_Wellesley was ordered to check on
deviants or mutants. But the evidence
was often subtle, and he knew he
couldn't afford to take a chance...._
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Worlds of If Science Fiction, June 1956.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
The Earthman, Wellesley, came to Ophir in the season of aphelion, when
the binary suns of that remote planet were cold serpent's eyes, dimly
seen above the chill mists that shrouded its fern forests and craggy,
young mountains, its silent oceans and magnificent organ pipe cities of
legend.
From space one might look down upon the vista of these latter
prominences and imagine a vast, exotic civilization spread over the
face of the equinoctial swamps, but Wellesley knew that the giant
towers were mere calcareous shells, hollow as the expectations they
had inspired in the first planeteers to arrive here two hundred years
ago--they were the work, in fact, of small, mindless crustaceans.
His own destination, a small, shabby, corporate plantation, was less
impressive in appearance. Its name was Aidennsport. It consisted of
a hundred buildings, including a commissary and a hulking communal
storehouse. The primordial jungle was all about it.
To Wellesley, yellow-cheeked from too many years in space, cynical from
the paucity of human values in his life, Aidennsport was the despised
prototype of colonial stagnation about the galactic rim. For he was a
dour, lanky pessimist among that immense, invaluable, but nondescript
order of men, the Rift constabulary, whose beat is the emptiness
between the stars, and which enforces the name of law throughout the
vast reaches of the firmament beyond Sol's sprawling civilization.
Wellesley's ship was accustomed to describe an elliptical orbit
which brought it near the system containing Ophir once every seventh
side-real month. It never stopped. Its course was as inexorable as a
comet's; nevertheless, he had lately received the commission of an
errand here for the omnipotent Department of Genetics and Genealogical
Records.
And so he was forced to make landfall in a rocket tender in a meadow by
Aidennsport, while the ground quaked dangerously beneath the settling
blasts of the tiny vessel. He located the single course of the village
without difficulty. Half a dozen ragged children were playing there,
and stopped to stare. Women peered at his dark uniform from behind
curtains in the stained, milk-colored bungalows. Quaintly dressed men,
tending the auto-pickers in nearby fields of drug-plant, shaded their
eyes to gaze with silent menace, though there was no sun.
He was able to find the house of the agent by the frayed company flag
flying over it. To the right of it was the warehouse where the annual
crop of senna-like leaves of the drug-plant were stored for drying.
This was Aidennsport's meagre industry. Beyond lay the swamp, and far
across its desolate surface, the multi-colored towers of the pipes
fingered the sky, aloof and sinister in aspect.
A boy of no more than ten, dark eyed but with that startling,
burnished-gold complexion so often found in the systems of twin or
multiple suns, sat upon the steps before the cottage. He was playing
with a furry animal not unlike a Martian ferrax, which sprang up,
scarlet-eyed and bristling, at the sight of Wellesley.
"Here, boy," said Wellesley, who neither liked nor trusted children.
"Is this the house of Amos Sealilly, the factor of Aidennsport?"
"Sure. That's my pa. Say, are you a spaceman?"
"Never mind that. Where is your father?"
"In the warehouse," the boy said. "I'll show you how to get inside. My
name's Joseph, and I have a spaceship in the back yard. I call it the
_Stygia_, after the pirate ship of the twenty-eighth century. Do you
want to see my crew?"
"Later, perhaps," said Wellesley dryly. "Come along, now."
They found tall, aluminum doors which slid back at the wave of a hand,
and entered into a vastness of cool gloom, permeated by a spicelike
odor of curing leaves.
A figure emerged from the drying racks at the other end of the
warehouse.
"_Is that you, Joseph?_"
"That's pa," Joseph said.
"Damn you, Joseph!"
"I guess he's drunk," Joseph said.
Wellesley advanced. "I am Lieutenant Wellesley of the Rift police," he
said.
Amos Sealilly was a great, craggy ruin of a man, with seamed face and
heavy grey brows that shadowed intense blue eyes. Eyes that glared just
now. "What do you want here?" he bellowed.
"My mission is to perform an ethnic census for the Bureau of Genetics.
