"Make the scoop of the century," Ricker's blue eyes twinkled. "I'm Bill
Ricker of the _Planetary Times_. I'm going to contact my boss and give
him a chat with Benjamin Adison's murderess after her most sensational
but unsuccessful escape." The idea was positively brilliant. "I don't
think the law'll mind--the Patrol can have you when I'm through."
"You won't get me before a radio," snarled the Martian, his eyes like
black marbles.
"Well!" said Ricker, feigning surprise. "The dear boy's publicity shy!
Afraid your boss'll be annoyed if you make a fool of yourself?" The
question went in the man like a barb. He said nothing, but his swarthy
cheeks paled a shade. Ricker's elation soared. "I followed Molly Borden
all the way from Earth thinking something would happen." He grinned.
"I thought another plane'd attack and try to rescue her but you, my
weak-lunged friend, were melodramatic enough. Also, when the Patrol
gets through with you maybe we'll know where those _plans_ are."
The woman started, perceptibly. "I burned the plans!" she flared.
"That's what the police thought," said Ricker. "But they thought
you were working alone, too, and your Martian chum here has rather
disproved that. No, Molly Borden. There's more to the Adison case than
came out in the trial. There're others involved. I'm going to find out
_who_ if it's my last story."
"You blundering imbecile--!" the woman broke suddenly. But quickly she
stopped, clinched her teeth and lowered her eyes. Since Ricker had
known her, this was the first time she'd lost that notorious composure
and he made a mental note of it. He had the telenews man's objectivity
about murderers, millionaires and chorus girls. Molly Borden wasn't a
cold-blooded killer to him, nor a most lovely woman. To Ricker she was
just a good telenews yarn....
He waved the pistol toward the boat's little air lock. "Get in there,
both of you," he ordered. "It'll keep you out of mischief while I
contact the _Times_."
The lock was slightly larger than a closet, about one quarter the size
of the whole boat. Standing well away from any sudden move, Ricker
forced them in, sullen and tight-lipped. He spun a wheel giving them
enough air and slid the door on the hissing chamber. Then hands on his
hips, he surveyed the interior of the cabin.
From about waist-high on all sides and sloping overhead, the walls were
transparent--glassite, a foot thick. At the nose of the triangular
shaped room was a control box, instrument panel and a small radio
outfit. Ricker stepped over quickly, his pulse pounding with glee.
He checked the auto-pilot; it was idling the boat correctly in its wide
driftless circle. Then he clicked on the transmitter, found the New
York beam and sat down.
"Ricker calling _Times_, Ricker calling _Planetary Times_...." As he
waited, he glanced through the glass, saw the huge ball of Neptune
circle beneath him. The planet glowed like a weak green light bulb in
the lonely darkness and he shivered to think twelve inches of glassite
was all that stood between him and the vacuum of stellar night, the
long dead fall to those snows far below....
"_Planetary Times_. What is it--?"
"Gimme th' Chief!" His fingers tattooed excitedly on the panel. "Chief?
This's Rick. Got th' biggest story since the ice age. Molly Borden's
escaped with a Martian. What? No! Don't start an extra yet!" He paused
for breath. "Gimme a Mercury-to-Pluto hook up. I've got Molly and her
accomplice _here_--for a personal interview."
"Jupiter's jumpers!"
Ricker had never heard the Chief so gone wild before. "Yep. That's
right." He laughed. "Do I get that raise? Just a moment and I'll put
Molly Borden on the ether...."
He turned half-way around, half rose from his seat--and froze.
Beside him, outside the glass, was a huge glistening shape, like a
space beast swimming in the void. It gleamed bright silver in the light
from the cabin and as he stared, mouth open, it THUMPED against the
side of the boat.
Panic jumped in Ricker. He almost fell over the instrument panel.
Then he made out a row of darkened ports, a shark-like prow. He
realized then slowly. The shadowed bulk outside was a space ship. It
showed no lights, no life....
