“What about your family?”
“And find them my own way.”
“Why? What now?”
“It’s too much . . . you and the war . . . because you’re as bad as the war. Worse. What happened to me tonight is what happens to me every moment I’m with you. I can stand one or the other; not both.”
“No,” he said. “I need you.”
“I’m prepared to buy my way out.”
“How?”
“You’ve lost all your leads to ‘Vorga,’ haven’t you?”
“And?”
“I’ve found another.”
“Where?”
“Never mind where. Will you agree to let me go if I turn it over to you?”
“I can take it from you.”
“Go ahead. Take it.” Her eyes flashed. “If you know what it is, you won’t have any trouble.”
“I can make you give it to me.”
“Can you? After the bombing tonight? Try.”
He was taken aback by her defiance. “How do I know you’re not bluffing?”
“I’ll give you one hint. Remember the man in Australia?”
“Forrest?”
“Yes. He tried to tell you the names of the crew. Do you remember the only name he got out?”
“Kemp.”
“He died before he could finish it. The name is Kempsey.”
“That’s your lead?”
“Yes. Kempsey. Name and address. In return for your promise to let me go.”
“It’s a sale,” he said. “You can go. Give it to me.”
She went at once to the travel dress she had worn in Shanghai. From the pocket she took out a sheet of partially burned paper.
“I saw this on Sergei Orel’s desk when I was trying to put the fire out . . . the fire the Burning Man started . . .”
She handed him the sheet of paper. It was a fragment of a begging letter. It read:
. . . do anything to get out of these bacteria fields. Why should a man just because he can’t jaunte get treated like a dog? Please help me, Serg. Help an old shipmate off a ship we don’t mention. You can spare Cr 100. Remember all the favors I done you? Send Cr 200 or even Cr 50. Don’t let me down.
Rodg Kempsey
Barrack 3
Bacteria, Inc.
Mare Nubium
Moon
“By God!” Foyle exclaimed. “This is the lead. We can’t fail this time. We’ll know what to do. He’ll spill everything . . . everything.” He grinned at Robin. “We leave for the moon tomorrow night. Book passage. No, there’ll be trouble on account of the attack. Buy a ship. They’ll be unloading them cheap anyway.”
“We?” Robin said. “You mean you.”
“I mean we,” Foyle answered. “We’re going to the moon.
Both of us.”
“I’m leaving.”
“You’re not leaving. You’re staying with me.”
“But you swore you’d—”
“Grow up, girl. I had to swear to anything to get this. I need you more than ever now. Not for ‘Vorga.’ I’ll handle ‘Vorga’ myself. For something much more important.”
He looked at her incredulous face and smiled ruefully. “It’s too bad, girl. If you’d given me this letter two hours ago I’d have kept my word. But it’s too late now. I need a Romance Secretary. I’m in love with Olivia Presteign.”
She leaped to her feet in a blaze of fury. “You’re in love with her? Olivia Presteign? In love with that white corpse!” The bitter fury of her telesending was a startling revelation to him. “Ah, now you have lost me. Forever. Now I’ll destroy you!”
She disappeared.
Twelve
Captain Peter Y’ang-Yeovil was handling reports at Central Intelligence Hq. in London at the rate of six per minute. Information was phoned in, wired in, cabled in, jaunted in. The bombardment picture unfolded rapidly.
ATTACK SATURATED N & S AMERICA FROM 60° TO 120° WEST LONGITUDE . . . LABRADOR TO ALASKA IN N . . . RIO TO ECUADOR IN S . . . ESTIMATED TEN PER CENT (10%) MISSILES PENETRATED INTERCEPTION SCREEN . . . ESTIMATED POPULATION LOSS: TEN TO TWELVE MILLION . .
“If it wasn’t for jaunting,” Y’ang-Yeovil said, “the losses would have been five times that. All the same, it’s close to a knockout. One more punch like that and Terra’s finished.”
He addressed this to the assistants jaunting in and out of his office, appearing and disappearing, dropping reports on his desk and chalking results and equations on the glass blackboard that covered one entire wall. Informality was the rule, and Y’angYeovil was surprised and suspicious when an assistant knocked on his door and entered with elaborate formality.