I shall require your co-operation."
"There are three hundred and twelve people in Aidennsport," Sealilly
said. "Write that down and get out. Go back to your space castle and
leave us alone."
Wellesley sighed. "I am afraid that an ethnic census is never quite
that simple. However, since you are required by law to assist me, you
may as well know the truth. This community is suspected of inbreeding."
* * * * *
Inbreeding is not, of course, a crime, except against nature. Nor is
it ordinarily dangerous. Combined, however, with the environmental
influences of certain Rim planets, it may cause genuine, true-breeding
mutations within the species, such as monsters, impressiono-telepaths,
psycho-variants and other undesirables which, if allowed to multiply
for a few generations, might become dominant. They are located and
deported to A-type worlds.
It had been an anonymous tip that had brought Wellesley to Ophir,
but in all the inhabited universe, he knew, the Bureau was the sole
guardian of the classic blood strain, and it took no chances.
"What's 'inbreeding,' pa?" said Joseph, tugging solemnly at his
father's sleeve.
"A naughty word of the middle ages," said Sealilly thickly. "A bugaboo
of the mighty sky-chiefs. If we do not co-operate we bring their
lightning upon our heads. Yet, what must we do?"
Wellesley did not smile. "You must inform the colonists that I wish
to interview each member of every family and clan briefly, beginning
tomorrow morning at seven. I do not mind in the least being _persona
non grata_, but if any person fails to show up, or if there is any
trouble, you will be held personally responsible. Moreover, I do not
think you are as drunk as you would like me to believe."
Amos Sealilly bowed, took a flask from his pocket and drained it.
"One other thing. I shall need a place to sleep."
Sealilly smiled. "There is an abandoned native daub-hut behind my
house. You are welcome to it."
"It will serve," answered Wellesley coldly. "There are natives in the
area then?"
"Yes. Bipeds, though not mammalian, you will find. In fact, quite low
in the scale of evolution. They are nearsighted and harmless by day,
but you will be wise to keep to your hut after dark."
"I can take care of myself."
"I'll show you the place," Joseph offered. "I can carry your space kit,
too."
* * * * *
"Over there is my ship," Joseph said, pointing. "We are making ready to
put out for Arcturus."
There was a bright constancy about Joseph that clutched at the heart.
Not Lieutenant Wellesley's heart, of course, he reminded himself.
The "ship" was indeed the rusty, peaked foretank from some ancient
freighter, complete with hatch. It was set on end at the edge of the
swamp. To any boy it would have been a starship.
It was already dusk. The Ophirian daub-hut was not so bad as he
expected. It was massive. The orifice had been enlarged into a door.
Windows had been added. The only furnishing was the rude couch. It was
a measure of Sealilly's hostility.
Joseph spied the ferrax-thing scuttling across the lawn and dived at
it. The two of them rolled over and over, Joseph laughing, the animal
growling and spitting.
Wellesley went in, closed the door and removed his official log
from its case. The next two hours were spent in a carefully worded
account--for space logs are part of the permanent records of the
Galactic Court, among others--of the events of the day, including a
bleak and perhaps prejudiced account of the character of Aidennsport
and of Amos Sealilly.
Afterwards he lay back on the couch and smoked several cigarettes
in lieu of the food capsules that he did not crave. He was far from
imaginative; nevertheless, the character of the place crept at last
into his consciousness. He was used to cramped, machinery-filled
spaces and the sterile smells of hot metal and ozone; here was an
aura of decaying organic matter--and of something else. A faint,
but unmistakable reptilian odor, attesting to the nature of past
inhabitants.
The vault of darkness was absolute, unabated by the dim patches of
light that were the fenestrations above where he lay.
And presently someone very stealthily opened the door and entered.
* * * * *
Only for an instant was the figure silhouetted there before the door
closed and darkness reigned supreme once more. Yet that instant was
long enough to tell him that it had been a woman. And though her
features had not been discernible, he had gotten the impression of
exceptional beauty.
For a time there was no movement; no sound save her faint breathing.
"Who's there?" he said. "What do you want?"
