The Five Gold Bands

by Jack Vance

  After a period the question was no longer asked and then it seemed as if the torture had become meaningless.

  Paddy emerged from quiet suddenly with a clear vision. The face of Zhri Khainga looked down at him.

  "What did you do with the remaining data?"

  Paddy licked his lips. They wouldn't trick him. He'd die first. But there was the rub! This kind of torture didn't let a man die. One twentieth of such treatment would kill a man were it fixed on him the normal way! Here they could torture him to death as many times as they chose and bring him back fresh and sound, nerves tingling and keen for the next session.

  "What did you do with the other data?"

  Paddy stared at the pale face. And why not tell them? Space-drive was lost to Earth in any event. Four-fifths was as bad as none at all.

  Paddy grimaced. Suggestion from without. It must be, since this was the Son's own arguments. Fay! He wondered about Fay: Had they caught her, had she got away? He tried to think but the nerve-suit left him little leisure.

  "What did you do with the other data?"

  Zhri Khainga's head was close, his eyes dilated, and his face was like a death's-head. The eyes dwindled, expanded again. Wax, wane, swell, subside. Paddy was having visions. The air was crowded with old faces.

  There was his father Charley Blackthorn, waving a cheery hand at him, and his mother, gazing from her rocking chair with Dan, the collie, at her feet. Paddy sighed, smiled. It was beautiful to be home, breathing the turf smoke, smelling the salt fishy air of the Skibbereen wharves.

  The visions flitted and danced, swept past like the seasons. The jail at Akhabats, the asteroid, the five dead Sons of Langtry. A quick flitting of scenes like a movie run too fast. There now, something he recognized-Spade-Ace. The doc-

  tor and Fay-Fay as he had first seen her, a small dark-haired imp of a girl. And beautiful-ah! so beautiful!

  The grace in her movements, her lovely dark eyes, the fire in her slender body-and he saw her dancing at the Kamborogian Arrowhead, her rounded little body as soft and sweet as cream. And he had thought her plain!

  He saw her with her golden hair, with the new arch side-glances she had begun to give him. But now her eyes were full of bright anger and pity.

  "What did you do with the other data?"

  The wraiths departed regretfully. Paddy was back in the bare room with the Koton Son of Langtry, who wanted to know the secret of space-drive, the secret his grandfather twenty times removed had stumbled upon.

  Paddy said, "Ah, you ghoul, do you think I'd be telling you? Not on your life."

  "You can't resist, Blackthorn," said the Son mildly. "The strongest wills break. No man of any planet can fight indefinitely. Some last an hour, some a day, some two days. One Koton hero stayed two weeks and held his tongue. Then he spoke. He babbled, craving for death."

  Paddy said, "I suppose you gave it to him then?"

  Zhri Khainga made a quick quivering motion with his mouth. "Then we took our revenge on him. Oh, no. He still lives."

  "And when I speak-after that you'll take your revenge on me?"

  Zhri Khainga smiled, a ghastly grin that affected Paddy's viscera. "There is yet your woman."

  Paddy felt flat, buffeted, over-powered. "You've-caught Fay then?"

  "Certainly."

  "I don't believe it," said Paddy weakly.

  Zhri Khainga tapped an upright tube on the table with his shiny blue-gray fingernail. It rang. A Koton in a yellow breech-clout scuttled into Paddy's range of vision. "Yes, Lord, your magnificent commands."

  "The small Earther woman."

  Paddy waited like a spent swimmer. Zhri Khainga watched him carefully for a moment, then said, "You have a projective identification with this woman?"

  Paddy blinked. "Eh, now? What are you saying?"

  "You 'love' this woman?"

  "None of your business."

  Zhri Khainga made play with his fingernails on the table-top. "Assume that you do. Would you then allow her to suffer?"

  Paddy said quietly, "What would be the difference since in any event you'll torment us till you tire of the sport?"

  Zhri Khainga said silkily, "Not necessarily. We Kotons are the most direct of all intelligences. You have put me in your debt by. killing my father, thus setting me free to shave my head. Life and death are mine. Now I have over-power. I rule, I direct, I envision.

  "Already two hundred of my jealous brothers are stacked in the Cairn of South Thinkers. If you helped me to sole knowledge of the space-drive over the false Sons from Shaul, Badau, Alpheratz and Loristan-then there would be an unbalance indeed."

