Un-Man and Other Novellas

by Poul Anderson

  Calling Prior from a public communibooth, even using the scrambler, was risky too, but it had to be done. The mails were not to be trusted any more, and communication was an absolute necessity for accomplishment.

  The voice was gray with weariness: “Mars, eh? Nice job, Naysmith. What should we do?”

  “Get the word to Fourre, of course, for whatever he can make of it. And a coded radio message to our operatives on Mars. They can check this Pilgrim business and also look into Rosenberg’s background and associates. Should be a lot of leads there. However, I’ll try to snatch Rosenberg myself, with a Brother or two to help me, before the Americanists get him.”

  “Yeah, you’d better. The Service’s hands are pretty well tied just now while the U.N. investigation of the Chinese accusations is going on. Furthermore, we can’t be sure of many of our own people. So we, and especially the Brotherhood, will have to act pretty much independently for the time being. Carry on as well as you can. However, I can get your information to Rio and Mars all right.”

  “Good man. How are things going with you?”

  “Don’t call me again, Naysmith. I’m being watched, and my own men can’t stop a really all-out assassination attempt.” Prior chuckled dryly. “If they succeed, we can talk it over in hell.”

  “To modify what the old cacique said about Spaniards in Heaven—if there are nationalists in hell, I’m not sure if I want to go there. Okay, then. And good luck!”

  It was only the next day that the newscasts carried word of the murder of one Nathan Prior, semanticist residing at Frisco Unit. It was believed to be the work of foreign agents, and S-men had been assigned to aid the local police.

  MOST OF the Brothers had, of course, been given disguises early in their careers. Plastic surgery had altered the distinctive countenance and the exact height, false fingerprints and retinals been put in their ID records; each of them had a matching set of transparent plastic “tips” to put on his own fingers when he made a print for any official purpose. These men should temporarily be safe, and there was no justification for calling on their help yet. They were sitting tight and wary, for if the deadly efficiency of Hessling’s organization came to suspect them and pull them in, an elementary physical exam would rip the masquerade wide open.

  That left perhaps a hundred undisguised Brothers in the United States when word came for them to go underground. Identical physique could be too useful—for example, in furnishing unshakeable alibis, or in creating the legend of a superman who was everywhere—to be removed from all. Some of these would be able to assume temporary appearances and -move in public for a while. The rest had to cross the border or hide.

  The case of Juho Lampi was especially unfortunate. He had made enough of a’ name as a nucleonic engineer in Finland to be invited to America, and his disguise was only superficial. When Fourre’s warning went out on the code circuit, he left his apartment in a hurry. A mechanic at the garage where he hired an airboat recognized the picture that had been flashed over the entire country. Lampi read the man’s poorly hidden agitation, slugged him, and stole the boat, but it put the S-men on his trail. It told them, furthermore, that the identical men were not only American.

  Lampi had been given the name and address of a woman in Iowa. The Brothers were organized into cells of half a dozen, each with its own rendezvous and contacts, and this was to be Lampi’s while he was in the States. He went there after dark and got a room. Somewhat later, Naysmith showed up. Naysmith, being more nearly a full-time operative, knew where several cells had their meeting places. He collected Lampi and decided not to wait for anyone else. The Phobos was coming to Earth in a matter of hours. Naysmith had gone to Iowa in a self-driver boat hired from a careless office in Colorado; now, through the woman running the house, the two men rented another and flew back to Robinson Field.

  “I have my own boat—repainted, new number, and so on—parked near here,” said Naysmith." We’ll take off in it. If we get away.”

  “And then what?” asked Lampi. His English was good, marked with only a trace of accent. The Brothers were natural linguists.

  “I don’t know. I just don’t know.” Naysmith looked moodily about him. “We’re being hunted as few have ever been hunted.” He murmured half to himself:

  “I heard myself proclaim’d;

  And by the happy hollow of a tree Escap’d the hunt. No port is free; no place,

  That guard and most unusual vigilance Does not attend my taking.”

