by Don Wilcox
“So you wanted him killed?”
“You knew that three hundred thousand was my own offer. You knew I wanted him killed.”
“Do I get the money?”
“You’ll get your money later. My sister’s got it. Get me to Mars. Later, we’ll settle up.”
“We’ll settle up right now,” George said. He seized Glasgow by the arms and began to shake him. He might have felt like a bully if his anger hadn’t begun to run away with him. His rehearsed speeches had flown to the winds. All the pent-up feelings from past weeks surged into his grip. The little man’s bird-like face was a decided red for once, flopping hard.
“Stop! Stop, for God’s sake. Give me a chance—”
“Why did you want Keller killed?”
“Who said I—”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’ll shake it out of you, you snake. How many of Keller’s men did you kill on Mogo?”
“Stop it!”
“You killed two. Didn’t you? Didn’t you?”
“What if I did?”
“And you tried to kill Keller?”
“All right. Give me a chance to tell—”
“You meant to take over his ships—”
“Yes. Why not?”
“And his wife!”
“Poppendorff! Come in here!”
“And all this story about Keller’s plot against the earth—it was a lie! Wasn’t it? Wasn’t it?”
“Yes. Hell, yes. You’re choking me! Poppen—”
Gunfire flashed through the cavern. George lifted Glasgow and hurled him bodily. Poppendorf, rushing in, stumbled into him as the little man bounced to the floor. The big shouldered bodyguard was thrown off balance for a split second. George seized the folding chair and flung it. It clattered into Poppendorf just as the pistol came up. A streak of yellow knifed across the room. Ziz-z-z! A corner of the makeshift desk disintegrated under the atomic spray.
Smack! George’s fist caught Poppendorf’s jaw squarely. The big-shouldered man tottered, and the gun fell from his hand. George kicked at it and missed. Poppendorf bounced back against the wall, then came forward like a prizefighter, springing from the ropes. His fists swung, a blur. George ducked, but the blow grazed his scalp and the hard punch he had aimed for the midsection was lost in the whirl.
Crack. That was his own jaw. It seemed to go right through his head, leaving a trail of stars.
For a moment his elbows hung loose at his sides. Another wide swing came at him. This time he ducked clean. Then he dived for the floor. Garritt Glasgow had crawled along the wall and was reaching for the pistol. George kicked him on the knee. For an instant the little man recoiled. But he had the pistol now, and George couldn’t reach him. Poppendorf, jolting him back against the wall, came up with open hand, that stiff-arm gesture striking hard from the toe up—then, a thump.
George’s head struck back against solid stone. He was sinking, sinking—not quite sure of anything. Somehow he knew that a yellow flash streaked in above everyone’s head, and it wasn’t Glasgow’s pistol.
It was Waterfield, Waterfield and the other two witnesses. They had climbed out of hiding, and Waterfield’s bark was the most welcome sound George had ever heard. Waterfield had them. Everything was all right now. George slumped to the floor and let himself go to sleep on the way down.
CHAPTER XXXIII
Gret-O-Gret had lived a comparatively peaceful existence on his Mogo planet. The turmoil of his recent days on the earth had not been easy to take. On the night that he rescued his tiny earth friend, Paul Keller, from the Banrab cavern, with the aid of a wingman, he had been only too glad to close his Mogo space boat against the air of the earth and take off into the black skies.
As soon as they were well out into the heavens, he turned his attention to Paul to see how he had fared. The little fellow was pacing about disconsolately. Gret used a reading glass to study his companion’s expressions.
Pleasure or pain? Gret was not sure, at first. The tight lines of a frown on Paul’s forehead, together with the persistent movement of his lips, indicated that the little man was mentally reenacting the recent hours.
Gret was busy at the controls for several minutes. He couldn’t resist the temptation to swing close enough to the earth’s moon for a satisfying view of its crusty peaks and valleys highlighted by the sun.
