Manly Wade Wellman - Novel 1959 (14 page)

 
          
"Why
. . ."

           
"Hold it, Mr. Darragh!"
Sam Criddle was breaking in on his own part. "Let Orrin finish what he's
saying, or we'll get nowhere."

 
          
Darragh
fell silent. Again Lyle faced the gathering.

           
"First, he would fail in whatever
scheme he tried," he went on, "and that would cause the Owners to be
doubly strict at guarding us and fencing us in, doubly sure in making us doubly
far off from liberty. Second, by giving this information against him as I have,
I succeed in convincing the Owners that the rest of us are mild and content to
be here in this community. They will come in and remove him. Then they will
trust us as never before." He spread his hands in an eloquent gesture of
appeal to reason. "I want to ask you, and each of you, to decide whether
this isn't sufficient explanation, whether this isn't good logic and good
method. That's all."

 
          
He
stepped back, as though to put an end to the discussion. The group of people
seemed almost on the point of breaking up and dispersing. But Darragh flung up
his two long arms.

 
          
"Hold
on, every single one of you," he shouted. "Orrin Lyle seems to have
finished, and I let him finish. Now let me say my last word!"

 
          
Quick
as thought, he shot out his big hand and closed it on the shoulder of Orrin
Lyle. The smaller man started and tried to pull himself away, but Darragh's
fingers dug into his flesh and drew him close. Darragh gave Lyle a vigorous
shake, that
jolted the struggle out of him for the moment.
The onlookers had drawn back together, wide-eyed with amazement.

 
          
Darragh
knew that he would have brief seconds of that attention he had so violently and
melodramatically claimed. Again he shook Orrin, for emphasis.

 
          
"Let
me tell you the facts about this sneak who calls himself the boss of your community!"
he trumpeted. "He communicates with those jailers of yours; he admits that
he's a snitch."

 
          
"I
told why I did it," Lyle sputtered.

           
"He snitched on me,"
Darragh went on, "and hell snitch on any one of you who does something
that may not suit his royal high mightiness!"

 
          
"I—I
was acting for the best," Lyle tried to say as he struggled. His calm
semity and disdain had left him. "Listenl" he cried out. "Unless
we can gain time and knowledge to build ourselves a ship, leam to fly it, well
never escape!"

 
          
"A ship to escape in!"
Darragh took up the words.
"I'm coming to that, my friends. We don't need to
build
one and learn about it. Our ship's going to be here before we
know itl"

 
          
"M-Mark,"
Brenda stammered, "the only ship that's coming will take you away . .
."

 
          
"It
will take us all away," cried Darragh. "I know it's coming for
me—but we're going to capture it as it lands!"

 
          
"How
.. .
" began Criddle.

           
"How will we fly it?"
Darragh finished the question for him. "I can fly their ships. I told you
that, Criddle. I'm going to get you all out of here, every one of you, this
very hour!"

 
          
And
his audacious bid for attention and approval was succeeding. Criddle and one or
two shouted enthusiastically. Darragh thanked heaven for making him stronger
than Lyle, enough stronger to subdue his accuser physically. Others were crying
out in favor of Darragh, who decided to clinch matters by thrusting Orrin down
from the porch.

 
          
"Take
charge of this traitor, some of you," he directed, and two of the biggest
men obeyed, almost automatically. They caught Lyle by the arms and held him
tight.

 
          
"Now,
then," sent on Darragh, "we've got to move fast. We have a trap to
set."

 
          
Brenda
had come to his elbow, still lugging her books.

           
"Mark," she whispered,
"you're wonderful. You've simply overpowered everybody."

 
          
"You
turned the trick when you came out and spoke for me," he told her.
"It was just the right thing at the right time."

 
          
"But
how are you going to do this thing?"

           
"How am I going to do it?"
he
echoed,
his voice loud again for all to hear.
"Listen, those Cold Creatures aren't going to expect any trouble, only
what I may cause. They spotted me in your cottage, Brenda; they'll come there
for me." He addressed his new allies. "Do you people have any ropes?
Bring me the longest, strongest ropes you can find."

 
          
Several
of them hurried away to do his bidding. Darragh spared only the briefest of
glances, to make sure that Lyle's captors were leading him away. He saw them
conducting their captive to one of the cottages—Criddle's cottage, evidently,
because Criddle was going along. Then he rushed into the room where he and
Brenda had sat, talked of love and rebellion, and come to decisions.

 
          
He
looked at the view-panel first. No Cold Creatures idled there. He snatched up
his leather clothing from the floor.

