The Complete Short Stories- The 1950s - Volume One

by Aldiss, Brian

  Tyne looked round the tree, peering out like a scared squirrel.

  Dickens had jumped or fallen on to the fly-spy! The agent had climbed the next tree and then launched himself, or dropped outwards. Now he sprawled on top of the disc, fighting to get a grasp of it.

  ‘Dickens!’ Tyne yelled.

  The agent slithered over the rocking surface of the fly-spy. His legs dangled, kicking wildly in air. Then he caught a finger hold in the machine’s central mesh and drew himself into a more secure position. As the fly-spy rocked among the branches, he pulled his gun out, aiming it at the rotor blades.

  All this had obviously taken the Rosks who controlled the big disc completely by surprise. It just drifted where it was, helplessly. Then it moved. Its pervasive note changing pitch, it shot up like an express lift.

  Dickens was knocked flat by a bough. Partially stunned, he slithered once more over the side, and his gun went flying – clatter-clattering all the way from branch to branch down to the ground.

  ‘Jump, Dickens, for God’s sake!’ Tyne shouted.

  It was doubtful if the agent heard a word of it. He was carried up through the foliage, hanging on grimly, head half-buried in his arms. The last leaves swished by, and the fly-spy was out in the open, climbing slowly.

  Heedlessly, Tyne jumped from the tree to sprawl full length in a flowering bush. Picking himself up, he broke from the trees, running along below the fly-spy, shouting incoherently. He dared not fire in case he hit Dickens.

  In the vapid early morning light, the disc was clearly visible thirty feet up, heading fast on an unswerving course that would, Tyne guessed, take it back to Sumatran base, where the Rosks awaited it. Dickens had evidently had the same thought. He knelt on top of the thing, wrenching at the screens on its upper surface. In a moment, he had unlatched a segment of screen, a wedge-shaped bit that left the rotors revolving nakedly underneath.

  He wrenched his shoe off and flung it into the rotors.

  At once the dynamic hum changed into a violent knocking. From the knocking grew the mirthless squeal of metal breaking up. With a few staccato grinding sounds, the fly-spy began to fall, canting sharply.

  Tyne was still running when it crashed into the river he had noticed earlier, bearing its passenger with it. They disappeared with a splash and did not come up again.

  VI

  IT was 9.15 in the morning.

  Tyne Leslie sat at the back of a Chinese coffee shop, eating durian off a cracked plate. His cheeks were smooth, his head was clear; he had been to a nappi wallah who had shaved him and massaged his head and shoulders. When he had finally plodded into Padang, ninety minutes ago, after a fruitless search along the river bank for Dickens, he had felt half-dead. Now he was, after the shave, the massage and breakfast, alive again, alert, planning ahead, casting little feelers of worry into the future.

  Already he had written a note to Under-Secretary Grierson, a second secretary whose under-secretary Tyne had been, outlining that threat of invasion to Earth. That note had been delivered to the British Diplomatic Mission building, and would be before the Under-Secretary himself within an hour. How long it would be before any action was taken on it was another matter.

  Meanwhile time grew short. Murray had been at large in Padang for twenty-four hours. If the Roskian RPF agent had been unable to reach Murray, it would be because he had been dogged by his own people, the Rosks faithful to Ap II Dowl. Undoubtedly though, the parties interested in finding Murray were closing in: RPF, Dowl’s men, the UNC, and possibly – undoubtedly, if they had wind of the affair – various nationally interested Earth groups. And Tyne.

  And Tyne. He had told Dickens he was prepared to go straight to Murray. It was the truth. By a paradox, he could have done as much yesterday, before Stobart spoke to him.

  The truth had lain, as so often happens, inside him, waiting for the ripe moment to reveal itself.

  When Tyne questioned Mina in the Roxy foyer, she said that Murray had announced he was going to the plankton plant. She had assumed – and Tyne had unthinkingly accepted her assumption – that Murray meant the plant at Semapang, where he had nearly drowned himself. When Stobart had questioned the girl later, he had got the same answer; that was why Tyne and Dickens had met at the building.

  But Murray had meant something quite different when he spoke of the plankton plant.

