Jonnie felt the ground rumble. The monster was in the cage. A boot toe turned him over. Slitted, amber eyes appraised him.
“You'll live,” grunted Terl indifferently. “How long will it take you to get well?”
Jonnie said nothing. He just looked up at Terl.
“You're stupid,” said Terl. “You don't know anything about remote controls.”
“And what could I have done, tied to the seat?” said Jonnie.
"Zzt, the bastard, put a remote control under the hood. And a firebomb.”
“How was I supposed to see that?”
“You could have inspected.”
Jonnie smiled thinly. “Tied to the cab?”
“You know now. When we do it again
I’ll-"
“There won't be any 'again,' " said Jonnie.
Terl loomed over him, looking down.
“Not under these conditions,” said Jonnie.
“Shut up, animal!”
“Take off this collar. My neck is burned.”
Terl looked at the frayed flexirope. He went out of the cage and came back with a small welding unit and a new coil of rope. It wasn't flexirope. It was thinner and metallic. He burned off the old rope and welded the new one on, ignoring Jonnie's effort to twist away from the flame. He fixed the far end of the new rope into a loop and dropped it over a high cage bar out of reach.
With Jonnie's eyes burning holes in his back, Terl went out of the cage and locked the door.
Jonnie wrapped himself in the dirty fur of a robe and lay in sodden misery beneath the newly fallen snow.
Part IV
Chapter 1
It had been a very bad winter in the mountains; snowslides had early blocked the passes into the high meadow.
Chrissie sat quietly and forlornly in front of the council in the courthouse. The wind whined and moaned through the gaps in the walls, and the fire that had been built in the center of the room sent harried palls of smoke into the faces of the council.
Parson Staffor lay very ill in a nearby hut. The winter had sapped what little vitality he had and his place was taken by the older Jimson man they were now calling parson. Jimson was flanked by an elder named Clay and by Brown Limper Staffor, who seemed to be acting as a council member even though he was far too young and clubfooted-he had begun to sit in for Parson Staffor when he became ill and had just stayed on, grown into a council member now. The three men sat on an old bench.
Chrissie, across the fire from them, was not paying much attention. She had had a horrible nightmare two nights ago– a nightmare that had yanked her, sweating, out of sleep and left her trembling ever since. She had dreamed that Jonnie had been consumed in fire. He had been calling her name and it still sounded in her ears.
“It’s just plain foolishness,” Parson Jimson was saying to her. “There are three young men who want to marry you and you have no right whatever to refuse them. They village population is dwindling in size; only thirty have survived the winter. This is not a time to be thinking only of yourself.”
Chrissie numbly realized he was talking to her. She made an effort to gather the words in: something about population. Two babies had been born that winter and two babies had died. The young men had not driven many cattle up from the plains before the pass closed and the village was half-starved. If Jonnie had been here...
“When spring comes,” said Chrissie, "I’m going down on the plains to find Jonnie.”
This was no shock to the council. They had heard her say it several times since Jonnie left.
Brown Limper looked through the smoke at her. He had a faint sneer on his thin lips. The council tolerated him because he didn't ever say much and because he brought them water and food when meetings were too long. But he couldn't resist. “We all know Jonnie must be dead. The monsters must have got him.”
Jimson and Clay frowned at him. He had been the one who brought to their attention the fact that Chrissie refused to marry any of the young men. Clay wondered whether Brown Limper didn't have a personal stake in this.
Chrissie rallied from her misery. “His horses didn't come home.”
“Maybe the monsters got them, too,” said Brown Limper.
"Jonnie did not believe there were any monsters,” said Chrissie. “He went to find the Great Village of the legend.”
“Oh, there are monsters, all right,” said Jimson. “It is blasphemy to doubt the legends.”
“Then,” said Chrissie, “why don't they come here?”
“The mountains are holy,” said Jimson.
“The snow,” said Brown Limper, “closed the passes before the horses could come home. That is, if the monsters didn't get them, too.”
The older men looked at him, frowning him to silence.
"Chrissie," said Parson Jimson, “you are to put aside this foolishness and permit the young men to court you. It is quite obvious that Jonnie Goodboy Tyler is gone.”
“When the year has gone by,” said Chrissie, “I shall go down to the plains.”
"Chrissie," said Clay, “this is simply a suicidal idea.”
Chrissie looked into the fire. Jonnie's scream echoed in her ears from the nightmare. It was completely true, what they said: she did not want to live if Jonnie was dead. And then the sound of the scream died away and she seemed to hear him whisper her name. She looked up with a trace of defiance.
“He is not dead,” said Chrissie.
The three council members looked at each other. They had not prevailed. They would try again some other day.
They ignored her and fell to discussing the fact that Parson Staffor wanted a funeral when he died. There wouldn't be much in the way of food and there were problems of digging in the frozen ground. Of course he was entitled to a funeral, for he had been parson and maybe even mayor for many years. But there were problems.
Chrissie realized she was dismissed, and she got up, eyes red with more than smoke, and walked to the courthouse door.
