The Edmond Hamilton Megapack: 16 Classic Science Fiction Tales (10 page)

“What kind of a property?” asked Hyrst.

Vernon shrugged. “The Bellavers have never said what kind, for fairly obvious reasons.”

“Something to do with ships?”

“I suppose so. It isn’t important to me. Nor to you, Mr. Hyrst.”

“Will you pour me a drink?” said Hyrst, pointing to the cellaret close beside Vernon. “Yes, that’s fine. How long ago?”

“What?” asked Vernon, measuring whisky into a glass.

“The theft,” said Hyrst, and threw his mind suddenly against the barrier. For one fleeting second he forced a crack in it. “Something over fifty—”, said Vernon, and let the glass fall. He spun around from the cellaret and was halfway to his feet when Hyrst hit him. He hit him three or four times before he would stay down, and three or four more before he would lie quiet. Hyrst straightened up, breathing hard. His lip was bleeding and he wiped it with the back of his hand. “That was a little too big a job for
you
, Mr. Vernon,” he said viciously. “Trying to keep my mind blanked and under control for hours.” He stuffed a handkerchief into Vernon’s mouth, and tied him up with his own cummerbund, and shoved him out of sight behind an enormous bed. Then he opened the door carefully, and went out.

There was nobody in the corridor. This was wide and ornate, with doors opening off it, and nothing to show what was behind them or which way to go. Hyrst stood still a minute, getting control of himself. The barrier no longer obscured his mind. He let it rove, finding that every time he did that it was easier, and the images clearer. He heard Shearing again, as he had heard him in that one second when Vernon’s guard had faltered. His face became set and ugly. He began to move toward the stern of the
Happy Dream
.

Heavy metal-cloth curtains closed this end of the corridor. Beyond them was a ballroom in which only one dim light now burned, a vastness of black polished floors and crystal windows looking upon space. Hyrst’s footsteps were hushed and swallowed up in whispering echoes. He made his way across to another set of curtains, edged between them with infinite caution, and found himself in the upper aisle of an amphitheater.

It was pitch dark where he was, and he stood perfectly still, exploring with his mind. He could not see any guards. The rows of empty seats were arranged in circles around a central pit, large enough for any entertainment Mr. Bellaver might decide to give. The pit was brilliantly lighted, and from somewhere lower down came the intermittent sound of voices.

Also from the pit came Shearing’s cries. Hyrst began to tremble with outrage and anger, and his still-uncertain mental control faltered dangerously. Then from out of nowhere, a voice spoke in his mind, and he saw the face of the woman he had seen twice before, the woman Shearing served.

“Careful,” she said. “There is a Lazarite with Bellaver. His attention is all on Shearing, but you must keep your mind shielded. I’ll help you.”

Hyrst whispered. “Thanks.” He felt calm now, alert and capable. He crept along the dark aisle, toward the pit.

Mr. Bellaver’s theater lacked nothing. The large circular stage area was fitted with upper and lower electromagnets for the use of acrobats and dancers with null-grav specialties. They could perform without disturbing the regular grav-field of the
Happy Dream
, thus keeping the guests comfortable, and by skillful manipulation of the magnetic fields more spectacular stunts were possible than in ordinary no-gravity.

Shearing was in the pit, between the upper and lower magnets. He wore an acrobat’s metal attraction-harness, strapped on over his clothes. When Hyrst looked over the rail he was hanging at the central point of weightlessness, where everything in a man floats free and his senses are lost in a dreadful vertigo unless he has been conditioned over a long period of time to get used to it. Shearing had not been conditioned.

“Careful,” said the woman’s warning voice in his mind. “His life depends on you. No, don’t try to make contact with him! The Lazarite would sense you—”

Shearing began a slow ascension toward the upper magnet as the current was increased, from some unseen control board. He moved convulsively turning horizontally around the axis of his own middle like a toy spun on a string. His back was uppermost, and Hyrst could not see his face.

“Bellaver and the Lazarite,” said the woman quietly, “are trying to learn from Shearing where our ship is. He has been able so far to keep his mind shielded. He is—a very brave man. But you’ll have to hurry. He’s near the breaking point.”

