by E. C. Tubb
"He told me to tell you that there is no answer on Shem, Delph and Clovis. To me the words have no sense."
"And yet you lied before the inspector," said Quendis quickly. "Why did you do that?"
"I had my reasons," said Dumarest. He had seen fields ringed by high fences before, manned by men with guns and wearing uniforms who asked endless questions and who watched as they were answered. And he had sensed the other's fear, the inward cringing at what he might say. It had seemed safer to lie, ambiguous messages could carry hidden meanings and he had no desire to become involved in planetary politics.
He sat back, eyes somber as he thought of the officer, his computer, the messages it could send and the information it could hold. The man had been too intent, too concerned with detail, and all he had learned had been transmitted to the machine. Dumarest had the uneasy feeling that somehow he had walked into a trap. He moved, a ray of sunlight catching the gem of his ring, the red, flat stone glowing likely freshly spilled blood on the third finger of his left hand.
Quendis said, "You traveled far to bring me Carl's message. I owe you much. You must tell me what I can do to repay you for your trouble."
"You can help me to find a man. He is a collector of antiquities and his name is Delmayer. Will you take me to his place?"
"At once," said Quendis. "But I do not think that you will like what you see."
* * *
From the summit of a ridge Dumarest looked down at an undulating sea of greenish yellow vegetation. Massed vines, inextricably interwoven, rioted in savage fecundity in an unbroken carpet toward the northern horizon, the sickly color blotched with the scarlet of blooms, the puffing white of fruiting pods, the whole bristling with thorns.
"You would never think it. Earl," said Quendis heavily, "but all this was once a prosperous orchard and farm."
"Delmayer's?"
"That's right. You can just make out the whereabouts of his mansion." The grower lifted his arm. "Over there, see?"
Dumarest followed the pointing arm. In the near distance the vines rose in a gentle hummock, massed blooms glowing like fire in the light of the setting sun.
"A fine place," said Quendis regretfully. "It held the continuous improvements of a dozen generations. I visited it often. Delmayer was a hospitable man and loved to give feasts. They were events to remember. Five kinds of wine, ten of meat and fish, a score of fruits and a dozen types of vegetable. We would start at dusk and continue until dawn. He had the finest regurgitorium I have ever seen." He sighed. "Well, that's all over now."
"How long?"
"It has been three years since the growth covered his farm."
"And Delmayer?"
"He killed himself when it became obvious that the land could not be reclaimed. He tried, we all tried, but nothing can eliminate the thorge once it takes hold." Quendis's voice was thick with rage. "Delmayer was a good man. He fed over a thousand dependents and carried as many displaced workers from other farms to the north. What else could he do but die with honor when they reached toward him with empty hands?"
Dumarest stepped down the slope to where reaching shoots sought to cover the naked stone. Stooping he tore free a thin growth. It came from one as thick as his finger which sprouted in turn from one as thick as his arm. The stem was fibrous, hard to break, vicious with thorns. A thick juice oozed from the broken end. A drop fell on his hand and he wiped it clean as he felt the sting of acid. From the juice came a fetid odor accentuating the miasma rising from the ground at his feet.
"We can't get rid of it," said Quendis as Dumarest straightened. "The third year stems are as thick as a man and the speed of growth is phenomenal. It seeds throughout the year aside from four months in winter and leeches the soil where it grows. It can be cut but the acid eats into the blades. If we burn it the flames release a poisonous vapor which sears the lungs and blisters the flesh. We can drag it out by the roots but if a fragment is left it grows again. It's a weed," he explained. "A mutated pest. Against it cultivated plants haven't a chance."
Dumarest looked toward the buried mansion. The growth must be high for the swell to be so insignificant Obeying natural law the shoots would struggle to reach the sun, which meant that the lower levels would be free of leaf and thin shoots. A band of determined men could, perhaps, fight their way through the massed stems.
Quendis shook his head when he mentioned it. "No, Earl, it can't be done."