She wrapped the bearskin more tightly about her and looked up at the wintry sky. When the constellation was in that same place in spring she would go. The wind was cutting keen and she pulled the bearskin even tighter. Jonnie had given her the bearskin and she fingered it. She would get busy and make him some new buckskin clothes. She would prepare packs. She would not let them eat the last two horses.
When the time came she would be all ready to go. And she would go.
A blast of wind from Highpeak chilled her, mocked her. Nevertheless, when the time came she would go.
Chapter 2
Terl was in a furious burst of activity. He hardly slept. He left the kerbango alone. The doom of years of exile on this cursed planet haunted him; each time he slowed his pace he collided with the horrible thought and it jabbed him into even greater efforts.
Leverage, leverage! He conceived himself to be a pauper in leverage.
He had a few things on employees here and there, but they were minor things: peccadillos with some of the Psychlo female clerks, drunkenness on the job leading to breakage, tapes of mutterings about foremen, personal letters smuggled into the teleportation of ore, but nothing big. This was not the kind of thing personal fortunes were easily built from. Yet here were thousands of Psychlos, and his experience as a security officer told him the odds in favor of finding blackmail material were large. The company did not hire angels. It hired miners and mining administrators and it hired them tough; in some cases, particularly on a planet like this– no favored spot– the company even winked at taking on ex-criminals. It was a criticism of himself, no less, that he could not get more blackmail than he had.
This Numph. Now there was one. He had potential leverage on Numph but
Terl did not know what it was. He knew it had something to do with the nephew Nipe in home office accounting. But Terl could not dig out what it really was. And so he dared not push it. The risk lay in pretending to be wise to it and then, by some slip, revealing he didn't have the data. The leverage would go up
in smoke, for Numph would know Terl had nothing. So he had to use it so sparingly that it was almost no use at all. Blast!
As the days and weeks of winter went on, a new factor arose. His requests for information from the home planet were not being answered. Only that one scrap about Nipe, that was all. It was a trifle frightening. No answers. He could send green flash urgents until he wore out his pen and there wasn't even an acknowledgment.
He had even become sly and reported the discovery of a nonexistent hoard of arms. Actually it was just a couple
Of muzzle-loading bronze cannon some workman had dug up in a minesite on the overseas continent. But Terl had worded the report in such a way that it was alarming, although it could be retracted with no damage to himself: a routine, essential report. And no acknowledgment had come back. None.
He had investigated furiously to see whether other departmental reports got like treatment– they didn't. He had considered the possibility that Numph was removing reports from the teleportation box. Numph wasn't.
Home office knew he existed, that was for sure. They had confirmed the additional ten-year duty stretch, had noted Numph's commendation affirmative, and had added the clause of company optional extension. So they knew he was alive, and there could not possibly be any action being taken against him or he would have intercepted interrogatories about himself. There had been none.
So, without any hope of home office cooperation, it was obviously up to Terl to dig himself out. The ancient security maxim was ever present in his mind now: where a situation is needed but doesn't exist, make one.
His pockets bulged with button cameras and his skill in hiding them was expert. Every picto-recorder he could lay his paws on lined the shelves of his office– and he kept his door locked.
Just now he was glued to a scope, observing the garage interior. He was waiting for Zzt to go to lunch. In his belt Terl had the duplicate keys to the garage.
Open beside him was the book of company regulations relating to the conduct of personnel (Security Volume 989), and it was open to Article 34a-IV (Uniform Code of Penalties).
The article said: “Wherein and whereas theft viciously affects profits...” and there followed five pages of company theft penalties, “...and whereas and wherefore company personnel also have rights to their monies, bonuses, and possessions...” and there followed one page of different aspects of it, “...the theft of personal monies from the quarters of employees by employees, when duly evidenced, shall carry the penalty of vaporization.”
That was the key to Terl's present operation. It didn't say theft went on record. It didn't say a word about when it happened as related to when it was to be punished. The key items were “when duly evidenced” and “vaporization.” There was no judicial vaporization chamber on this planet, but that was no barrier. A blast gun could vaporize anyone with great thoroughness.
There were two other clauses in that book that were important: “All company executives of whatever grade shall uphold these regulations”; and “The enforcement of all such regulations shall be vested in the security officers, their assistants, deputies, and personnel.” The earlier one included Numph-he could not even squeak. The latter one meant Terl, the sole and only security officer– or deputy or assistant or personnel– on this planet.
Terl had spot-watched Zzt for a couple of days now and he knew where he kept his dirty workcoats and caps.
Aha, Zzt was leaving. Terl waited to make sure the transport chief did not come back because he had forgotten something. Good. He was gone.
With speed, but not to betray himself or alarm anyone by rushing if met in the halls, Terl went to the garage.
He let himself in with a duplicate key and went directly to the washroom. He took down a dirty workcoat and cap. He let himself out and locked the door behind him.
