A few hours before the time of rendezvous with the cruiser which was
bringing Chris out to him, the detectors picked up a vessel whose
course, it proved, was set to intersect their own. A minute or so later
a sharp, clear thought came through Kinnison's Lens.
"Kim? Raoul. Been flitting around out Arisia way, and they called me in
and asked me to bring you a package. Said you'd be expecting it. QX?"
"Hi, Spacehound! QX." Kinnison had very decidedly not been expecting
it--he had thought that he would have to do the best he could without
it--but he realized instantly, with a thrill of gladness, what it was.
"Inert? Or can't you stay?"
"Free. Got to make a rendezvous. Can't take time to inert--that is, if
you'll inert the thing in your cocoon. Don't want it to hole out on
you, though."
"Can do. Free it is. Pilot room! Prepare for inertialess contact with
vessel approaching. Magnets. Messenger coming aboard--free."
The two speeding vessels flashed together, at all their unimaginable
velocities, without a thump or jar. Magnetic clamps locked and held.
Air-lock doors opened, shut, opened; and at the inner port Kinnison met
Raoul la Forge, his classmate through the four years at Wentworth Hall.
Brief but hearty greetings were exchanged, but the visitor could not
stop. Lensmen are busy men.
"Fine seeing you, Kim--be sure and inert the thing--clear ether!"
"Same to you, ace. Sure, I will--think I want to tear a guy's arm off?"
Indeed, inerting the package was the Lensman's first care, for in the
free condition it was a frightfully dangerous thing. Its intrinsic
velocity was that of Arisia, while the ship's was that of Lyrane
II. They might be forty or fifty miles per second apart; and if the
_Dauntless_ should go inert that harmless-looking package would
instantly become a meteorite inside the ship. At the thought of that
velocity he paused. The cocoon would stand it--but would the Lens? Oh,
sure, the Arisian knew that this was coming; the Lens would be packed
to stand it.
Kinnison wrapped the package in heavy gauze, then in roll after roll of
spring steel mesh. He jammed heavy steel springs into the ends, then
clamped the whole thing into a form with tool-steel bolts an inch in
diameter. He poured in two hundred pounds of metallic mercury, filling
the form to the top. Then a cover, also bolted on. This whole assembly
went into the "cocoon," a cushioned, heavily padded affair suspended
from all four walls, ceiling, and floor by every shock-absorbing device
known to the engineers of the Patrol.
The _Dauntless_ inerted briefly at Kinnison's word and it seemed
as though a troop of elephants were running silently amuck in the
cocoon room. The package to be inerted weighed no more than eight
ounces--but eight ounces of mass, at a relative velocity of fifty miles
per second, possesses a kinetic energy by no means to be despised.
The frantic lurchings and bouncings subsided, the cruiser resumed
her free flight, and the man undid all that he had done. The Arisian
package looked exactly as before, but it was harmless now; it had the
same intrinsic velocity as did everything else aboard the vessel.
Then the Lensman pulled on a pair of thick rubber gloves and opened the
package; finding, as he had expected, that the packing material was a
dense, viscous liquid. He poured it out and there was the Lens--Chris'
Lens! He cleaned it carefully, then wrapped it in heavy insulation.
For of all the billions of unnumbered billions of living entities in
existence, Clarrissa MacDougall was the only one whose flesh could
touch that apparently innocuous jewel with impunity. Others could
safely touch it while she wore it, while it glowed with its marvelously
polychromatic cold flame; but until she wore it, and unless she wore
it, its touch meant death to any life to which it was not attuned.
* * * * *
Shortly thereafter another Patrol cruiser hove in sight. This meeting,
however, was to be no casual one, for the nurse could not be inerted
from the free state in the _Dauntless'_ cocoon. No such device
ever built could stand it--and those structures are stronger far than
is the human frame. Any adjustment which even the hardest, toughest
spacehound can take in a cocoon is measured in feet per second, not in
miles.
Hundreds of miles apart, the ships inerted and their pilots fought with
supreme skill to make the two intrinsics match. And even so the vessels
did not touch, even nearly. A space line was thrown; the nurse and her
space roll were quite unceremoniously hauled aboard.
Kinnison did not meet her at the air lock, but waited for her in his
con room; and the details of that meeting will remain unchronicled.
They were young, they had not seen each other for a long time, and they
were very much in love. It is evident, therefore, that Patrol affairs
were not the first matters to be touched upon. Nor, if the historian
has succeeded even partially in portraying truly the characters of the
two persons involved, is it either necessary or desirable to go at any
length into the argument they had as to whether or not she should be
inducted so cavalierly into a service from which her sex had always,
automatically, been barred. He did not want to make her carry that
load, but he had to; she did not--although for entirely different
reasons--want to take it.