"Why not? I have money and can pay. A hundred men with saws and axes should be able to cut a path. We could use lasers if they are available and wear protective clothing."
"You don't understand," said the grower patiently. "It's all been tried. The house is over a mile from where we stand and, no matter how many men you employ, only a few can attack the thorge at any one time. Cutting the stems will release the upper growth. More, it will release the juice and give rise to lethal vapors. Burning with lasers the same. If you made ten yards in a day you would be lucky. Within a week the new growth would have blocked the path behind you."
There is another way," said Dumarest tightly. "I could hire rafts and fly out to where the house is. Lasers could burn the area clear."
"And what do you hope to find? An empty house filled with things of antiquity and items of value? Rooms untouched and waiting your investigation?" Quendis mastered his impatience; how could this stranger understand? "All you would find is a heap of disintegrating rubble. A mound of crumbling brick and stone laced with roots and rotting with acid. What the thorge touches it destroys. Whatever you hoped to find in the mansion of Delmayer is no longer there. It would be a waste of time and money to search." He paused and added, "And there is something else. I hate to mention it, but it cannot be forgotten. You have seven days before you must report back to the landing field."
"So?"
"It would take that long to assemble the rafts and men. Longer to burn clear the area. I'm sorry, Earl there simply isn't enough time."
Time! Dumarest looked down at his hands, now clenched into fists. Again he was too late. The knowledge Delmayer had owned, assuming he had owned it, was lost. Had been lost for years. But surely Carl would have known?
"He left five years ago," said Quendis when he put the question. "Shortly after the thorge first appeared. He was brilliant and guessed what must happen unless we found a defense against it. His message told me that he had failed to discover a weapon. Three worlds at least do not possess the answer. It was a hopeless quest from the start."
Dumarest was impatient. "This growth would be easy to destroy. Short life radioactives would do it. You could dust the area and within a year burn the dead vines. The ash would help to fertilize the soil which you could then restock with bacteria and low life forms. Within five years you could be growing selected crops."
Quendis, not looking at Dumarest, said, slowly, "Are you suggesting that we kill the land?"
"Not kill it, cleanse it."
"With radioactives?"
"Yes, if necessary, why not?"
He was a stranger, Quendis reminded himself, fighting his anger. He could not know of the terrible thing he suggested, the ingrained horror of what he proposed. To kill the land! To burn it lifeless with the invisible fire of radiation! To kill every seed and worm, every scrap of potential life, the very bacteria even!
The land which contained the sweat and blood, the body and bone of countless predecessors.
Watching him, Dumarest sensed his anger, the inner turmoil of his thoughts. Quietly he said, "I am a stranger unused to your ways. If I have given offense I apologize."
"There is no offense." Quendis inflated his chest and dabbed at the sweat on face and neck. He was too old to suffer such anger and yet, now, he was glad of the tolerance age had brought. A younger man would have struck without thinking. Struck and, perhaps, died. Dumarest did not look the type of man who would take a blow without retaliation. "The thought of killing the land is repulsive to us," he explained. "It would be wise not to mention the use of radioa
ctives again."
"I understand." Dumarest turned and looked once more at the sea of vegetation, the distant swell covering the house. "Is there no natural enemy you could use? A parasite or a mold?"
"That is what Carl was seeking. If it exists at all it must be on the world of Technos."
"The ones who started the growth?"
"You know?" Quendis looked at Dumarest then shook his head. "You are guessing but it is a shrewd guess. We were a happy people tending the land and spending a generation to perfect the color of a rose. Production was high and we exported the surplus; dehydrated foods, perfumes, liqueurs, seeds of a thousand varieties. Then Technos demanded that we supply men to help in a war against Gest. We refused. A month later the thorge appeared, at first only in the most northern sector, but it was enough. It spread like fire and, as we tried to fight it, there came the warning that unless we submitted to the rule of Technos the whole planet would be seeded with the vile growth. And so we became a tributary world ruled by those who wear the red and black."
"And the tribute?"
"Men and women," said Quendis bitterly. "A thousand of each. Young, fit and virile."