But his little guest showed little interest in the familiar sight. Finally the moon was left behind, and Gret went to work rigging up a tiny microphone and a loud speaker for Paul so they could exchange thoughts. This cheered the earth man noticeably.
“Green Flash, the wingman, performed well,” Paul said. “He was glad to be a friend.”
“I might have brought him and other wingmen with us,” Gret said, “but they preferred to stay on the earth.”
“I wonder if they will fly back to the other continent to join the rest of their flock.”
“I wonder.”
Gret was curious about them and asked Paul several questions. How closely related to earth people were they? Had the scientists no explanation for the seeming similarity? Why did the wingmen so enjoy spying on the earth people? Had wingmen and earth people never tried living together?
In answer, Paul explained that there was far more difference between the two groups than he, Gret, might appreciate. Differences in background. Differences in degree of development. Originally, differences in language. And no similarity whatsoever in their cultural institutions.
“Until they began to catch the ways of the earth people,” Paul explained, “they were extremely primitive. The brief garments they now wear have been adopted as a result of contact with the American colony.”
“But they have learned to understand and sometimes speak your language,” said Gret. “And they do understand the use of bombs and firearms. Does this talent not qualify them to mingle with you wing-less ones who call yourselves Americans?”
“It qualifies them to become stooges for tricksters like Glasgow,” Paul said in his voice of displeasure. Gret had not meant to bring up the troublesome subject of Glasgow. Paul went on. “It is conceivable that intelligent wingmen like Green Flash and Purple Wings might live in our social order. But if there were many Glasgows among us, the wingmen would be made miserable.”
“If there were many Glasgows among you,” Gret ventured, “all of you would be made miserable.”
“How right you are.” Gret pressed his point, for he believed his idea was one that he, as a so-called giant, could see, which Paul and other earth men tended to overlook.
“Except for wings, you and Green Flash are much more alike than you and Glasgow.”
His little guest gave a half amused sniff. He sat down on the edge of the wide, glass-floored shelf and dangled his feet. Then he lay back, hands under his head, so that he could look straight up at Gret without straining.
“Your philosophies are worth considering, Gret,” he said, bending the microphone to his face for perfect comfort. “You might add that you and I are more alike than Glasgow and I—except for size.”
“Your words are true.” Gret felt a thrill of elation. This earth man always showed such a quick understanding.
“But does that mean,” Paul asked, “that you and I and Green Flash—all different in form—could live together in a social order more congenially than Glasgow and I?”
“Yes! Yes! So it does!” Gret spoke almost too loud in his enthusiasm, and his blast of breath made Paul hug the glass floor to avoid slipping over the edge.
“Don’t you see that neither you nor Katherine nor George nor Green Flash can live agreeably as long as people like Glasgow are around them!”
The little earth creature fell silent then, and Gret knew that it had been a mistake to mention the name of Katherine. He was worried about her. She had cried out to him, just as Gret had removed him from the cave. Of course, she would have wanted to come, too. Did Paul fear that she would be unsafe, left in a world d
ominated by Garritt Glasgow? If so, Gret’s point was proved.
The planet of Mercury expanded steadily, through the hours that followed. Eventually it widened to fill almost half of the sky. Soon its continents welled up, clear and hard in the light of the sun. Gret was watching his charts closely, and he called upon Paul to check his observations. Automatic cameras were at work, catching long-range and telescopic views.
“I see signs of Mox-O-Mox’s visit,” Gret was studying the deep blue pock-marks freshly blasted in the planet’s surface. “He chose the sunny side for his target.”
Gret had noted with interest that one face of the planet Mercury was always toward the sun, the other in the dark. Between the extremes of heat and cold, Paul had told him, the inhabitants of Mercury thrived along the boundary of light. Gret now piloted toward the rim of darkness.
“Where are the cities?”
“You can’t see much of them,” said Paul. The native Mercurians built most of their habitations underground. When the engineers from the earth came, they followed suit.”
Occasionally the telescope revealed a thin line that might have been a railway or a highway, following along the edge of a lake. The hills would swallow it up at either end, which meant that it had dipped down to some underground city.