* * * * *
The ship drifted past like a falling leaf, a ghostly hulk floating
aimlessly down toward Neptune. As it disappeared below the glass,
Ricker caught a number and an insignia.
It was the liner they had just left.
"Chief," Ricker spoke to the transmitter. "Stand by! There's something
wrong! The Jupiter-Pluto Liner--the one we were on--it just passed
without signaling." He grabbed the controls, eased down on the
throttle. Top-jets humming, it was but a moment till the liner came in
view again.
Ricker circled the falling ship, saw no trace of a light. Its jets
were off but the gyro-brake must be working because it wasn't falling
fast. He moved closer alongside, shot out a spotlight. The white beam
glowed weirdly on the silver hull, its dead staring windows. He flicked
the light through the glass of the liner's control room--and his heart
jumped.
It wasn't a Negro or a Mercurian. He could tell by the features which
still clung to the face. It was an Earthian, in the stained uniform of
Stellar Liners, lying on his back across the instrument board. His arms
stuck out stiffly, crumbling hands palm up, and one pipe-like leg swung
with the motion of the wallowing ship. His face was black, black as
a charred hunk of steak--as if his head had been sprayed with a blow
torch....
Ricker spasmodically snapped off the light.
It was several moments before he turned it on again and played it
through the ports of the lifeless cabin.
They were all the same. The other pilot lay in the aisle. The detective
lolled restlessly near his seat. The old sourdough swayed, upright in
his chair--with his head almost burned away.
Ricker clicked off the light, pulled away from the drifting tomb and
bent over the transmitter. "Chief?" he said hoarsely. "Everybody on
that liner's been murdered. They're black--burned. I don't know how. I
think--"
"Do you think you're the only plane with a radio?"
Ricker looked around helplessly as his nerves turned to high tension
wire. The very hair on his head tingled. It was a voice vibrating
through the walls of the boat itself. An insane metallic voice from
nowhere.
Suddenly little dots of fire began to rain over the boat, sparkled on
the glass roof. Then a stream of crimson light gashed the blackness
outside and a drone of rockets came softly into the cabin. He caught
a glimpse of a space ship circling over. The light disappeared in a
cascade of sparks again. The plane vanished behind him.
Ricker gripped the panel and his nails whitened. He began talking to
the transmitter, very clearly and carefully.
"Chief!" The humming increased as the plane neared again, coming in
from behind. "Can you hear me? There's another ship outside. They're
using impact phones and it isn't a Patrol boat. I think I'm in for
trouble." The little pointer on the transmitter dial quit vibrating.
"We burned off your aerial," chattered the mechanical voice through the
walls. "Open your space-door and prepare for boarding. And no tricks!
We have a sight on you."
With clenched fists, Ricker gazed into the blackness a moment, then
resignedly walked over and opened the lock. The Martian stepped out
with a smirk of malicious triumph. The woman's face was expressionless.
Of course they'd heard the voice, too, probably recognized it, and
Ricker made no pretense of covering them with the pistol. Doubtless,
_he_ was the prisoner now.
The Martian coughed behind his hand. "Soon," he said, "I shall repay
you for this delay."
"It's all in the game," said Ricker.
The boat trembled as the craft outside clamped to the air lock.
* * * * *
Ricker opened the lock when the order came and a dark, rat-like little
man in gray coveralls entered the cabin. He carried a pistol of a type
Ricker had never seen before. It looked like a revolver with the barrel
sawed off.
"Nice work, Vanger," he greeted the Martian. He glanced at Molly Borden
curiously, then with narrow-eyed admiration. Ricker waited stiffly. The
Martian motioned to him.
"Watch this man, Gurren," he said. "Don't hesitate to shoot if he tries
anything but I'd like to find out what he knows when we land."
_Land!_ Ricker's forehead wrinkled. Where could they land? The nearest
habitable planet was the radium-warmed Pluto and prison was what they
were escaping. And who were they? Could they explain the liner and its
cremated passengers? As he was marched through the lock into the other
plane he decided information wouldn't do a corpse much good but he'd
certainly find out all he could until he became one....