He shook out the Lens and, holding it in a thick-folded corner of the
insulating blanket, flicked one of the girl's fingertips across the
bracelet. Satisfied by the fleeting flash of color which swept across
the jewel, he snapped the platinum-iridium band around her left wrist,
which it fitted exactly.
Chris stared for a minute at the smoothly, rhythmically flowing colors
of the thing so magically sprung to life upon her wrist; awe and
humility in her glorious eyes. Then:
"I can't, Kim. I simply can't. I'm not worthy of it," she choked.
"None of us is, Chris. We can't be--but we've got to do it, just the
same."
"I suppose that's true--it would be so, of course. I'll do my best--but
you know perfectly well, Kim, that I'm not--can't ever be--a real
Lensman."
"Sure, you can. Do we have to go over all that again? You won't have
some of the technical stuff that we got, of course, but you carry jets
that no other Lensman ever has had. You're a real Lensman; don't worry
about that--if you weren't, do you think that they would have made that
Lens for you?"
"In a way I see that that must be true, even though I can't understand
it. But I'm simply scared to death of the rest of it, Kim."
"You needn't be. It'll hurt, but not more than you can stand. Don't
think we'd better start that stuff for a few days yet, though; not
until you get used to using your Lens. Coming at you, Lensman!" and he
went into Lens-to-Lens communication, broadening it gradually into a
wide-open two-way.
She was appalled at first, but entranced some thirty minutes later,
when he called the lesson to a halt.
"Enough for now," he decided. "It doesn't take much of that stuff to be
a great plenty, at first."
"I'll say it doesn't," she agreed. "Put this away for me until next
time, will you, Kim? I don't want to wear it all the time until I know
more about it."
"Fair enough. In the meantime I want you to get acquainted with a new
girl friend of mine," and he sent out a call for Illona Potter.
"_Girl_ friend!"
"Uh-huh. Study her. Educational no end, and she may be important. Want
to compare notes with you on her later, is why I'm not giving you any
advance dope on her--here she comes."
"Mac, this is Illona," he introduced them informally. "I told them to
give you the cabin next to hers," he added, to the nurse. "I'll go with
you to be sure that everything's on the green."
It was, and the Lensman left the two together.
* * * * *
"I'm awfully glad you're here," Illona said, shyly. "I've heard
_so_ much about you, Miss--"
"Mac to you, my dear--all of my friends call me that," the nurse broke
in. "And you don't want to believe everything you hear, especially
aboard this space can." Her lips smiled, but her eyes were faintly
troubled.
"Oh, it was nice," Illona assured her. "About what a grand person you
are, and what a wonderful couple you and Lensman Kinnison make ... why,
you really _are_ in love with him, aren't you?" This in surprise,
as she studied the nurse's face.
"Yes," unequivocally. "And you love him, too, and that makes it--"
"Good heavens, no!" the Aldebaranian exclaimed, so positively that
Clarrissa jumped.
"What? You don't? _Really?_" Gold-flecked, tawny eyes stared
intensely into engagingly candid eyes of black. Mac wished then that
she had left her Lens on, so that she could tell whether this bejeweled
brunet hussy was telling the truth or not.
"Certainly not. That's what I meant--I'm simply scared to death of him.
He's so--well--so over-powering. He's so much more--tremendous--than I
am. I didn't see how any girl could possibly love him--but I understand
now how you could, perhaps. You're sort of--terrific--yourself, you
know. I feel as though I ought to call you 'Your Magnificence' instead
of just plain Mac."
"Why, I'm no such thing!" Clarrissa exclaimed; but she softened
noticeably, none the less. "And I think that I'm going to like you a
lot."
"Oh-h-h--honestly?" Illona squealed. "It sounds too good to be true,
you're so marvelous. But if you do, I think that Civilization will be
everything that I've been afraid--_so_ afraid--that it couldn't
possibly be!"
No longer was it a feminine Lensman investigating a female zwilnik; it
was two girls--two young, intensely alive, human girls--who chattered
on and on.
Days passed. Mac learned the use of her Lens as well as any first stage
Lensman had ever known it. Then Kinnison, one of the few then existent
second stage Lensmen, began really to bear down. Since the acquirement
of the second stage of Lensmanship has been described in detail
elsewhere, it need be said here only that Clarrissa MacDougall had
mental capacity enough to take it without becoming insane. He suffered
as much as she did; after every mental bout he was as spent as she was;
but both of them stuck relentlessly to it.
