by Ted Mark
It wasn't long before I came face to face with that someone. The ice-structure in the center of the circle of igloos turned out to be only an entrance to a vast underground complex. The Chinese and I were escorted down in an elevator and then taken through a series of chambers hinting at the magnitude of the operation. Two of the Eskimos flanking me indicated that I should be seated in one of these chambers while the others took the Chinese through a door opposite the one by which we'd entered.
It was an hour or more before the Chinese reappeared. He looked like he'd been given a going-over. The Eskimo guards hustled him out, and then it was my turn. They prodded me through a door, and I found myself facing a man seated behind a plush desk. The man was Peter Highman!
"We meet again, Mr. Victor."
"So it seems." I was too shaken to say anything else. I had hoped to come up against some S.M.U.T. official I could con the way I'd conned Olga. Instead, I'd hopped out of the arctic frying pan and straight into the fire of Peter Highman's clutches.
"I congratulate you on your persistence," Highman said.
"Thanks. I take it I'm your prisoner."
"Yes."
"And I suppose you're going to kill me."
"At my leisure, Mr. Victor. There is no cause for immediate alarm on your part."
"Why wait?" I asked.
"There is certain information I would like from you and your Chinese friend, Mr. Victor."
"He's no friend of mine."
"Quite so. Nevertheless, there are things that you can tell us."
"Like what?"
"Like just how much your government has managed to learn about S.M.U.T. Like why they are cooperating with the Russians and even the Chinese in their quest for Dr. Nyet."
"You tell me your secrets, I'll tell you mine," I singsonged.
"I don't mind satisfying your curiosity, Mr. Victor. You are no longer in a position to do S.M.U.T. any harm. It's a human failing that I hope you'll forgive, but the truth is I rather enjoy this opportunity to gloat over a vanquished adversary."
"Why not call Dr. Nyet in to gloat with you?" I suggested.
"Alas, she has already left. She had to keep a previous engagement. I know she'll be devastated when I tell her how closely she missed you. Indeed, you made quite an impression on her."
"Then it was the blonde back in New York! The one who liked to go up in flames while making love!"
"It was. And it is. But she's not really a blonde, you know. She's a natural brunette. We simply prevailed upon her to dye her hair."
"She's the last one I would have picked," I admitted. "She talked like a born and bred Yankee."
"Among Dr. Nyet's other talents is a sure tongue for linguistics," Highman told me.
"Olga had that talent, too," I mused. "But then she was exactly what she said she was. Except she was also a dupe for you, which she didn't know."
"That's right."
"And so was Ilona."
"Yes – but something more as well." Highman sounded regretful.
"So she told me. And you were really hooked on her, weren't you? But then why did you have her killed?"
"It was inevitable once she took up with you, Mr. Victor. If only you had gone to New Delhi with Singh as planned, she would be alive today. It would have been you who was killed if you had gone to India. Everything was arranged for your quiet assassination. How did you happen to pick up Ilona's trail anyway?"
"Sheer chance. I spotted her at the airport."
"Sheer chance," Highman repeated. "And so you signed her death warrant. A death warrant, I can assure you, which I executed with great reluctance."
"Just how was she killed?" I asked. "And your wife – how did you manage that in a locked room? There wasn't a mark on either body to show what killed them."
"Both were killed by sound, Mr. Victor."
"Sound?"
"Yes. In my wife's case, I simply hooked a high-frequency device in on the Sonuswitch lines operating the appliances in her study. There was a timing mechanism attached so it would go off about an hour after the two of you were in there. You see, I wanted to give you time to get into a compromising position so that it might look as if you assaulted her. Oh, yes, I knew my wife. I knew how she arranged to enjoy her sex without ever admitting to herself what she was doing. I banked on her sucking you into some sort of sex situation. But what I didn't bank on was you going out to the bathroom. Again, sheer chance. If not for that, you would have died with her as you were meant to die."
