"Ten."
"Not many."
"Fully armed, though. There are sixty in the expedition altogether, but
I could only feel sure of ten. Some of them I planted myself."
Garth took the cigaret Brown handed him. "Thanks ... I know Chahnn
pretty well. Once we get there, we can get away from the others."
"How?"
"Underground passages--not well known. We'll come out about thirty
miles from Chahnn, and from there it's another twenty to the Black
Forest."
"The last lap on open ground?"
"Yeah."
"Not so good. If Benson misses us, he'll have planes out scouting. I've
a hunch he's suspicious already."
"If he catches up with us, so what? There'll be other chances."
"That's what you think," Brown said grimly. "I told you Benson was a
tough egg. He'd clap us all in the brig and we'd end up with prison
sentences on Earth--hazarding the success of a planetary expedition,
they call it. So you see why we've got to find this treasure, whatever
it is."
"Then you don't know either, eh?"
"Maybe I've a few ideas.... Finished? Let's go, then." Brown came to
his feet.
* * * * *
Garth followed Brown out of the ship, pondering. The Ancients had,
admittedly, been an incredibly advanced race. Any treasure they thought
worth guarding would be plenty valuable. Gold? Gems? They seemed
trivial, compared to the tremendous scientific powers of the Ancients.
And unimportant as well, while the Silver Plague raged over Earth.
They moved along the string of truck-cats, each loaded with the
necessary equipment, and reached the first. Commander Benson was
already there, talking to the pilot. He looked around.
"Ready? What's your name--Garth? All right, get in."
The front compartment of the truck-cat was roomy enough. Paula Trent,
Garth saw, was already there. She gave no sign that she noticed him.
He shrugged and found a seat, and Captain Brown dropped beside him,
impassive as ever.
The pilot came in. "Sit up here, next to me, buddy," he ordered. "I'll
need your help wrestling this tank through the arroyos."
Benson himself was the last man to enter. He slid the door shut and
nodded.
"Warm her up."
Beside the driver, Garth could not see the others, nor could he hear
their conversation as the motors coughed and snarled into life. The
truck-cat lurched forward on her caterpillar treads. The pilot looked
inquiringly at Garth.
"Where'll I head? West? What about these quicksands I've been hearing
about?"
"Steer for that mountain peak 'way over there," Garth told him. "It's
easy to see the sink-holes. They're big grey patches on the sand, with
no snow on 'em."
The roar of the engine died into a monotonous murmur. It was possible
to hear the conversation in the rear of the compartment. Commander
Benson was talking.
"--atomic power. It must have been that; there's no other answer. All
we need to know is the nature of the booster charge."
"I don't get it," Paula said. "Booster charge?"
"As far as our physicists know, atomic power's possible if there's
a known way to start it and control it. Earth's reserves are nearly
exhausted. Oil, coal--used up almost completely. And Earth needs power
plenty bad, to maintain civilization."
"The other planets have fuel."
"Spaceshipping's too expensive. It's prohibitive, Paula. Unless a
new power source is found very soon, Earthmen may have to migrate to
another world--and our civilization's so complex that that's nearly
impossible. Maybe we can find the answer in Chahnn this time. It was
one of the biggest cities of the Ancients."
"I've never seen it," Captain Brown said.
* * * * *
Benson grunted. "I did, once. Years ago. Tremendous! The scientific
achievements they must have had! And nobody knows what happened to the
Ancients. They just vanished, and their machines kept running till
they'd used up their power--and stopped. So there's no trace left.
We've located the fuel chambers, but in every case they've been empty.
Experiments have been made--unsuccessfully."
"You still think my translation of the Harro Panel was wrong, eh?"
Paula put in.
"I do," Commander Benson said. "It was a variable cipher. No one else
agrees with you that it was a code map."
"Ever heard of a double code?"
"I'm sorry," Benson said shortly. "We've settled all this. The Black
Forest is impassable. We can't risk our chance of success on a wild
goose chase."
Beside the pilot, Garth's mouth twisted sardonically. He had an
idea, now, what Carver Brown and Paula were after. The secret of the
Ancients' power-source. Well, it might be found in the Black Forest.
Anything might. Including the lost race of the Zarno, and.... His eyes
went hard. Not yet would he let himself believe Doc Willard was still
alive. The most he could hope for was an answer to that question--the
tormenting problem of whether or not he had killed Willard.
Lost in his absorption, he snapped out of it scarcely in time as the
truck-cat skidded on slick ice.
"Hard left! Sand the treads!" Instinctively his hand flashed to the
right lever, releasing a sprinkling of sand that provided traction. He
held it down while the pilot fought the wheel. They lurched, swung
half around, and found level surface again. Through the window Garth
could see a twenty-foot-wide funnel, sloping down to a black hole at
the center.
"What was it?" the pilot asked.
"_Creethas_, the natives call 'em, but that doesn't mean much. Six-foot
insects. Poisonous. They dig traps like ant-lions on Earth, pits with
sloping sides. Once you skid on the ice, you slip on down to the hole
at the bottom."
"Dangerous?"
"Not to us, in here. But we might have damaged the engine."
"Keep your eyes open after this, Garth," Commander Benson said sharply.
"Okay." Garth was silent. The truck-cat drove on, leading the
procession.
The vehicles were fast. On level ground they raced, hitting eighty
m.p.h. sometimes. By Jupiter-set they had reached Chahnn. Paula, for
one, was disappointed.
"I expected a city," she told Garth as they stared around at the
mile-square block of black stone, raised a few feet above ground level,
its surface broken by a few structures oddly reminiscent of the subway
kiosks of two centuries ago.
"It's all underground," Garth said. He was feeling shaky, needing a
shot or two of liquor. But there was none. In lieu of it, he borrowed a
cigaret from the girl and idled about, watching the men make camp.
* * * * *
The roomy truck-cats provided accommodations for sixty men without
crowding. It wasn't necessary to set up tents. Indeed, in that icy
air, only "warmer" tents, heated by induced current in their metallic
fabric, would have been feasible. The trucks, however, could be
heated easily and were air-conditioned. Garth walked over to a kiosk
and peered into the black depths. Chahnn lay below, the gigantic,
complicated city of the Ancients.
Through Chahnn was the road to the Black Forest--the only road they
could use, under the circumstances.
Garth shivered and went in search of Brown. He was feeling shakier than
ever. Vividly in his mind was a picture he did not want to remember--a
man stretched on an altar, a knife at his breast....
He found Brown beside one of the trucks, looking into the darkness.
"Captain--"
"Huh? Oh, Garth. Say, Paula--Miss Trent took a flashlamp and went down
into Chahnn to do a bit of exploring. I was thinking of going after
her. Any danger down there?"