  They were sitting in the Moonjumper, bar and restaurant adjacent to the spaceport. They had chosen a booth near the door, and the transparent wall on this side opened onto the field. Its great pale expanse of concrete stretched under glaring floodlights out toward darkness, a gigantic loom of buildings on three sides of it. Coveralled mechanics were busy around a series of landing cradles. A uniformed policeman strolled by, speaking idly with a technician. Or was it so casual? The technie looked solemn.

  “Oh, well,” said Lampi. “To get onto a more cheerful subject, have you seen Warschawski’s latest exhibition?” “What’s so cheerful about that?” asked Naysmith. “It’s awful. Sculpture just doesn’t lend itself to abstraction as he seems to think.”

  Though the Brothers naturally tended to have similar tastes, environment could make a difference. Naysmith and Lampi plunged into a stiff-necked argument about modem art. It was going at a fine pace when they were interrupted.

  The curtains of the booth had been drawn. They were twitched aside now and the waitress looked in. She was young and shapely, and the skimpy playsuit might have been painted on. Beyond her, the bar room was a surge of people, a buzz and hum and rumble of voices. In spite of the laboring ventilators, there was a blue haze of smoke in the air.

  "Would you like another round?” asked the girl.

  “Not just yet, thanks,” said Naysmith, turning his masked face toward her. He had dyed his yellow hair a mousey brown at the hideaway, and Lampi’s was now black, but that didn’t help much; there hadn’t been time to change the wiry texture. He sat stooped, so that she wouldn’t see at a casual glance that he was as big as Lampi, and hoped she wasn’t very observant.

  “Want some company?” she asked. “I can fix it up.”

  “No, thanks,” said Naysmith. “Were waiting for the rocket.”

  “I mean later. Nice girls. You’ll like them.” She gave him a mechanically meretricious smile.

  “ Um m m—well—” Naysmith swapped a glance with Lampi, who nodded. He arranged an assignation for an hour after the landing and slipped her a bill. She left them, swaying her hips.

  Lampi chuckled. “It’s hardly fair to a couple of hardworking girls,” he said. “They will be expecting us.”

  “Yeah, Probably supporting aged grandmothers, too.” Naysmith grinned and lifted the Scotch to the mouth-slit of his mask. “However, it’s not the sort of arrangement two fugitives would make.”

  “What about the American Guardsmen?”

  “Probably those burly characters lounging at the bar. Didn’t you notice them as we came in? They’ll have friends elsewhere who’ll—”

  “Your attention, please. The first tender from the Phobos will be cradling in ten minutes, carrying half the passengers from Mars. The second will follow ten minutes later. Repeat, the first—"

  “Which one is Rosenberg on?” asked Lampi.

  “How should I know?” Naysmith shrugged. “Well just have to take our chance. Drink up.”

  He patfed his shoulder-holstered gun and loosened the tunic over it. He and Lampi had obtained breastplates and half-boots at the hideaway; their masks were needle-proof, and an arm or groin or thigh was hard to hit when a knee-length cloak flapped around the body. They should be fairly well immune to stet-guns if they worked fast. Not to bullets— but even the Guardsmen probably wouldn’t care to use those in a crowd.

  The two men went out of the booth and mingled with the people swirling toward the passenger egress. They separated as they neared the g
ate and hung about on the fringe of the group. There were a couple of big hard-looking men in masks who had shouldered their way up next to the gate. One of therri had been in the Moon jumper, Naysmith remembered.

  He had no picture of Rosenberg, and Samsey’s incoherent description had been of little value. The man was a nonentity who must have been off Earth for years. But presumably the Guardsmen knew what to look for. Which meant that—

  There was a red and yellow glare high in the darkened heavens. The far thunder became a howling, bellowing, shaking roar that trembled in the bones and echoed in the skull. Nerves crawled with the nameless half terror of unheard subsonic vibrations. The tender grew to a slim spearhead, backing down with radio control on the landing cradle. Her chemical blasts splashed vividly off the concrete baffles. When she lay still and the rockets cut off, there was a ringing silence.

  Endless ceremony—the mechanics wheeled up a stairway, the airlock ground open, a steward emerged, a medical crew stood by to handle space sickness—Naysmith longed for a cigaret. He shifted on his feet and forced his nerves to a thuttering calm.