As is now well known, the prime requisite of all such advanced
treatment is to know with the utmost precision exactly what knowledge
or ability is required. Mac had no idea as to what she wanted or
needed; but Kinnison did.
He could not give her everything that the Arisian had given him, of
course. Much of it was too hazy yet; more of it did not apply. He gave
her everything, however, which she could handle and which would be
of any use to her in the work she was to do; including the sense of
perception. He did it, that is, with a modicum of help; for, once or
twice, when he faltered or weakened, not knowing exactly what to do
or not being quite able to do it, a stronger mind than his was always
there.
* * * * *
At length, approaching Tellus fast, Mac and Kim had a final conference;
the consultation of two Lensmen settling the last details of procedure
in a long-planned and highly important campaign.
"I agree with you that Lyrane II is a key planet," the nurse was
saying, thoughtfully. "It must be, to have those expeditions from
Lonabar and the as yet unknown planet 'X' centering there."
"'X' certainly, and don't forget the possibility of 'Y' and 'Z' and
maybe others," he reminded her. "The Lyrane-Lonabar linkage is the only
one we are sure of. With you on one end of that and me on the other,
it'll be funny if we can't trace out some more. While I'm building up
an authentic identity to tackle Bleeko, you'll be getting chummy with
Helen of Lyrane. That's about as far ahead as we can plan definitely
right now, since this ground-work can't be hurried too much."
"And I report to you often--frequently, in fact." Mac widened her
expressive eyes at her man.
"At least," he agreed. "And I'll report to you between times."
"Oh, Kim, it's nice, being a Lensman!" She snuggled closer. Some way
or other, the conference had become somewhat personal. "Being _en
rapport_ will be almost as good as being together--we can stand it,
that way, at least."
"It'll help a lot, ace, no fooling. That was why I was afraid to go
ahead with it on my own hook. I couldn't be sure that my feelings were
not in control, instead of my judgment--if any."
"I'd have been certain that it was your soft heart instead of your hard
head if it hadn't been for Mentor," she sighed, happily. "As it is,
though, I know that everything is on the green."
"All done with Illona?"
"Yes, the darling. She's the _sweetest_ thing, Kim--and a
storehouse of information if there ever was one. You and I know more of
Boskonian life than anyone of Civilization ever knew before, I am sure.
And it's so ghastly! We _must_ win, Kim--we simply _must_,
for the good of all creation!"
"We will." Kinnison spoke with grim finality.
"But back to Illona. She can't go with me, and she can't stay here with
Hank aboard the _Dauntless_ taking me back to Lyrane, and you
can't watch her. I'd hate to think of anything happening to her, Kim."
"It won't," he replied, comfortably. "Ilyowicz won't sleep nights until
he has her as the top-flight solo dancer in his show--even though she
doesn't have to work for a living any more."
"She will, though, I think. Don't you?"
"Probably. Anyway, a couple of Haynes' smart girls are going to be her
best friends, wherever she goes. Sort of keep an eye on her until she
learns the ropes--it won't take long. We owe her that much, I figure."
"That much, at least. You're seeing to the selling of her jewelry
yourself, aren't you?"
"No, I had a new thought on that. I'm going to buy it myself--or
rather, Cartiff is. They're making up a set of paste imitations.
Cartiff has to buy a stock somewhere; why not hers?"
"That's a thought--there's certainly enough of them to stock a
wholesaler. 'Cartiff'--I can see that sign," she snickered. "Almost
microscopic letters, severely plain, in the lower right-hand corner
of an immense plate-glass window. One gem in the middle of an acre
of black velvet. Cartiff, the most peculiar, if not quite the most
exclusive, jeweler in the Galaxy. And nobody except you and me knows
anything about him. Isn't that something?"
"Everybody will know about Cartiff pretty soon," he told her. "Found
any flaws in the scheme yet?"
"Nary a flaw." She shook her head. "That is, if none of the boys overdo
it, and I'm sure they won't. I've got a picture of it," and she
giggled merrily. "Think of a whole gang of sleuths from the homicide
division chasing poor Cartiff, and never quite catching him!"
"Uh-huh--a touching picture indeed. But there goes the signal, and
there's Tellus. We're about to land."
"Oh, I want to see!" and she started to get up.
"Look, then," pulling her down into her original place at his side.
"You've got the sense of perception now, remember; you don't need
visiplates."
And side by side, arms around each other, the two Lensmen watched the
docking of their great vessel.
* * * * *
It landed. Jewelers came aboard with their carefully made wares.
Assured that the metal would not discolor her skin, Illona made the
exchange willingly enough. Beads were beads, to her. She could scarcely
believe that she was now independently wealthy--in fact, she forgot all
about her money after Ilyowicz had seen her dance.