And then she came nearer and stood so close to him that the perfume of
her breath was upon his face. Suddenly he groped, caught her arm and
pulled her to him. The warmth of her body was against him. He felt her
tremble. But she did not try to pull away.
He laughed. "Perhaps I may revise my opinion of Ophir," he said.
"No light!" she whispered. Her voice was low and vibrant.
"Why not?"
"I must not be seen here. But I had to warn you. It would not have been
right not to warn you about Aidennsport."
"What of Aidennsport?"
"It is a dreadful--an evil place. There are forces here which you would
not understand. Leave at once while you are still able to go!"
"You forget that I am a policeman. To leave without completing the
census would be dereliction. I remind you that the Empire is inexorable
in these things. And who are you, anyway?"
She did not answer, but drew away so quickly that he could not grasp
her. In a moment, from across the room her voice came. It was less
intimate, even matter-of-fact.
"If you will not leave," she said, "lock this door behind me and do
not, as you value your life, step outside this hut until daylight."
She was suddenly gone and he was alone in mystification and wonder, and
a dull, stirring anger that he could not account for.
But he could make nothing of it and after a time he put the incident
resolutely out of his mind and tried to sleep. This was not
accomplished at once. Curious sounds had begun to filter in through the
fenestrations. Some were the night sounds of birds or insects. Other
sounds, faint hissings and gruntings, were unidentifiable. Once he
thought he heard the slap-slap of bare feet running past his door.
At last he was forced to employ a mild form of auto-suggestion, learned
long ago and employed often during those first lonely years in space.
He slept.
But once, in the early hours of morning, he was awakened by a tumult.
There was much loud hissing and the scampering of many feet outside
the daub-hut, as though some intricate and riotous game might be in
progress out there, the nature of the game--or for that matter, the
players--unguessed at. But he was half asleep, and thought little of it
until he awoke again at daybreak.
* * * * *
The Authority of the Rift constabulary is acknowledged universally,
though sometimes grudgingly. The men of Aidennsport, therefore,
sullenly reported to Wellesley, and brought their families.
It is a singular thing, but almost every birth and death in the galaxy
is recorded by the Empire. The laws concerning this are old and
stringently enforced. Therefore Wellesley already had a fairly accurate
estimate of the true population of Aidennsport, and it came close to
the number offered by Amos Sealilly.
Following the seldom-used manual of the Bureau, he received vital
statistics, made micro-photos and dermal prints, and endeavored a
minute scrutiny of every man, woman and child that passed before him.
He was finished by mid-afternoon.
Evidence of ingeneration he found in plenty, in the marked similarity
of features among certain families, but nothing which could be called
deviation or mutation. Not even polydactylism, which is one of the
earlier manifestations. Still, he knew that the physical impress of the
mutant was often subtle, and that he might have overlooked something.
In none of the females could he identify the girl of last evening. If
she had failed to appear--was hiding in the village--might not others
be hiding too?
The only recourse was to study the natives and try again. In many cases
deviation among _homo sapiens_, who had colonized the Rim planets,
simulated the natural characteristics of native races. The relationship
between mutation and environment was obvious.
The chief magistrate, factor, or leader of any colony with an official
grant was required by law to assist and obey any member of the Rift
police in the capacity of a deputy.
Wellesley called Amos Sealilly, who had been avoiding him all day. "Is
there a tribe of the dominant native species near here?" he asked.
Sealilly was still drinking, and saluted stiffly. "In the swamp,
Lieutenant."
"Guide me there."
"You can go to hell," Sealilly said, "and I will guide you _there_."
"You refuse?"
"I do. It's too dangerous for a spaceman. Full of bog-fever. You've no
natural resistance. Besides, I'm busy inventorying."
"Very well," Wellesley said, struggling to hold his temper in check,
"I'll find them alone."
"In which case," said Sealilly, "you will not come back, and that will
be an irreparable loss to the Empire."
Wellesley left him and made his way toward the swamp. Joseph was
playing near his ship, and calling orders to an imaginary crew inside.
When he saw Wellesley he came running.