A few tiny planes could be seen skimming over the surface at one point. They presently flew into a break in the earth and were gone. “I would like to visit such underground cities,” Gret said.
“They weren’t made for a man of your dimensions, I’m afraid. You’d break out at the ceilings. I don’t mean any sort of offense, Gret.”
Gret was amused. “No offense.” The radio which Gret and Paul had made ready was now in action, automatically signaling its call.
“If we don’t get an answer right away, Gret, we’d better climb for more altitude.”
“Will they think us an enemy?”
“From the size of this ship, they may think we are Mox-O-Mox returning.”
“Mox’s ship would be the Rudu-frazoo-wuff—the Red Comet. It is a little larger than this ship, and is ribbed with red metal.”
Paul was shaking his head, giving that warning frown.
“You are continually expecting people of our system to make fine distinctions, and I’m afraid we’re not very quick to do it. They’ve never seen a ship the size of Rudu—”
“Rudu-frazoowuff.”
“Yes—so they’re going to classify us and the Rudu-frazoowuff together. They’ll take one look at us and say, ‘Here come more bombs.’ So we’d better fly high.”
The radio presently brought in a reply from the American headquarters on Mercury. The words came fast and Gret couldn’t keep up with them. Paul worked furiously, exchanging messages. Whenever he looked up he would call for more altitude. Gret complied. It seemed strange that as persuasive a person as Paul Keller couldn’t allay all fear of danger among people of his own kind with an honest word of reassurance.
“They think I am a fake,” Paul said resignedly. “They don’t know my voice.”
“Can you not contact someone you know?”
“They’ve been too badly shocked . . . Here, wait . . . Here’s the man I’ve been calling for . . . Lessinger! This is Paul Keller. I’m in the big ship directly above Point Morezand . . . It belongs to a friend from Mogo . . . No, this is NOT an attack. Believe me, I’m no prisoner. I’m not being forced to say . . . Yes, we know about your catastrophe. We’re seeking the Mogo giant who did it. Can you direct us?”
The planet of Mercury was in a belligerent mood. Though Paul did his best to learn the extent of the damages, he did not succeed in breaking through the wall of suspicion, even with an old friend Lessinger. Lessinger informed Paul that they were watching the big Mogo boat from below, and were warning it. If it had any relief supplies, it could drop them over Point Morezand by parachute at once. Any further dallying, however, would be deemed an act of war.
“They’re about to toss up a cluster of atom bombs,” Paul announced. “We’d better streak for the high skies, Gret.”
At that moment Gret saw, through the telescope, a fountain of several hundred tiny rockets leaping upward toward the underbelly of his ship. All four of his hands reached for the controls. The thirteen-mile boat leaped out of the path of the oncoming rockets and streaked into the high skies. A blinding white flash! Another! And another!
The Mogo boat had dodged them. It raced on through the blackness of space undisturbed.
“Where next, Paul?”
“Venus.”
CHAPTER XXXIV
On the afternoon that George had rushed up to the cave to spring Plan X, Mamma Mountain and Papa Mouse sat on the top of the picnic table at the edge of the clearing, finishing their mid-afternoon lunch. Papa insisted that if Mamma finished the big plateful of food she was holding on her lap she would break the table down. Mamma was willing to put it to a test, giving Papa a scornful eye every time she took a bite.
“See? It’s all a matter of spacing your weight evenly.”
“You’re getting thinner,” said Papa. “Worry?”
“How could it be worry? Fist-fights and tumbling’s over cliffs. Surly porters. Big orange eyes that come up to your cave at nights, as big as a moon. Giant hands that reach in and snatch you away. Now what could I have to worry about with a picnic like that going on?”
Mamma Mountain glanced at the overcast sky. Papa imitated her, craning his head around at the rain clouds. “According to my infra-red eyes,” Papa said, “there’s nothing in sight.”