  In those terrible seconds when Tyne was dragged drowning through the submarine intakes at Semapang, scenes from his past life had bubbled through his mind. One scene had been of Murray, Allan Cunliffe and himself breakfasting at the Merdeka Hotel after a heavy night. While he and Allan sat drinking coffee, Murray tucked in to a large breakfast, complaining all the time about the badness of the food. ‘It’s always synthetic at the Merdeka,’ he said. ‘Doesn’t matter what the food resembles, it’s really plankton underneath. As the Americans say, it’s a plant. A plankton plant! I tell you dreary-looking couple of so-and-sos, we live in a plankton plant. Before you know it, the management will be offering us plankton women …’

  The comments had stuck. From then on, the three of them had occasionally referred to the Merdeka as ‘the plankton plant’; it had been a private joke between them, until they tired of it.

  All of this had run through Tyne’s drowning mind. He knew now that to find Murray he had to go to the Merdeka again; that was the place Murray had been referring to. Mina had been misled; so had Stobart; naturally enough, for they had never heard the old private joke. Tyne had been once, fruitlessly, to the Merdeka; today, he was going to ask the right questions of the right people.

  Settling his bill, he left the cafe. He had already purchased a spare clip of ammunition for the stolen gun in his pocket. Now he moved through side streets, warily, alert for danger. A protest march of the displaced, complete with drums and banners (‘ROSKS LEAVE OUR WORLD TO PEACE’. ‘WORLD POWERS ARE DUPES OF ALIENS’. ‘SUMATRA HAS BEEN SACRIFICED!’), acted as convenient cover as Tyne slipped into the foyer of the hotel.

  The familiarity, at once welcome and repugnant, of the place assailed him like a pervasive fog. At this hour, before Padang’s political life, with its endless conferences and discussions, was under way, the lounge was full of the sort of men Tyne had been: restless, wretched (but smiling) men who continually manoeuvred, but never manoeuvred boldly enough. Tyne skirted them, feeling as alien to them as a Rosk might have done.

  He went through the building into the rear courtyard, where two very ancient Chinese ladies were combing each other’s hair in the sunshine.

  ‘Have you seen Amir, please?’ Tyne asked.

  ‘He is at the warehouse, checking the rations.’

  The ‘warehouse’ was a crude brick shed beyond the courtyard, tucked between other buildings and conveniently facing a small back lane. Outside it stood a little delivery van, labelled in Malayan, Chinese and English, ‘Semapang Plankton Processed Foodstuffs’. The Merdeka was getting its daily quota of nourishment.

  As Tyne approached, a uniformed driver emerged from the warehouse, climbed into the van and drove off. Tyne went stealthily to the warehouse door. Amir was there alone, left arm in a sling, leaning over a box checking delivery notes. Tyne entered, closing the door behind him.

  Amir had been something of a friend of Allan’s and Tyne’s. Now there was only fear on his dark, intelligent face as he looked up and recognised his visitor.

  ‘What have you done to your arm, Amir?’

  ‘I thought you were dead, Mr Leslie!’

  ‘Who told you that?’

  ‘You should not be here! It is dangerous here, Mr Leslie! The Merdeka is always being watched. Please go away at once. For everyone’s safety, go away!’

  His agitation was painful to watch. Tyne took his good arm and said: ‘Listen, Amir, if you know there is danger, you must know something of what is happening. The lives of everyone on Earth are threatened. I have to find Murray Mumford at once. At once! Do you know where he is?’

  To his surprise and emb
arrassment, the young Sumatran began to weep. He made no noise or fuss about it; the tears rolled down his cheeks and fell on to the clean floor. He put up a hand to cover his eyes.

  ‘So much trouble has been caused my country by other countries. Soon I shall join the Displaced. When our numbers are big enough, we shall force all foreigners to leave our land.’

  ‘And the Rosks,’ Tyne added.

  ‘All foreigners. Do you know there is a funeral to be held this evening, at the Bukit Besar? Do you know whose funeral it is? The half-Dutch girl, Mina.’

  ‘Mina! She’s dead?’ exclaimed Tyne.

  ‘That is generally the reason for funerals,’ said Amir caustically. ‘The Rosks killed her because she had to do with your friend Mumford. Perhaps you will be interested to hear that the Rosks came for me yesterday; they tortured me. Perhaps today they will come back to kill me. You came to the Merdeka yesterday and I avoided you. Today I have not avoided you, and I shall probably die.’

