by J F Bone
Fourknocks! Sure, I’d heard of it. What citizen hadn’t? They still tell stories of that fabulous hoard of gold. Tons of it buried on Earth waiting for someone with guts enough to go in and find it.
“All your ship will hold,” Redman said. “After we analyze its principles.”
Five tons of gold! Six million munits! So much money! It staggered me. I’d never dreamed of that much money. Redman was right. I would kick my mother’s teeth out if the price was right. And the price—I jumped convulsively. My arm brushed the control board, kicking off the negative inertia and slapping the axial correction jets.
The ship spun like a top! Centrifugal force crushed me against the control room floor. Redman, an expression of pained surprise on his face before it slammed against the floor, was jammed helplessly in the corridor. I had time for one brief grin. The Patrol would zero in on us, and I’d have a hundred thousand I could spend. What could I do with six million I couldn’t use?
Then hell broke out. A fire extinguisher came loose from its fastenings and started flying around the room in complete defiance of artificial gravity. Switches on the control board clicked on and off. The ship bucked, shuddered and jumped. But the spin held. Redman, crushed face down to the floor, couldn’t see what he was doing. Besides—he didn’t know what he was doing—but he was trying. The fire extinguisher came whizzing across the floor and cracked me on the shin. A scream of pure agony left my lips as I felt the bone snap.
“Got you!” Redman grunted, as he lifted his head against the crushing force and sighted at me like a gunner. The extinguisher reversed its flight across the room and came hurtling at my head.
“Too late!” I gloated mentally. Then the world was filled with novae and comets as the extinguisher struck. The cheerful thought that Redman was trapped because he didn’t—couldn’t—know how to drive a hypership was drowned in a rush of darkness.
When I came to, my leg was aching like a thousand devils and I was lying on a rocky surface. Near—terribly near—was a jagged rock horizon cutting the black of space dotted with the blazing lights of stars. I groaned and rolled over, wincing at the double pain in leg and head. Redman was standing over me, carrying a couple of oxygen bottles and a black case. He looked odd, standing there with a load in his arms that would have crushed him flat on Mars. And then I knew. I was on an asteroid.
“But how did I get here?”
“Easy,” Redman’s voice came over my headphone. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you an unconscious mind is easier to read than a conscious one?” He chuckled. “No,” he continued, “I don’t suppose they did—but it is. Indeed it is.” He laid the bottles down, and put the box beside them. “I learned how to operate the ship, stopped the spin, and got her back into negative inertia before the Patrol found me. Found this place about an hour ago—and since you began to look like you’d live, I figured you should have a chance. So I’m leaving you a communicator and enough air to keep you alive until you can get help. But so help me—you don’t deserve it. After I played square with you, you try to do this to me.”
“Square!” I yelped. “Why you—” The rest of what I said was unprintable.
Redman grinned at me, his face rosy behind the glassite of his helmet—and turned away. I turned to watch him picking his way carefully back to where the yacht rested lightly on the naked rock. At the airlock he turned and waved at me. Then he squeezed inside. The lock closed. There was a brief shimmer around the ship—a briefer blast of heat, and the yacht vanished.
I turned on the communicator and called for help. I used the Patrol band. “I’ll keep the transmitter turned on so you can home in on me,” I broad-casted, “but get that Earthman first! He’s got my money and my ship. Pick me up later, but get him now!”
I didn’t know whether my message was received or not, because Redman didn’t leave me any receiver other than the spacesuit intercom in my helmet. It was, I suspected, a deliberate piece of meanness on his part. So I kept talking until my voice was a hoarse croak, calling the Patrol, calling—calling—calling, until a black shark shape blotted out the stars overhead and a couple of Patrolmen in jetsuits homed in on me.
“Did you get him?” I asked.
The Patrolman bending over me shrugged his shoulders. “They haven’t told me,” he said.
They hauled me back to Marsport, put my leg in a cast, ran me through the lie detector, and then tossed me in jail for safekeeping. I beefed about the jail, but not too loud. As I figured it I was lucky to be out of Abie’s hands.
