"That's the story, sir," said Strong to Commander Walters, after the
Solar Guard captain had related the information he had wormed out of the
bartender at the Spacelanes Bar and the news Roger and Astro had
brought.
"All right, Steve," nodded the commander. "I'll have the man picked up
right away and psychographed. Meantime, you go on to Venus and see
Nicholas Shinny."
"Very well, sir," said Strong. "End transmission!"
"End transmission," acknowledged Walters. Strong flipped the switch and
the teleceiver screen darkened.
Fifteen minutes later, the _Dog Star_ blasted off from Mars, heading for
Venus.
During the trip back to the young planet that was rapidly growing into a
major industrial center rivaling Earth, Strong received a report from
Space Academy that the bartender had been picked up. His name was Joseph
Price, and after questioning him under truth serum, Solar Guard security
officers found the man's mind to be so filled with criminal plots and
counter-plots, it would take several weeks for the psychograph analyst
to learn the name of the man he claimed would know the whereabouts of
Wallace. This was disappointing news for Strong, especially since the
report included news of a second, third, and fourth strike by Wallace
and Simms on spaceships near the asteroid belt.
Reaching the starting place of their adventure, Venusport and the Solar
Exposition, Strong and the three cadets went immediately to a small
suburban section of the great city and the home of Nicholas Shinny.
Shinny lived comfortably in a small house made of Titan crystal,
enjoying himself during the day catching Venusian fatfish and watching
the stereos at night. Once an enlisted spaceman, he had been retired
with full pension and was living in ease and comfort. When Strong and
the three cadets arrived at the elderly spaceman's house, they found him
busy teaching a young Venusian wolfhound puppy how to retrieve.
"Well, blast my jets!" cried the old man. "If it ain't Tommy, Roger, and
the big fella, Astro! And Captain Strong!"
"Hello, Nick!" said Strong with a smile. "You're a sight for space-blind
eyes!"
"Heh-heh-heh," cackled Shinny, his merry eyes twinkling against his deep
space tan. "It's mighty good to see you boys. Come on in the house. I
got a mess of fatfish just pulled out of the stream and some of the most
delicious biscuits you ever had in your life!"
"Well, thanks, Nick," hesitated the captain. "But we're in--"
"Can't be in too much of a hurry to eat," snapped the old man with a
grin. "Anything you got to say is better said when you got a bellyful of
Molly's cookin'."
"Molly!" cried Tom. "But, Mr. Shinny--"
"When--" gulped Astro, "when did you--"
"Hey! Hold on!" cried the old spaceman. "Just damp your tubes there,
youngsters! You're way off course. Molly ain't nothing but an electronic
cook I got installed in the kitchen. She cooks better'n any
space-brained woman and she never opens her mouth to give me any sass!"
The four spacemen laughed at Shinny's obvious indignation.
"Now come on!" he growled. "Let's eat. I'm hungry!"
Refusing to allow them to get near Molly, Shinny began pushing food into
slots, compartments, turning on switches and punching buttons. In the
cozy living room, Strong relaxed while the three cadets played with the
Venusian wolfhound. Finally Shinny announced dinner and they fell to
with gusto. There wasn't much talk during the course of the meal. Strong
and the boys felt that Shinny would let them know when he was ready.
Finally the meal was over. Shinny sprawled in his chair, lit his pipe,
then looked at his guests, his eyes twinkling. "All right, me friends, I
think you've held back long enough. Let's have it."
Strong immediately told the old spaceman the entire story, from Wallace
and Simms' false concession at the exposition to the present.
"You see, Nick," he concluded, "with an adjustable light-key enabling
them to open any lock in the solar system, nothing is safe. Personally,
I think it's only because they haven't a larger or faster ship and
aren't better armed that they haven't tried more daring piracy. They'll
reach that point soon, though. They've already robbed four ships for
arms alone."
"I'll do anything I can to help you, Captain," said Shinny. "What is it
you want to know?"
"We suspect that Wallace has a secret hide-out in the asteroid belt,"
said Strong. "Since you once prospected the asteroids with him I thought
you might know where the hide-out is."
Shinny grew reflective and knocked the ashes out of his pipe before he
answered. "That was a long time ago, Captain. More'n ten years. And Gus
Wallace was a real square spaceman then. He didn't turn bad until after
we split up and he met that other feller."
"What other fellow?" asked Strong.
Skinny paused. There was a hard glint in his eyes. "Bull Coxine!" He
spat the name out as though it had left a bad taste in his mouth.
"Coxine!" exclaimed Strong.
