"She did," said Shoemaker, taking out his handkerchief, "and she died
with one great wish unfulfilled."
"Yeah? What was that?" Burford asked skeptically.
"She always wanted to have a son like you," Shoemaker said, "so that
she could whale the living daylights out of him." He blew his nose
raucously, slipped the capsule into his mouth, put his handkerchief
away and smiled beatifically.
Davies was frowning. "Jim," he said, "I wish you wouldn't make jokes
about it. We all know what's the matter with you. You been fightin' the
liquor too hard."
"Who says so?" Shoemaker demanded.
"Now, Jim, don't make things difficult. I don't like this any more'n
you do, but--"
"Like what?"
Burford made an impatient gesture. "Go ahead, tell him, Lou. No use
dragging it out."
"That's right," Hale put in, glowering.
"Shut up, you," said Shoemaker. He turned to Davies. "Tell me what?
You're not going to bring up that 'cure' chestnut again, by any chance?"
Davies looked uncomfortable. "I'm sorry, Jim. I know you don't want to
take it. I argued against it, but the boys finally convinced me. You
know, Jim, if it was only you that we had to think about, I wouldn't
try to make you do anything you didn't want to. But, don't you see,
this is it--either we all stick together or we're sunk. If we don't
all keep in good shape and able to do our jobs, why ... well, you see,
don't you, Jim--"
"What he means," said Burford, "is that this time you're going to take
the cure, whether you want to or not."
Shoemaker got up and put his chair very carefully out of the way.
"Let's see you make me," he said.
* * * * *
It had to look good, so when Burford grabbed for him he stepped back
and swung a hearty right into the middle of Burford's face.
Burford staggered, but kept on coming. He clipped Shoemaker's jaw
glancingly, swung again and missed, then gave him a beauty in the eye.
Shoemaker aimed for the midriff and got it. "Uff!" said Burford. Then
Hale tackled him from behind and the three of them were all over him.
[Illustration: _Every time he tore loose they brought him down again._]
Shoemaker writhed, kicking, biting and using his elbows, but every
time he tore loose they brought him down again. After a while he was
beginning to wonder if he could get away even if he really meant it.
Then, somehow, Davies got a half Nelson on him and bore down. Shoemaker
decided it was time to quit.
He looked at his opponents. Burford had a black eye and several
assorted contusions, Hale a puffed and bleeding cheek. He couldn't see
Davies' face, but the pants-leg stretched out beside his own was ripped
and hanging down over the boot, revealing a hairy thigh. Shoemaker felt
pretty good.
"Whuff," said Burford, gazing at him with a new respect. He got up
carefully, walked over to the sick-box and came back with a box of
powders and a glass of water.
He knelt. Shoemaker glared at him. Burford said, "Okay, baby, open
your mouth or we'll pry it open. Hold his head, Lou." Davies' big hand
clasped Shoemaker's skull, and Burford pried at his lower jaw. The
instant his lips parted, Burford tilted the powder into his mouth, then
pushed it shut again. Shoemaker's eyes bulged. "Swallow," said Burford
remorselessly, and grabbed Shoemaker's nose between a horny finger and
thumb.
Shoemaker swallowed. "Now you get the water," Burford said, and held
the glass to his lips. Shoemaker drank, meekly.
Burford stood up. "Well," he said uncertainly, "that's that." Davies
let go of Shoemaker and eased out from under him. Then he stood beside
Burford and Hale, and all three looked down at Shoemaker.
There were real tears in Shoemaker's eyes--from having his nose pinched
in Burford's vise-like grip--and his face looked drawn. Slowly, like an
old man, he got to his feet, walked to the table and sat down.
"Now, Jim," Davies began hesitantly, "don't take on. It isn't so bad.
You'll be a better man for it, you know. You'll prob'ly gain weight and
everything. Now, Jim--"
Shoemaker wasn't listening. His eyes were rigid and glassy, his jaw
lax. Slowly he began to tremble. He slumped over and hit the deck with
a thud, still jerking.
"Good Lord!" exploded Burford.
"What is it?" Hale demanded.
"Mitchel's reaction," said Burford. "Hasn't happened twice in thirty
years. I never thought--"
"Is it dangerous, Charley?"