Two days later, a Patrolman with the insignia of a Commander on his collar tabs showed up at my cell. He was apologetic. I was a hero, he said. Seems like the Patrol caught Redman trying to sneak through the asteroid belt on standard drive and blasted him out of space.
So they gave me the reward and turned me loose.
But it didn’t do me any good. After taxes, it only came to twenty thousand, and Abie grabbed that before I could get out of town. Like I said, Abie’s unforgiving where money’s concerned, and Redman had taken him for over thirty kilos, which, according to Abie was my fault for lifting him and getting him out of town. After he got my twenty kilos he still figured I owed him twelve—and so I’ve never made it back. Every time I get a stake he grabs it, and what with the interest, I still owe him twelve.
But I still keep trying, because there’s still a chance. You see, when Redman probed around in my mind to learn how to run the spaceship, he was in a hurry. He must have done something to my brain, because when he left me on that asteroid, as he turned and waved at me, I could hear him thinking that the Patrol would not be able to stop hyperships, and if he made it to Earth his people could emigrate to some clean world and stop having to inject their kids, and while they couldn’t make the grade themselves, their kids could crash the Galaxy without any trouble. I got the impression that it wouldn’t be too much trouble to empty Earth. Seems as though there wasn’t many more than a million people left. The red color wasn’t complete protection apparently.
And there’s another thing. About a month after I got the reward, there was a minor complaint from Centaurus V about one of their officials who disappeared on a vacation trip to Mars. His ship was a Starflite class, Serial CY 122439. Get the idea?
So I keep watching all the incoming tourists like you. Someday I figure I’m going to run into a decolorized Earthman. They won’t be able to stay away any more than the other peoples of the Galaxy. Old Mother Earth keeps dragging them back even though they’ve been gone for over a thousand years. Don’t get the idea they want to see Mars. It’s Earth that draws them. And it’ll draw an Earthman’s kids. And I figure that if I could read Redman’s mind, I can read theirs, too even though I haven’t read a thought since. It figures, does it not?
Hey! Hold on! There’s no need to run. All I want to do is collect a fifty year old bill—plus interest. Your folks owe me that much.
THE END
TO CHOKE AN OCEAN
Gourmets all agree that nothing can beat oysters on the half-shell—not even the armed might of the Terran Confederation!
“NICE that you dropped in,” the man in the detention room said. “I never expected a visit from the Consul General. It makes me feel important.”
“The Confederation takes an interest in all of its citizens’ welfare,” Lanceford said. “You are important! Incidentally, how is it going?”
“Not too bad. They treat me all right. But these natives sure are tough on visitors. I’ve never been checked so thoroughly in all my life—and now this thirty day quarantine! Why, you’d think I was carrying the plague instead of a sample case!”
The chubby little commercial traveller probably had a right to complain, Lanceford thought. After all, a Niobian quarantine station isn’t the pleasantest sort of environment. It’s not meant to be comfortable, physical discomfort being as good a way as any to discourage casual visitors. The ones who have fortitude enough to stand the entry regulations can get in, but tourists seldom visit
Niobe. However, the planet’s expanding economy offered a fertile field for salesmen, and men of that stripe would endure far worse hardships than a port of entry in pursuit of the Almighty Credit.
Now this fellow, George Perkins, was a typical salesman. And despite his soft exterior there was a good hard core inside.
Lanceford looked him over and decided that he would last. “You came here of your own free will, didn’t you?” he asked.
“If you call a company directive free will,” Perkins answered. “I wouldn’t come here for a vacation, if that’s what you mean. But the commercial opportunities can’t be ignored.”
“I suppose not, but you can hardly blame the Niobians for being suspicious of strangers. Perhaps there’s no harm in you. But they have a right to be sure; they’ve been burned before.” Lanceford uncoiled his lean gray length from the chair and walked over to the broad armorglas window. He stared out at the gloomy view of Niobe’s rainswept polar landscape. “You know,” he continued, “you might call this Customs Service a natural consequence of uninvestigated visitors.” He brooded over the grayness outside. A polar view was depressing—scrubby vegetation, dank grassland, the eternal Niobian rain. He felt sorry for Perkins. Thirty days in this place would be sheer torture.