"We were just blasting off for Earth," he said, "but I heard you and Pa
talking. If you want to go in the swamp, I'll show you the way. I've
been there lots. The Ophirians hang out on the shores of the black
lake, where the organ pipes are." He pointed to the towering pinnacles
in the distance. "They catch shellfish there."
"You know them?"
"Everybody has seen them. They are kind of green and slimy, but they
won't hurt you. They can't see in the day-time. Only smell. Anyway, I'm
not afraid of them."
"Done," said Wellesley, "and in return for the favor I promise to put
in a word for you at the nearest spaceman's hiring hall."
"You won't have to do that," Joseph said. "My crew and I are going to
be space pirates."
Then Wellesley laughed aloud, and felt better afterward than he had
felt in many a long month.
* * * * *
The trail through the swamp was damp and primitive. Everywhere the
cycads, giant ferns and reeds overhung the path. There were great,
blood-colored flowers which snapped at twigs that Joseph put into their
corollas.
Meanwhile, the ferrax-beast labored behind them, following with its
proboscis to the ground, until the boy, taking pity, picked it up and
carried it. Wellesley asked its name.
"His name is Omur," Joseph said. "I caught him in the mountains when he
was little and raised him. But now Omur is too fat to walk."
Eventually they emerged into an open swale, with a stretch of dark
water before them. On the other side of the slough lay a sight well
worth a day's march. Dozens of giant pipes, some two hundred feet or
more in height, stood braced against the sky, pastel blue, pink, and
gold in the mists.
But Wellesley was less interested in these than the creatures which
moved like grubs about their base, at the edge of the lake--squat,
grotesque forms that waded the shallow water, scavenging for shellfish
and crustaceans, and took no notice of the humans.
On coming nearer, however, Wellesley observed a very curious fact. The
Ophirians were of two varieties. The ones in the mud were gross and
toadlike in appearance. Whenever they found an especial delicacy they
would run, with their webbed feet making smacking sounds in the shoal
water, and lay it at the feet of an Ophirian who sat in a wallow of
peat moss and mud, and did nothing. He was a much smaller variety, but,
Wellesley noted, with considerably greater frontal development to his
skull. Also his thin body bore a long, green tail. The tails of the
workers were vestigial.
"The chief?" Wellesley asked.
"No," Joseph said. "It's something else."
"Are they a clan, then, or brothers?"
"Closer than brothers," Joseph said, scratching Omur's head.
"I have it--_avatars!_ I should have guessed!" He had heard of this
odd genetic arrangement before, but never witnessed it. In such
cases a dozen or more individuals were born of a single nucleus in
a single egg. Of these, one developed more fully than the rest and
controlled his mentally-stunted avatars with a mental vinculum far more
fundamental and powerful than mere telepathic union. On the other hand,
the avatars were his hands and feet, and had larger bodies.
The large-headed Ophirian sat in his wallow and accepted the food
offered him with long, leathery fingers. He crunched noisily. Once he
turned to stare at them briefly with great, owl eyes. Eleven avatars
turned simultaneously to stare. It was like looking into a multiple
mirror.
"They sense us," Joseph said, "but they can't see us. Come on."
From nearby, the pipes were even more awe-inspiring. Besides the
massive old towers there were smaller ones in every stage of
development. It was incredible to think that they were actually
growing; pushing up out of the lake.
In one of them a jagged hole, five or six feet in circumference, had
been broken at the base. Joseph, with his furry pet under his arm, went
to investigate it.
A moment later there came a shout from him that brought Wellesley
running. "What's the matter?"
"Omur went up the pipe," Joseph said, "but _you_ can get him." There
were tears in his eyes. Beseeching tears.
"We'll see," said Lieutenant Wellesley brusquely. He put his head
inside the pipe. A tiny circle of light far above him showed at what an
awesome height was the upper rim. The inner surface, however, was very
rough, and there were plenty of holds for hands and feet. He could not
see Omur; only the circle of light, and around it, blackness. Suppose
the damned thing bit him when he tried to rescue it! A faint, moaning
sound emanated from the vast funnel, doubtless from the updraft.
He found a place for his foot; drew himself up a step; then another.