"You see," she explained to Mac and Kinnison, "there were two things I
wanted to do until Hank gets back--travel around a lot and learn all
I can about your Civilization. I wanted to dance, too, but I didn't
see how I could. Now I can do all three, and get paid for doing them
besides--isn't that _marvelous_? And Mr. Ilyowicz said that you
said that it was QX. Is it, really?"
"Right," and Illona was off.
The _Dauntless_ was serviced and Mac was off, to far Lyrane.
Lensman Kinnison was supposedly off somewhere, also, when Cartiff
appeared. Cartiff, the ultra-ultra; the, oh, so exclusive! Cartiff did
not advertise. He catered, word spread fast, to only the very upper
flakes of the upper crust. Simple dignity was Cartiff's keynote, his
insidiously spread claim; the dignified simplicity of immense wealth
and impeccable social position.
What he actually achieved, however, was something subtly different. His
simplicity was just a hair off beam; his dignity was an affected, not
a natural, quality. Nobody with less than a million credits ever got
past his door, it is true. However, instead of being the real _crème
de la crème_ of Earth, Cartiff's clients were those who pretended to
belong to, or who were trying to force an entrance into, that select
stratum. Cartiff was a snob of snobs; he built up a clientele of snobs;
and, even more than in his admittedly fine and flawless gems, he dealt
in equally high-proof snobbery.
Betimes came Nadreck, the Unattached Lensman of Palain VII, and
Kinnison met him secretly at Prime Base. Soft-voiced as ever,
apologetic, diffident; even though Kim had learned that the Palainian
had a record of accomplishment as long as any one of his arms. But it
was not an act, not affectation. It was simply a racial trait, for the
intelligent and civilized race of that planet is in no sense human.
Nadreck was utterly, startlingly unhuman. In his atmosphere there was
no oxygen, in his body there flowed no aqueous blood. At his normal
body temperature neither liquid water nor gaseous oxygen could exist.
The seventh planet out from any sun would, of course, be cold, but
Kinnison had not thought particularly about the point until he felt
the bitter radiation from the heavily insulated suit of his guest;
perceived how fiercely its refrigerators were laboring to keep its
internal temperature down.
"If you will permit it, please, I will depart at once," Nadreck
pleaded, as soon as he had delivered his spool and his message. "My
heat dissipators, powerful though they are, cannot cope much longer
with this frightfully high temperature."
"QX, Nadreck--thanks a million," and the weird little monstrosity
scuttled out. "Remember, Lensman's Seal on all this stuff until Prime
Base releases it."
"Of course, Kinnison. You will understand, however, I am sure, that
none of our races of Civilization are even remotely interested in
Lonabar--it is as hot, as poisonous, as hellish generally as is Tellus
itself!"
* * * * *
Kinnison went back to Cartiff's; and very soon thereafter it became
noised abroad that Cartiff was a crook. He was a cheat, a liar, a
robber. His stones were synthetic; he made them himself. The stories
grew. He was a smuggler; he didn't have an honest gem in his shop. He
was a zwilnik, an out-and-out pirate; a red-handed murderer who, if he
wasn't there already, certainly ought to be in the big black book of
the Galactic Patrol. This wasn't just gossip, either; everybody saw and
spoke to men who had seen unspeakable things with their own eyes.
Thus Cartiff was arrested. He blasted his way out, however, before he
could be brought to trial, and the newscasters blazed with that highly
spectacular, murderous jail break. Nobody actually saw Cartiff escape,
nobody actually saw any lifeless bodies. Everybody, however, saw the
telenews broadcasts of the shattered walls and the sheeted forms; and,
since such pictures are and always have been just as convincing as
the real thing, everybody knew that there had been plenty of mangled
corpses in those ruins and that Cartiff was a fugitive murderer. Also,
everybody knew that the Patrol never gives up on a murderer.
Hence it was natural enough that the search for Cartiff, the
jeweler-murderer, should spread from planet to planet and from region
to region. Not exactly obtrusively, but inexorably, it did so spread;
until finally anyone interested in the subject could find upon any one
of a hundred million planets unmistakable evidence that the Patrol
wanted one Cartiff, description so-and-so, for murder in the first
degree.
And the Patrol was thorough. Wherever Cartiff went or how, they managed
to follow him. At first he disguised himself, changed his name, and
stayed in the legitimate jewelry business; apparently the only business
he knew. But he never could get even a start. Scarcely would his shop
open than he would be discovered and forced again to flee.