“It must have been quite some disturbance to result in this.” Perkins waved his hand at the barren room. “Sounds like you know something about it.”
“I do. In a way you might say that I was responsible for it.”
“Would you mind telling me?”
“I WOULDN’T mind at all.” Lanceford looked at his watch. “If I have the time, that is. I’m due to be picked up in an hour, but Niobians have some quaint conceptions of time. So if you want to take a chance that I won’t finish—”
“Go ahead.”
“To start with, take a look at that insigne over the door. The whole story’s right there.”
Perkins eyed the emblem of the Niobian Customs Service. It was a five-pointed star surrounding a circle, superimposed over the typically Terran motto: “Eternal Vigilance is the Price of Safety.” He nodded.
“How come the Terran style?” he asked.
“That’s part of the story. Actually that insigne’s a whole chapter of Niobe’s history. But you have to know what it stands for.” Lanceford sighed reminiscently. “It began during the banquet that celebrated the signing of the Agreement which made Niobe a member of the Confederation. I was the Director of the BEE’s Niobe Division at that time. As a matter of fact, I’d just taken the job over from Alvord Sims. The Old Man had been ordered back to Terra, to take over a job in the Administration, and I was the next man in line.
“The banquet was a flop, of course. Like most mixed gatherings involving different races, it was a compromise affair. Nobody was satisfied. It dragged along in a spirit of suffering resignation—the Niobians quietly enduring the tasteless quality of the food, while the Confederation representatives, wearing unobtrusive nose plugs, suffered politely through the watered-down aroma and taste of the Niobian delicacies. All things being considered, it was moving along more smoothly than it had any right to, and if some moron on the kitchen staff hadn’t used tobasco sauce instead of catsup, we’d probably have signed the Agreement and gone on happily ever after.
“But it didn’t work out that way.
“Of course it wasn’t entirely the kitchen’s fault. There had to be some damn fool at the banquet who’d place the bomb where it would do some good. And of course I had to be it.” Lanceford grinned. “About the only thing I have to say in my defense is that I didn’t know it was loaded!”
Perkins looked at him expectantly as Lanceford paused. “Well, don’t stop there,” he said. “You’ve got me interested.”
Lanceford smiled good-naturedly and went on.
WE HELD the banquet in the central plaza of Base Alpha. It was the only roofed area on the planet large enough to hold the crowd of high brass that had assembled for the occasion. We don’t do things that way now, but fifty years ago we had a lot to learn. In those days, the admission of a humanoid planet into the Confederation was quite an event. The VIP’s thought that the native population should be aware of it.
I was sitting between Kron Avar and one of the high brass from the Bureau of Interstellar Trade, a fellow named Hartmann. I had no business being in that rarefied air, since Kron was one of the two First Councilors and Hartmann ranked me by a couple of thousand files on the promotion list. But I happened to be a friend of Kron’s, so protocol got stretched a bit in the name of friendship. He and I had been through a lot together when I was a junior explorer with the BEE some ten years before. We’d kept contact with each other ever since. We had both come up the ladder quite a ways, but a Planetary Director, by rights, belonged farther down the table. So there I was, the recipient of one of the places of honor and a lot of dirty looks.
Hartmann didn’t think much of being bumped one seat away from the top. He wasn’t used to associating with mere directors, and besides, I kept him from talking with Kron about trade relations. Kron was busy rehashing the old days when we were opening Niobe to viscayaculture. Trade didn’t interest him very much, and Hartmann interested him less. Niobians are never too cordial to strangers, and he had never seen the BIT man before this meeting.
Anyway, the talk got around to the time he introduced me to vorkum, a native dish that acts as a systemic insect repellant—and tastes like one! And right then I got the bright idea that nearly wrecked Niobe.
As I said, there was both Niobian and Confederation food at the banquet, so I figured that it was a good time as any to get revenge for what my dog-headed friend did to my stomach a good decade before.