The ship was egg-shaped, its interior bisected into cabin and
blast-engines. Small but powerful, Ricker inferred from the heavy
insulation. He was led into the cabin where another man, also wearing
coveralls, with ear-phones on his head, sat at the wheel. He was squat,
like a tractor. He eyed Molly Borden appraisingly.
"Hello, Hines," said the Martian. "Get rid of that boat out there and
let's go."
"Right," said the big fellow, reluctant to take his eyes from the woman.
They cast off, circled the boat and then settled just over it. Hines
jerked a trigger-like lever on the wheel. Ricker glanced through the
viewplate.
The boat beneath him glowed red. A puff of white smoke--it was _gone_!
God o' Mars! Ricker stared through the glass hardly believing what
he'd seen. A little chill tickled the back of his neck. The boat had
vanished in clear space, like a magician's trick. This plane must have
some sort of heat gun--a disintegrator.
Vanger, the Martian, laughed in a voice irritatingly shrill. "And
you tried to interfere with us," he jeered at Ricker's amazement. He
pushed him into a seat in a corner of the cramped cabin, then turned
to Gurren. "It took you long enough to find us," his tone changed to
displeasure.
"The liner circled back and radioed the Patrol," the ratty fellow
explained. "We thought we better put it out of the way." He grinned.
"We just gave 'em a small dose--cooked 'em. When the Patrol comes,
won't they get a headache trying to figure that out?"
Vanger laughed with him till a fit of coughing darkened his face.
Ricker ground his teeth. So that's what happened to the liner! They'd
blasted it like the small boat, but with only just enough heat to--.
Ricker thought of the friendly old sourdough. The dirty yellow weasels!
Suddenly he sprang up like a whip, lashed his fist into Vanger's mouth.
The Martian crashed backward into the instrument panel. Ricker started
after him with blind fury in his heart.
Something banged into the back of his head, stunning, blackening.
As he fell, he saw Molly Borden standing over him with a wrench in her
hand. Her green eyes glinted with a look he could not define as he
wavered into blackness....
* * * * *
"We can't fail!" The words reached Ricker through a haze of pain
throbbing in his head. "With all that equipment, it'll be like
capturing a rabbit hutch. And won't I just love potting several rabbits
I know. The chief of police, the judge, twelve rabbits that were on the
jury--I really can't wait!"
Ricker opened his eyes, fought with his whirling senses. The Martian
leaned against the opposite wall, the other two men worked silently at
the controls. The woman sat on the floor with her legs neatly crossed,
a cigarette spiraling toward the ceiling. Her green eyes played the
Martian like a piano and apparently the strings of his black heart were
attuned.
"But," Molly Borden purred, "you don't know what I went through on that
liner, Van. After we passed Uranus and nobody came, I almost gave up.
I knew there wasn't a livable place after Jupiter and--well, I had no
idea you could have located at Neptune...."
"So!" Vanger glanced toward Ricker, interrupted her. "Our publicity
agent's with us again!"
Ricker met his eyes evenly, said nothing. Sinking into his mind was
what he had just heard. _Something_ was located on Neptune; something
would be like shooting rabbits.... But Neptune was covered with snow a
hundred miles deep. Its surface was a bleak hell of frozen, screaming
winds. Nothing could hide, or live on Neptune. And equipment--rabbits--?
He turned to the port, looked out as in his mind three facts suddenly
and logically came together: Benjamin Adison could warm a planet and
his plans were stolen--Neptune was barren with ice and--He saw the
planet slowly spreading out beneath them like a convex plain of white
glass....
"That's right, telenewsman," the Martian interpreted his movement. He
coughed like a dog sneezing. "Take a good look. Out of that desolate
waste soon will come the most terrible armada of all history. We shall
sweep everything before us--in a blast of white heat. Did you notice
what happened to the boat we escaped in? Such will happen to your war
planes. Who opposes us will quickly become a crisp black corpse."