Deeper and deeper he went, then, into the noisome society of crime. A
fence now--still and always he clung to jewelry. But always and ever
the bloodhounds of the law were baying at his heels. Whatever name
he used was nosed aside and "Cartiff" they howled; so loudly that a
thousand million worlds came to know that despised and hated name.
Perforce he became a traveling fence, always on the go. He flew a
dead-black ship, ultrafast, armed and armored like a superdreadnought,
crewed--according to the newscasts--by the hardest-boiled gang of
cutthroats in the known universe. He traded in, and boasted of
trading in, the most bloodstained, the most ghost-ridden gems of a
thousand worlds. And, so trading, hurling defiance the while into
the teeth of the Patrol, establishing himself ever more firmly as
one of Civilization's cleverest and most implacable foes, he worked
zigzagwise and not at all obviously toward the unexplored spiral
arm in which the planet Lonabar lay. And as he moved farther and
farther away from the Solarian System his stock of jewels began to
change. He had always favored pearls--the lovely, glorious things so
characteristically Tellurian--and those he kept. The diamonds, however,
he traded away; likewise the emeralds, the rubies, the sapphires, and
some others. He kept and accumulated Borovan firestones, Manarkan
star drops, and a hundred other gorgeous gems, none of which would be
"beads" upon the planet which was his goal.
He visited planets only fleetingly now; the Patrol was hopelessly
out-distanced. Nevertheless, he took no chances. His villainous crew
guarded his ship; his bullies guarded him wherever he went--surrounding
him when he walked, standing behind him while he ate, sitting at either
side of the bed in which he slept. He was a king snipe now.
As such he was accosted one evening as he was about to dine in a garish
restaurant. A tall, somewhat fish-faced man in faultless evening dress
approached. His arms were at his sides, fingertips bent into the "I'm
not shooting" sign.
* * * * *
"Captain Cartiff, I believe. May I seat myself at your table, please?"
the stranger asked, politely, in the _lingua franca_ of deep space.
Kinnison's sense of perception frisked him rapidly for concealed
weapons. He was clean. "I would be very happy, sir, to have you as my
guest," he replied, courteously.
The stranger sat down, unfolded his napkin, and delicately allowed
it to fall into his lap, all without letting either of his hands
disappear from sight, even for an instant, beneath the table's top.
He was an old and skillful hand. And during the excellent meal the two
men conversed brilliantly upon many topics, none of which were of the
least importance. After it Kinnison paid the check, despite the polite
protestations of his vis-à-vis. Then:
"I am simply a messenger, you will understand, nothing else," the guest
observed. "No. 1 has been checking up on you, and has decided to let
you come in. He will receive you tonight. The usual safeguards on both
sides, of course--I am to be your guide and guarantee."
"Very kind of him, I'm sure." Kinnison's mind raced. Who could this No.
1 be? The ape had a thought-screen on, so he was flying blind. Couldn't
be a real big shot, though, so soon--no use monkeying with him at all.
"Please convey my thanks, but also my regrets."
"What?" the other demanded. His veneer of politeness had sloughed
off; his eyes were narrow, keen, and cold. "You know what happens to
independent operators around here, don't you? Do you think that you can
fight _us_?"
"Not fight you, no." The Lensman elaborately stifled a yawn. He now had
a clue. "Simply ignore you--if you act up, smash you like bugs, that's
all. Please tell your No. 1 that I do not split my takes with anybody.
Tell him also that I am looking for a choicer location to settle down
upon than any I have found as yet. If I do not find such a place near
here, I shall move on. If I do find it I shall take it, in spite of man
or the devil."
The stranger stood up, glaring in quiet fury, but with both hands still
above the table. "You want to make it a war, then, Captain Cartiff!" he
gritted.
"Not 'Captain' Cartiff, please," Kinnison begged, dipping one paw
delicately into his finger bowl. "'Cartiff' merely, my dear fellow,
if you don't mind. Simplicity, sir, and dignity; those two are my key
words."
"Not for long," prophesied the other. "No. 1 will blast you out of the
ether before you can swap another necklace."
"The Patrol has been trying to do that for some time now, and I'm still
here," Kinnison reminded him, gently. "Caution him, please, in order to
avoid bloodshed, not to come after me in only one ship, but a fleet;
and suggest that he have something hotter than Patrol primaries before
he tackles me at all."
Surrounded by his bodyguards, Kinnison left the restaurant, and as he
walked along he reflected. Nice going, this. It would get around fast.
This No. 1 couldn't be Bleeko; but the king snipe of Lonabar and its
environs would hear the news in short order. He was now ready to go. He
would flit around a few more days--give this bunch of zwilniks a chance
to make a pass at him if they felt like calling his bluff--then on to
Lonabar.