Chapter Five
Blanchard's
white hands fluttered in the night gesticulating before the face of the tramp
rocket-ship captain. Now they threatened, now they pleaded, now they rubbed
thumb against fingers in the money sign, but whatever they did the hard-bitten
old master of the spaceship remained adamant.
Dart
squirmed and wriggled nervously as he regarded the odds in the form of five
armed spacemen which they faced.
The
captain stood sturdily on the lower step of the air lock and grimly shook his
head. “No, Mr. Blanchard, I cain't do nothing like that. I gotta yella ticket,
I tell ye. I cain't clear until it's turned white by him that wrote it.”
“But
I tell you again and again,” cried Blanchard, “that I can get a physician here
in Junction City who'll give you a white ticket that will get you through any
planetary quarantine you face.”
“Naw
sir, you ain't no regular port and if there's disease to be carried I ain't
carryin' it. Nawthing can make me go up against a yella ticket signed by a
Soldier of Light.”
Sudden
intelligence shot through Blanchard's face. His hands stiffened, clenched. “How
can this be? When did it happen?”
“Just
afore sundown, Mr. Blanchard. He come here and he give me the ticket and he
give everybody else the same yella ticket. And while he didn't say
wot
disease,
and while he didn't even say there
was
disease, a yella ticket from a
Soldier of Light is good enough for me. I don't go nowhere and I don't take you
nowhere, and there's no use askin' it 'cause I'd make myself and my crew an
outlaw for all the rest of my days if I was to do it. There ain't no planetary
port anywhere in the galaxy that'd receive us with a yella ticket from him.”
Anger
displayed the extent of Blanchard's defeat. “I can show you there is no
disease,” he cried wildly. Then, bethinking himself that a more proper frame
of mind would better suit his ends, he calmed.
“How
could you get rid of such a thing as a yellow ticket? Supposing the Soldier of
Light himself were to be stricken by the disease? Supposing he were to die?
Then what? Supposing any number of things happened? Supposing Junction City
burned down? Supposing, well, you can't stand there and tell me that you would
then refuse to leave.”
“Oh,
that would be different, Mr. Blanchard. But them conditions ain't nowise
appeared. While there's a Soldier of Light alive and well and as long as I
holds his yella ticket I don't go no place. There's no use offering bribes and
there's no use using threats.
I ain't going!
”
The
space door shut with a clang.
If
Blanchard's eyes had been acetylene torches they would have cut it neatly
through, but they were not. He and Dart, followed by three outlaws who carried
amongst them a quantity of baggage and a peculiarly noisy chest, made their way
back towards the Comet Saloon.
They
had not gone nearer than the outskirts of the platted town when they encountered
two pioneers at one of the innumerable water hydrants which Blanchard had used
as props to give stability to his swindle.
They
had just drunk when one of them said, in a sour voice, “Look at that damned
sky. Goin' to rain, sure as hell.”
Blanchard
glanced up. The fine brilliance of the stars was not marred by a single cloud
anywhere.
“Rain,
hell,” said the other pioneer, “it'll probably hail or sleet. I never saw a
worse lookin' night!”
“My
old woman,” said the first, “she'll probably die if it turns cold. She's doin'
awful poor.”
“And
you never saw ground,” said the second, “harder to dig a grave in.”
This
gloomy dissertation caused Blanchard to walk faster. The soft turf yielded, the
night was fine. But there was chill in the wind which was not temperature. A
lot depended upon the state of mind of these people.
Near
the river he paused and let the three carriers come up. They jostled to a halt
in the starlight.
“Men,”
said Blanchard, “I expect there's going to be a little trouble.”
This
did not amaze the three or bother them. They had been spawned in trouble. Their
mental reaction was that Blanchard could be shaken down for a little more now.
Not so Dart. He shifted his mask uneasily and mopped behind it with a silk
cloth and squirmed. He felt rivulets of perspiration running inside his mailed
jacket and yet he was chilly.
“Dart
and I,” said Blanchard, “have a task to perform, after which we will get our
white ticket for the captain back there. The three of you leave your baggage at
this point and go to the saloon. We will join you.”
“What'll
we do with this chest?” said one. He looked at the river.
There
were muffled beatings coming from within it now. It was true that someone might
come near it and investigate.
Blanchard
waved a careless hand. “Make sure she's silent and then throw her in. Things
are too complicated now for any part of that.” He motioned to Dart and went
on.
The
three opened the chest and stood for a moment looking down at Alicia Elston.
Dart
felt the chill deepening into his brittle bones as he slithered after his
master. He looked out at the stars which winked and glared and saw, suddenly,
that all this immensity was small indeed. Hardly a livable planet in this
galaxy remained where a Soldier of Light had not trod. A thin, luminous wheel
faintly beckonedâbut it was difficult to get passage on an intergalactic ship.
Passports, money, time. And a man with a slave passport such as his would not
get far. The very stars seemed to be crowding down against him, pressing into his
skull. He clawed suddenly at his mask for his breath was quick, and the abrupt
flood of oxygen into his lungs made his pointed ears shrink and ring and the
path before him blurred.
Blanchard
cursed him as he stumbled and would have said more except for the hum of
voices, hive-like, which came from the main section of the town. Uncertainly,
Blanchard paused. He hesitated for some time at the edge of the field where
stood the
Morgue,
rubbing his sweating palm against the butt of his
blaster. The hum increased and there were angry shouts.
Pointing
at the crude landing tower beside them, Blanchard ordered Dart up, watching his
slave intently.