  Paddy said. "Now butter won't melt in your mouth, I don't understand you. You are bargaining with me? What for what? And why?"

  "My reasons are my own. There is dignity to be considered."

  "And haste?" suggested Paddy.

  "Haste-and you might lose your memory. That is common when a man lies too long in the nerve-suit. The imagination begins to intrude upon fact and presently information is untrustworthy."

  Paddy cackled a wild laugh. "So we've got you in a corner! And your nerve-suit won't get you your bacon after all. Well, then, old owl, what's your bargain?"

  Zhri Khainga stared expressionlessly across the room. "On the one hand you may return to Earth, with your woman and your space-vessel. I crave the death of neither of you."

  Zhri Khainga flicked with the back of his hand. "Negligible. Riches, money? As much as you desire." He flicked again. "Negligible. Any amount and I will not say no. That on the one hand. On the other-"

  A sound interrupted him. Paddy turned his head sharply. It came from a nerve-suit which had been quietly rolled into the room-a cry of desperation, contralto, aching, lost.

  "That," said the Son of Langtry, "is your woman. She is experiencing unpleasantness. That is the alternative-for both of you. Forever and ever for all your lives."

  Paddy struggled to rise but was afflicted by a strange weakness as if his legs were muscled with loose string. Zhri Khainga watched attentively.

  Paddy said hoarsely "Stop it, you devil-you devil!"

  Zhri Khainga made a sign with his hand. The Koton in the yellow breech-clout snapped down a bar. A sigh, a gasp came from within.

  "Let me talk to her," said Paddy. "Let me talk to her alone."

  Zhri Khainga said slowly, "Very well. You shall talk together."

  XIII

  Fay, Fay, Fay!" cried Paddy. "Why didn't you leave the wretched world when you had the chance?"

  She smiled wanly. "Paddy, I couldn't leave you. I knew I should. I knew my life was more important to Earth than to you. I knew all the things that the Agency drilled into me- but still I couldn't leave without trying to help. And they trapped the ship."

  They stood in a wide concrete hall, a hundred yards long, high-ceilinged, illuminated with a glow that seemed blue and yellow at the same time, like strong moonlight.

  Paddy looked in all directions. "Can they hear us now?"

  Fay said dully, "I imagine that every sound we make is amplified and recorded."

  Paddy moved close, and said softly into Fay's ear, "They want to trade us our lives."

  She looked at him with wide eyes that still held traces of terror. "Paddy-I want to live!"

  Paddy said between his teeth. "I want you to live too, Fay-and me with you."

  She said desperately, "Paddy, I've thought the whole thing out. And I don't see what we gain by holding our tongues. The Kotons will get the space-drive-but what then?

  "Earth wouldn't have it in any event since we've got only four fifths. And the four fifths"-she breathed in his ear in a whisper so low he could hardly hear-"I can dictate from memory."

  "From-" Paddy gasped.

  "Yes. I told you once I was trained for that."

  "Hmm."

  Fay said softly, "If we were able to keep silent no one would have space-drive. In ten years there's be no more star travel. On the other hand, if we told what we know-and if we can get b
ack to Earth-then Earth will have as much as we have now."

  "Which is as good as nothing," Paddy said bitterly. "Of the thirty numbers you only know twenty-four. Twenty-four dial-settings."

  He paused, blinked. A picture came into his mind from a past that seemed remote as ancient Egypt. It was the interior of the manifolding shop on Akhabats, where the five Sons came to curl power into the tungsten cylinders. Five panels, each with three dials.

  "Fay," said Paddy, "I'm not fit to live."

  She looked at him in alarm. "What's the matter?"

  Paddy said slowly, "I see it all now and I see it clear. We've been abysmal fools. I've been the worse one. Now on these sheets"-he leaned to her ear-"remember the duplications?"

  "Oh, Paddy!"

  He said, "When I broke into that shop on Akhabats I saw a curling machine. There were fifteen control knobs. Those data sheets show six readings to a sheet-thirty in all. Does that mean anything?"

  She nodded. "There are duplicates of the numbers too. Paddy-we had it all!"