Shearing was now almost level with Hyrst, suspended over that open pit, looking down, a long way.

“You’ll have to be quick, Hyrst. Please. Please get him out of there before we have to kill him.”

The current in the magnet was cut and Shearing fell, with a long neighing scream.

Hyrst looked down. The repelling force of the lower magnet cushioned the fall, and the upper magnet took hold, hard. Shearing stopped about three feet above the stage floor and started slowly to rise again. He seemed to be crying. Hyrst turned and ran back to the top of the aisle. Halfway around the circle he found steps and went tearing down them. On the next level—there were three—he saw two men leaning over the broad rail, watching Shearing.

“Yes, there they are. You must find a weapon—”

Hyrst looked around, blinking like a mole in the dark. Seats, nothing but seats. Ornamentation, but all solid. Small metal cylinder, set in a wall niche. Chemical extinguisher. Yes. Compact and heavy. He took it.

“Hurry. He’s almost through—”

The two men were tense and hungry, eager as wolves. One was the Lazarite, a grey man, old and seamed with living and none of it good. The other was Bellaver, and he was young. He was tall and fresh-faced, impeccably shaven, impeccably dressed, the keen, clean, public-spirited executive.

“I can give you more if you want it, Shearing,” Bellaver said, his fingers ready on a control-plate set into the broad rail. “How about it?”

“Shut up, Bellaver,” whispered the Lazarite aloud. “I’ve almost got it. Almost—” His face was agonized with concentration.

“
Now!
”

The woman’s voiceless cry in his mind sent Hyrst forward. His hand swung up and then down in a crashing arc, elongated by the heavy cylinder. The Lazarite fell without a sound. He fell across Bellaver, pushing him back from the control-plate, and lay over his feet, bleeding gently into the thick pile of the carpet. Bellaver’s mouth and eyes opened wide. He looked at the Lazarite and then at Hyrst. He leaped backward, away from the encumbrance at his ankles, making the first hoarse effort at a shout for help. Hyrst did not give him time to finish it. The first row of seats caught Bellaver and threw him, and Hyrst swung the cylinder again. Bellaver collapsed.

“Was I in time?” Hyrst asked of the woman, in his mind. He thought she was crying when she answered, “Yes.” He smiled. He stepped over the Lazarite and went to the control-plate and began to work with it until he had Shearing safely on the floor of the stage. Then he cut the power and ran down another flight of steps to the bottom level. His mind was able to range free now. He could not sense anyone close at hand. Bellaver seemed to have sent underlings elsewhere in the
Happy Dream
while he worked on Shearing. It was nothing for which a man would seek witnesses. Hyrst vaulted the rail onto the stage and dragged Shearing away from the magnet. He felt uncomfortable in all that glare of light. He hauled and grunted until he got Shearing over the rail into the dark. Then he wrestled the harness off him. Shearing sobbed feebly, and retched.

“Can you stand up?” said Hyrst. “Hey. Shearing.” He shook him, hard. “Stand up.”

He got Shearing up, a one-hundred-and-ninety pound rag doll draped over his shoulders. He began to walk him out of the theater. “Are you still there?” he asked of the woman.

The answer came into his mind swiftly. “Yes. I’ll help you watch. Do you see where the skiff is?”

It was in a pod under the belly of the
Happy Dream
. “I see it,” said Hyrst.

“Take that. Bellaver’s yacht is faster, but you’d need the crew. The skiff you can handle yourself.”

He walked Shearing into a fore-and-aft corridor. Shearing’s feet were beginning to move of their own accord, and he had stopped retching. But his eyes were still blank and he staggered aimlessly. Hyrst’s nerves were prickling with a mixture of fierce satisfaction and fear. Far above in the lush suite he felt Vernon stir and come to. There were men somewhere closer, quite close. He forced his mind to see. Two of the very accurate men who had been with Vernon were playing cards with two others who were apparently stewards. The third one lolled in a chair, smoking. All five were in a lounge just around the corner of a transverse corridor. The door was open.

Without realizing that he had done so, Hyrst took control of Shearing’s mind. “Steady, now. We’re going past that corner without a sound. You hear me, Shearing? Not a sound.”

