Tom Swift in the Race to the Moon (8 page)

Tom nodded. "Yes, I am. Of course—"

"What, pal?"

"I could be wrong!"

After a time the young inventor went up to the lounge, where Faber and Glennon were discussing their findings. "Now I have a bit more optimism, Tom," said Dr. Faber. "However these animals may appear superficially, to earthly eyes, there is reason to think their basic structure will be at least somewhat responsive to conventional techniques."

"Aye, indeed so, yes!" agreed Glennon with hearty enthusiasm. "But unlike Anton I was never less than enthusiastic. Was I? Well, lad, I’ve repented."

Back at Enterprises Tom headed for Harlan Ames’s office made a detailed report of his contact with Streffan Mirov. "If you Swifts didn’t have a few friends in high places, this sort of extracurricular communication could get us all in a lot of hot water," Ames observed. "But it seems they’re willing to tolerate a bit of it—the eccentricities of genius."

"Good to know my ‘eccentric’ act is paying off!" Tom laughed.

Tom spent the balance of the day working with Hank Sterling to iron out some final minor problems with the space repelatron system. Finally he pronounced himself satisfied. "I’m ready to give the go-ahead to have the modified versions turned out and hooked-up to the frame of the ship."

Sterling grinned with enthusiasm. "At last! And it shouldn’t take long, either."

"We’ll give the spaceship as a whole unit a test flight," Tom said. "Then it’s off to the moon!"

Hank left. As Tom also prepared to leave and was reaching for the light switch, he paused, looking at his compact computer setup.
I really should make some entries in my electronic journal,
he thought.
But I’m beat—I’ll make up for it tomorrow!

That night, after dinner, Tom was relaxing in the living room reading when the house telephone rang. He heard Sandy say hello; then after a moment of silence came the click of a hangup.

"Who was it, San?" Tom called out.

"No one there," his sister replied. "Wrong number, I guess."

But not a minute later the same thing happened. This time Tom scooped up the receiver, but was met only with dead air. He checked the caller identification panel—unidentified.

The incidents seemed to stick in Tom’s mind. Finally, acting on a hunch, he went into the small room next to the laundry room that he had made into a workshop. He switched on the computer that sat on the workbench and accessed the server that held his electronic journal. He typed the day’s date, then waited. Suddenly, just as he had hoped, two words unreeled across the screen just below his own entry.

GOOD THINKING

"Call it scientific intuition,"
Tom typed.
"Do you have something to tell me?"

LATEST HOT TIPS
FROM YOUR FRIENDS AT COLLECTIONS

Several times now Tom had been contacted in this mysterious manner by a secret US government agency known only as "Collections"—a joke based on their catchphrase "You tax dollars at work." They did not involve themselves in every Swift project, not even on occasions of great danger, but seemed to reserve their efforts to cases involving space exploration and certain international espionage groups.

SO YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT DIANA EH

Tom knew the secretive "Taxman" was referring to the Brungarian
Dyaune
project.
"Is she alive?"

AND KICKING
LAUNCHES IN FIVE DAYS
YOU CAN BEAT HER TOM

"I hope so,"
he typed.
"What can you tell us about our enemies?"

THE SENTIMENTALISTS
FOOLISH OLD MEN
FREEDOM MAKES THEM NERVOUS
WANT THOSE SPACE GERMS
BAD NEWS IF THEY GET THERE FIRST

Tom was not surprised to learn that Collections knew about the capsule of diseased animals.
"Since you know everything, how about a tip on the cure?"

YOURE DREAMIN KID
ITS UP TO YOU
YOU ECCENTRIC GENIUS YOU
BUT WE DO HAVE AN IN
COUNTERSPY PLANTED AMONG THEM
JOSEF WARTURO
MAY SUSPECT HIM THOUGH
KEEPING EYE ON HIM
EXPECT CONTACT
CHERRY TREES NEED PRUNING

Tom could not imagine what that last phrase might mean, and wrote it off to his communicator’s odd sense of humor.
"When will we hear from him?"
was Tom’s next message.

NOT WE
JUST YOU
GOT TO GO NOW
YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK

"Thanks!"