 
          
"What's
the plan, Mark?" asked Brenda, following him in.

           
"Bring me something to stuff
these clothes with," he said. "Put the books down on the table. Bring
anything. Bedclothes will do."

 
          
"Why?"
she asked, but did not wait to hear. She fairly flew into another room, and
came back carrying a pillow and some sheets. He took them from her, and quickly
padded the empty suit into the semblance of a human body.

 
          
"I
don't understand," Brenda was saying.

           
"I hope the Cold People won't,
either," he returned, and drew his dummy upright against the central pole
that supported the roof. "Now, you told me that your roofing is mighty
heavy—would collapse without this support."

 
          
"Yes,
but. . ."

           
"Well fill
the
buts
in later."

           
With a napkin he tied the dummy to
the pole, then drew its arms aloft and put the gloves on them. He caught up his
knife from the table where it had lain, and spiked the arms in place. Finally
he arranged the hood as though a head was inside, and stepped back to make a
survey. He smiled and nodded in triumph. Thus posed, the stuffed garment was
amazingly lifelike,

 
          
"There
I am, Brenda," he announced, pointing. "Standing there, in a pose of
surrender—the Cold People understood what hands up meant when your folks
surrendered to them fifty years ago." He moved back. "Yes. It's a
good likeness of me, don't you think? Now, what about those ropes I asked
for?"

 
          
He
strode back out on the porch. Half a dozen men were making haste toward him,
holding out coils of line. Quickly he chose the two strongest pieces, and
doubled them for extra strength. Back into the cottage he went.

 
          
"Do
you have a window at the side of the cottage?" he asked Brenda. She
pointed.

           
"There is? Good." He went
to it. "Here, you men out there, take one end of this doubled line."

 
          
They
did so. He took the other end to the supporting pole and knotted it securely at
the bottom.

 
          
"Where's
that other cord, Brenda?"

           
She gave it to him, and he stood on
tiptoe to loop it around the top of the timber and fasten it tightly with' a
square knot. He carried the free end to the front window and threw it out into
the open. Then he and Brenda walked onto the porch.

 
          
Men
and women waited there, eagerly ready for any of Darragh's orders. He walked in
among them, choosing one after another of the strongest men until he had eight.
Criddle came out of his own cottage and toward Darragh.

 
          
"We've
got Lyle cooped up, close against the back wall where he'll be hard to spot
from a view-window," he reported. "What's your scheme now?"

 
          
"Let
me divide this tug-of-war team I've picked," replied Darragh. "You
four, stand by the side window and take hold of the rope that comes out. The
other four take charge of the rope through the front window."

 
          
"I
get you, boss," said one of the men briskly. "What next?"

 
          
"I
want everybody else to stand around and be nonchalant, make a screen so that
the two rope gangs won't be spotted. Act as if you're just having a gabfest.
That's it—some of you at the side and some at the front, but leave the way to
the door open. Don't obstruct any Cold Creatures when they go waddling
in."

 
          
"But
what's your scheme?" asked Criddle again.

           
"
Ill
explain
. Come here
beside me, Brenda. I see you've got those books. Now, everybody,
attentionl"

 
          
Faces
turned to him on all sides.

           
"That ship that Orrin Lyle sent
for will come in and
land,
and a posse of Cold
Creatures will get out and head into Brenda's parlor after me. That's why I
made a dummy in there for them to head for. Once they're inside, I'll yell for
you to pull. Both teams drag on those ropes, quick and hard. One rope will drag
the top of the timber one
way,
the other rope will
drag the bottom of it the other way. And down will
come
the roof on them. Understand?"

           
"Sure," said Criddle.
"But they'll leave guards outside here, with their ship."

 
          
"We'll
tackle those," said Darragh, "and kill them. Don't stick your eyes
out at me—Cold Creatures can be knocked over. I've been doing it myself."

 
          
They tbied
to raise another cheer for
Darragh then, but he flourished his arms for silence. "Friends, I
appreciate it, but let's
be
nonchalant. When we've
grabbed their ship and sail out of here, I'll lead the cheers myself. But just
now . . ."

           
"Here it comes!"
squalled
a woman.

 
          
A
great shadow had fallen across the court, a shadow that grew and darkened.
Darragh glanced up. An oval ship was lowering
itself
from above, and it looked like a big one. He glanced around. The villagers, bom
and bred in captivity and subjugation, cowered like chickens when a hawk swoops
down. Only Brenda stood up straight. Her eyes were on Darragh, happy and
trusting.