"I still don't quite understand how sound killed her."
"Then let me explain. The pitch of the frequency directed into the room is so high that it can't be heard. It bypasses the eardrum and goes directly to the brain. It makes for a direct and agonizing sort of 'hearing.' Every muscle in the victim's body contracts from it. Spasm after spasm seizes the body as the clothes are ripped off in an effort to pluck the ultra-sensitized nerve-ends themselves from the body. The stress is so great that eventually the victim breaks her own neck in an effort to escape the deadly – but actually unheard – sound."
"You sound like you enjoy it." I shuddered.
"Well, you must admit it's ingenious. It was even more ingenious in Ilona's case. I had to virtually invent a hand transmitter with all-transistor components, a new weapon which could aim a beam of high frequency at her without the sort of leakage that might have killed half of Salisbury. I tell you, it wasn't easy."
"I'll bet. But why did you send Ilona to Salisbury in the first place? And why did you go there yourself? Surely that wasn't necessary just to transport the phallus. Any underling could have seen to that."
"True. The phallus was secondary. I only took it with me to Salisbury to throw those seeking its return off the track. I had to go to Salisbury anyway, and I simply took advantage of the trip to send it to Hammerfest from there. My real reason for going to Salisbury was gold, Mr. Victor."
"Gold?"
"Yes. The gold necessary to finance S.M.U.T.'s operations. You see, the stealing and selling and reclaiming of art objects like the phallus is not sufficient to finance our expanding needs. I went to Salisbury to arrange a deal through T.U.M.S. with the Rhodesian government. That government faces an international embargo on its gold exports. I was arranging terms whereby S.M.U.T. would bypass that embargo and dispose of the gold for the Rhodesians at a handsome profit. Unfortunately, the details were still being worked out when your Russian counterpart succeeded in rifling my room and getting a lead on the whereabouts of Dr. Nyet. That made it necessary for me to leave Rhodesia and fly here immediately. S.M.U.T. couldn't take any chances of the Russians' finding Dr. Nyet."
"Just what was it that Vlankov discovered?" I asked.
"You don't know? But how amusing! I naturally thought you were in cahoots when you traveled to Hammerfest together. What Vlankov found was a half- written message from me to my superiors requesting a plane to pick up Dr. Nyet in Hammerfest and fly her here."
"Then Dr. Nyet was in Hammerfest along with Olga?"
"Not with her, no. But they were both there at the same time. The original plan was for Dr. Nyet to wait there for the delivery of the phallus, and then sail to Franz Josef Land. Olga was to be sent back to Paris. But your interference made me nervous, and so I decided Dr. Nyet should be taken to safety as soon as possible while Olga waited to deliver the phallus."
"And the name of the ship was in the letter," I guessed. "That's why Vlankov went straight to it when he reached Hammerfest."
"Yes."
"Something he had just said stuck in my mind. "You mentioned your superiors," I said. "Does that mean you're not top man?"
"No, I'm not. I'm very close to the top. But I'm not the man in charge of S.M.U.T."
Who is?
"If I told you the name it wouldn't mean anything to you, Mr. Victor. It's just a name. Some day the whole world will know it. But that's in the future. By then you will be long dead."
"The whole world…" I picked up the phrase. "You real
ly think that S.M.U.T. can enslave the population of the whole world by multiplying it? But how will you control them? And how will you feed them if their numbers increase? There's not enough food to sustain the population of the world as it exists today."
"Control and survival are intertwined, Mr. Victor. Let me give you an example. Did you notice the Eskimos above ground when you arrived?"
"Yes. I wondered about them. I've never seen so many Eskimos gathered together in one place. They don't usually crowd together in such numbers."