  There came the passengers, half a dozen of them filing toward the gateway. They stopped one by one at the clearance booth to have their papers stamped. The two Guardsmen exchanged a masked glance.

  A stocky Oriental came through first. Then there was a woman engineer in Spaceways uniform who held up the line as she gathered two waiting children into her arms. Then—

  He was a small bandy-legged ma'n with a hooked nose and a leathery brown skin, shabbily clad, lugging a battered valise. One of the Guardsmen tapped him politely on the arm. He looked up and Naysmith saw his lips moving, the face etched in a harsh white glare. He couldn’t hear what was said over the babble of the crowd, but he could imagine it. “Why, yes, I’m Barney Rosenberg. What do you want?”

  Some answer was given him; it didn’t really matter what. With a look of mild surprise, the little fellow nodded. The other Guardsman pushed over to him, and he went out of the crowd between them. Naysmith drew his stet-gun, holding it under his cloak, and cat-footed after. The Guardsmen didn’t escort Rosenberg into the shadows beyond the field, but walked over toward the Moonjumper. There was no reason for Rosenberg to suspect their motives, especially if they stood him a drink.

  Naysmith lengthened his stride and fell in beside the right-hand man. He didn’t waste time: his gun was ready, its muzzle against the victim’s hip. He fired. The Guardsman strangled on a yell.

  Lampi was already on the left, but he’d been a trifle slow. That enemy grabbed the Finn’s gun wrist with a slashing movement. Naysmith leaned over the first guardsman, who clawed at him as he sagged to his knees, and brought the edge of his left palm down on the second one’s neck, just at the base of the skull. The blow cracked num’bingly back into his own sinews.

  “What the blazes—” Rosenberg opened his mouth to shout. There was no time to argue, and Lampi needled him. With a look of utter astonishment, the prospector wilted. Lampi caught him under the arms and hoisted him to one shoulder.

  The kidnaping had been seen. People were turning around, staring. Somebody began to scream. Lampi stepped over the two toppled men and followed Naysmith.

  Past die door of the bar, out to the street, hurry!

  A whistle skirled behind them. They jumped over the slideway and dashed across the avenue. There was a transcontinental Diesel truck bearing down on them, its lights one great glare, the roar of its engine filling the world. Naysmith thought that it brushed him. But its huge bulk was a cover. They plunged over the slideway beyond, ignoring the stares of passersby, and intp the shadows of a park.

  A siren began to howl. When he had reached the sheltering gloom thrown by a tree, Naysmith looked behind him. Two policemen were coming, but they hadn’t spotted the fugitives yet. Naysmith and Lampi ducked through a formal garden, jumping hedges and running down twisted paths. Gravel scrunched underfoot.

  Quartering across the park, Naysmith led the way to his airboat. He fumbled the door open and slithered inside. Lampi climbed in with him, tossing Rosenberg into the back seat and slamming the door. The boat slid smoothly out into passing traffic. There were quite a few cars and boats abroad, and Naysmith mingled with them.

  Lampi breathed heavily in the gloom. A giant neon sign threw a bloody light over his mask. “Now what?” he asked.

  “Now we get the devil out of here,” said Naysmith. “Those boys are smart. It won’t take them long to alert traffic control and stop all nearby vehicles for search. We have to be in the air before that time.”

  They left the clustered shops and dwellings, and Naysmith punched the board for permission to take off southbound. The automatic signal flashed him a fourth-lane directive. He climbed to the indicated height and went obediently south on the beam. Passing traffic was a stream of moving stars around him.

  The emergency announcement signal blinked an angry red. “Fast is right,” said Lampi, swearing in four languages.

  “Up we go,” said Naysmith.

  He climbed vertically, narrowly missing boats in the higher levels, until he was above all lanes. He kept climbing till his vehicle was in the lower stratosphere. Then he turned westward at top speed.

  “We’ll go out over the Pacific,” he explained. “Then we find us a nice uninhabited islet with some trees and lie doggo till tomorrow night. Won’t be any too comfortable, but it’ll have to be done and I have some food along.” He grinned beneath his mask. “I hope you like cold canned beans, Juho.”