"You heard me," snorted Shinny. "Bull Coxine and Gus Wallace got
together after me and Wallace lost our stake hunting for uranium
pitchblende in the asteroids and split up. Next thing I heard, him and
Coxine was mixed up in that business up on Ganymede when the Credit
Exchange was held up."
Strong's face had turned the color of chalk. "Coxine!" he repeated under
his breath.
Noticing Strong's reaction to Shinny's statement, Tom asked, "Who is
Coxine, Captain Strong?"
Strong was silent and Shinny turned to the cadets.
"When your skipper here was a young feller just starting out in the
Solar Guard," the old man explained, "he was on a routine flight out to
Titan and there was a mutiny. Coxine was the ringleader. The captain
joined up with Coxine after they had put his skipper in the brig. When
he had Coxine's confidence, he regained control of the ship and sent
Coxine and the others to a prison asteroid. Coxine has hated the captain
ever since and swore to get him."
"But how did he pull the holdup on Ganymede, then?" asked Roger.
"Coxine escaped from the prison asteroid in a jet boat, disguised as a
guard," continued Shinny. "Only man ever to escape. He drifted around in
the belt for a while and was picked up by a freighter going to Ganymede.
The freighter had been out rocket-hopping among the asteroids,
collecting the prospectors' small supplies of uranium and taking the
stuff back to Ganymede for refining. Wallace happened to be dead-heading
on the freighter. When they got to Ganymede, and Coxine saw all the
money lying around at the Credit Exchange to pay off the prospectors, he
convinced Wallace to go in with him and they robbed the Exchange. Coxine
was caught red-handed, but Wallace got away. In fact, the Solar Guard
didn't know Wallace had anything to do with it. So Coxine was taken back
to the prison asteroid, and Wallace has been driftin' around the system
ever since."
"But, Mr. Shinny," asked Astro, "if you knew Wallace was tied up with
the robbery of the Credit Exchange, why didn't you tell the Solar Guard
before now?"
"Sonny," sighed Shinny, "most of what I know is space dust and space
gas. But even so, I don't think Commander Walters or Captain Strong, or
even you boys, would think much of me if I went around like an old space
crawler, blowin' my jets all over the place."
Strong had listened to Shinny fill in the background of Bull Coxine with
a thoughtful look in his eyes. He remembered all too clearly the mutiny
on the ship out to Titan. Coxine had been an enlisted Solar Guard petty
officer aboard the ship. He had made great strides in two years and was
being considered as an officer candidate on the very day he tried to
take over the ship. When Strong regained control later, he talked to
Coxine, trying to find out why he had started the mutiny. But the man
had only cursed him, swearing vengeance. Strong hadn't seen him since.
"So you think he would know where Wallace and Simms might be hiding
out?" Strong asked finally.
"If anyone does," replied Shinny, "he does. And I'll tell you this,
Captain, if you go to talk to him and I figger you will, you'll find him
a lot tougher."
"Will I?"
"Well, take yourself, for instance. No reflection on you, of course, but
take yourself. You're smart, you're hard, and you got a good mind.
You're one of the best spacemen in the deep. Take all that and turn it
bad. Real bad. Sour it with too many years on a prison asteroid and
you've got a fire-eating rocket buster as tough and as rough as God and
society can make him!"
The three cadets gulped and looked at Strong. They saw their skipper
clench his teeth and ball his fists into tight knots.
"I know," said Strong in a hoarse whisper, "but if he knows where
Wallace and Simms are, he'll tell me. You can bet your last credit,
he'll tell me!"
Shinny paused reflectively. "I won't bet," he said simply.
* * * * *
The air inside the space shack was stale because of a faulty filter in
the oxygen circulator that neither Wallace nor Simms bothered to clean.
The two men lazed around in stocking feet and undershirts, listening to
popular music coming over the audio receiver on a late pickup from one
of the small Jovian satellite colonies near by.
"Pour me another cup of coffee, Simms," grunted Wallace.
The smaller man poured a cup of steaming black liquid and silently
handed it over to his companion. They both listened as the music faded
to an end and the voice of the announcer crackled over the loud-speaker.
"This audiocast has been beamed to space quadrants D through K, as a
courtesy to the army of uranium prospectors working the asteroid belt.
Hope you've enjoyed it, spacemen, and happy hunting!"
Wallace reached over and snapped off the receiver. "Thanks, pal." He
laughed. "The hunting's been real good! We've got a full catch!" The
giant spaceman laughed again.
"Yeah," agreed Simms. "I just went over the take. We've got enough money
in that locker"--he indicated a black box on the floor--"to sit back and
take it easy for the rest of our lives."