Joseph's white face was staring up at him from below. _And suddenly the
circle of light was blotted out!_
* * * * *
There was a rustling sound like dry leaves in the wind, and a sudden,
sharp pain in his temple. Then another at the base of his neck. He fell
back and sprang out into the open. The aperture, in an instant, was
full of small, needle-like fluttering things.
"Stingbats!" Joseph screamed. "Run!"
Wellesley fled after him, but he was already beginning to feel a sick,
draining weakness. Within a few steps his legs had become rubbery.
Joseph was out of sight. Perhaps gone for help. But then Joseph did not
know that he had been stung.
After a while he came to a small, black pond in his path. He had gotten
off the trail. He sank down, there, beneath a fern tree, cursing.
He was sure that he was dying, for a numbness, an absence of feeling,
had stolen up from his feet and possessed his legs. He essayed a bitter
smile. He was more chagrined than afraid, for this was an ignominious
way to pass, here in a nameless swamp, alone, not even beset by one
worthy enemy. And perhaps when he thought he smiled, he was merely
baring his teeth in that manner that certain neurotoxins leave their
corpses always....
* * * * *
Someone was shaking him brutally and insistently, and someone was
repeating his name, over and over. He knew the voice at once, for it
had been lately in his thoughts.
"_Get up!_" she said.
"I can't."
"You must--or die. Get up now and try to walk. Come, I'll help you."
She did help him, and with her support he managed to get to his knees
and then to his feet. He walked.
Afterward, there was a kind of delirium. He remembered bitter tasting
capsules which she made him swallow later on in the daub-hut, but he
did not recall having arrived there. He only knew that it was pleasant
to have her cool hands on his forehead. The hands seemed to fill a
vast, fundamental need. And this was out-of-character for Lieutenant
Wellesley.
After a while he was lucid, and was surprised to note that, as at their
other meeting, the darkness was absolute. "It's night," he said. "Very
dark."
"Yes."
"Give me your hand."
He held it for a time in both his own. It was a firm, capable hand with
long, tapering fingers. "Believe that I am grateful," Wellesley said,
"even though I must be grateful to a benefactor whom I have yet to see
for the first time. Let me look at you. I cannot command you to tell me
who you are, as an officer of the Rift constabulary, but I ask it as
your friend."
"You ask the impossible," she said. "The worst is over for you, but
there may be still another shock to come. You must stay here until you
are stronger, and then I will help you escape. Now I had better go,
before--before I am missed."
He heard her retreating footsteps and the closing of the door.
_Escape from what?_ he wondered vaguely. The poison, or the antidote
seemed to have brought about some curious psychological change in him.
He could not think with the old, clear incisiveness. The drive was
gone, the purposefulness of his mission to Ophir. He was like Samson
shorn--or a man taken with void amentia whose mind becomes as a
child's.
And it was so dark. A horrible suspicion arose in his mind. He searched
for, and found the torch that was in his kit. He turned it on. Nothing
happened. No beam of light shot out to illuminate the ceiling. He
clicked the switch several times, then held the lens against his cheek.
It was warm, all right.
He was stone blind.
* * * * *
Wellesley was not unlearned in the physiological sciences. He guessed
that the blindness might be temporary--a result of neural shock, but
that was scant consolation.
Now it seemed to him that since his arrival an invisible pattern of
ill-will had been forming up around him. An ugly something lurking
beneath the sullen surface of this strange village. A malignant force,
beyond doubt, that well knew his true mission on Ophir.
Now he was helpless, incapable of concerted action. He could not even
retreat, but only lie and listen and wait. Now it was _their_ move. The
terrors of the blind were apt to be blind terrors indeed.
The sounds were not long in beginning. At first an indistinct murmur.
Then something--or someone--scampered swiftly past his door. He got
up and locked it; then lay back, spent by the exertion. Presently the
running and scampering began in earnest. And a hissing and squealing
such as might have emanated from all the fiends in Hell. Once there
came a scratching at the door.
An hour passed like a century. The sounds had gradually died away into
an absolute silence that was much worse. He waited.
There came a knock at the door.