So I introduced him to Terran cooking.
Niobians assimilate it all right, but their sense of taste isn’t the same as ours. Our best dishes are just mush to their palates, which are conditioned to sauces that would make the most confirmed spice lover on Earth run screaming for the water tap. They have a sense of the delicate, too, but it needs to be stimulated with something like liquid fire before they can appreciate it. For instance, Kron liked Earth peaches, but he spiced them with horseradish and red pepper.
I must admit that he was a good sport. He took the hors d’oeuvres in stride, swallowing such tasteless things as caviar, Roquefort and anchovy paste without so much as a grimace. Of course, I was taking an unfair advantage of Kron’s natural courtesy, but it didn’t bother me too much. He had rubbed that vorkum episode in for years. It was nice to watch him squirm.
WHEN I pressed him to try an oyster cocktail, I figured things had gone far enough.
He took it, of course, even though anyone who knew Niobians could see that he didn’t want any part of it. There was a pleading look in his eye that I couldn’t ignore. After all, Kron was a friend. I was actually about to stop him when he pulled an oyster from its red bath and popped it into his mouth. There was a ‘you’ll be sorry’ look on his face. I gestured to a waiter to remove the cocktail as he bit into the oyster, figuring, somewhat belatedly, that I had gone too far.
The grateful look I got from him was sufficient reward. But then it happened. Kron stopped looking grateful and literally snatched the cocktail back from the startled waiter!
He looked at me with an expression of disgust. “The first decent food thus far,” he said, “and you attempt to send it away!”
“Huh?” I exclaimed stupidly. “I didn’t want to make you miserable.”
“Miserable! Hah! This dish is wonderful! What in the name of my First Ancestor is it?” His pleased grin was enough like a snarl to make Hartmann cringe in his chair. Since Kron and I were both speaking Niobian rather than Confed, he didn’t understand what was happening. I suppose he thought that Kron was about to rip my throat out. It was a natural error, of course. You’ve seen a dog smile, and wondered what was going on behind the teeth? Well, Kron looked something like that. A Niobian with his dog-headed humanoid body is impressive under any conditions. When he sm
iles he can be downright frightening.
I winked at Hartmann. “Don’t worry, sir,” I said. “Everything’s all right.”
“It certainly is,” Kron said in Confed. “This dish is delicious. Incidentally, friend Lanceford, what is it? It tastes something like our Komal, but with a subtle difference of flavor that is indescribable!”
“It’s called an oyster cocktail, Kron,” I said.
“This is a product of your world we would enjoy!” Kron said. “Although the sauce is somewhat mild, the flavor of the meat is exquisite!” He closed his eyes, savoring the taste. “It would be somewhat better with vanka,” he said musingly. “Or perhaps with Kala berries.”
I shuddered. I had tried those sauces once. Once was enough! I could still feel the fire.
“I wonder if you could ship them to us,” Kron continued.
Hartmann’s ears pricked up at the word “ship.” It looked like an opening gambit for a fast sales talk on behalf of interstellar trade, a subject dear to his heart.
But I was puzzled. I couldn’t figure it out until I tried one of the oysters—after which I knew! Some fool had dished them up in straight tobasco sauce! It took some time before I could talk, what with trying to wash the fire out of my mouth, and during the conversational hiatus Hartmann picked up the ball where I dropped it. So I sat by and listened, my burned mouth being in no condition for use.
“I’M AFRAID that we couldn’t ship them,” Hartmann said. “At least not on a commercial basis. Interstellar freight costs are prohibitive where food is concerned.”
Kron nodded sadly. He passed the oysters to Tovan Harl, his fellow First Councilor. Harl went through the same reaction pattern Kron had shown.
“However,” Hartmann continued, “we could send you a few dozen. Perhaps you could start a small oyster farm.”
“Is this a plant?” Kron asked curiously.
“No, it’s a marine animal with a hard outer shell.”
“Just like our Komal. We could try planting some of them in our oceans. If they grow, we will be very obliged to you Terrans for giving us a new taste sensation.”