"Lord, yes. Wait till I get the handbook." Shoemaker heard his quick
steps, then pages being riffled.
When he thought it was safe, Shoemaker sneaked a look out of one
eye. The other two men were pressed close to Burford, staring over
his shoulders. Their backs were to him, but he kept jerking his body
occasionally anyway, just to be on the safe side.
"Treatment," said Burford hoarsely, "extended rest on soft diet,
diathermy, u. v. irradiation, hourly injection of--Hell, we can't do
that. We haven't got half the stuff."
"What happens if he don't get it, Charley?" said Davies nervously. "I
mean to say, how long--"
Burford flipped pages. "General debility, progressing rapidly, followed
by heart stoppage and death after four to ten weeks."
"Oh, my," said Davies. "What'll we do, Charley? I mean--"
"Wait a minute, here. Are you sure he's got what you think?" asked Hale
skeptically. "How do you know he's not faking?"
"Faking!" said Burford. "Well--he's got all the symptoms." He riffled
pages. "Immediate unconsciousness, violent tremors--oh-oh. Look at
this."
The two heads craned forward eagerly. There was a moment of silence,
and then Hale giggled. "Well, if he does _that_, I'll believe you!"
"Yes," said Davies seriously, "but, if he's unconscious, how can he--"
Burford glanced at the handbook again. "He should be coming to any time
now," he said loudly. "When he does, we'll know for sure."
* * * * *
Shoemaker grinned to himself. He knew that section of the Medical
Handbook by heart. _Patient remains unconscious and cannot_ be roused
for twenty minutes to one-half hour.... He kept his eyes closed and
waited, jerking occasionally, for what he judged was a good twenty
minutes, then another five for good measure. When he opened them again,
he saw Davies' anxious face a few inches away, flanked by Burford's and
Hale's.
"He's coming out of it!" said Burford. "How do you feel, old man?"
"Wha--?" said Shoemaker.
"You've had a little stroke," said Burford mendaciously. "Help me get
him up.... You'll be all right, Jim, but you've got to do just as we
tell you."
"Poisoned me," Shoemaker gasped, suffering himself to be hoisted limply
erect.
"No, no," Davies protested. "We're trying to help you, Jimmy boy. Just
go with Charley, that's right. Here, take this bottle, Charley."
Even Shoemaker was a little startled by what followed.
When they returned, Burford nodded solemnly. "It was blue, all right,"
he said.
"Poisoned me!" said Shoemaker, allowing himself to speak a little more
emphatically.
"Oh, hell!" said Burford, lifting Shoemaker's quaking body into a
chair. "So we poisoned you. We didn't mean to do it. Question is now,
what's to be done?"
"Why, we've got to get him to a hospital," said Davies. "Got to start
back to Earth immediately. Uh--but, Charley, will he be well enough to
work on the trip?"
"It _might_ not kill him," said Burford grimly. "But what about us? Are
we going to go back empty-handed?"
"Oh, my," said Davies. "I forgot for a minute. No, we _can't_ do that.
But look here, Charley--if he dies while we're still here, how're we
going to get back without him?"
"We'll have to, that's all," said Burford.
"Check," said Hale.
"Well, I got to admit you boys are right," said Davies promptly, with
a long face. "Never had to make a more difficult decision in my life.
Poor old Jim! When I think--"
He stopped with a gasp as Shoemaker rose to his feet, swelling visibly
with rage. "When _I_ think," said Shoemaker loudly, "of the chances
I've had--" he found himself encumbered by the broken halves of the
capsule under his tongue, and spat them out violently--"to strangle
the whole murdering crew of you quietly in your sleep--" His fingers
curled. He started toward Davies slowly, on stiff legs.
Burford was staring at the capsule-halves on the deck. Suddenly he
bent and picked them up, saw the faint blue stain that still clung to
their edges. Light broke over his face. "Methylene blue!" he said. "You
knew--you hid this in your mouth and swallowed it. Why, you old--"
"I did," said Shoemaker, "and now I'm going to make _you_ swallow it."
He stepped forward and swung a vigorous right that knocked Burford
through the open door.
Hale had picked up a chair. Shoemaker ducked aside as it whooshed
down, meanwhile kicking Hale in the stomach. Then he looked around for
Davies, but the latter, it seemed, was behind him. Something tapped
Shoemaker on the back of the skull, and then everything faded away in
gray mist....