  "All of it," said Paddy. "We didn't need to come to Koto any closer than the Southern Cross."

  Fay winced.

  "We've got to get away," said Paddy with great energy.

  "Somehow. Because in that little cap of yours you've got space-drive."

  Fay shook her head sadly. "They won't let us go, Paddy. Even if we tell everything we know they'd still kill us."

  "Not till we'd blown the fuses in all their nerve-suits."

  "Oh Paddy! Let's think-think!"

  They thought. Paddy said, "He's hot after us, that Zhri Khainga, he's got the wind up. But why? Maybe word has got out to the other planets that he's caught us and all the spies and agents and secret services are going into action and he doesn't want to chance our holding out till the others get to see us."

  There was a moment of silence. "Think," muttered Fay.

  "Listen here," said Paddy. "We'll tell him that you'll go out to get the sheets and I'll stay as a hostage. Then you go to Earth and we'll spring the news that we know all there is to know about space-drive. Then you buy me back for twenty space-drives more or less."

  "At the going rate," said Fay dryly, "that's twenty million marks. Are you worth that much?"

  "That's the best I can think up," said Paddy. "There's no other way of getting us both out alive and the drive to Earth."

  "Zhri Khainga won't like it," said Fay. "He'll want us to trust him. After he gets the sheets-then he turns us loose."

  "I wonder," said Paddy. "What?"

  "Could it be that he'd agree to all of us going? We'd take him to you-know-where alone-and there we'd switch."

  Fay said breathlessly, "It would be fair that way and he'd be getting the quick action he seems to want. Let's ask."

  Stepping gingerly past the ranked crew members, conscious of the oyster-colored gaze, Paddy and Fay entered the familiar cabin which had taken them so far.

  Zhri Khainga followed them, the port was slammed shut, they were cast adrift from the mother ship. Paddy and Fay stood stiffly, silently by the control deck; Zhri Khainga took a seat back in the cabin and leaned back at his ease.

  "Now," he said, "I have complied exactly with your conditions. Here is your space-boat-we are alone. Take me to the hiding place of the data, I will call my own vessel, you may leave me and go your way in friendship. I have done my part. See to it that you keep good faith."

  Paddy looked at Fay, rubbed his nose uneasily. "Well, now, to tell the truth, we'd like to look the ship over. Some of your men-by mistake, I'm saying might be asleep in the bilges or checking stores in the forward locker."

  Zhri Khainga nodded. "By all means satisfy yourselves. In the meantime," he turned to Fay, "perhaps you will put your ship on course."

  Wordlessly Fay climbed up into the seat, threw the boat into space-drive and the vessel which had brought them from Koto twinkled an enormous distance astern.

  Paddy came back. "Nothing," he grumbled. "Not hair nor hide."

  Zhri Khainga nodded his head sardonically. "It troubles you that I keep to the terms of the bargain?"

  Paddy muttered under his breath. Fay sat looking into the blank outside the port. Suddenly she pulled back the space-drive arm. The boat surged and sang into normal continuum once more.

  "Look outside, Paddy," she said. "Around the hull."

  "That's it," said Paddy. He pulled an air-suit from the rack, stepped in, zipped up the seam, set the bubble on his head while Zhri Khainga watched without words.

  Paddy vanished outside the lock and Fay waited beside the controls, covertly eyeing the Koton, trying to fathom the weft of plot and plan below the dome of the shaven pate.

  "I am thinking," said Zhri Khainga, "of great deeds. The wealth of any imagining shall be mine. I will give a quadrant of the planet to the plain of Arma-Geth-it shall be extended.

  "Mountains will be leveled, the plain will be floored with black glass. So shall the statues dwell in the opulent silence and there will be my magnificent entity among them. I shall be magnified a thousand times. For all eternity will I tower-mine will be the life-loved pivot of history."

  Fay turned, looked out through the port. Where was Sol? That faint star? Perhaps.

  Paddy entered the ship. Another figure followed him. In the bubble Fay saw the great-eyed head of a Koton.

  "This is what I find strapped to the hull. Do you call that subscribing to our proposals?"

  Zhri Khainga sat upright. "Quiet now, little man! Who are you to challenge my wishes? You should be glorying in your fortune, that you give freely what otherwise could be wrung from your lips." He sat back in his chair. "But now- we are committed."