  ‘Nonsense, Amir, take a grip of yourself! The Rosks won’t want you again,’ Tyne said. ‘What did they ask you yesterday?’

  Amir stopped crying as suddenly as he had begun. Looking Tyne straight in the eye, he pulled his bandaged arm from its sling and began to unwrap it. In a minute he produced it, exposing it with a penetrating mixture of horror and pride.

  ‘The Rosks asked me where Murray Mumford is hiding,’ Amir said. ‘Because I did not tell them, this is what they did to me.’

  His left hand had been amputated at the wrist. Grafted on in its place, hanging limply, uselessly, was a chimpanzee’s paw.

  Tyne’s own artificial left hand clenched convulsively in sympathetic pain.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry, Amir.’

  This is how they think of man.’

  He turned away, clumsily rebandaging his limb, and added in a choked voice, ‘But I did not tell them where Murray is. You I can tell. When he came here early yesterday morning, he said he was going to hide in the old Deli Jalat temple, down the lane. Now please go. Go and do not ever ask me anything again.’

  ‘I’m truly sorry,’ Tyne said, pausing by the door. ‘This’ll be made up to you one day, Amir. Wait and see.’

  Amir did not turn round.

  * * *

  Outside, Tyne leapt straight over a low stone wall and crouched there with his gun out. Amir had given him a bigger shaking than he cared to admit to himself. Slowly he raised his head and looked about.

  One or two natives were busy about the few dwellings facing on to the little back street into which he had emerged; none of them seemed to be interested in Murray. With a pang, he realised a bitter truth in what Amir had said. To the local population, the visiting nations which had descended upon Sumatra were as troublesome as the Rosks. Both groups were equally opposed to their way of life. The Rosks owed their ability to travel easily beyond their perimeter to a typically Eastern indifference to which of two forms of explanation fell upon them. Had the powerful Western nations behaved with more consideration to Sumatra over the past few centuries, they might be receiving more consideration from her now.

  As Tyne was about to climb back over the wall, a man appeared from the direction of the Merdeka. He walked slowly as befitted his bulk, his eyes guardedly casting to left and right. It was Stobart.

  He was walking away from the direction in which the Deli Jalat temple stood. When he saw the road was empty, he quickened his pace. As Tyne sank back into concealment, Stobart produced a whistle, raised it to his lips, blew it. No audible sound emerged; it was ultrasonic – no doubt a summoning of forces.

  Directly the UNC agent had gone, Tyne hopped back over the low wall and headed in the direction of the temple, where Murray had told Amir he was going to hide. The settlement with Murray was coming; in Tyne’s pocket, the loaded gun felt reassuringly heavy.

  Despite the hot sun on his shoulders, icy clarity seized him. He knew exactly what he was going to do. He was going to kill Murray.

  Only one thing worried him, and he wasn’t going to let that spoil his aim. Murray, waiting with his microfilm to meet the RPF agent, had covered his tracks well; the glimpse of Stobart (who had no doubt picked up Tyne’s trail in the Merdeka lounge) was a token he was still at large, despite the none too scrupulous powers ranged against him. Yet Tyne, working alone, was on the point of finding him. Why?

  Two pieces of information had led Tyne to Murray: Mina’s information about the ‘plankton plant’; and from there, Amir’s about the temple. Both UNC and, presumably, Rosk had got the same lead from Mina; neither had got anything from Amir. Mina’s information was capable of correct interpretation only by Tyne: Amir had said his piece voluntarily only to Tyne. Why?

  One answer alone emerged. Murray had expected Tyne to pursue him. Before going into hiding, he had left those two messages with Mina and Amir deliberately knowing Tyne would follow them up. Yet Murray would realise Tyne could have only one reason for following: to avenge Allan Cunliffe’s death on the moon. And the motives a man might have for silently, deviously, beckoning his murderer towards him remained notably obscure. And seductively obscure.

  Murray must be made to explain before the stolen gun and the bought bullets had their way with him. He must explain – and of course he must yield up the vital microfilm; then he could die. Tyne experienced that touch of ice-cold clarity again. Once more he was right in the torrid zone of events. The equator of action whirled faster and faster about him; yet he could not feel a thing.