"I presume," said Ricker dryly, "that you have Adison's plans. They
were supposed to be able to heat a planet but your Neptune still
appears cold as ever. Do you care to elaborate on this little scheme of
yours?"
"Certainly." Vanger smiled like a cat in the canary's cage. "As to
Neptune, you will have a personal showing in due time. As to the Adison
Unit--you've seen an application of it destroy a plane in a matter of
seconds. This ship is equipped with four guns that can cut through
a yard of steel instantly. And the guns are controlled in range,
intensity and breadth of contact. They can reduce a space liner to dust
at ten feet--or melt a pin-head a mile away. What will you think when
you see ten thousand planes like this--and materials for a million?"
"I'll think you're a damn liar," said Ricker, "till I do see 'em.
And even then I won't believe you can lick one Patrol boat." He was
bluffing and he knew it. Obviously Vanger knew it, too, for he winked
at the imperturbable Molly Borden, his nasty smile still there.
Ricker cursed himself. If he'd called the Patrol instead of trying to
be smart and contact the _Times_, this would have been nipped in the
bud. What if it all _was_ true? He'd seen what this ship could do. He'd
also seen those dark crumbling bodies in the liner. And he'd followed
Molly Borden on the wildest hunch. What had he run into? And what a
story--if he lived to tell it....
"Landing," voiced Gurren from the wheel.
Ricker felt a sinking sensation as the plane slowed its descent.
Looking out the port, he saw the surface of Neptune gradually flatten
into an endless table of sleek gleaming ice, ghostly blue in the pale
light, like a frozen lake in moonlight. They sank closer and the bare
expanse swelled to a dim monotonous plain of mirrored shadows. Far
out, above the razor-smooth horizon, a dull red ball cast its feeble
light across the lonely scene. Ricker felt a twinge of helplessness,
home-sickness. That weak orange light was the sun....
Gurren fought the controls. The plane wallowed like a ship in a storm
and outside a wind that was almost visible tore at them with grim, icy
fingers. That sweep of wind, Ricker knew, was an endless hurricane that
scoured the dead surface of Neptune to the smoothness of tin. It was a
wind of tinted methane, a five hundred mile gale, eternally....
What live secret teemed on this forgotten planet? What lurking fate
awaited _him_--when he'd learned its festering secret--too late?
Bump!
The plane jarred down to a rough landing, streamed across the snow in a
swirl of wind-driven ice dust. Ricker thought of what the Martian had
said. Ten thousand planes--where? The man was mad. There was no place
on this naked planet to hide a factory.
"Forty-four-five!" said Hines. Apparently it was their magnetic
position on Neptune. Ricker remembered it.
"Right," said Gurren. "Dig in!" He threw the brake, made a breathtaking
stop and held the plane like a wild horse against the wind.
Hines pulled a trigger on the wheel. A misty cloud of
white--_steam_--suddenly frosted the windows. An angry hissing
penetrated the walls and the falling sensation rose in Ricker again,
though he could see nothing through the ice-coated ports. His eyes
widened.
The plane had landed, but it _continued to fall_!
Ricker stared at the pilots with mixed exasperation and astonishment.
He glanced at Molly Borden but she was blasé as ever. Finally he turned
to Vanger.
"Would you mind telling me what's going on?" he asked with more
nonchalance than he felt.
"Not at all." The Martian grimaced with what was his smile. "Since you
won't live to repeat it, we're bound for the perfect hideout--beneath
the snows of Neptune."
He laughed and the sound of his laughter mingled with the whispering
hiss of steam, seemed to echo from the painted windows which had now
turned black.
Ricker watched the windows. His eyes narrowed again when they glowed
again with the reflection of light outside. The light was brighter than
before.
Then, suddenly, as if by some quick heat, the ice vanished from the
windows, and, if he felt surprise at the wizardry of their descent into
the snow, what he beheld now was with a staggering shock.