"To be paid each year?"
"When they demand." Quendis thought of Cleon and bit his lip against the emotional agony. "At first only once in a year, then twice, then three times and now four. Soon it will be more. They drain our youth and leave us, old men to tend dwindling lands, bankrupt growers and dispossessed workers. Soon we shall have nothing."
He turned, remembering that he had a guest, conscious of the rule of hospitality.
"Come," he said, leading the way to the raft. "You must not allow me to bore you with our problems. It is time I welcomed you to my house."
* * *
It was a big place with massive walls of mortared stone, beamed with foot-thick timbers, many-storied and strewn with a clutter of outhouses, workshops, stores and barns. The center of a compact village which, as far as Dumarest could see, was entirely self-supporting.
Sitting at one end of the table, close to his host, he looked over the assembly as they ate their evening meal. The food was good, heaped plates accompanied by jugs of wine and beer, perfectly cooked and dispensed with a lavish hand. The people bore the stamp of similarity, olive skinned, liquid eyed, happy in an unsophisticated way. Inbred, he guessed, content to live close to nature, eating well, working hard when the occasion demanded but unreliable if it came to hardship. A soft and protected people embraced by a feudal system, serfs in fact if not in name.
But not Quendis. He sat, a king in his castle, his wife at his side and next to her a young man who could only have been his son. His eldest son, Dumarest guessed, the likeness was unmistakable.
"A toast!" Quendis rose, goblet in hand. "To the guest within my walls!"
To the guest!"
The toast signaled the end of the meal. As the empty goblets rattled on the table the assembly headed from the room, leaving Quendis, his wife and son, and Dumarest alone. As servants bustled forward to clear away the debris the grower leaned toward his guest.
"If it is your pleasure we will adjourn to a smaller chamber. My wife and son are eager to hear the story you bring."
The room was pleasant; a bowl of assorted fruit stood on a table together with a decanter of some thick, yellow fluid. Susan poured, handing around the glasses, smiling at Dumarest as she lifted her own.
"To you, many thanks for your trouble," she said. "Carl was close to my heart. Now tell us, how did he die?"
"Bravely, my lady." Dumarest sipped at the liqueur. It was astringently cool, kind to throat and stomach, bearing the scent of flowers. He settled back as he told his lies, padding what he had said to the inspector, giving the dead man the aura of a hero who had given his life to save that of his friend. He ended, "He was a good man. I shall never forget him."
"You knew him long?" Cleon leaned forward, his drink forgotten.
"Not long, but when you work with a man you know him well."
"He always wanted to travel. I remember him talking about it when I was young and again before he left. The galaxy is full of worlds, he told me, new planets filled with waiting adventure. Have you traveled far?"
"Yes," said Dumarest.
"And for long?"
Too long. Riding High with the magic of quick time compressing hours into minutes, riding Low doped, frozen and ninety percent dead, gambling each time that the fifteen percent death rate would hit other targets. Drifting from world to world, working, moving on, looking, always looking.
"Yes," he said flatly. "For a long time."
"I wish I could travel," said Cleon. "I-" He broke off. "Well, it's too late now. My first journey will be my last."
"Cleon has been chosen," said the woman quietly, breaking the awkward silence. "He is to go with the next batch of tribute." She turned to the young man. "You had better retire now. You were up all last night and out most of the day."
"But-"
"Go!" snapped Quendis. He looked at Dumarest as Cleon left the room. "I must apologize for my son. Not usually is he so disobedient."
"He must have a lot on his mind," said Dumarest. "What happens to those who are chosen?"
"They go to Technos," said Quendis bitterly. "After that we simply don't know. No word has ever been received from any of those taken. They could be put to work as servants or used as guards on other worlds. They might even be bred and their children used as janissaries, such as those you saw at the gate. They could be killed, slaughtered for sport, used to provide regrafts for the local population. We simply don't know."
"Don't think about it, husband." The woman was quick to change the subject, "Did you have a productive meeting?"