 
          
"Chins
up, all of you!" Darragh rasped out. "Take your places and hang onto
the ropes. Brenda, come with me. We'll watch from that cottage just opposite to
yours."

 
          
There
was an obedient scramble of the rope-handlers into position. Darragh caught
Brenda's hand and hustled her across the court and into another cottage. They
peered cautiously out as the ship settled down upon the central turf.

 
          
It
was fifty feet long, Darragh judged, and perhaps thirty at its largest width.
He nodded at Brenda, and patted her shoulder.

 
          
"That's
big enough to hold everybody," he whispered.

           
"You sound as if we'd already
captured it," she said.

           
"Do I? Well, maybe I'm counting
my chickens before I've got a rooster, but I think we're going to win."

 
          
A
hatchway swung open. A Cold Creature shuffled out.
Then
another and another.
There were six of them in all. He saw that they
wore their gleaming transparent armor-film, and all of them bore ray-weapons
ready in their tentacles.

 
          
They
paused together, gesturing snakily as though in consultation. Then one moved
to the nose of the ship and stopped there, like a guard. The other five, formed
into a close, cautious patrol, humped their way confidentiy toward Brenda's
cottage.

 
          
They
seemed to take forever to move those few yards. As they approached, the men and
women nearest them seemed to shrink away. That was habit, reflected Darragh,
but just now it was a good move. It made the community look
submissive,
awed. Again a pause, while the creatures seemed to study the interior of the
cottage through the open door. Quite evidently they were aware of the leather
decoy Darragh had set up inside, its arms aloft in token of surrender.

 
          
Again
the party moved to the doorstep. There, one Cold Creature moved aside, standing
like a sentry. The other four heayed themselves up on the porch, and moved one
by one into the parlor.

 
          
Even
as the last of them moved over the threshold and inside, there was a cry and a
flurry at Criddle's cottage. Out sprang Orrin Lyle, and behind him his two
guards. Somehow he had broken away. He raced toward the guard at Brenda's door,
his hands moving in swift signals as though he tried to warn his allies.

 
          
"Pull!"
roared Darragh at the top of his lungs, and himself rushed forth and at the
guard left by the ship.

 
          
A
dozen great hopping strides brought him across the intervening space before
the thing could be aware of him. From behind he struck, and swiftly. Before the
guard was aware of his presence and attack, Darragh had clutched its
ray-thrower with both his hands and struggled to possess himself of it.

 
          
At
the same instant, his ears rang with a crash like thunder. The two quartets of
big men, heaving on their ropes, had torn that supporting pole free inside, and
the roof had fallen with a mighty boom and clatter of tiles. Darragh, wrestling
for the ray-weapon, laughed aloud—those four Cold Creatures inside must have
been squashed like chipmunks in a deadfall.

 
          
He
spared a single glance, to see Lyle run up to the one that had remained
outside. That being levelled its own ray-gun. Out gushed cold white fire at
Lyle, and he burst into a cloud of foul vapor that thinned away everywhere.
Then the rest of the men and women had rushed in from both sides and over the
creature like a vengeful wave over a rock.

 
          
After
that, Darragh was too busy to watch or listen. The Cold Creature he had grappled
was too heavy, had- too many tentacles. He could not wrench its weapon away or
bowl it over. Desperately it hunched along toward the open hatch of the ship,
dragging him with it. It wanted to get away, signal or bring others.

 
          
"You
aren't going anywhere," Darragh vowed through clenched teeth, and suddenly
let go the ray-thrower. With both hands he clutched at the thing's armor,
gathered two great fistfuls of the fabric. Up he brought a foot, braced it
against the rubbery hulk, and flung his weight backward, tugging with every
ounce of strength he could summon.

 
          
The
tough, flexible substance held for a black half-moment of despair, and he
wondered if he could rend it. Then, abruptly, he was falling back full-length
upon the grass, his hands still clamped full of the armor fabric.

 
          
He
had rent its insulated protection open. His adversary, exposed to the instantiy
deadly summer temperature, quivered and swelled—and slackly subsided.

 
          
Darragh
struggled to his feet. His head spun with the straining effort he had made, his
limbs trembled with the accumulated weariness of all his endeavors, but he was
smiling. Brenda, half cheering and half weeping, had come to his side. Still
she hugged her precious books against her bosom.

 
          
"Mark,
we've won!" she exulted.

           
And they had won.

           
Through and over the ruins of
Brenda's cottage the victorious captive humans swarmed like warrior ants,
stamping and clubbing the bulks that feebly twitched there under the weight of
tiles and planks. Criddle looked toward the ship, wagged his gray head, and
hurried toward Darragh and and Brenda. His hands were laden with ray-weapons
taken from the conquered Cold Creatures.