"Yeah?" snarled Wallace. "You mean sitting in the sun on a crummy
lakeside, watching the birds and bees?"
"Gus," asked Simms thoughtfully, "you got any idea how much fun we can
buy with the credits in that box?"
"Yeah, I have!" sneered Wallace, "and I know what a thousand times that
much will buy too!"
Suddenly Simms turned and looked his partner in the eye. "What do you
say we quit now, Gus? I mean it. We got plenty."
"You sound like you been exposed to too many cosmic rays!" said Wallace,
tapping his head with one finger. "We've got the biggest secret in the
system, the adjustable light-key plus an airtight hide-out, and you want
to quit!"
"It ain't that," whined Simms. "It's the other deal. I don't mind going
out and blasting a few freighters, but to try to--"
"Lissen," interrupted Wallace, "I'd rather try it and take the licking
if we mess it up, than not try it and take that licking. I know which
side of the space lane I'd better be on when the time comes!"
Simms hesitated and then sighed, "Yeah, I guess you're right."
"Come on. Let's listen to that story spool again."
"Oh, no," moaned Simms. "I know that spool by heart! We've heard it at
least fifty times!"
"One slip-up," said Wallace, sticking his finger in Simms' face, "just
one slip-up and we're finished! We've got to be sure!"
With a reluctant shrug of his shoulders, Simms poured another cup of
coffee and sat on the side of his bunk while Wallace inserted the story
spool in the audio playback.
They settled themselves and listened as a deep voice began to speak in a
loud whisper.
"... The operation will take place on the night of October twenty-ninth
at exactly twenty-one hundred hours. You will make your approach from
section eleven, M quadrant--"
Simms jumped up abruptly and switched off the playback. Turning to
Wallace, he pleaded, "I can't listen to it again! I know it by heart.
Instructions on how to get to the time capsule; instructions on what to
take, and how to build an adjustable light-key after we get the plans;
instructions on how to hijack the first ship and what to take. Orders,
information, instructions! I'm sick of listening. If you want to, go
ahead, but I'm going to work on the ship!"
"O.K., O.K.," said Wallace, getting up. "Don't blow your jets. I hate
the thing as much as you do. Wait a minute and I'll go with you."
The two men began climbing into space suits. In a few minutes they were
dressed in black plastic suits with small round clear plastic helmets.
They stepped into the air lock on one side of the room and closed a
heavy door. Wallace adjusted the valve in the chamber and watched the
needle drop until it showed zero.
"O.K.," said Wallace over his helmet spacephones. "All the air's out.
Open the outer lock."
Simms cranked the heavy handle, and the door in the opposite wall of the
chamber slowly swung open. They stepped out into the airless black void
of space and onto the surface of an asteroid, drifting in the thickest
part of the belt. Surrounding the asteroid were countless smaller
secondary satellites circling the mother body like a wide curving
blanket. The mother body was perfectly hidden from outside observation.
It made a perfect base of operations for the two space pirates.
The freighter that they had used at the concession at the Solar
Exposition and later to make their escape was a far different ship from
the one now resting on the asteroid. Two powerful three-inch atomic
blasters could be seen sticking out of the forward part of the ship. And
near the stern, two gaping holes showed the emplacements for two
additional guns not yet installed.
The two men walked over to the ship, and while Wallace entered the ship,
Simms picked up a cutting torch and ignited it, preparing to finish the
two holes in the stern.
When Wallace reappeared, he was carrying a coil of wire with a double
plug to attach to the spacephones inside their helmets. He jammed the
plug into Simms' helmet and then into his own. Simms' eyes lit up with
surprise as he heard....
"...This is a general emergency announcement from Solar Guard
headquarters. Squadrons A and B of the Marsopolis garrison will proceed
to space quadrants W, sections forty-one to fifty. It is believed that
Gus Wallace and Luther Simms are in that vicinity. Approach with
caution, they are armed with atomic blasters and are believed to be
psychologically unable to surrender. It is believed they will resist
arrest...."
The voice repeated the announcement and added a general call for the
men, if they were listening, to surrender. Wallace pulled out the two
plugs and grinned at Simms.
"Picked it up on the teleceiver inside the ship. Thought you might like
to know how safe we are here."
Simms grinned back, "And how far off the track they are. Where is that
space quadrant they think we're in?"
"Out past Saturn," said Wallace with a grin. "With the Mars garrison
chasing us at one end of the system, we'll hit them on the other and be
gone before they know what happened!"
Simms patted the barrel of the nearest atomic blaster. "And, spaceman,
we're going to hit them hard!"