by Andre Norton
“I’ll be out in a few minutes.”
He dressed himself quickly with smooth fluid motion. He paused for a moment before opening the panel leading from his flight quarters to the captain’s gallery. Visions of his vessel’s sleek, silver sides and streamlined length washed the background of his mind like a welcome dream. The Bureau of Ships called it a Dispatch Freighter, but no captain commanding a mighty thousand-meter exploring battleship would ever experience the soul-satisfying thrill his ship filled him with. A wave of pure contentment filled him as his eyes ran over the narrow welded seams of the ivory-dyed bulkhead. He paused there to listen to his ship: the soft whisper of the muffled air ducts was as soothing as a muted lullaby. The thin, tiny creak of the outer hull responding to its airless environment was as thrilling as a triumphant, stellar symphony. A frown of perplexity flickered between his gray eyes as he sniffed the air.
The atmosphere seemed slightly tainted. It lacked the heady, tingling, euphoric quality the conditioners normally imparted to the ship’s atmosphere. One of the tubes working the negatron must have blown during the night. He realized he couldn’t depend on Bickford and that he would have to be watched closely. The thought flashed through his mind of the consequences if Bickford were to be careless. What if he got sloppy and something did go wrong with their air? He had once seen the results of slow asphyxiation in an attack transport. He forced the unwelcome memory from his mind.
He stepped out on the gallery.
“Good morning,” Nord said as the watch officer snapped to attention.
Three meters below him the helmsmen were bent over the green-lighted circular telegator screen. The tiny red and amber lights over the instrument banks imparted a soft, restful gloom to the darkened bridge.
He walked the length of his gallery. On the right brushing his sleeve were the telepanels: the spy plates hated alike by officers and crew. The plates which brought him visual contact with all compartments of the ship and which he never used except in drills. On his left at waist-high level were the master’s meters, duplicates of the instrument banks on the bridge deck below.
’Midship, in front of his own telegator screen, he paused, adjusted the magnification of the tiny green light indicating their course and which speared the exact center of the screen. He measured the circumference of the dot with a micrometer of sodium light, ran off the difference in the calibrator.
“Latham,” he leaned over the rail.
Latham stepped forward of the steering gang, looked up. “Yes, captain.”
“Three-millionths of a millimeter in ten million miles is not very much angulation, but in fourteen light-years it amounts to several hundred miles of unnecessary travel. You are off your course,” he made it sound like a joke between old friends, “three point two angstrom units.”
He stepped over to the lattice, checked the dimensions of the nebulous cloud on the screen. A quick glance at the map above his head showed the cloud had never been charted. Under high magnification he could see the lazy whirling of its vortex. He set drift spots on the larger lumps in the periphery, ran up the time scale to see how near it lay on their course.
“Divert twenty-three angstroms on an axial plane—”
“But don’t you want to decelerate and study the cloud for the astrographic office?” Latham asked in bewildered surprise.
Nord smiled indulgently. “It would take us a full month to decelerate, jockey back. Then we’d have to start accelerating again and it would take almost three months to come back to terminal velocity. The time loss would be almost four months. Just chart the cloud and let the office worry about the details.”
He looked at the air instruments. He studied them so long he was aware he was being watched by the men below. He straightened, checked all the instruments before he leaned over the rail to clasp his hands in what appeared to be benign unconcern.
Just as the 0600 gong announced the change in watch he spoke up. “Mr. Latham, give me your air readings.”
“Yes, sir.” Latham stepped to the air board. “Pressure in the ship, steady at seven-seventy mm; mean temperature twenty degrees, three degrees fluctuation downwards at 2300. Humidity fifty-two per cent. Air motion: forty meters per minute with seven-meter variation every fourteen seconds. Composition of arterial air: oxygen eighteen point four three per cent, carbon dioxide point eight three per cent. Excess negative ions to the order of—”
“That’s enough.” Nord turned back and looked again at his own board. Something was the matter. What had Bickford neglected to do now? His voice took on cold purpose. “Summon Mr. Bickford for me, please.”