From
the top, Dart viewed the town square and held on hard.
“Well?”
yelled Blanchard.
“It's
a big mob!” Dart shouted back. There was hysteria in his voice. “That Soldier
is up there on a platform talking to them! He's got a portable speaker but I
can't hearâ”
A
renewed and savage howl came from the town, blotting Dart's words. Blanchard
started across the field to the
Morgue.
He
scouted the big ship for a moment and then boldly, with past familiarity,
wrenched open the port and went into the main control section. His eyes
scorched over the walls until they found the long-range weapon rack. He
wrenched a missile thrower from its clamps and fitted its telescopic sight upon
it. A moment later he was back at the landing tower and climbing.
His
white fingers trembled as they gripped the hewn crossbars, for he was well
aware of the crime he contemplated and all that it might involve. But his
fingers did not tremble when he leveled the missile thrower and there was only
bitter calculation in his eye as he gazed through the scope, into the lighted
square.
Ole
Doc's image wavered in the glass and then steadied. The finder against height
registered six hundred and eighty meters. The sight whined for an instant and
then flashed green. As the sight opened again, the entire square leaped into
the widened spotter field and the black light of the sight itself came back
with all images clear and close.
There
was a crash of fire against the pillar on Ole Doc's right and he reeled.
Sprays, like orange plumes, radiated down into the crowd and slammed men and
women to earth. The material of the platform began to burn and at its base
small green puffs bloomed where the dust was burning.
With
considerable pride, glowing with the pleasure of good marksmanship, Blanchard
looked long at the motionless figure of the doctor about whom fire shoots began
to sprout, first from the planking and then from his clothes.
Dart's
hysterical tugging brought Blanchard away from the sight. The slave was
gesturing at the river which lay on their right.
Bright
starlight showed on two bodies which bobbed there, traveling evenly in the
quiet current. A moment later a third crossed the light path of an enormous
star. The grisly trio hovered together in an eddy as though holding a ghostly
conference and then, having decided nothing, drifted casually apart and
traveled on.
“To
hell with it!” said Blanchard. “A drunken brawl.” And he would have gazed
again at the square except that he was almost dislodged by Dart's fleeing down
the tower with such violence that even his slight weight shook it. He was
screaming shrilly.
Blanchard's
nerves were grating already. His anger flashed after the running slave. It was
all too clear that Dart had broken before this crime's importance. And a broken
slave . . .
Throwing
the missile weapon to his hip, Blanchard shot at the running Martian. He tossed
flame before the slave but Dart bolted on. Clicking the action over to
automatic, Blanchard sprayed gouts of fire around and about the escaping man.
But the recoil of the weapon was such that the last blast was directed more
nearly at the zenith than at the runner.
Dart,
however, had been hit. He was running still but his course was erratic and
shortly brought him back into a pattern of fires the weapon had made. He
stumbled out of this but now his clothing burned. He stopped, tore in agony at
his mask. His screams were punctuated by the slaps of the tenacious mouthpiece
against his lips. He turned once more and fell heavily into a fire, sending
green drops hurtling up about him. The flames flared, smoke rose and then, no
longer fed, the fire guttered down and went out.
Blanchard's
hands were trembling as he reached for the crossbars to swing down from the
landing tower. He was not without a sense of loss, and for a moment he was
appalled at the manner he had handed death to one who, while he might have been
cowardly, had at least been loyal. More than this he was shocked by his own
lack of self-control, a shock which was doubled by a sickness he felt at being
so far thrown out of orbit with his plans.
He
reached the ground and, for a moment, hesitated. But the heaviness of his
cash-lined pockets and the knowledge that so far he had triumphed gave him
courage. He took a deep breath of the cold night and then, with renewed
assurance, reloaded his missile weapon and looked about him.
It
was not until then that an idea struck him. He crouched a little as though
buffeted by the renewed yells coming from the center of town. His gaze swept
across the field to the
Morgue.
A white ticket? What did he need of a
white ticket?
He
laughed in a sharp bark. There were guns on the
Morgue.
Ray
disintegrators. And while the ship would have been bested in a battle with a
major naval vessel, few transports would be so well armed. And even if the ship
had no guns, one could stand her on her tail above this town and the other
vessels in the port and leave not one scrap of anything to tell the systems
other than that space pirates had evidently been at work.
The
yells seemed louder. But without a glance back, Blanchard sprinted to the
Morgue.
Soldier of Light. Well, few would question the occupant of the ship and many
were the dismal planets where one could jettison such as she and buy another
for half the currency that would be aboard her.
It
was for an instant only that Blanchard regretted the way in which he had been
forced into doing things for which a man could be enslaved and sent to the
hells forever. Elston had been his scapegoat. And a good one, for Elston was
dead. But even then Blanchard doubted that any blame would be attached to
anyone now except the inevitable space pirates to which the System Police
always assigned blame for those crimes which otherwise were never solved. And
in ten minutes this corner of Spico would be subject to certain chain reactions
caused by either guns or tubes.
He
ran past Dartâor the charred thing which had been Dartâand, so vividly was
Blanchard seeing everything, he noted that the Martian's salametal tag was
glittering brightly. Blanchard paused and tore off his own. There could as
easily be two men in that ash pile as one. His identification tag clinked
against Dart's.
Starting
up again he ran on toward the door of the
Morgue
gleaming palely golden
in the starlight.
“Blanchard!”
Despite
himself he whirled, missile weapon at ready. He froze. Halfway between the
landing tower and himself a man came running.