“What larceny now?” he asked.
“Lady to see you, Yeo.”
“Is this the time for comedy?” Y’ang-Yeovil said in exasperated tones. He pointed to the Whitehead equations spelling disaster on the transparent blackboard. “Read that and weep on the way out.”
“Very special lady, Yeo. Your Venus from the Spanish Stairs.” “Who? What Venus?”
“Your Congo Venus.”
“Oh? That one?” Y’ang-Yeovil hesitated. “Send her in.”
“You’ll interview her in private, of course.”
“Of course nothing. There’s a war on. Keep those reports coming, but tip everybody to switch to Secret Speech if they have to talk to me.”
Robin Wednesbury entered the office, still wearing the torn white evening gown. She had jaunted immediately from New York to London without bothering to change. Her face was strained, but lovely. Y’ang-Yeovil gave her a split-second inspection and realized that his first appreciation of her had not been mistaken. Robin returned the inspection and her eyes dilated. “But you’re the cook from the Spanish Stairs! Angelo Poggi!”
As an Intelligence Officer, Y’ang-Yeovil was prepared to deal with this crisis. “Not a cook, madam. I haven’t had time to change back to my usual fascinating self. Please sit here, Miss . . . ?”
“Wednesbury. Robin Wednesbury.”
“Charmed. I’m Captain Y’ang-Yeovil. How nice of you to come and see me, Miss Wednesbury. You’ve saved me a long, hard search.”
“B-But I don’t understand. What were you doing on the Spanish Stairs? Why were you hunting—?”
Y’ang-Yeovil saw that her lips weren’t moving. “Ah? You’re a telepath, Miss Wednesbury? How is that possible? I thought I knew every telepath in the system.”
“I’m not a full telepath. I’m a telesend. I can only send . . not receive.”
“Which, of course, makes you worthless to the world. I see.” Y’ang-Yeovil cocked a sympathetic eye at her. “What a dirty trick, Miss Wednesbury . . . to be saddled with all the disadvantages of telepathy, and be deprived of all the advantages. I do sympathize. Believe me.”
“Bless him! He’s the first ever to realize that without being told.”
“Careful, Miss Wednesbury, I’m receiving you. Now, about the Spanish Stairs?”
He paused, listening intently to her agitated telesending: “Why was he hunting? Me? Alien Bellig—Oh God! Will they hurt me? Cut and— Information. I—”
“My dear girl,” Y’ang-Yeovil said gently. He took her hands and held them sympathetically. “Listen to me a moment. You’re alarmed over nothing. Apparently you’re an Alien Belligerent. Yes?”
She nodded.
“That’s unfortunate, but we won’t worry about it now. About Intelligence cutting and slicing information out of people . . that’s all propaganda.”
“Propaganda?”
“We’re not maladroits, Miss Wednesbury. We know how to extract information without being medieval. But we spread the legend to soften people up in advance, so to speak.”
“Is that true? He’s lying. It’s a trick.”
“It’s true, Miss Wednesbury. I do finesse, but there’s no need now. Not when you’ve evidently come of your own free will to offer information.”
“He’s too adroit . . . too quick . . . He—”
“Yo
u sound as though you’ve been badly tricked recently, Miss Wednesbury . . . Badly burned.”
“I have. I have. By myself, mostly. I’m a fool. A hateful fool.”
“Never a fool, Miss Wednesbury, and never hateful. I don’t know what’s happened to shatter your opinion of yourself, but I hope to restore it. So . . . you’ve been deceived, have you? By yourself, mostly? We all do that. But you’ve been helped by someone. Who?”
“I’m betraying him.”
“Then don’t tell me.”
“But I’ve got to find my mother and sisters . . . I can’t trust him any more . . . I’ve got to do it myself.” Robin took a deep breath. “I want to tell you about a man named Gulliver Foyle.”
Y’ang-Yeovil at once got down to business.
“Is it true he arrived by railroad?” Olivia Presteign asked. “In a locomotive and observation car? What wonderful audacity.”
