"No word yet. Joe will let us know. The circuit's still open. Well,
you've heard the report. What do you make of it?"
Biggs said slowly, "I don't know, Sparks. It's very peculiar. I'll have
to think it over--_Yes? What is it?_"
He spoke this last to the wall audio which had come to life. Cap Hanson
answered from the bridge.
"Lanse, are you there, son? Listen, come up to the bridge right away,
will you?"
Swift apprehension tightened Biggs' features.
"What's the matter? The Themisites getting violent? They're not
attacking the ship?"
Hanson groaned like the guest artist at a seance.
"Just the opposite! Another of them phony 'nights' has passed outside
since you two've been fiddlin' around up there. Now it's daylight
again ... and there's a mob of Themisites gathered around outside ...
_wavin' banners and peltin' the_ Saturn _with flowers_! The Thagwar has
just sent a messenger biddin' us friendly welcome to Themis!"
* * * * *
"Great growling guttersnipes!" I spluttered, "What's this all about?
One minute they want to kill and boo ... the next they want to bill and
coo! Why don't they make up their minds?"
"Probably," decided the skipper, "because they ain't got none. Lanse--?"
"We can't learn anything," said Biggs quietly, "in here. Let's go
outside."
So for the third time in as many Themisian 'days', out we pranced, to
be greeted by such hooraw and ballyhoo as you never saw. Those same
centaurs who, a few short Earthly hours ago had been aiming lethal
presents at our kissers were now aiming kisses at our presence! Their
leader pranced forward gracefully and made a low bow before Cap Hanson.
"Greetings, Oh child of the Blue World!" he intoned. "As Thagwar of
Themis I bid you welcome to our peace-loving little planet--"
"Th-thanks!" said the Old Man, and looked bewildered. "Lanse, son,
suppose you--?"
But Lanse was staring curiously at the speaker. He nudged me and
whispered, "Sparks, study the Thagwar! Do you notice anything ...
well ... _strange_ about him?"
"Sure!" I assented. "He looks like a veterinarian's mistake; is that
what you mean? If it's the color of his eyes you're worrying about,
you'd better ask somebody else. These Themisites all look the same to
me. Like peas from the same pot."
"That's not what I meant," whispered Biggs. "What strikes me as being
odd is that ... remember how proud he was of those ornaments we gave
him before the 'night' period set in? He had himself all decked out
like a Christmas tree. But now look at him! Not a single decoration!"
"Maybe," I suggested, "he's allergic to tin?"
"And on the other hand," mused Biggs, "_that_ Themisite over there is
wearing a bracelet and a brass curtain rod in his nose--"
He was perfectly right. The big boss of Themis was as barren of
trinkets as a Pilgrim father. But standing in the background was one of
his henchmen glittering like gilt on a joy-joint bar! It was whacky.
The Thagwar didn't look to me like the kind of guy--or hoss--who would
donate his "tribute" to a subject.
"There's something fishy about this," I said. "Ask him how come,
Lanse ... just for the halibut."
"I will," said Biggs, and stepped forward to do so. But before he could
pop the question, the Thagwar spoke up.
"Peace," he said hoarsely--no pun intended, pals! Lay down them
bricks!--"Peace between your people and mine. And now--did you bring
the usual tribute?"
"Usual tribute!" repeated the Old Man starkly. "Of course we did! We
give it to you yesterday, you rascally old scoundrel. What's the big
idea of--?"
The Thagwar's eyes darkened, and he pawed the ground fretfully.
"That is a mistake, Earthman! You gave me nothing!"
"Wha-a-at! A whole darn caseful of--"
"You gave me," repeated the Thagwar with increasing ominousness,
"nothing! You offered a few baubles to the _old_ Thagwar, possibly--"
Cap Hanson groaned and turned agonized eyes to his son-in-law. "Ain't
that something, now! Another revolution! Now we got to pay off twice!"
Lanse nodded soberly.
"I suspected something like that. Yes, I'm afraid we must, Dad.