Corbett turned abruptly, went into his flight quarters. The steward had already made up his bunk and the compartment was now as neat as that distant day on Earth he had moved into it. He drew a cup of coffee from a gleaming canister, sipped slowly. It would be a good idea to have Hardman check the entire air system from venous intake to arterial outflow. On second thought, he resolved to do it himself.
He was reading the master log when his yeoman entered the office. “Dr. Stacker and Mr. Hardman request permission to speak to the captain.”
“Morning, gentlemen,” Nord greeted them; he waved to the canister and cups, shoved a cigarette box across his desk. “Help yourself to morning coffee, then toss me your mind.”
Hardman turned to Dr. Stacker, his face drawn and cold. “You tell him, Doc.”
The space surgeon lit a cigarette, watched the smoke spiral towards the venous duct. “A lad playing laska ball last night fractured a patella. I had a corpsman up all night watching him because sometimes the bone plastic causes pain. He called me at 2315 that the sick bay temp had dropped four degrees.”
“What of that? You have your own thermostatic control,” Corbett told him.
“That’s true,” Stacker admitted, “but I usually maintain ship’s temp. When the drop came I didn’t know whether it came on order from the senior watch officer or . . . or—”
Nord understood the hesitation. The doctor did not want to be an informer. “You mean,” he suggested helpfully, “you wondered if the air officer might be careless.”
Stacker nodded. “You saw his act last night at dinner. That is not the action of a normal man. That anger was a paranoid reaction to his hatred for all of us and particularly for you. In you he sees the authority he hates so much. That scene crystallized in his mind the determination of what he intended to do to the ship.”
Nord felt again as if Pluto’s frigid winds were blowing out from the center of his being. Dread like a black frozen cloud enveloped his mind. “What did he intend to do?” His voice was voder cold.
“I don’t know.” The doctor admitted his ignorance in a tight, hushed voice.
Nord was aware of the unperceived worry that flowed over the space surgeon’s mind, knew it mirrored his own vague premonition of impending catastrophe. “Go on,” he prodded gently.
“I went down to his cabin to investigate. You see I’ve felt Bickford was a psychopath. No reason, you understand,” he explained apologetically, “sensed it, an intuitive reaction rather than something of real diagnostic import. He’s always been most affable to me, a bit eccentric, but his conduct in the mess except for some vulgar characteristics has been exemplary.”
“He seemed O.K. to me,” Nord said. “I’ve made it a point to look for personality change at dinner. He never seemed sour like so many officers do when they get space weary. I never trusted him much,” he admitted hesitantly. “I felt that was pure friction between opposing personalities; it seemed to me he was always trying to impress me with his influential relatives.”
“They are influential,” Dr. Stacker pointed out, “otherwise they could never have gotten him aboard without a psychosomatic examination. When he reported I asked him for permission to contact the Public Health Bureau which maintains medical files on all citizens. He refused. I thought he might have something in his record he was ashamed of and was overly sensitive about it. I asked to e
xamine him myself and he said it wasn’t necessary. Well,” the physician shrugged his shoulders, “you can’t examine a civilian in a military ship against his wishes. After we left lunar quarantine I watched him closely, but as he seemed to adapt to ship’s routine I thought I might be wrong. I knew he was money mad, feels wealth will give him the security he lacks. Last night he heard about the wealth on board and because he felt we were not giving him the honor and deference he thought his position warranted he resolved to do something about it and show us how good his mind was.
“He went down to air treatment and got drunk.”
“Got drunk!” Nord looked stunned. “Why? How? On what?”
“He used the alcohol showers in air treatment as his bar. Entrance to the chlorophyl banks is through an alcohol bath. The bath is necessary to remove bacteria from the armor, otherwise you would infect the chlorophyl which is about a thousand times more sensitive to infection than a chick embryo.