“Yes, he’s a remarkable young man,” Presteign answered. He stood, iron gray and iron hard, in the reception hall of his home, alone with his daughter. He was guarding honor and life while he waited for servants and staff to return from their panic-stricken jaunte to safety. He chatted imperturbably with Olivia, never once permitting her to realize their grave danger.
“Father, I’m exhausted.”
“It’s been a trying night, my dear. But please don’t retire yet.”
“Why not?”
Presteign refrained from telling her that she would be safer with him. “I’m lonely, Olivia. We’ll talk for a few minutes.”
“I did a daring thing, Father. I watched the attack from the garden.”
“My dear! Alone?”
“No. With Fourmyle.”
A heavy pounding began to shake the front door, which Presteign had closed.
'What's that?'
'Looters,' Presteign answered calmly. 'Don't be alarmed, Olivia. They won't get in.'
He stepped to a table on which he had laid out an assortment of weapons as neatly as a game of patience. 'There's no danger, my love.'
He tried to distract her. 'You were telling me about Fourmyle. . .
'Oh, yes. We watched together . . . describing the bombing to each other.'
'Un-chaperoned? That wasn't discreet, Olivia.'
'I know. I behaved disgracefully. He seemed so big, so sure of himself, that I gave him the Lady Hauteur treatment. You remember Miss Post, my governess, who was so dignified and aloof that I called her Lady Hauteur? I acted like Miss Post. He was furious, father. That's why he came looking for me in the garden.'
'And you permitted him to remain? I'm shocked, dear.'
'I am too. I think I was half out of my mind with excitement. What's he like, father? Tell me. What's he look like to you?'
'He is big. Tall, very dark, rather enigmatic. Like a Borgia. He seems to alternate between assurance and savagery.'
'Ali, he is savage, then? I could see it myself. He glows with danger. Most people just shimmer . . . he looks like a lightning bolt. It's terribly fascinating.'
'My dear,' Presteign remonstrated gently. 'Unmarried females are too modest to talk like that. It would displease me, my love, if you were to form a romantic attachment for a parvenu like Fourmyle of Ceres.'
The Presteign staff jaunted into the reception hall, cooks, waitresses, footmen, pages, coachmen, valets, maids. All were shaken and hang-dog after their flight from death.
'You have deserted your posts. It will be remembered,' Presteign said coldly. 'My safety and honor are again in your hands. Guard them. Lady Olivia and I will retire.'
He took his daughter's arm and led her up the stairs, savagely protective of his ice-pure princess. 'Blood and money,' Presteign murmured.
'What, father?'
'I was thinking of a family vice, Olivia. I was thanking the Deity that you have not inherited it'
'What vice is that?
'There's no need for you to know.
'It's one that Fourmyle shares.'
'Ah, he's wicked? I knew it. Like a Borgia, you said. A wicked Borgia with black eyes and lines in his face. That must account for the pattern.'
'Pattern, my dear?'
'Yes. I can see a strange pattern over his face . . . not the usual electricity of nerve and muscle. Something laid over that. It fascinated me from the beginning.'
'What sort of pattern do you mean?'
'Fantastic . . . Wonderfully evil. I can't describe it. Give me something to write with. I'll show you.'
They stopped before a Chippendale cabinet. Presteign took out a silver-mounted slab of crystal and handed it to Olivia. She touched it with her fingertip; a black dot appeared. She moved her finger and the dot elongated into a line. With quick strokes she sketched the hideous swirls and blazons of a devilmask.
Saul Dagenham left the darkened bedroom. A moment later it was flooded with light as one wall illuminated. It seemed as though a giant mirror reflected Jisbella’s bedroom, but with one odd quirk. Jisbella lay in the bed alone, but in the reflection Saul Dagenham sat on the edge of the bed alone. The mirror was, in fact, a sheet of lead glass separating identical rooms. Dagenham had just illuminated his.
“Love by the clock.” Dagenham’s voice came through a speaker. “Disgusting.”
“No, Saul. Never.”
“Frustrating.”
“Not that, either.”
“But unhappy.”
“No. You’re greedy. Be content with what you’ve got.”
“It’s more than I ever had. You’re magnificent.”
“You’re extravagant. Now go to sleep, darling. We’re skiing tomorrow.”