JUST THROW MONEY

As his family had already retired for the evening, Tom went up to his room. Though the interchange of message with the Taxman had been cordial, even humorous, he remained upset and worried. If he failed to win this race—but he would not think of
that.
When he went to bed, Tom tossed restlessly for hours before he finally fell asleep.

Somewhat later he was awakened by a slight noise. Opening his eyes, he turned silently in bed. A stealthy figure, silhouetted in the moonlight, was climbing in through his open bedroom window!

SCARCELY daring to draw a breath, Tom closed his eyes to mere slits, twisting under the blankets and tensing his strong young muscles. He waited until the intruder was well inside the room. Then, in a flash, he leapt out of bed and grabbed the prowler in a tight armlock!

Taken by surprise, the man floundered wildly. Grappling and swinging, he managed to butt Torn in the stomach and they tumbled to the floor in a heap.

As Tom tightened his grip, the man hissed, "I’m Warturo! The one you were told about! But don’t get up yet or turn on the light. I’m being watched!"

Torn was amazed. He did not know whether to believe his midnight visitor or not. Was it just a trick?

"It’s the truth!" the man gasped. "You’ve got to believe me, Swift!"

Tom stopped struggling and loosened his wrestling hold just enough to let the man speak more freely. "All right, keep talking," he said in a grim whisper.

"I think I’m suspected," the man explained, "because someone planted a secret transmitter in the midget digital recorder I have with me. I found the transmitter turned on. But," he added quickly, "I turned it off."

"But why come here if you’re being watched?" Tom demanded.

"I was ordered to," was the whispered reply. "I’m supposed to threaten you with a gun and force information out of you—when your spaceship launches, that kind of thing. Details about how to convince the space guys that we’re you. Get it? Then I’m to hold this under your nose"—he managed to extract a small vial from his pocket—"and put you to sleep.’’

Tom’s heart pounded nervously, his thoughts racing. Was this a madman, a spy, a counterspy, or what? Could he be the real Josef Warturo? A man whose existence Tom had not known about until a mere few hours before?

Stalling for time and still suspicious, Tom asked, "How did you get past our alarm system?"

The entire Swift house and grounds were surrounded by a controlled magnetic field. Any person entering the field automatically touched off an alarm inside the house, unless he carried a deactivator mechanism.

"Better upgrade your system, kid—those magnetic nullifier coils are in circulation on the espionage market. Got one in my watch, just like you do," the man explained.

Still Tom was not completely convinced. There was too much at stake to risk falling victim to a clever impostor. Then a thought occurred to him. "Are you a gardener, Warturo?" he demanded.

"Thought you’d never ask!" the man answered promptly. "Sure am—cherry trees my passion. Mine needs pruning."

Tom let out a faint sigh of relief. Only Josef Warturo would have known enough to identify himself with the extra remark provided Tom by the Taxman.

"Okay," Tom murmured, releasing the other from his wiry grip. "Sorry if I handled you a bit roughly."

Warturo heaved himself tip on one elbow and mopped his forehead. "I don’t blame you," he muttered. "In this game, it doesn’t pay to take chances!"

"Anything you can tell me?" Tom asked.

"Plenty," Warturo replied. "But quickly! The Brungarian faction is ready to launch in their ship, called the
Dyaune-1,
some sort of real high-tech advanced job. They have a base in the Ahaggar Mountains in the Sahara—don’t expect any help from the host country in shutting it down. Their goal is to make a big propaganda coup by capturing the alien rocket and bringing it back to Brungaria, to use as a bargaining chip with the legal government and maybe set off another revolution, this time in their favor. Naturally they’re not concerned with helping your space friends."

"I figured as much," Tom gritted.

"The man in charge of the operation is named Nattan Volj," Warturo went on, "A bigshot in COSMOSA who’s been secretly meeting with the Sentimentalists. He’ll be leading the expedition. Swift, he’s ruthless!"

Tom’s throat tightened as he realized the deadly weapon the space disease might prove to be in the hands of such an enemy.

Warturo drew out a tiny pocket transmitter. "I don’t dare leave this off any longer. They’re testing me—it could mean my life. We’ll stand up in plain sight of the window. I’ll be covering you with my gun, as though I’ve just managed to subdue you after a struggle. Then I’ll start pumping you for secret information. Make your answers sound good."

"Okay. Do your immediate bosses know anything about science?"

"Very little," Warturo answered.