“I found Bickford clinically intoxicated, he’d passed out in his cabin. I did a blood alcohol on him and found he had four point three milligrams per cent—that’s enough alcohol in the blood to make anyone dead drunk. I’m afraid, captain, in having his party he must have infected the chlorophyl. Our oxygen is going down and C02 is rising.”
“That means recharging the tanks.” Hardman slapped the arm of his chair violently.
Infected chlorophyl! The spaceman’s one great dread. It wasn’t the danger of asphyxiation that worried Nord. They had plenty of fresh media to recharge the tanks. But, until the new stuff grew sufficiently to handle the vitiated air, they would have to live from stored oxygen. That meant curtailment of recreational activity and with limited exercise came deterioration of morale. His mind leaped to the crew.
They would be forced to lay in their bunks for hours on end looking at the curving overhead. Corrosion of the spirit from such confinement was the one exciting cause for that most dreaded of all spatial afflictions: Spaceneuroses; the overmastering, unreasoning anxiety syndrome. The claustrophobia that destroyed the very fabric of the mind and that could easily—if long continued—wreck the ship.
And Bickford did it
Didn’t the fool realize his life, too, depended on air? He looked down at the open log on his desk. He closed the book with a snap that strained its metal hinges and wrinkled the sheets of its plastic pages.
He forced his voice to be steady. “Where is Bickford now?”
“He’s outside waiting to see you,” Hardman answered. “The doctor sobered him up.”
Bickford’s almost colorless, pale-blue eyes darted a quick apprehensive glance at Dr. Stacker before he turned to stare insolently at the captain. His slack mouth looked as if nature had painted it on his thin, immature face. He jerked his head at the scribespeech on the captain’s desk, aimlessly wiped flecks of saliva from his narrow, pointed chin with a pink silk handkerchief which he quickly thrust into his uniform pocket.
“Mr. Bickford,” Nord’s voice was ominously calm, “did you check air this morning?”
“Why of course I did,” he snapped irritably. He tilted his head, sniffed loudly through his narrow nose. “Seems O.K. to me.”
“Did you go to air treatment after the game last night?” Bickford jerked the handkerchief from his pocket, nervously wiped foamy saliva from his twitching mouth. “I think I did. I turned down the temp five or six degrees, thought the ship too hot.”
“A little while later, the medical officer went to your cabin and found that you had been drinking. Do you deny this?” Nord’s voice trembled from manifest control.
Bickford forced a weak smile to his lips. He blew a short, explosive whistle of self-congratulation. “I was really drunk in my cabin last night. I was just really flooded.”
“This is no time for humor, Mr. Bickford. When we planet, I shall charge you with being drunk on duty, carelessness and incompetence and recommend your dismissal from the civilian branch of the Spatial Service.”
Bickford shrugged his narrow shoulders. “So what,” he answered truculently. His voice became edged with triumph. “My cousin is general manager of Synthetic Air. That’s the company who installed the conditioner aboard this ship. He got me assigned to this job over you academy boys. You’re jealous of me. I’ll tell him what you’ve done to me and he’ll have the Bureau of Personnel really burn you up. You all thought I was dumb. Told me last night I was crazy. I’ll show you how smart I was last night.” He started to laugh: a harsh, treble, nerve-chilling laugh. “This is a good joke on you, Corbett. When the green goo goes sour, what’re you going to do?”
Nord felt an icy vortex swirl around his heart. He leaned forward, damp palms clasping the arms of his chair. He knew already what the man was going to say.
Bickford wiped tears of exultant laughter from his pale eyes. Stared derisively at the officers. “What’re you going to do now? We don’t have any extra stock or media aboard. We don’t have any more of anything to recharge your tanks.”
“What!” Hardman leaped to his feet. Nord placed a restraining hand on his executive officer’s arm.
Bickford sneered at his startled expression. “I thought that would get you.” He looked down at the captain. “While you were checking the ship at Lunar Quarantine, I traded all our reserve stock of chlorophyl powder and nutrient media for a set of bench tools. I made the deal with the captain of Mr. Brockway’s yacht. Do you know who Mr. Brockway is? He’s one of the richest men on the inner planets. You see, I intended to go into business on Lanvin—”
“You?” Hardman gurgled. “In business?”