* * * * *
The mist lifted once, while, with a throbbing head, he listened to
Burford explaining that everything on the ship that could possibly
be a weapon was locked up; that if he attempted any more reactionary
violence they would as soon leave him dead on Venus as not; and that if
he knew what was good for him, he would behave himself both before the
takeoff--which would occur when they pleased--and after it.
He tried to tell Burford what he could do with himself, but he fell
asleep again before he was half through.
When he woke, finally, it was evening, and low voices from the galley
forward told him that the other three had returned from another day of
hunting. He got up, feeling stiff and heavy, and prowled disconsolately
down the passageway as far as his shop door, which was, indeed, locked.
He was hungry, but he had a feeling that the sight of any one of the
other three human faces on Venus would take away his appetite. For lack
of anything better to do, he stepped into the airlock, closed the inner
door quietly behind him, and sat down morosely in the sallyport.
Sky and sea were dull blue-green, without star or horizon. There was a
stink of sulphur, and then a stink of fish, and then another stink of
sulphur.... He sat and sweated, thinking his gloomy thoughts.
Shoemaker was not a moral man, but the sense of personal doom was
strong upon him. Suppose there really were a Hell, he thought, only
the preachers were wrong about everything but the heat.... A splitting
skull.... _No_ liquor.... _No_ women.... A stinking, slime-blue
seascape that was the same right-side up, upside-down, or crossways....
And the little green men. He had almost forgotten them.
When he looked up, he remembered.
The third little man was slimmer, and had no whiskers at all. He
carried a shiny golden dagger, almost as big as himself. He was walking
forward purposefully.
Shoemaker waited, paralyzed.
The little man fixed him with his gleaming eye. "We're through kidding
around," he said grimly. "Question is now!"
And he laid the golden dagger in Shoemaker's quaking palm.
Shoemaker's first impulse was to cut his own throat. His second was to
throw the dagger as far away as possible. Those two came in flashing
tenths of a second. The third was stronger. He rose effortlessly into
the air, landed facing the sallyport, and, mouth wide open but emitting
no sound, ran straight through it. He passed the closed inner door more
by a process of ignoring it than by bursting it open.
Directly opposite was the door of Burford's chubby, just now open far
enough to show Burford's startled face. When he saw Shoemaker, he tried
hastily to shut the door, but Shoemaker by now had so much momentum as
to have reached, for practical purposes, the status of an irresistible
force. In the next second, he came to a full stop; but this was only
because he was jammed against Burford, who was jammed against the far
wall of the room, which was braced by five hundred tons of metal.
"_Ugg_," said Burford. "Whuff--where did you get that _knife_?"
"Shut up and start talking," said Shoemaker wildly. "Where's the
microspectrograph?"
Burford opened his mouth to yell. Shoemaker shut it with a fist,
meanwhile thrusting the knife firmly against Burford's midriff to
illustrate the point.
Burford spat out a tooth. As Shoemaker put a little more pressure on
the blade, he said hastily, "It's in the--uhh!--fuel reservoir."
Shoemaker whirled him around and propelled him into the corridor, after
a quick look to make sure that the way was clear. They proceeded to the
engine room, in this order: Burford, knife, Shoemaker.
Without waiting to be persuaded, Burford produced a ring of keys,
unlocked the reservoir, and withdrew the microspectrograph. "Hook it
up," said Shoemaker. Burford did so.
"Uhh," said Burford. "Now what--whiskey?"
"Nope," said Shoemaker incautiously. "We're taking off."
Burford's eyes bulged. He made a whoofling noise and then, without
warning, lunged forward, grabbing Shoemaker's knife arm with one hand
and punching him with the other. They rolled on the deck.
Shoemaker noticed that Burford's mouth was open again, and he put
his hand into it, being too busy keeping away from Burford's knee to
take more effective measures. Burford bit a chunk out of the hand and
shouted, "Hale! Davies! Help!"
* * * * *
There were bangings in the corridor. Shoemaker decided the knife was
more of a hindrance than a help, and dropped it. When Burford let
go to reach for it, he managed to roll them both away, at the same
time getting a good two-handed grip on Burford's skinny throat. This
maneuver had the disadvantage of putting Burford on top, but Shoemaker
solved the problem by lifting him bodily and banging his skull against
the nearby bulkhead.