"Quite so. And the reason there are so many of them here is that S.M.U.T. carefully selected them as a sample population to test the theories we intend to apply to all the peoples of the world. To understand this, let me give you some facts about Eskimos. Twenty years ago, when the last worldwide census was taken, those countries with an Eskimo population put the total number of Eskimos in the world at 100,000. Today those same nations place their combined Eskimo populations at 30,000. A fantastic drop during a period when the rest of the world is faced with a population explosion."
"What caused it?" I asked.
"Civilization. That's right, Mr. Victor. Civilization is responsible for decimating the Eskimo population. As new frontiers were opened, Eskimos retreated farther and farther into the arctic wildernesses. Those who remained fell prey to diseases brought by civilized man. Believe it or not, measles killed thousands of them. There was no heritage of immunity to diseases which to us are minor. Indeed, the Eskimos have been dying off at such an alarming rate that both the U.S. and Canadian governments are taking measures to check their declining birth rate before the Eskimos become extinct."
"But what has this to do with S.M.U.T.?"
"We took our lead from those government programs. We sought out small bands of Eskimos on the brink of starvation and held a carrot in front of their noses. The carrot was food – just that, food, the means of survival – and they readily followed it to this settlement. Here our control over them is total. They labor for S.M.U.T. in return for food and shelter – and one thing more."
"Which is?"
"The security of knowing that their children will live. The infant mortality rate among Eskimos is fantastically high ordinarily. But not among the Eskimos here. We have reduced it to an insignificant ftaction. We encourage our Eskimos to have children and we guarantee the survival of those children. The Eskimos here know that S.M.U.T. controls that survival, and so they work willingly in exchange for it."
"In other words, you're breeding them like work animals. You're creating a slave population."
"I don't deny it," Highman said. "But it is only the beginning of S.M.U.T.'s great experiment. What has worked with the Eskimos will work on a far vaster scale with all the people in the world."
"I'm not so sure. You still haven't answered my second question. How will you feed your hordes of slaves if you succeed in creating an overpopulated world?"
"I take it you didn't see The New York Times of December 24th, Mr. Victor."
"The newsboy didn't deliver my copy," I told him drily. "Because of the weather, I imagine. What's that got to do with it?"
"There was a front page story there which answered your question. It told of the results of certain investigations by your Interior Department's Bureau of Commercial Fisheries. S.M.U.T. has long been interested in these investigations, and we have kept pace with their progress. There was nothing secret about them, and so it was simple. It is a mark of our faith in your scientists that we were convinced they would succeed in what they were working on long before their actual success was accomplished. You see, they didn't realize it, of course, but they were going to provide us with the answer of how to feed an overpopulated world of slaves. And now they have done it."
"Just what is it that they've done?"
"They've developed a pure fish concentrate with a protein content of 80 percent, the remaining 20 percent consisting of the most beneficial minerals and vitamins. It's really quite ingenious – the process, I mean. The flesh of the fish is ground to a pulp and then the pulp is put through an alcohol cold-bath. This removes all the water and fatty content from the pulp. Then it is immersed in isopropyl alcohol, which further purifies it. Finally it's spray-dried, and the result is the world's first perfect synthetic food supplement."
"Very interesting. But how can a fish-food sustain an overexpanded humanity?"
"This isn't just a 'fish-food,' Mr. Victor. It is a pure food concentrate. By your own government's estimates, it can be produced so cheaply and easily as to feed two-thirds of the human race today with no strain whatsoever. All it would take to do this would be the building of a relatively inexpensive plant capable of producing ten tons of concentrate daily. That, incidentally, is close to the output of – say – a large sardine cannery. The cost of this – including a margin for profit – would be only eighteen cents a pound. A larger plant might produce 100 tons daily at a cost of only thirteen cents a pound. And a pound of this concentrate could easily sustain – and provide a maximum of nourishment to – a human being for a week to ten days. Thus S.M.U.T. will easily be able to feed large populations. Indeed, one of the reasons for establishing this base here is the excellent fishing off the coast of Franz Josef Land. The need for secrecy keeps us inland now, but eventually we will move to the coast. Here we'll set up a processing plant to be supplied on a regular basis by our own fishing fleet."