"I’m sure," said Tom, "that the reason you were sent here was to test your loyalty, not to get any secrets from me. I’ll cover up for you with something that sounds like it makes sense."

Warturo flicked on the micro-transmitter and slipped it back into his pocket. He and Tom got to their feet, with Warturo holding his gun in the young inventor’s ribs.

"Okay, Swift," he snarled. "Now give me the answers!"

"Wh-what do you want to know?" Tom replied in a husky, frightened tone.

"That new spaceship of yours—how does it work?"

"I’ve developed a new meson-dyxon engine, working on a system of pion propulsion. The power transmission depends upon a reflex baffle chamber."

"Have you tested the ship?" Warturo went on.

Torn pretended to hesitate. "N-no—not exactly. You see, it’s not really perfected yet."

"Come on, quit stalling!" Warturo growled. "We know different, so tell the truth."

"All right, I—I admit we’ve flown it once or twice. But not beyond the atmosphere. Some bugs showed up.

"Like for instance?"

"Well, the neutrons are charged in the high velocity plasma and can’t be held back." Tom faltered. ‘‘I souped it up with a small hydrogen reactor, but the fusion got out of control and overdrove the tweeter. So now I am trying to fix it by adding a thermo-emetic quasartron and a cathode follower. We should be ready for space in about a month if all goes well."

As Tom continued, be could hardly stifle his mirth and keep a straight face. Finally Warturo pretended to be satisfied. "Okay. Now inhale this, you lowbrow egghead!" he ordered, thrusting the vial under Tom’s nose.

Tom pretended to be overcome by the drug. He swayed and staggered forward, then collapsed limply to the floor. As he lay there, quaking with silent mirth, Warturo crawled out the window. He climbed down a light, collapsible metal ladder which he had placed against the side of the house.

Tom waited for several moments, then cautiously pulled himself to his feet, out of range of the window. He stood behind the drapes, well out of the moonlight so as not to be visible, and peered out.

A man was standing on the roadway, beyond the hedge which bordered the wide grounds of the Swifts’ residence. He was Warturo. His back was turned to the house, as though he were waiting to be picked up.

Suddenly a car roared into view. Instead of slowing down, it sped past, striking Warturo with its right fender, and knocking him to the side of the road! It roared off.

Tom was horrified. His first inclination was to dash out of the house and help the unconscious counterspy, who lay without moving, perhaps seriously injured.

"But I’d better not," Tom decided as another thought struck him. This might be a trick of the faction to find out which side Warturo was on! The Brungarians were certainly ruthless enough to use such tactics. It was possible that the occupants of the car were watching even now from some vantage point farther down the road. If Torn appeared, Warturo’s life might be at stake!

Tom hesitated in fearful uncertainty. What should he do?

Suddenly he remembered that a bachelor dinner had been planned that evening for an Enterprises employee named Dick Hampton, who was about to be married. The party was being held at the Stacy Hotel downtown.

Tom glanced at his watch. "Maybe I can get Dick to help me!" he said to himself, and grabbed his bedside phone. He dialed the hotel’s number. Fortunately, the party was just ending.

"What’s up?" Dick asked when he heard who was calling.

"Will you do me a favor?" Tom said. "It’s urgent!"

"Sure. Just name it."

"There’s no time to explain, but please drive past my house—pronto! If you see an injured man lying alongside the road, act surprised. Get out and help him. Whisper to him I sent you, and if he has any message, call me back as soon as possible!"

Though puzzled, Dick promised to comply.

Tom was watching anxiously from his bedroom window. Ten minutes later he saw the lights of an oncoming car. As it slowed to a halt near the Swifts’ driveway, he recognized Dick’s hardtop coupe.

The driver sprang out and bent over the prostrate figure which lay sprawled in the glare of his headlights. Dick picked up the unconscious counterspy in his arms, lugged him back to the car, and drove away.

Tom waited tensely. Minutes later, the phone rang. Tom scooped up the receiver. Dick Hampton was calling from the hospital.

"The man’s okay," Dick reported. "Just shaken up. He said to tell you he’s glad you figured out the ruse and didn’t fall for it. Said he’d be back on the job soon, and you’d understand what he meant."

"I do, Dick. And thanks a million. Tell you later what it’s all about."