“Nothing? Look in the mirror, Papa, and you’ll get the same result. But there’s rain in sight, and the whole camp is going to get wet. And here we are with all our goods moved out of the cave, and you haven’t put the tent up yet.”
“Glasgow didn’t have any right to move us out,” Papa said gloomily. “Just because you happened to have bad dreams about giants, and wailed like a fire siren, and woke everyone up—”
“He said he needed the room for his headquarters.”
“Well, I wasn’t taking up any room. It was you.”
“Yes, dearie.”
“I could have slept in one of your shoes.”
“I wouldn’t have you sleeping in such a draft, dearie. If I don’t get some new shoes soon—”
Papa Mouse struggled with the tent a few minutes without visible results. He was thinking of something else.
“You know what Mr. Waterfield has been saying. Over on the American side of the planet the ruins are full of everything we could want for hundreds of years to come.”
“That depends upon how many of our Venus relatives come to visit us.”
“Anyway, he says we should move out of these caves—”
“We’re already moving, dearie. Come on, I’ll help you put up that tent before we get drenched . . . Look, here comes that speckled wingman again, the one that helped them cut away the trees. Maybe he’ll help you.”
Papa was dubious. Some of the larger wingmen, two or three times his size, always looked rather menacing to him. He could imagine them, in an unguarded moment, picking him up and carrying him off. But Mamma would say, “Nonsense. They are never that desperate, either for food or for company.”
The whole camp was working fast to get itself under cover before the rain came. A dozen or more wingmen flew in from their mountainside nooks to offer their services. That had been Green Flash’s challenge to them—to work themselves into the good graces of the new earth colony by doing favors. People who would have shunned and feared them back in Venus were now at least tolerating their presence. They had come by way of Gret-O-Gret’s boat. He brought several of them over from the other side of the planet—among them the skeptical ones who wanted to see whether Green Flash would succeed in being of service to the giant. They had seen. They had watched Green Flash and Purple Wings on the night that the two helped with the rescue of Paul Keller. Even Black Cloud had had to admit that that was a neat bit of heroism.
Now Papa, with the aid of the large speckled-winged fellow, was making progress with his tent when he was interrupted suddenly by a sharp startled cry from Mamma.
“Papa, what’s happening at the cave?” Several persons were running up the trail to the cliff road. Others, attracted by the excitement, dropped their spades or tossed their blueprints under canvas and followed.
“Be careful of the cliff!” one of the porters warned. “Don’t crowd . . . Keep back . . .”
“What’s happening?” Mamma puffed as she and Papa joined the race.
“What was the shooting about?” one of the girls ahead of her cried.
“Shooting?” Mamma Mountain gulped. “Whoooeeee! I wonder if George was in on it.”
As most of the camp knew, George had bounded in from an unauthorized space jaunt about an hour before, and had asked to see Glasgow at once. A porter in the valley had phoned to the cave for an appointment, and George had dashed up the hill, argued briefly with Poppendorf at the entrance, and gone on in.
“Did they get George?” someone else called. “Where’s Anna Pantella?”
“Where’s Anna?” Mamma echoed dizzily as she reached the top of her climb. Amid the excited shouting of questions and speculations she caught little information. Anna, someone said, had pushed in ahead of the others. Yes, George was certainly in there.
The rush suddenly jammed at the entrance. Several important people were coming out, and they were making a path through the throng without any trouble. No one disputed the right-of-way of atomic firearms. Thank goodness, Mamma thought, the good ones are running the show now. Waterfield, the doctor and one of the engineers were holding guns and directing the traffic. The traffic consisted of Garritt Glasgow and his man Poppendorf. The rest of the crowd turned to statues of curiosity.
Glasgow and his bodyguard were being marched out of the cave!
At the cave entrance Waterfield halted them. He saw that it would be necessary to reserve his maneuver. The rain had begun and the whole camp had dropped its tools and was surging toward the cave.
“All right, people, come on in. We’d just as well have an assembly right now,” Waterfield called.