The ship floated down into a cavernous box-like place that stretched
out into miles of smooth floor surrounded by white, glistening walls of
sheer ice. On the floor, long geometrical rows of flat buildings, like
an automobile factory, striped one side of a wide smooth landing field.
On the other side of the field stood a large house like an office
building and behind it lay a silver, windowed dome from which ran heavy
tubes curving into the ground. Upon the field, forming a great dotted
circle around it, rested literally thousands of egg-shaped space ships.
Ricker stared through the viewplate as if watching the very gates
of Hades open before him. They landed slowly. And despite his
astonishment, he absorbed everything he saw with the photographic
memory of a good telenewsman.
The place was an immense chamber deep in the icy rind of the
planet--apparently resting on the very surface of Neptune itself for
the floor appeared to be rock, different from the glistening walls and
the roof. And the roof--glancing up, Ricker saw the low sleek dome held
no mark of their entrance! The ice had instantly frozen behind them
again as they passed through. This place was impregnable, perfectly
hidden. A hundred miles of snow was at once a shield and camouflage.
But how?
Then he saw how. Along the walls reared tall tripods, similar to radio
towers. At the top of each flared a ring of yellow light--it was
blinding to look at. Like looking full at the noonday sun. And through
the windows, he could feel the sweaty penetration of--heat!
"Show Miss Borden to her room, Hines." The Martian's voice brought
Ricker's staring eyes back to the cabin. "I'll call for you shortly,
Molly. And you, Gurren, lock up our meddlesome journalist till I have
time for him."
The ship landed like a feather. Vanger opened the door, ogled a
twittering good-by to the woman, and jumped to the ground. He strode
off toward the office-like building beside the ship-encircled field.
All the planes were shiny and new, Ricker noticed.
Gurren and Hines motioned the woman and him out. The floor was a kind
of granite underfoot, Ricker saw. The field was about the size of a
baseball diamond, the ships staggered in a wide circle around it like
eggs in a giant incubator. And an incubator it was. From the shops a
quarter of a mile away echoed the whirr of machinery, the clang of
metal against metal, the stutter of riveting hammers. Pale blue light
rayed from the windows and open doors, cast an aura of stark efficiency
above the gleaming roofs and in the streets.
Several men passed, wearing the gray coveralls of his captors, and
obviously a landing space ship was not unusual for they gave them no
more than a passing glance. They stared at Molly Borden, of course.
But then she would have attracted attention in the Shangri-la where
dead nymphs go.
"This way," said Hines, and led them across the field, past a center
tripod toward the factories. Ricker had never seen the Adison unit
before but he knew this must be it. Like steel columns, heat held back
Neptune's sunless cold, forced a rigid hollow inside the living ice.
Hines and the woman walked ahead. Ricker followed with Gurren a few
paces behind him. Neither of his guards drew their strange-looking
guns and Ricker also knew that escape was impossible. It would be like
trying to get out of a box buried in a block of concrete. And he was no
Houdini....
A few yards into the canyons of the seething city and Hines stopped.
"This is your room for the time being." He grinned at Molly Borden like
a school boy at the teacher. He waited beside an open door which led
into a living compartment of some sort. "If there's anything you wish--"
Next door stood a building from which droned a low monotonous chatter,
the hum of a transmitter, the crackle of static. On the roof towered
two poles from which hung a long radio antenna. An idea akin to suicide
suddenly quickened Ricker's pulse.
"Thank you," the woman said to Hines who, since Vanger left, was
rapidly becoming a two-bit cavalier on his own. Ricker glanced at
Gurren out of the corner of his eye. He was also gulping in the beauty
of the Venusian.
If that radio room was only empty! thought Ricker. If he could make it
in time--get the door closed--
"Perhaps I should see if everything's all right," said Gurren,
reluctant to leave. As Hines frowned nastily, he took Molly Borden's
arm, started into the room with her.
Like a fleeing deer, Ricker suddenly streaked away.
A shout behind him. The door wasn't ten feet ahead. A hot white blast
whizzed past his left shoulder. The door frame glowed red, steamed.