"No, everything went as usual. It was a waste of time attending. Colton had some idea of us all pooling our labor, concentrating on essential foods, and all working together to clear an individual farm. I left shortly after it began."
"So early? But you did not arrive home until late."
"We called at Delmayer's place," explained the grower. "Earl wanted to see him. He hoped that he could learn something from his collection. It's all ruined now, of course, and Delmayer is dead. Now he will never know if the man had the information he wanted."
"He might," said Susan. "Elaine might know."
"His daughter?" Quendis frowned. "But how-" He broke off, snapping his fingers. "Of course! Her talent! She can remember everything she has ever seen or heard," he explained to Dumarest. "A truly phenomenal memory. She was close to Delmayer, his wife died shortly after she was born and he never remarried, and he took delight in showing her the old things. Books and charts, ancient records, things like that. She used to play with them. I wouldn't be surprised if she hadn't read every word in his library."
An eidetic memory? It was possible. It was a common talent among the scattered peoples of the galaxy, minor to some found among the sensitives, and there was no reason to doubt what Quendis had said. Dumarest glanced at the woman. She, too, was revealing nothing but truth.
He said, "This woman. Where can I find her?"
Quendis slumped. "I'm sorry, Earl, I had forgotten. She moved to Technos years ago. Before the trouble started. She could still be there, but I don't know how you can reach her. You need special clearance from the planet itself before they will permit you to land and there is a complete ban on arrivals from Loame."
Dumarest remembered the interest of the officer at the gate, the details he had taken and recorded. He looked at his hands, at the glow of the ring as it caught the light.
"I can reach her," he said quietly. "If you will help me."
"Help you?" Quendis was puzzled. "How?"
"By letting me take Cleon's place."
He saw the look, the sudden understanding in the man's eyes, the flare of hope on the woman's face as she leaned toward him. It died as Quendis shook his head.
"No, Earl. It can't be done. I won't allow it."
But he would, Dumarest knew. He woul
d permit it because it was the thing he wanted, what both he and his wife wanted. He pressed the point as if the objection hadn't been made.
"They go by numbers not faces. They won't care who goes as long as the total is filled, but it isn't just a matter of my taking his place, he will have to take mine. I'm recorded at the gate," he explained. "They know that I am with you and they expect me to report back. Now, if Cleon pretends to be me, no one will ask any questions. He must wear my clothes and it would be best for him to catch a ship when that particular inspector is off duty. He could go tonight; the man must sleep, and, in any case, it will be dark. The ship leaves at dawn. Have you money? The cost of a High passage?"
"Yes," said the woman. "Oh, yes."
"And he must wear a ring. A red stone in a band of gold. Can you obtain such a ring?"
"Yes," she said again quickly. "Oh, yes."
Quendis stirred as if waking from sleep. "Where will he go?" he demanded. "What will he do?"
"Does it matter?" Susan, with a woman's logic, beat aside his objections. "He will be alive and free. There will be none to look at you with scorn for having cheated or with pity for having lost your heir. He can travel, work somewhere, return when things are better. But he will be alive and we shall know it."
The rest was a matter of detail.
Chapter Four
LEON VARGAS, Technarch, Chairman of the Supreme Council and virtual ruler of Technos, woke screaming from a nightmare in which he was trapped and threatened by hideous dangers. Light bloomed from concealed fixtures as he reared upright, heart pounding, sweat dewing face and body. In the open doorway the figure of his personal guard loomed large against the dimness beyond.
"Sire?" The man was armed, the laser in his hand following his questing eyes. At any moment it could discharge a pencil of searing heat. "Is anything wrong, sire?"
Vargas gulped and felt himself cringe. Why did the man have to point his weapon at the bed? Desperately he tried to reassure himself. The man was loyal, tested by every device known to modern science, dedicated to the welfare of his master. He was armed only as a defensive measure. It was natural that he should scan the room and be ready to destroy any potential danger. And yet, a mistake, a trifle too much pressure on the trigger, a little too much eagerness, and he could do the one thing he was paid to prevent.