a piece of lightly buttered toast and a fresh cup of coffee.”
“It’s fortunate that I happened to wander in during my morning stroll along the boulevard,” Dane said. “Otherwise you might well have starved. Then we’d have had the impossible job of untangling you from that chair. Are you sitting in it or lying down on it?”
“Most persons are oafish in the early morning,” Heileman sighed. “While you’re at it, make that two slices of toast. I must build up my strength. Lightly buttered, mind you.”
Dane loaded a tray at the serving window and took it back to the offered chair. Heileman attacked his fresh slice of ham. After a few mouthfuls he said, “It’s getting pretty thick, isn’t it?” He knifed precisely around the annular bone. “I’ve got a feeling of something closing in on us. Like waiting for a knock on the door, after you’ve broken a window and run home. The inevitability that something pretty terrible has to happen and there’s nothing to do but wait for it. What do you think; John? What do you really think?”
It was discomforting to see Heileman disturbed, out of character. “There isn’t much else to think except that some kind of intelligent somethings are looking us over very carefully,” Dane repeated himself. “Maybe like specimens on display. Who knows? What did we do ourselves in the early days of exploration of Earth? Explorers brought back specimens as a matter of course. Curiosity and profit were more important than any consideration of the welfare of the specimens themselves.”
Heileman looked carefully around the yellow and blue-trimmed premises of the plate-walled messroom. “I’ve got to admit I didn’t think it would be like this. Immobile here. God knows what around us. Even the damned vegetation eating through metal bulkheads. We carry enough armament to defeat a small army, but what the hell good is it against something we can’t even imagine? Where could th
ey be? We surveyed the entire surface of the planet before we landed. We couldn’t have missed any kind of civilization at all. We’d have been certain to see something of it, no matter how scattered and dispersed it was.”
Dane didn’t want to talk about it. “Unless the Martians are very small. Say on the order of a sixteenth of an inch tall. They could hide sizable towns under the lichen forests.”
“You think they could be like some kind of an insect, John? Wertz was telling me last night about what you told Yudin. He said it was your idea they might even be submicroscopic. But how would a minute creature like that build a transmitter capable of sending the signals we have been getting? It’s not mechanically possible.”
“That we don’t know. Or anything else, for that matter,” Dane told him. He spoke with finality and got up to go. He just didn’t want to talk about it. Not with Heileman, from whom he was accustomed to have light banter. It drew the menace in, all around and waiting, to have Heileman this way. Nonsense, he thought. He’s scared just like the rest of us. And why not? It was peculiar that he should feel so about it. Just because it was Heileman.
“What’s your hurry?” Heileman said. “Time for your train?” He managed one of his grins. “Let’s you and me take a little stroll this fine summer’s morn. We can put on a nicely pressed pressure suit and saunter over to Judah’s mine. Maybe he’s dug up Captain Kidd’s treasure and we’ll force him to share it. This is a heist,” he flatted menacingly. “Fill up this bag with doubloons afore we turn off your air conditioner. Instanter.”
It would be something to do. Judah was now down about ninety feet in his study of the planet’s crust. Not that anything spectacular had been unearthed, but it would be interesting to see. How do you get doubloons here? You couldn’t very well unearth them. Do you unmars them?” he ventured.
“Nothing is forgiven,” Heileman said sternly. “Never come home again. Meantime we leave in an hour for the doubloons. By the way,” he added, “one is supposed to get permission to leave the ship these days. You’ll have to get Noel’s okay.”
Major Noel was doubtful. He swiveled his chair around to face Dane and then swiveled back square against the command desk. He reached for the daily log and thumbed back a page. He picked up a sheaf of papers and flipped through the top half dozen sheets. Finally he grunted his dissatisfaction with purposeless risk-taking. If nothing else, it interfered with orderly operations. “Actually we don’t know if there is any risk.” he admitted. “We’ve been sending more than a few men out for scouting or for scientific purposes. Just for the sake of curiosity, it doesn’t seem wise to take a chance on our people. We’ve already lost five men. Maybe two more. Beemis and Jackson are still unconscious and getting weaker.”
“You don’t want to forget that I’m the accredited correspondent on this little junket,” Dane told him. “My business requires firsthand knowledge of whatever we find here.”
Noel went on nosing through his stack of papers. He thought it should be just as newsworthy to go down and talk with Beloit and Vining instead. They were very near the end of a complete overhaul of the drive. “We may be able to try a take-off in two or three days.”
He didn’t sound very optimistic about it, Dane thought “Why? They found anything?”
Noel shook his head. “Vining thinks we’re trapped in some sort of magnetic zone, or maybe a force storm, that’s upsetting the reactions. He’s got the idea now that it could be only a temporary phenomenon. Sort of comes and goes. Anyway, they’re assembling the reactors and generators, and we’re going to try again. Even if we blow ourselves out of existence, we don’t have any choice. The radiation is still below what we’ve been calling the critical level, but that’s mainly guesswork, based on cosmic-ray penetration data. We don’t even know what this local stuff is. Maybe it’s cumulative in some way we don’t understand. Anyway, we’re not going to take it an hour longer than we have to. Colonel Cragg laid the law down on that last night.”