Tomkins ... Splicer...."
* * * * *
He called to two of the crew. So we had to do it again. Go through
the same old rigmarole. I'll spare you the details this time, since
they were the same as before. We donated, the Thagwar accepted, then
we started talking peace-terms. The pact was presented, the Thagwar
studied it and this time--fortunately--succeeded in stamping it with
his official O.Q. before Themis' invisible moon brought night again.
So at last our job was accomplished. As we entered the ship, Cap Hanson
was jubilant.
"Thank goodness _that's_ done!" he sighed happily. "And now--back to
Earth! And Diane--"
Biggs' Adam's-apple bobbled convulsively in his lean throat. "I--er--I
think we'd better wait just a little while longer, Dad," he said mildly.
"Wait? What for? We got the peace pact signed."
"I know. But don't forget, that's only the eighth in a long series of
such 'peace pacts.' We'd better stick around a little while and see if
they live up to it."
"Stick around a while! How long?"
Lanse glanced through the quartzite viewpanes and said, "Not long.
Because--see? It's night again."
"Night! What's night got to do with it?"
"That," said Lanse seriously, "is just what _I_ want to know. If I
could only get the theory straight in my mind I might have the answer.
Sparks--" He turned to me--"turn on the telaudio. Let's see if we can't
get some word--"
So I did, but there was nothing cooking. The circuit was as cold as a
divorcee's kiss. And that was bad, because Biggs was growing nervouser
and nervouser by the minute. He wanted to get back to Earth so bad he
could taste it. But that's Biggs for you. Thorough and painstaking if
he undertakes a thing. And he wasn't going to leave Themis until he
knew this situation was completely cleared up.
But at last the darkness outside began to lift, and Cap Hanson fidgeted.
"Well, here's what you were waitin' for, boy. Now what?"
"Now," said Biggs, "we see what happens. Are they coming back from
their city?"
They were. The Themisites were galloping across the plains toward the
_Saturn_ again. They were the romping, roamingest bunch of mavericks I
ever saw. "Yup!" I said.
"And--and their attitude?"
"Friendly, of course!" snorted the skipper. "Why shouldn't they be?
Didn't we just sign a peace treaty with them? Lanse, I don't know
what's ailin' you! You--"
He never finished his denunciation of Biggs. For at that moment
the oncoming Themisites hove within hurling distance--and started
hurling! Only this time it was not, as it had been a short while
before, flowers. This time their expressions of "everlasting peace and
affection" were offered with--_stones, arrows, and spears_!
* * * * *
Well, Hanson's roar of rage threatened to lift the top clean off the
control turret.
"Dastards!" he screamed. "Vandals, murderers and things that rhyme
with what I first called 'em! This is all I'm goin' to take from them
four-legged scoundrels. Call up the men, Sparks! Tell 'em to man the
guns! We're goin' to blast them murderin' skunks from here to Kingdom
Come--"
"Wait, Dad!" pleaded Biggs feverishly. "I think I'm beginning to
understand--faintly. If you'll give me just a little more time--"
"Time your Aunt Nellie! I've done all the delayin' I'm goin' to--"
It was at that moment the telaudio, which I had set to vocode any
message which came in on the Luna circuit, began squawking. It was
faint at first, and sort of garbled, with lots of static, but it
cleared as it went along.
"Lieutenant Lancelot Biggs," it called, "aboard the
_Saturn_--congratulations! You are the father of a fine baby boy!"
"B-b-b-boy!" gasped Biggs. His face turned every color in the spectrum,
and a couple that haven't been invented yet. "A--a boy!"
"_Yippee!_" howled the Old Man, his thoughts of vengeance on the
Themisites temporarily forgotten. "A grandson! I'm a grampaw! _Yippee!_"
"Congratulations, Lanse!" I said. "A boy, eh? Swell! Another Biggs in
space, one of these days--"
"S-s-see if you can get Earth, Sparks," chattered Biggs. "F-f-find out
how Diane is."