  “And then—?”

  “I know another island off the California coast,” said Naysmith. “We’ll disguise this boat at our first stop, of course, changing the number and recognition signal and so on. Then at the second place we’ll refuel and I’ll make an important call. You can bet your last mark the enemy knows who pulled this job and will have alerted all fuel station operators this time. But the man where we’re going is an absentminded old codger who won’t be hard to deceive.” He scowled. “That’ll take about the last of my cash money, too. Have to get more somehow, if we’re to carry on in our present style.”

  “Where do we go from there?” said Lampi.

  “North, I suppose. We have to hide Rosenberg somewhere, and you—” Naysmith shook his head, feeling a dull pain within him. That was the end of the masquerade. Jeanne Donner would know.

  At first Barney Rosenberg didn’t believe it. He was too shocked. The Guardsmen had simply told him they were representatives of some vaguely identified company which was thinking of developments on Mars and wanted to consult him. He’d been offered a hotel suite and had been told the fee would be nice. Now he looked at his kidnapers with 'bewildered eyes and challenged them to say who they were.

  “Think we’d be fools enough to carry our real IDs around?” snorted Naysmith, “You’ll just have to take our word for it that we’re U.N. operatives—till later, anyway, when we can safely prove it. I tell you, the devil is loose on Earth and you need protection. Those fellows were after your

  knowledge, and once they got that you’d have been a corpse.”

  Rosenberg looked from one masked face to the other. His head felt blurred, the drug was still in him and he couldn’t think straight. But those voices—

  He thought he remembered the voices. Both of them. Only they were the same.

  “I don’t know anything,” he said weakly, “I tell you, I’m just a prospector, home from Mars.”

  “You must have information—that’s the only possibility,” said Lampi. "Something you learned on Mars which is important to them, perhaps to the whole world. What?”

  Fieri in Drygulch, and the Pilgrim, who had been so eager—

  Rosenberg shook his head, trying to clear it. He looked at the two big cloaked figures hemming him in. There was darkness outside the hurtling airboat.

  “Who are you?” he whispered.

  “I told you we’re friends. Un-men. Secret agents.” Naysmith laid a hand on Rosenberg’s shoulder. “
We want to help you, that’s all. We want to protect you and whatever it is you know.”

  Rosenberg looked at the hand—strong, sinewy, bluntfingered, with fine gold hairs on the knuckles. But no, no, no! His heart began thumping till he thought it must shatter his ribs.

  “Let me see your faces,” he gasped.

  “Well—why not?” Naysmith and Lampi took off their masks. The dull panel light gleamed off die same features; broad, strong-boned, blue-eyed. There was a deep wrinkle above each jutting triangle of nose. The left ear was faintly bigger than the right. Both men had a trick of cocking their head a trifle sideways when listening.

  We’ll tell him we’re twin brothers, thought Naysmith and Lampi simultaneously.

  Rosenberg shrank into the seat. There was a tiny whimper in his throat.

  “Stef,” he murmured. “Stefan Rostomily.”

  THE NEWCASTS told of crisis in the U.N. Etienne Fourre, backed by its President, was claiming that the Chinese government was pressing a fantastic charge to cover up designs of its own. A full-dress investigation was in order. Only—as Besser, Minister of International Finance, pointed out—when the official investigating service was itself under suspicion, who could be trusted to get at the facts?

  In the United States, Security was after a dangerous spy and public enemy. Minute descriptions of Donner-Naysmith-Lampi were on all the screens. Theoretically, the American President could call off the hunt, but that would mean an uproar in the delicately balanced Congress; there’d have been a vote of confidence, and if the President lost that, he and his cabinet would have to resign—and who would be elected to succeed? But Naysmith and Lampi exchanged grins at the interview statement of the President, that he thought this much-hunted spy was in Chinese pay.

  Officially, Canada was cooperating with the United States in. chasing the fugitive. Actually, Naysmith was sure it was bluff, a sop to the anti-U.N. elements in the Dominion. Mexico was doing nothing—but that meant the Mexican border was being closely watched.