 
          
"Look
what we took away from them!" he roared in a fury of proud happiness.

 
          
"Good,"
said Darragh. "We're going to use those things. I want samples of their
insulated armor, too. Did anyone get killed beside Lyle?"

 
          
"Three
did.
Two women and a man."

           
"Oh!" said Brenda
miserably. "That's terrible."

           
"Terrible," agreed
Darragh, "but the rest of us lived through it, and we'd better get out of
here."

 
          
"When?"
demanded Criddle.

           
"Right now,
this moment."
Darragh raised his voice. "Give me your
attention! We're going to leave inside of one hundred and twenty seconds. Run
to your homes and pick up tools, books,
a littie food—enough
for a day's rations. Understand?
On the jump, now!"

 
          
They
dashed away obediently in every direction, storming into their houses and out
again. They gathered at the ship, variously laden. At Darragh's orders they
made a double file. Into the ship they marched, like children at
a
fire drill.

 
          
"Don't
touch anything," Darragh warned as he followed them in. The cabin was not
too crowded, he thought. Brenda waited for him just inside.

 
          
"Mark,
has anybody ever explained to you how wonderful you are?" she gasped at
him. "I could kiss you a thousand times."

 
          
"You'll
kiss me a hundred thousand times when we get a litde bit of leisure," he
told her, and slammed the hatch shut. Its automatic fastenings clamped
resoundingly.

 
          
Then
he found himself suddenly nervous, daunted. He, who had spoken so confidentiy
of flying the aircraft of the Cold People, who had extended his blazing
confidence to all these others so that they had risen and overthrown a party of
the monsters that had jailed them, found he had a breath's space in which to
remember that he had guided but that one small ship. Yes, and he had done that
without landing or faking off. But now, all eyes were upon him, expectant,
trustful. And the eyes of Brenda Thompson glowed with love and rapt assurance.
Darragh stepped to the control assembly, took hold of the bead on the upright
arm, and drew it high.

 
          
There
was a sharp hum, a swish.

           
And they were far, far up into the
blue sky.

           
Rising perpendicularly as though
snatched up by
a
cosmic fishing
line, the craft had negotiated that chimneylike tube without mishap.
Luck, butt luck,
Darragh told
himself
,
it must be
that there's Something somewhere rooting for me.
And they were soaring
upward as though falling into space. He carefully lowered the up-bead,
flattened out the course, and advanced the forward bead. A glance out of the
viewport gave him his bearings, high above a smudgy-seeming landscape on which
the dome shelter made a litde half-egg of substance beside a lake like a sheet
of greeny-silver plastic. Fiddling with the beads, he managed a great turning
sweep to southward.

 
          
"They're
coming out after us," Criddle yelled, looking from another port.

 
          
"But
we've got a head start," grunted Darragh, and again moved the forward
bead. He felt the whole fabric of the ship buzz as it gathered' speed, and
pushed the bead out until they seemed to snap through the upper air.

 
          
Already
the dome from which they had fled was out of sight. The craft that had risen
from hatchways to pursue were specks afar on their backward trail.

 
          
"They
won't catch us," said Darragh—to himself as much as to anybody. "Sit
down, folks. Relax. We're going home down south. Isn't there a song about that,
or wasn't there one in the old free days?"

 
          
"How about the new free days?"
Criddle asked him.
"Listen here, Captain—Commander, whatever we're to call you

 
          
"Try
my name," invited Darragh. "It's Mark." He looked at Brenda
beside him, grimaced and winked. She winked back.

 
          
"I'm
just beginning to feel free," Criddle was saying. "I don't know how
to describe freedom, but it's—well, there's a sort of loose, easy feeling about
it."

 
          
The
others all began to jabber at once. Brenda leaned close to make herself heard.

 
          
"They
won't catch us,
that's
true," she said.
"Where away now?"

 
          
"Down south, fust as I told Criddle.
Down to the
headquarters of the army of reconquest, that sent me up here."

 
          
"Are
there any more men like you down there, Mark?"

           
He winked at her again. "Why?
Looking for someone to trade me in on? Sure there are more like me.
Thousands.
I'm run of the mill down on the Orinoco."

 
          
"You're
not run of the mill here," said Criddle behind them. "You're boss of
the bunch here."

 
          
"That's
right," nodded Brenda.
"Boss of the bunch."

           
He took one hand from the controls
and put his arm around her.
"How about you?
Am I
boss
of you?"