Ricker dived through the door.
* * * * *
He caught the door as he went through, slammed it shut behind him.
A man whirled around from a mass of instruments. In that split second
all Ricker saw was the man's startled face, his hand snatching a pistol
from his belt.
Ricker leaped for him as from a catapult, brought up a swift short
right. Smack! The fellow fell back into a bank of scattered dials.
Ricker jerked the gun from his hand as he sagged to the floor.
Without another glance at him, he leaped to the transmitter. It was an
ordinary radio outfit but apparently of tremendous power. He snapped
the sending switch, kept his eyes fused to the door.
"Come out, Ricker!" It was Gurren's voice. "We'll burn you through the
door!"
Ricker didn't answer. His ears strained for the warming tone of the
sender. He knew they wouldn't blast the building; it would destroy the
radio. And they wouldn't come through the door--for a moment.
A low hum sang in the room. The transmitter was working. Ricker bent
over the mike, eyes on the door.
"Attention, all listeners." He spoke rapidly but without a tremor.
"Ricker, _Planetary Times_--calling for help. Send Patrol to Neptune.
Magnetic location--" God! what was that number! "Forty-four-five.
Neptune, magnetic forty-four-five--"
The door opened.
"Get back!" said Ricker. "I'll kill the first man that enters!"
Molly Borden came through the door.
"Stop," said Ricker. "I swear I'll shoot if you come a step inside."
"Put down that gun," she said quietly. Gurren and Hines stood in the
door behind her, their pistols leveled but unable to shoot with her
directly in the line of fire. The woman moved slowly toward Ricker.
"Stop!" he said. God! Why didn't he shoot! This woman was dead anyway.
The state had condemned her. It wouldn't be like killing anybody else.
She came on, slowly, like a lion trainer approaching a dangerous animal
but with no vestige of fear. Her eyes knifed into his, unblinking,
commanding, like the paralyzing fangs of a serpent. His finger
tightened on the trigger.
"Give me the pistol. Please." Her voice was low, throaty but with
vibrant confidence. With the spell of her eyes, it urged Ricker like
the subtle demand of a hypnotist. "Please."
She halted before him, a gorgeous creature, like some great poisonous
jungle flower. Her cold green eyes bored into him without a waver. Her
face was expressionless, a thing of tinted marble. She held out her
hand.
"Give me the gun, Bill Ricker," she said softly. "They'll kill you if
you don't."
Ricker leveled the pistol at her heart. "I've never killed a woman--"
Gurren and Hines moved around to get a shot at him. "Stay where you
are!" said Ricker. "I'll burn a hole through her if you move a step."
He tried to avoid her seeking eyes, met them again. Their gaze met like
live wires touching. A current passed between them that almost made
sparks. Ricker's whole body vibrated to the electric force of her gaze.
Her eyes became an irresistible power transfixing his very being.
For an instant he felt like a moth on a pin. Then without shifting her
eyes, Molly Borden slapped the pistol from his hand.
It clattered to the floor. The men were upon him....
* * * * *
Ricker found his pockets contained one cigarette, a book of matches
and a clipping from the _Times_. He sat down on the cold metal bunk,
dejectedly lit the cigarette and stared at the dark windowless walls
and the heavy door that made his prison. Finally he glanced at the
clipping:
As Molly Borden, confessed murderess of scientist Adison, was
hustled into a plane bound for Pluto today, the only question in
the minds of the police and the thousands who witnessed her
spectacular trial was "Who is Molly Borden?" The identity of the
Venusian panther-woman remains as mysterious as her emerald eyes.
Since immigration officers apprehended her at the City Rocket
Terminal as she attempted to leave the country, no hint of her
past has escaped her carmine lips. Her fingerprints, photographs,
the handsome assassin herself, have brought no trace of
recognition from a bewildered universe.