  The Koton who had entered the ship with Paddy had not moved from his first position. Zhri Khainga waved his fingers. "Out. Fly through space with your hands. You are not needed."

  The Koton hesitated, looked up at Fay, back at the Son of Langtry, slowly turned, let himself out the lock. They saw him push himself away from the ship and drift off alone and hopeless.

  "Now," said Zhri Khainga, "are you satisfied? We are alone. To the hiding place. Please be swift. There is much of importance awaiting my pleasure throughout the universe. Note that my gun is at hand, that I shall be alert."

  Paddy slowly joined Fay on the control deck. "Go on, Fay. Set the course."

  Delta Trianguli shone far and cold to the left. The dull black planet bulked below. Zhri Khainga, at the port, said, "Delta Trianguli Two; am I right?"

  "You are," said Paddy shortly.

  "And now where?"

  "You'll see in due course."

  Zhri Khainga wordlessly seated himself once more.

  Paddy went to the transmitter, sent out a call on the frequency used in the air-suit head-sets. "Hello, hello."

  They listened. Faintly came, "Hello, hello," out of the receiver.

  Zhri Khainga moved uneasily. "There are others here?"

  "No," said Paddy. "None but us. Did you get the line, Fay?"

  "Yes."

  The dead face of the planet passed below-plains flat and dull as black velvet, the pocked mesh of mountains, which looked as if they had been dug by monstrous moles. Dead ahead rose an enormous peak.

  "There's Angry Dragon," said Fay.

  She set the ship down on the plain of black sand. The hum of the generator died, the ship was still.

  Paddy said to the still-seated Son of Langtry, "Now listen close and don't think to trick us, for sure you'll never win by it. You might get our lives but you'd never hold the four sheets for your own."

  The Koton stared unblinking.

  Paddy continued. "I'm going out there, and I'm going for the sheets. They're well hid. You'd never find them."

  "I could have a hundred thousand slaves on this spot next week," observed the Koton tonelessly.

  Paddy ignored him. "I'll get the sheets. I'll lay them on that bit of black rock out there. Fay will stay here in the ship. When I set them down you'll call your ship, tell them where to
come for you, where to pick you up.

  "Then you'll get in your air-suit and come toward me and I'll leave the sheets and go to the ship. When we pass each other you'll put down your gun and go on. I'll continue toward the ship and so we'll take our leave. You'll get the sheets and in a day or so your ship will be here to take you home. Is that agreeable?"

  Zhri Khuinga said, "You allow me little scope for tricking you. You are strong and muscular. When I put down the gun what is to prevent you from attacking me?"

  Paddy laughed. "That little poison ball-whip you carry along your arm. That's what I'm afraid of. What's to keep you from attacking me?"

  "The fact that you can outdistance me by running, and thus regain your boat. But how will I know that you are not giving me bogus data sheets?"

  "You have binoculars," said Paddy. "I'll hold the sheets up for your inspection and you can watch me put them down. They're unmistakable-and with those binoculars you can read every bit of the text."

  "Very well," said the Koton. "I agree to your conditions."

  Paddy slipped into his air-suit. Before setting the bubble over his head he turned to the still seated Koton. "Now this is my last word. By no means try to trick us or catch us off guard.

  "I know you Kotons are devils for your revenges and your tortures and that you love nothing better than blackhanded treachery-so I'm warning you, take care or it will go ill with you and all your hopes."

  "What is your specific meaning?" inquired the Koton.

  "Never mind," said Paddy. "And now I'm going."

  He left the ship. Fay and the Koton could see him through the dome, marching across the black sand toward the peak. He disappeared into the tumble around the base.

  Minutes passed. He reappeared and Fay saw the glint of the golden sheets.

  Paddy stood by the black rock, held the sheets up, face toward the space-boat. Zhri Khainga seized his binoculars, clamped the funnel-shaped eye-pieces over his eyes, stared eagerly.

  He put down the binoculars.

  "Satisfied?" asked Fay brittlely.

  "Yes," said the Koton. "I'm satisfied."

  "Then call your ship."

  Zhri Khainga slowly went to the space-wave transmitter, snapped the switch, spoke a few short sentences in a language Fay could not understand.