  * * *

  ‘Come in, sir. I will make inquiry about your friend from the priests,’ the wizened dwarf at the teak gate said. He pattered away on bare feet, crabbed and eager. Fallen women and white tuans especially welcome.

  The Deli Jalat temple stood decaying in several acres of ground which were littered with past attempts to start chicken farms and scrap heaps. The central building was a not ignoble imitation of a late Hindu temple, highly ornamented, but round it had collected, like smashed cars round a road obstruction, a number of later erections, most of them flimsy affairs of lath or corrugated iron. These had never been immaculate; now they were merely tumbledown.

  Unwilling to wait where he was bidden, Tyne moved over grass-encircled stones after the gatekeeper. In the air lingered an enchantingly sweet-sharp smell, a scent that seemed to carry with it its own unidentifiable emotion. There was a spice garden – grown out of hand, no doubt! – close at hand. Turning a corner, Tyne came on a ramshackle covered way. At the far end, a woman in a Chinese dress, with clacking wooden soles on her feet, turned to look at him, then ran through a doorway. It looked like – yes, it had looked like Benda Ittai. Instinctively, Tyne increased his pace, sunlight jogging up and down on his shoulders.

  He had a sudden choking image of taking her into the deserted spice garden, of making love to her there. It was not a picture he had intended. He turned his thoughts to Murray.

  At the last door, the gatekeeper almost fell upon him with excitement, waving his arms anxiously.

  ‘No sir, not here, sir! Stop by the gate, sir. Previously I ask you to wait. The priests will not be prepared –’

  ‘I’ve not come to see the priests,’ Tyne said. Pushing the man aside, he stepped in, into the shade inside the building. It was as if the sunlight had rattled up like a blind, showing the room behind it: a cool room, all wood, except for two big stone vases in the middle of the floor. Three men, priests, with that vindictive, forward-leaning air that religion implants in the elderly, came forward at once.

  ‘Please take me to Murray Mumford. I cannot wait,’ Tyne said.

  ‘This is not a suitable hour,’ one of them said, ineffectually waving his hands.

  ‘I’m sorry I cannot wait.’

  The three priests broke into a dialect, chattering rapidly to each other. They were frightened and angry. Fright won.

  ‘Better to follow me,’ one of them said, beckoning querulously at Tyne.

  He led the way up broad and creaking stairs, o
n which a smell of cats floated. They passed down corridors of wood and corridors of stone, finally stopping by an insignificant door below another staircase. The priest unbarred this door and opened it. A short anteroom was revealed beyond, with two doors leading from it.

  ‘Try the right door,’ suggested the priest.

  As Tyne stepped inside, the priest slammed the door behind him. Left suddenly in semi-darkness, he moved, carefully over to the right-hand door; steadying himself, levelling the gun, he flung the door open.

  It was a long, narrow room with a dirty window at one end. Occupying most of the space near the door was a wooden bed, now in use as a table and seat combined.

  Benda Ittai, in a Chinese dress, stood alone in the middle of the room, her mouth slightly open in a moue of surprise.

  ‘Come in, Mr Todpuddle,’ she said, using the name Tyne had assumed when interrogated on Budo Budda’s ketch.

  He nodded to her, as if in brief acknowledgement of her beauty.

  His hackles up, Tyne took one step inside the room. Murray Mumford stood behind the door, his hands raised above his head. Round his waist he wore a Space Service belt; a revolver protruded from its unbuttoned holster.

  Tyne swung slowly on his heel, bringing his own revolver up to cover Murray’s chest. He was aware of his face, stiff as leather, contorted into a killer’s grin.

  ‘Glad you finally made it, Tyne,’ Murray said, with a fair attempt at his old manner. ‘Put your gun away and make yourself at home. Welcome to my humble –’

  ‘Move over by the girl,’ Tyne said in a rasping whisper. ‘And I’ll have your gun. Keep your hands raised. You’re scum, Mumford – a betrayer, a traitor.’

  ‘If you hadn’t got that toy in your hand I’d break your neck for saying that,’ Murray said evenly, his cheeks colouring darkly.

  ‘No, you wouldn’t! Are you suggesting you aren’t carrying information for the Rosks – information absolutely vital to Earth?’

  Murray, keeping his hands raised, looked at Tyne straightly as he shuffled over towards Benda. His roughly handsome face looked tired and shadowy.