“Cragg!” Dane exclaimed. “I might as well be back on Earth for all you let me know what’s going on! When did he take over? I thought he was still half in drowsy land.”
“The commander’s condition has been improving steadily since yesterday morning,” Noel said sententiously. “However he has not been able to take over yet.”
“Look,” Dane said. “Put me down for a trip to the mine this morning, but first I want to talk to Colonel Cragg. If he’s able.”
Noel smiled sardonically. “He’s able all right. In fact he’s already made quite a point that he wants you to see him ‘at you convenience.’ This morning, that is.”
Dane said, “That’s one way to put it, I suppose.”
“Yes,” Noel agreed, “it is.”
The nurse on duty sat meticulously straight at his small desk. When he put his paperback book down, Dane saw it was Romany Rye. In collarless white duck jacket and pants the young man looked only partly dressed.
He spoke up briskly, like a clerk tending store. “May I help you?”
Dane told him he could. And how he could.
The young man picked up his book. “No visitors. Maybe tomorrow. Colonel Cragg is still on the quiet list.”
Dane explained that he was not exactly a visitor.
The young man put his book back down. “What’s your first name and middle initial, Mr. Dane?” He fished a small card out of the desk and wrote the information upon it, noting also the time from his watch and setting it down. Then he wrote, “States purpose of visit to comply with patient’s invitation.” He thought a moment and lined out the last two words, writing above them, “Commander’s (as patient) order.” Still not satisfied, he struck out this substitution and wrote, “patient’s (the Commander) order, as stated by Mr. Dane, for Mr. Dane to report to him before 1200.”
Dane said, “You ought to put ‘apostrophe s’ on the word ‘Commander.’”
The young man considered the card. He shook his head doubtfully. “The appositive should agree in case with the word ‘Patient’s,’ but it wouldn’t look right to make it. I think we ought to leave it the way it is.”
Dane said, “You may be right. After all, it is your record card. I withdraw the suggestion. Now where do I go?”
The young man closed his book on his pencil to save his place. “Just have a seat here and I’ll see if Colonel Cragg is awake.” He disappeared around the angle in the corridor.
Dane looked at the book, memories stirring of George Borrow’s gypsies and of his own sophomore year. Odd choice for a library destined to visit the surface of Mars. Maybe not so odd, he decided, thinking he would like to read Romany Rye again when young mister cross-the-t’s returned it to the shelves.
The young man in white came back and reported that Dane could go in, if he would just please follow him. This, Dane was pleased to do, until they came to a guard standing at a door. Evidently Noel was taking no chances.
The head of the bed had been cranked up to a forty-five-degree angle, but weakness darkened the colonel’s eyes against his blanched face and weighted his head back against its supporting pillow.
“They tell me not to talk,” he said. His harsh, strong voice had lost some of its bass timbre. “But there’s nothing wrong with my ears. I want the complete story on the messages we’ve been getting. They tell me you’re the star performer on them. I want to know firsthand from you what you’ve done and exactly how you did it.” He pointed at a sheaf of papers on the bedside table. “I’ve been over the reports. Now I want to hear it from you. I want to hear you answer two questions. One, what makes you so sure these signals are coming from outside the Far Venture? Second, if they are, how are you sure they are not of human origin?”
Down but not out, and no nonsense. The technique of command. Or more like it, the habit. How certain of himself and demanding did the man have to be to satisfy his neurosis for the throne? Dane seated himself deliberately in the unoffered chair. “I see, Colonel, that your recovery has progressed so far that y
ou can be your normal self. Attack. Always push. Shove the other man off balance. Keep him on the defensive. Make him mad. Do you suspect me of concealing something from my reports?”
Cragg gazed at him sourly, his cheek scar reddening. “Never mind that. Haven’t you stopped yet to think that some person or persons on board this spacecraft might have an interest in convincing us of the existence of Martians?”
“No,” Dane said. “It would appear to me to be a complicated and useless effort. There’s no way or means for anyone to do it. Even if there were, there wouldn’t be any point I hardly think we have any jokers of that caliber along.”
“Tong Asia Pact,” Cragg snapped. “Use your head.”
The silence extended. Finally Dane said, “It doesn’t figure. It’s too farfetched. We wouldn’t scare that easily. The United States would eventually send more spacecraft. Even if this one doesn’t return. All the more likely to send them then.”
“Suppose we reported that Mars not only was a barren, useless planet but also was inhabited by some kind of hostile, highly intelligent beings. The government might not send another expedition for years. Meantime, while we’re on the sidelines, Tong Asia solves the secret of the drive and takes over here.”
“Why?” Dane demanded. “What would they want with it? Assuming that a scheme like that would work, what would they want here?”
The colonel’s hands clinched into fists. “There was a time in the past when you pretended to be more informed. When you didn’t know anything at all, you still could nose into it and put together a half-baked story for the headlines.”
Dane said, “It’s ancient history now. Why don’t you let it alone?”
The scar flamed. “What do you know about a command decision, with a hundred factors to bring down to the right answer, and none of them clear? You think they were clear in the middle of the night, with the reports contradicting each other and half of them raw data and the imponderables stacked up in your mind and knowing you had to do something right now and the crews standing by ready to be committed and maybe God help a few million people and maybe your country’s existence if you weren’t right? Exactly right?”
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