"Right!" I snapped. "I'll get at it immediately."
I started for the radio room. But before I had taken two steps the
audio began talking again.
"Lieutenant Lancelot Biggs," it called, "aboard the
_Saturn_--congratulations! You are the father of a fine baby boy!"
My face sort of blanched. I turned to Biggs. "Congratulations," I
offered, "again, Lanse! Golly--_two_ boys!"
Hanson demanded, "Whaddya mean, two boys! That's a repeat message, you
dope!"
Lanse smiled sort of feebly.
"I--I'm afraid not, Dad," he said. "If it were a repeat message,
Marlowe would have said, 'Repeat.' Sparks is right. I--I'm the father
of twins!"
"Well, I'll be darned!" ejaculated the Old Man. Then, rallying, "Twins,
eh? Good! That makes me _two_ grampaws, eh? Fine! I'm twice as gla--"
He stopped, his jaw dropping strickenly. For again Joe Marlowe's voice
was rolling through the control turret.
"Lieutenant Lancelot Biggs," it called, "aboard the
_Saturn_--congratulations! You are the father of a fine baby boy--"
"G-g-gracious!" gasped Biggs, and fell into a chair. "_Triplets!_"
* * * * *
This time I addressed myself to Hanson. "Congratulations, Skipper," I
said. "Now you're _three_ grampaws. If Diane keeps _this_ up, you'll be
able to man a whole cruiser."
The Old Man's face was fiery.
"Now, hold everything!" he stormed. "This is goin' too far! Diane don't
have to overdo it, just because we're not there! There's such a thing
as--_Triplets_! I won't allow it!"
"What's the matter," I grinned at him, "afraid of the Three Little
Biggs, Skipper. Don't be a big bad wolf!"
But even _I_ didn't think it was funny when, at that moment, Joe
Marlowe's familiar tones rolled through the room _again_.
"Lieutenant Lancelot Biggs," he called, "aboard the
_Saturn_--congratulations! You are the father of a fine baby boy--"
"Gosh!" I gulped. "This is turning into a parade!"
Cap Hanson's face was a study in technicolor. His jowls were dangling
to his third weskit button. But oddly enough, at this third dire
pronouncement, Lancelot Biggs did not even wince. Instead, his eyes
brightened; he rose from the chair into which, a moment before, he had
tumbled.
"No!" he yelled. "Not a parade--a solution!"
"Huh?" I gaped at him. "Solution to what? The unemployment problem?"
"No, Sparks! All our troubles! Quadruplets? No! Triplets? No! Twins?
No, not even that! Just one baby!"
"Y-you mean," I asked him, "that's a repeat message? But, Lanse, you
know as well as I do Joe would have announced it as a repeat--"
"Certainly. But what we're hearing is the same message over and over
again!"
"Huh!" Hanson forced the query, new hope in every wrinkle of his brow.
"Yes. Remember how Marlowe's orders got grooved before, Sparks? Well,
this is some more of the same thing! I know _why_, too. And I _also_
know why we've been having so much trouble with the Themisites!"
"Y-you do? Why?"
"The moon! The invisible moon--that's the answer! Tell me, Sparks--what
sort of things are invisible?"
"Why?" I stammered, "dark things seen against a dark background ...
light things seen against a light background ... objects marked with
protective coloration...."
"And _transparent_ things!" chortled Biggs. "Transparent things with
just sufficient mass to cause refraction of light! That's what Themis'
moon is made of! Pure, unadulterated galena in its natural form is a
colorless, transparent substance, sufficiently opaque to occult Themis,
but also with enough mass to refract normal light rays! And galena is--"
"I get it!" I hollered. "A natural wave-trap for radio transmission.
Back in the early days of the Twentieth Century, galena was the
substance used in the manufacture of experimental so-called 'crystal
sets'!"