Dorothy Adison, socially prominent daughter of the scientist, who
left for Africa after the inquest at which she testified to seeing
Senator Geb Trexel at the scene of the crime and was proved
mistaken, could not be located for the trial. If Miss Adison can
throw any light on the identity of her father's murderess, it is
now inconsequential for the quick sword of justice--
Ricker crumpled the slip of paper, hurled it across his narrow cell.
Why hadn't he killed her when he had the chance. _She_ was a killer,
heartless, cruel as a lynx--and doubly dangerous because she possessed
the claws of woman. Her beauty was a mask of murder; the charm of her
eyes--well, he'd fallen into them and she'd taken a gun away from him
like a toy from a child.
His black thoughts returned to the fullness of his plight. Obviously,
Molly Borden had pretended to burn the plans to keep the police off
the trail of her henchmen. Then the law had virtually delivered her
to their door-step again. Blind fools! He'd written story after story
doubting those ashes they found in her stateroom. On the evidence of a
few half-burned symbols and a charred notebook cover, the law had made
a mistake endangering the very universe!
He was as blind as the police. At least he had expected something--but
now here he was trapped like a rabbit in a box. With a plot forming
around him that could shake worlds--with a story any telenewsman would
give his typewriter-fingers for!
Vanger hadn't lied. His heat-gunned ships could stop any army. And
here, beneath the lying ice-wastes of Neptune, such planes were being
made like bubbles....
Ricker combed desperate fingers through his unruly hair, got up and
paced the cramped floor. What was their plan? To attack Earth--conquer
Mars, Venus, Mercury--all the colonies? No! It was unimaginable! But
this unknown cave, those ships out there--?
He wondered if his attempted message had gotten through to the Patrol.
But he hadn't had time to say he was _beneath_ the location he'd given.
They wouldn't find a trace up there on the ice and how could they guess
what lay under a hundred miles of frozen gas?
He heard a key clink in the lock of his cell door. It opened to Hines'
tank-like figure. He had his gun ready, apparently wasn't taking any
chances since the incident of the radio building.
"Let's go, telenewsman," he ordered Ricker outside. Ricker walked out
the door without a word.
Hines motioned him to go ahead, directed him out into the noisy street.
The hum of machinery was deafening and in the buildings they passed,
Ricker saw space ships in all stages of construction along busy
assembly lines.
"Where do you get the materials?" he asked idly.
"Simple," said Hines. "Neptune's minerals have never been tapped
before. We mine everything we need right here."
"And the men?" The streets were deserted but hundreds were at work in
the shops.
"Every man has his price. We pay well."
Ricker remembered several mysterious disappearances in the industrial
centers on Earth. They had usually been without families and of small
means, however, and no extensive inquiry was made....
The gigantic cavern itself still fascinated him. Glancing up, he
noticed the dome of ice was almost the hue of clear blue sky. It
was perhaps a mile high and the suggestion of distance lent by the
shimmering walls made the place appear even larger than it was. He
wondered why there wasn't a constant dripping, why the chamber wasn't
moist like a cave. Then he remembered it wasn't frozen water around
them. It was frozen atmosphere, melting back into its gases--like dry
ice.
Wouldn't the public eat this story up, he thought, as they wove between
the evenly-spaced ships beside the field. Then he smiled ironically.
_What_ public? The only public he could reasonably expect was a jolly
bunch of pallbearers....
They crossed the field, Hines with the pistol at his back. Ricker saw
three new ships rolled out into line as they walked the short distance
to buildings on the other side.
"What're these?" he asked, looking at the tall three-story house and
the big silver dome at the rear.
"The Boss's place," said his guard. "And that dome's the power plant."
The Boss! Ricker's mind clicked. Who was the leader? Was it Vanger?
Molly Borden? Somehow neither of them seemed to fit.
They paused at the door of the building. Hines pushed a button. A
moment's wait, the door opened to Vanger's dusty face.
"Hello," he greeted. "I hope you found our humble hospitality to your
liking, Mr. Ricker." He led them down a narrow corridor to another
closed door. Hines left them, retraced his steps. Vanger opened the
door, ushered Ricker in.