"It looks like you've figured all the angles."
"Yes. Plus some fortuitous ones we didn't anticipate. Did I mention that this substance is colorless, odorless and tasteless? It looks like a gray flour, has no trace of a fish smell or taste about it, and is easily soluble. It's an ideal food supplement. It can be put in milkshakes, for instance, without being detected. These qualities have turned out to be most important to S.M.U.T. You see, they are also true of the formula for an antibirth control pill developed by Dr. Nyet."
"So what?"
"So this, Mr. Victor. Your government has been trying to encourage private industry to manufacture the food supplement. A company fronting for S.M.U.T. is already in the process of complying with this request. Only the supplement we produce will also have in it the formula invented by Dr. Nyet. Thus we will insure overpopulation at the very same time that we create the means to feed and control the resulting hordes."
"Then you do have Dr. Nyet's formula."
"Now we do, yes. You see, when she fled Russia, she was unable to take her notes with her. She had to destroy them. But with her scientific mind and photographic memory, it wasn't difficult for her to recreate the formula. She had done so and was testing the results when we got word of your coming to New York and took the precaution of hiding her in the brothel. How could I have guessed that fool Crampdick would steer you directly to her? No matter. That's past now. She finished the testing of the formula here yesterday, and wrote the ingredients and composition down on paper for S.M.U.T. I have that paper right here with me now." He tapped his breast pocket.
"And what will you do with it?"
"I will fly to New York immediately. Dr. Nyet already awaits me there. We will confer with the men arranging the production of the food supplement. Dr. Nyet has some ideas concerning the combining of the two in production." Highman sat back in his chair and beamed an "Oh-what-a-genius-am-I-don't-you-agree?" sort of smile at me.
"It's an ingenious scheme," I granted. "But how come you're telling me about it?"
"You will never be in a position to act on the information, Mr. Victor. Rest assured of that. As to why I'm telling you – Well, a man has to be able to talk to someone about his accomplishments. There's no one else here capable of understanding, even if I weren't kept from telling them by the need for secrecy. As for those above me – well, they only want to know the results, not the methods I labor so hard to devise in order to produce those results. We are enemies, Mr. Victor, but you are the only one with whom it is possible to enjoy a rapport concerning my work. I trust that rapport will continue after I return f
rom my journey to New York."
"If I live that long."
"Oh, you shall. And much longer if you will only cooperate with S.M.U.T. All you have to do is tell us the extent of your government's knowledge about our operation."
"Suppose I don't know."
"Come now, Mr. Victor. You couldn't have been as effective as you were if you didn't have such knowledge."
"And if I refuse to betray my government?"
"Then eventually you will die. But I feel sure you will change your mind before accepting such a drastic fate. Just a taste of the sound that kills, a taste that will fall short of actually killing you, should insure that." Highman nodded as if he was trying to be reassuring. "But now," he added, looking at his watch, "I must be off. The plane is waiting for me." He turned to the Eskimo guards and said something to them in their native tongue. They led me away.
A few moments later I was pushed into a sparsely furnished room which evidently served as a cell. The door was locked behind me. But I wasn't alone. The Chinese was already imprisoned there.
"Welcome," he greeted me.
I didn't return the greeting. I just glared at him. I couldn't forget that he'd killed Olga. I hated his guts.
He knew it, but he wasn't going to let it deter him. "Our only chance of escape, Mr. Victor, is if we cooperate with each other. Regardless of how you feel about me, it would be foolhardy not to cooperate. That would doom you as well as me."
"It's almost worth it," I told him. But I had to admit he was right. Whatever slender chance we had depended on us acting together. "All right. I'll cooperate," I agreed reluctantly. "What's your plan?"
"First I have to sneeze."
"Go ahead."
"It's not that simple," he said. "I don't feel like sneezing."