“I was going to make beautiful doll furniture. But now I’m going to be one of the richest men on Lanvin,” he said triumphantly. “When I learned how much money we had aboard the ship I decided then to show you how brilliant I really was.” He looked at them patronizingly. “I’m going to take the money designed for the base.”
“How will you do that?” Corbett’s voice was so calm it was unreal.
Bickford laughed unpleasantly. “I’m going to make a chlorine generator. It’s easy to make, just electrolysis of salt water. I’m going to put that into the air system. While you all are being finished, I’ll live in space armor. Then I will land the ship on Dynia, that’s Planet II, and take the shuttle across to Lanvin.”
“But now we know all about it, and we’re going to lock you up,” Nord said slowly. “Didn’t you realize we would know almost instantly when the air went bad?”
The realization of what he had said revealed itself in his widened eyes. His head shook from side to side as he started to whimper. “I never thought of that when I spit into the banks last night.” Hardman came forward, cold deadly purpose etched in the lines about his grim mouth and bitter eyes. Nord knew what he was about
to do, knew it would have to be done. Hardman was half a meter from Bickford before he spoke. “This is for the crew,” he said and his fist came up like a rocket.
Bickford took the blow, rocked under it, caught the second on his mouth and then Corbett and the doctor were between them, shoving them apart.
“The idiot should be chucked in space,” Hardman roared.
Stacker was wiping Bickford’s crimson mouth. Corbett released Hardman’s arm. “He’s a sick man,” he said heavily. “Go back to your duty. I’ll have Dr. Stacker act as air officer. We’ll keep Bickford under armed guard in the sick bay for the remaining seven months of the voyage.”
“Seven months! Without air!” Hardman’s voice became high with the tension of near-hysteria. Then noticing Nord’s level cold eyes he apologized. “I’m sorry, sir. I must have lost my temper.”
“I understand. We’ll forget what happened. Now let’s see what we can do about the air.” He turned to the doctor. “Take care of the patient. I’ll meet you down in air control.” He looked at the chronometer. It was 0640. It seemed like hours. “I’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” he finished abruptly.
Corbett glanced down at the glowing tip of his
cigarette. This is what came from having a psychopath aboard. Incidents like this were never discussed at the academy. Departments were always handled smoothly by brisk, efficient men always alert to serve the ship. Not even in fiction were there problems like this unwelcome thing. There, the personalities were always good, pure men at war against mythical creatures, invidious planets, self-centered, unpredictable novas or militant civilizations; never at war against their own personal environment because of the stupidity of politicians who insisted that unexamined, potentially insane men be made a part of the ship’s company.
Stacker was sitting, feet propped on the air officer’s desk, studying the “Handbook of Air Management” when Nord walked in. He stood up at once. “I’ve got Bickford in the brig ward. He’s perfectly safe now. Can’t harm himself or anyone else.” He touched buttons on the desk top and as the drawers slid out pointed at their contents. “Looks like a rat’s nest. He’s collected everything in this ship that wasn’t welded.”
“Never mind Bickford. What can we do about the air?”
“Not very much,” Stacker said diagnostically. “You know how this ship handles air?”
“Vaguely. I don’t know too much about it. Air management is so vital it’s always handled by an officer or civilian specializing in clinical industry.” There was no apology for his ignorance. It wasn’t his job to know air any more than he was required to know how to practice planetary epidemiology.
“The air system in this ship was designed, installed and maintained by Synthetic Air, Incorporated, of Great Kansas. The system uses a modified form of rebreather technic; that is, the unused oxygen is returned to the ship.
“Starting from the venous ducts located in all compartments the air is pulled over a precipitron which removes all dust, oil and water droplets and other curd. It then goes into the separator where the excess oxygen is removed; this passes directly back into the ship’s arterial system.