Ricker saw Molly Borden standing beside a small glass table in a
spacious but dim-lit room. The walls were mirrored and a dull hidden
light cast vague shadows upon heavy chairs and a sofa, gleamed weirdly
upon chrome ash-trays, a carved bottle and glasses. The highlighted
silhouette of the woman commanded the scene. She stood carelessly, one
crimson-tipped hand resting on the table, a cocktail glass glinting in
the other. She had changed from her traveling suit, wore a shimmering
gown that bathed her lithe body in a sheen of liquid silver. Had it
been under any ordinary circumstances, Ricker would have whistled at
the sight of her.
"Your stare tickles, Mr. Ricker," she said. "Won't you come in? Will
you have scotch or--"
"He's a telenewsman," said a deep voice from a shadowed chair to the
left. "He'll have scotch. And please turn on the light, Vanger. We must
make our guest feel at home."
A sudden light glowed over the room. Ricker gazed at the person who had
spoken.
He saw a large fat man lounging deep in a cushioned armchair. He had
three folds of pale flesh for a chin below his thick lips, his eyes
were puffed with the whites startlingly large and his skin was white,
an unhealthy white--like a great white worm.
Ricker inhaled quickly. His jaw dropped.
It was Senator Trexel sitting there.
Ricker was struck dumb. He clutched the back of a chair as his mind
swirled.
"So Dorothy Adison was right!" He heard himself speak the words as if
somebody else had said them.
"Alibis are easily purchased." The fat man's heavy lips curled up at
the corners and his hog-like eyes became slitted puffs of flesh. "But
do sit down," he smiled. "We have much to talk about."
Ricker found his way around the chair, sank down slowly with his eyes
upon the man. Dorothy Adison was right! The phrase roared in his mind.
Trexel _did_ have something to do with the murder. Had he hired Molly
Borden to do it? Was he a member of this Neptune gang? Was he the
_leader_?
"What will you have to drink?"
Ricker looked at the man as he would a Black Widow spider. "I don't
drink with murderers--and traitors," he said carefully.
With an amazing swiftness for a man of his bulk, Trexel left his chair,
stepped over and struck him smartly across the mouth with the flat of
his palm.
"You will be careful of your words!" he breathed. "Another remark like
that and you die where you sit!"
He returned to his chair, his composure regained as quickly as it left
him. He took a cigarette from his waistcoat pocket, struck a match.
"Now talk, telenewsman," he said. "Who knows where you are? How did you
suspect Molly Borden?" The light of the match made his face a white wax
mask. He lit the cigarette, blew out the match with a puff of his pasty
cheeks.
Ricker refused to open his bruised lips, stared at the man and kept
silent.
"There are ways," said Trexel, "of making you talk." Vanger, behind
Ricker's chair, coughed in agreement.
"I know," said Ricker finally. "And I imagine you could put Mercurian
torture methods to shame. But I'll save you the trouble. There are
three people who know where I am. One is my boss, the editor of the
_Planetary Times_, another is Dorothy Adison who saw you leaving her
father's laboratory after the murder and the other is--the President of
the United States."
Molly Borden put down her glass with a sharp clink.
Trexel slowly took his cigarette from his mouth, dropped his
tree-trunk arm to his lap. Ricker met his eyes evenly. Would he
believe it?
"You lie," said Trexel. "One of my men is in the President's office. I
know every move he makes."
"The President knew your spy was there," said Ricker. "We found him
more useful in your employ than in jail."
The fat man took on the look of a bullfrog caught in the glare of a
flashlight. The cigarette smoldered in his hand unnoticed. He gazed
at Ricker a long few seconds, as silence held the room like a stifled
breath.
Then he looked up quickly to the Martian.
"Vanger," he said in a voice like Napoleon must have had at Waterloo.
"Contact Number 12 at the White House, tell him to find out if what the
man says is true. And tell him whether it's true or not to prepare for
immediate action."