For days now Terl had also watched, with an artfully concealed button camera, the room of the smaller Chamco brother. He had found what he wanted. After work, the smaller Chamco brother habitually changed from his mine clothes in his room and put on a long coat he affected for dinner and an evening's gambling in the recreation area. More: the smaller Chamco brother always put and kept his cash in the cup of an antique drinking horn that hung on the wall of his room.
Terl now scanned the minesite patiently. He finally spotted the smaller Chamco brother exiting from the compound, finished with lunch, and boarding the bus to the teleportation transshipment area where he worked. Good. Terl also scanned the compound corridors. They were empty in the berthing areas during work time.
Working fast, Terl looked from a stilled picto-recorder frame of Zzt to the mirror before him and began to apply makeup. He thickened his eyebones, added length to his fangs, roughed the fur on his cheeks, and labored to get the resemblance exact. What a master of skills one had to be in security.
Made up, he donned the workcoat and cap.
He took five hundred credits in bills from his own wallet. The top one he marked: “Good luck!” very plainly. He scribbled several different names on it with different pens.
He connected a remote control to a picto-recorder that was registering the Chamco room, checked everything, and checked the mirror too.
One more look at the live view of the garage. Yes, Zzt was back, puttering around with a big motor. That would keep him busy for a while.
Terl sped down the corridors of the berthing compound. He entered the smaller Chamco brother's room with a passkey. He checked the drinking horn on the wall. Yes, it had money in it. He put in the five hundred credits. He went back to the door. Ready!
He touched the remote control in his pocket, imitating the rolling walk of Zzt, he went over to the drinking horn and with stealthy movements took out the five hundred credits, looked around as though fearful of being observed, counted the money– the marked bill plainly in view– and then crept out of the room, closing and locking the door.
A berthing attendant saw him from a distance and he ducked.
He got back to his room and swiftly removed the makeup. He put the five hundred credits back in his wallet.
When the screen showed him Zzt had gone for dinner, he returned the cap and workcoat to the washroom.
Back in his own quarters, Terl rubbed his paws.
Leverage. Leverage. Stage one of this lever was done, and he was going to pull it and good.
Chapter 3
It was a night that was long remembered by the employees in the recreation area of the minesite.
They were not unused to seeing Terl drunk, but tonight– well! The attendant shoveled panful after panful of kerbango at him and he took them all.
Terl had begun the evening looking depressed, and that was understandable since he wasn't very popular lately– if he ever had been. Char had watched him slit-eyed for a while, but Terl was obviously just bent on getting drunk. Finally Terl seemed to rouse himself and did a bit of paw-gripping– a game whose object was to see which player couldn't stand it any more and let go– with some of the mine managers. Terl had lost in every case; he was getting drunker and drunker.
And now Terl was heckling the smaller Chamco brother into a game of rings. It was a gambling game. A player took a ring and put it on the back of the paw and then with the other paw snapped it off and sailed it at a board. The board had pegs with numbers, the bigger numbers all around the edges. The one that got the biggest number won. Then stakes were put up again and another round occurred.
The smaller Chamco brother hadn't wanted to take him on. Terl was usually very good at rings. Then his drunken condition became too alluring and the Chamco let himself be persuaded.
They started by putting up ten-credit bets– steep enough for the recreation area. Chamco got a ninety and Terl a sixteen.
Terl insisted upon raising the bets and the Chamco couldn't refuse, of course.
The ring shot by the smaller Chamco brother sizzled through the atmosphere and clanged over a four peg. The Chamco groaned. Anything could beat that. And latel
y he had been saving his money. When he got home– in just a few months now– he was going to buy a wife. And this bet had been thirty credits!
Terl went through contortions of motions, put the ring on the back of his paw, sighted across it, and then with the other paw sent it like a ray blast at the board. A three! Terl lost.
As the winner, the smaller Chamco brother couldn't quit. And Terl had taken another pan of kerbango, leering around at the interested gallery, and upped the bets.
The onlookers placed some side bets of their own. Terl was reeling drunk. He did have a reputation with this game, which made the odds lower, but he was so obviously drunk that he even faced the wrong direction and had to be turned in the right one.
The smaller Chamco brother got fifty. Terl got two. “Ah, no, you don't quit now,” Terl said. “The winner can't quit.” His words were slurred. “I bet...l bet one hun -...hundred credits.”
Well, with pay halved and bonuses gone, nobody was going to object to winning easy money, and the smaller
Chamco went along.
The audience roared at Terl's bungling as loss after loss occurred. And the smaller Chamco brother found himself standing there with four hundred fifty credits.
Terl reeled over to the attendant and got another saucepan of kerbango. As he drank it he went through his pockets, turning them out one by one. Finally he came up with a single bill, a bit crumpled and marked all over. “My good-luck money,” sobbed Terl.
He lurched over to the firing position in front of the board. "Chamco Two, just one more crap-little bet. You see this bill?”
The smaller Chamco brother looked the bill over. It was a good-luck bill. Mine employees taking off for far places after a final party sometimes exchanged good-luck bills. Everybody signed everybody else's bill. And this had a dozen signatures on it.
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