Shearing’s eyes flickered vaguely. He frowned, and his step became steadier. The floor of the corridor was covered in a tough resilient plastic that deadened footsteps. They passed the corner. The men continued to play cards. Hyrst sent up a derisive insult to Vernon and told Shearing to hurry a little. The stair leading down into the pod was just ahead, ten yards, five—

A man appeared in the corridor ahead, coming from some storeroom with a rack of plastic bottles in his hand.

“You’ll have to run now,” came the woman’s thought, coolly. “Don’t panic. You can still make it.”

The man with the bottles yelled. He began to run toward Hyrst and Shearing, dropping the rack to leave his hands free. In the loungeroom behind them the card-party broke up. Hyrst took Shearing by the arm and clamped down even tighter on his mind, giving him a single command. They ran together, fast.

The men from the lounge poured out into the main corridor. Their voices were confused and very loud. Ahead, the man who had been bringing the bottles was now between Hyrst and the stair. He was a brown, hard man who looked like a pilot. He said, “You better stop,” and then he grappled with Hyrst and Shearing. The three of them spun around in a clumsy dance, Shearing moving like an automaton. Hyrst and the pilot flailing away with their fists, and then the pilot fell back hard on the seat of his pants, with the blood bursting out of his nose and his eyes glazing. Hyrst raced for the stair, propelling Shearing. They tumbled down it with a shot from a bee-gun buzzing over their heads. It was a short stair with a double-hatch door at the bottom. They fell through it, and Hyrst slammed it shut almost on the toes of a man coming down the stair behind them. The automatic lock took hold. Hyrst told Shearing, “You can stop now.”

A few minutes later, from the great swag belly of the
Happy Dream
, a small space-skiff shot away and was quickly lost in the star-shot immensity above the Belt.

CHAPTER IV

It did not stay lost for long. Shearing was at the controls. The chronometer showed fourteen hours and twenty-seven minutes since they left the
Happy Dream
. Shearing had spent eight of those hours in a species of comatose slumber, from which he had roused out practically normal. Now Hyrst was heavily asleep in the pneumo-chair beside him.

Shearing punched him. “Wake up.”

After several more punches Hyrst groaned and opened his eyes. He mumbled a question, and Shearing pointed out the wide curved port that gave full vision forward and on both sides.

“It was a good try,” he said, “but I don’t think we’re going to make it. Look there. No, farther back. See it? Now the other side. And there’s one astern.”

Still sleepy, but alarmed, Hyrst swung his mental vision around. It was easier than looking. Two fast, powerful tugs from the
Happy Dream
, and Bellaver’s yacht. He frowned in heavy concentration. “Bellaver’s aboard. He’s got a mighty goose-egg on his head. Vernon too, with his shields up tight. The three accurate men and the pilot—his nose is a thing of beauty—plus crew. Nine in all. Two men each to the tugs. The other Lazarite, the one I laid out—he’s not along.”

Shearing nodded approvingly. “You’re getting good. Now take a glance at our fuel-tanks and tell me what you see.”

Hyrst sat up straight, fully awake. “Practically,” he said, “nothing.”

“This skiff was meant for short hops only. We’ve got enough for perhaps another forty-five minutes, less if we get too involved. They’re faster than we are, so they’ll catch up to us—oh, say in about half an hour. We have friends coming—”

“Friends?”

“Certainly. You don’t think we let each other down, do you? Not the brotherhood. But they had to come from a long way off. We can’t possibly rendezvous under an hour and a half, maybe more if—”

“I know,” said Hyrst. “If we all get involved.” He looked out the port. In the beginning, following directions from the young woman—whose name he had never thought to ask—he had set a course that plunged him deep into one of the wildest sectors of the Belt. He was not a pilot. He could, like most men of his time, handle a simple craft under simple conditions, but these conditions were not simple. The skiff’s radar was short-range and it had no automatic deflection reflexes. Hyrst had had to fly on ESP, spotting meteor swarms, asteroids, debris of all sorts in this poetically named hell-hole, the Path of Minor Worlds, and then figuring out how to get by, through, or over them without a crash. Shearing had relieved him just in time.