"By golly, you're right, Lanse! That satellite is large enough to
capture and retain a record of Joe Marlowe's voice, and as it revolves
it keeps re-transmitting it to us over and over again--"
"Lieutenant Lancelot Biggs," repeated the voice of Marlowe--"aboard the
_Saturn_--congratulations! You are the father of a fine baby boy!"
"--like that!" said Biggs. "Yes! Notice how Joe's voice always catches
a little just before he says 'congratulations'? It's been the same
fault every time."
"O.Q.," broke in the Old Man. "Maybe you're right. You usually are. But
what's that got to do with the way the Themisites keeps changin' their
attitude towards us? Don't tell me they got galena in their veins?"
* * * * *
Biggs shook his head firmly.
"No, that's another question entirely. But it can be solved by the same
theory."
"Huh?"
"Twins!" said Biggs. "Or, rather, multiple rulers! Sparks, you said you
couldn't tell the difference between one Themisite and another--"
"That's right."
"Neither can I. Neither can any Earthman. That's why we've been unable
to understand their psychology and--more important still--their form of
government."
"Government!" burst in the Old Man. "Now he talks about government.
What's that got to do with--"
"Why," explained Lancelot, "everything! The Themisites have one of
the rarest forms of self-rule known. But one which early in the Greek
civilization had its counterpart on earth. You see, they are an
_omnigarchy_!"
"A who-ni-whichy?" I choked.
"Omnigarchy! From the Latin base _omni-_, meaning all! You see, on
this world--everyone takes his turn at being Thagwar! Every day a new
Themisite becomes master over his brethren until the next 'night'
period. That is why the Thagwar we signed our pact with today denied
having received any gifts. He told the truth. We had given our tributes
to the Thagwar of the preceding day.
"That is--must be!--also why peace pacts have been broken with such
regularity. Each succeeding Thagwar feels he, being now ruler, is
entitled to a share of the 'spoils' that go with the signing of a
treaty--and being not obligated to uphold the signature of a deposed
Thagwar leads a movement against colonists in an effort to win his
rights. The individual natures of these Thagwars dictates the form of
movement. If the Thagwar is a naturally peace-loving creature he comes
with soft words and flowers; if he is a brutal type, he attempts to
take his tribute by force."
I demanded wildly, "But--but how the dickens are we ever going to
form a permanent treaty with a race that changes rulers once a day?
Especially when a Themisian day is only a couple of Earth hours?"
Biggs shrugged. "That," he declaimed, "is not our problem, but that
of the Interplanetary Union. My private opinion is that, since Themis
has a limited population, the best way to assure peace would be to buy
over every single Themisite. Of course, that means a terrific initial
expenditure, but--"
"But," said the Old Man, "we've done what we was sent here for. We
signed a peace pact--which ain't worth the paper it's printed on--and
we found out why all former treaties was failures. So if you ask me,
the best thing we can do is git out of here before one of them periodic
Thagwars, smarter than the rest, discovers a way to wreck our ship.
What say, son?"
"That," nodded Biggs, "would be my idea, too. Our task is finished;
we'll leave it to the Space Patrolmen to figure out the rest. Come on,
Dad--let's lift gravs for home and Lancelot, Junior!"
"For Lance--!" The Old Man frowned. "Oh, no! No more silly names like
that in our family. That young man's name is gonna be Waldemar--after
me!"
"Lancelot!" said Lancelot stubbornly.
"Waldemar!" said Waldemar Hanson the same way.
"Lancelot!"
"Waldemar!"
* * * * *
So we all went home and met Christopher Biggs. Only trouble with those
two shipmates of mine is that they forgot Diane Hanson, who, being the
daughter of Waldemar and the wife of Lancelot, has a stubborn streak of
her own.
Kit Biggs weighed seven pounds and eight ounces. He and his mother
are both doing fine, thanks. Biggs is doing O.Q., too. He's got a new
title now. Around his home, that is. He's First Mate in Charge of the
Three-Cornered Pants Department.
But--what do you expect? After all, life is just one damp thing after
another....