“No, there’s been a change of plan. I’ve got to work.”
“Oh Saul . . . you promised me. No more working and fretting and running. Aren’t you going to keep your promise?”
“I can’t with a war on.”
“To hell with the war. You sacrificed enough up at Tycho Sands. They can’t ask any more of you.”
“I’ve got one job to finish.”
“I’ll help you finish it.”
“No. You’d best keep out of this, Jisbella.”
“You don’t trust me.”
“I don’t want you hurt.”
“Nothing can hurt us.”
“Foyle can.”
“W-What?”
“Fourmyle is Foyle. You know that. I know you know.”
“But I never—”
“No, you never told me. You’re magnificent. Keep faith with me the same way, Jisbella.”
“Then how did you find out?”
“Foyle slipped.”
“How?”
“The name.”
“Fourmyle of Ceres? He bought the Ceres company.”
“But Geoffrey Fourmyle?”
“He invented it.”
“He thinks he invented it. He remembered it. Geoffrey Fourmyle is the name they use in the megalomania test down in Combined Hospital in Mexico City. I used the Megal Mood on Foyle when I tried to open him up. The name must have stayed buried in his memory. He dredged it up and thought it was original. That tipped me.”
“Poor Gully.”
Dagenham smiled. “Yes, no matter how we defend ourselves against the outside we’re always licked by something from the inside. There’s no defense against betrayal, and we all betray ourselves.”
“What are you going to do, Saul?”
“Do? Finish him, of course.”
“For twenty pounds of PyrE?”
“No. To win a lost war.”
“What?” Jisbella came to the glass wall separating the rooms. “You, Saul? Patriotic?”
He nodded, almost guiltily. “It’s ridiculous. Grotesque. But I am. You’ve changed me completely. I’m a sane man again.”
He pressed his face to the wall too, and they kissed through three inches of lead glass.
Mare Nubium was ideally suited to the growth of anaerobic bacteria, soil organisms, phage, rare moulds, and all those microscopic life forms, essential
to medicine and industry, which required airless culture. Bacteria, Inc. was a huge mosaic of culture fields traversed by catwalks spread around a central clump of barracks, offices, and plant. Each field was a giant glass vat, one hundred feet in diameter, twelve inches high and no more than two molecules thick.
A day before the sunrise line, creeping across the face of the moon, reached Mare Nubium, the vats were filled with culture medium. At sunrise, abrupt and blinding on the airless moon, the vats were seeded, and for the next fourteen days of continuous sun they were tended, shielded, regulated, nurtured . . . the field workers trudging up and down the catwalks in spacesuits. As the sunset line crept toward Mare Nubium, the vats were harvested and then left to freeze and sterilize in the two week frost of the lunar night.
Jaunting was of no use in this tedious step-by-step cultivation. Hence Bacteria, Inc. hired unfortunates incapable of jaunting and paid them slave wages. This was the lowest form of labor, the dregs and scum of the Solar System; and the barracks of Bacteria, Inc. resembled an inferno during the two week lay-off period. Foyle discovered this when he entered Barrack 3.
He was met by an appalling spectacle. There were two hundred men in the giant room; there were whores and their hard-eyed pimps, professional gamblers and their portable tables, dope peddlers, money lenders. There was a haze of acrid smoke and the stench of alcohol and Analogue. Furniture, bedding, clothes, unconscious bodies, empty bottles, rotting food were scattered on the floor.
A roar challenged Foyle’s appearance, but he was equipped to handle this situation. He spoke to the first hairy face thrust into his.
“Kempsey?” he asked quietly. He was answered outrageously. Nevertheless he grinned and handed the man a Cr 100 note. “Kempsey?” he asked another. He was insulted. He paid again and continued his saunter down the barracks distributing r 100 notes in calm thanks for insult and invective. In the center of the barracks he found his key man, the obvious barracks bully, a monster of a man, naked, hairless, fondling two bawds and being fed whiskey by sycophants.
“Kempsey?” Foyle asked in the old gutter tongue. “I’m diggin’ Rodger Kempsey.”
American Science Fiction Five Classic Novels 1956-58 Page 34