Burford sagged. Shoemaker pushed him out of the way and got up, just in
time to be knocked down hard by Hale's chunky body.
"Old idiot," panted Hale, "oof! Help me, Davies!"
Shoemaker got an ear between his teeth, and was rewarded by a
bloodcurdling scream from Hale. Davies was hopping ponderously around
in the background, saying, "Boys, stop it! Oh, my--the guns are all
locked up. Charley, give me the keys!"
Shoemaker pulled himself loose from Hale, sprang up, and was
immediately pulled down again. Burford, who was getting dizzily to his
feet, tripped over Shoemaker's head and added himself to the tangle.
Shoemaker got a scissors on him and then devoted himself to the twin
problems of avoiding Burford's wildly threshing heels and keeping Hale
away from his throat. Suddenly inspired, he solved both by bending
Burford's body upward so that the latter's booted feet, on their next
swing, struck Hale squarely in the middle of his fat face.
At this point he noticed that Davies was standing nearby with one foot
raised. He grasped the foot and pushed. Davies hit the deck with a
satisfying clang.
Shoemaker got up for the third time and looked around for the dagger,
but it had been kicked out of sight. He paused, wondering whom to hit
next, and in the interval all three of his opponents scrambled up and
came at him.
Shoemaker thought, this is it. He spat on his fist for luck and hit
Burford a beauty on the chin. Burford fell down, and, astonishingly,
got up again. A little disheartened, Shoemaker took two blows in the
face from Hale before he knocked the little man into a far corner.
_Hale_ got up again. Shoemaker, who had been aware for some time that
someone was pummeling his back, turned around unhappily and knocked
Davies down. Davies, at any rate, stayed down.
Burford, whose face was puffy, and Hale, who was bleeding from assorted
cuts, came toward him. Hale, he saw, had the dagger in his hand.
Shoemaker stepped back, picked up the unconscious Davies by collar and
belt, and slung him across the deck. This time both men went down (Hale
with a soggy _bloomp_), and stayed there. The dagger skidded out of
Hale's hand and came to rest at Shoemaker's feet.
He picked it up, knelt at a convenient distance to cut off Hale's and
Burford's noses, and threatened to do just that. Burford intimated that
he would do as he was told. Hale said nothing, but the expression on
his face was enough.
Satisfied, Shoemaker opened a locker with Burford's keys, got a coil of
insulated wire and tied up Davies and Hale, after which, with Burford's
help, he strapped them into their acceleration hammocks.
Burford was acting a little vague. Shoemaker slapped him around until
he looked alive, then set him to punching calculator keys. After a few
minutes of this, Burford looked as if he wanted to say something.
"Well, spit it out," said Shoemaker, waving the golden knife.
"You'll get yours," said Burford, looking scared but stubborn. "When we
get back to New York--"
"South Africa," corrected Shoemaker, "where the Supreme Council can't
ask us any questions."
Burford looked surprised, then said it was a good idea.
It was, too.
* * * * *
The lone star winked out in the blue-green heavens, and the winds of
its passing died away. The throng of little rabbit-eared green men,
floating on their placid ocean, gazed after it long after it had
disappeared.
"What do _you_ think?" said the slim one without whiskers. "Did they
like us?"
The one addressed was yards away, but his long ears heard the question
plainly. "Can't say," he answered. "They acted so _funny_. When we
spoke to that one in their own language, so as to make him feel at
home--"
"Yes," said a third, almost invisible in the mist. "Was that the right
thing to do, d'you suppose? Are you _sure_ you got the words right,
that last time?"
"Sure," said the first, confidently. "I was right next to the ship all
evening, and I memorized everything they said...."
They considered that for a while, sipping from their flasks. Other
voices piped up: "Maybe we should have talked to them when they were
all together?"
"Nooo. They were so _big_. That one was much the nicest, anyway."
"He took our present."
"Yes," said the slim one, summing it up. "They must have liked us all
right. After all, they gave us _this_"--swinging his flask to make a
pleasant gurgle of 150-proof grain alcohol. "That proves it!"
_Burp!_