There was a shuffling sound from behind the lock. A moment's silence,
then Krassner, suspiciously, "Well?"
"What's the matter, my friend? You mustn't act like this. What is it
you want?"
"Turn the ship back to Earth!"
"But we can't do that." Mallory's voice was soothing, persuasive.
"We've set our course. We can't return."
"You must, damn you!"
I couldn't restrain myself any longer. I brushed by Mallory, cried,
"Krassner, you're acting like an idiot! Come out of there immediately!"
Again there was a brief instant of stillness. Then Krassner's tone
altered subtlely, became half-mocking. "Is that you, O'Shea?"
"Yes."
"The gallant captain of a drag-tailed company. You want to save your
command, don't you, Captain? Then make the old fool turn this ship
back, and do it _now_!"
Wrath inflamed me; I stepped forward and hammered on the metal door.
There came the sound of swift, frightened movements inside. Krassner
yelled sharply, incisively, "Don't try to come in here, O'Shea. I can
blast this ship to shards, and by the Banner, I'll--"
He stopped abruptly, aware that in his excitement he had finally given
himself away. But if he was startled, I was even more so. Suddenly,
now, it all made sense. I wondered why I had not guessed the truth
before. But I am not a clever man; I am just a soldier. And we had met
Krassner under circumstances that favored his deceit.
I said slowly, "So you're not one of us, after all, Krassner? You're
one of them?"
He had recovered his aplomb. He laughed stridently. In my mind's eye I
could see his face, thin lips drawn in a tight smile, those too-close
eyes lifted at the corners with mockery. His voice was a taunt.
"Congratulations, O'Shea, on having played the dupe so long and so
excellently. Allow me to introduce myself in my proper character.
Captain Jacob Krassner of the Imperial German Army--at your service!"
It was all too clear, now. I remembered the day we had met Krassner,
seen him "shot down" by an enemy plane. I remembered MacGregor's
comment at the time. "Damned funny. First Totie I ever saw who didn't
gun a parachuter."
And that day I had caught him listening to us from Mallory's outer
office. His restless wanderings around the laboratory grounds; now I
knew he had been seeking the hide-away of the _Jefferson_. And the
betraying rifle-shot--
"You Americans are a naïve race," Krassner was saying amusedly. "It
never occurred to you, did it, O'Shea, that I might have concealed on
me a portable transmitter? It was I who exposed the location of the
laboratory to our gallant forces. We had suspected for some time that
strange things were brewing near Cleft Canyon. That is why I--shall we
say 'dropped into the picture'? To learn the meaning of certain things
that puzzled us."
He was a braggart, like the rest of them. Now that he had given himself
away--only Toties swore "by the Banner"--he was gloating triumphantly.
And he held the upper hand. We could not even tell him that which we
knew; that Earth was doomed, that already hundreds of thousands of his
compatriots as well as ours by quiescent in dreadful, sleeping undeath.
If he discovered the Totie cause was lost--well, they were ever ones
for the heroic, the vainglorious gesture. And his hand controlled
forces that would blast us all into nothingness.
* * * * *
I glanced about me nervously. The faces of the men mirrored my anxiety,
Mallory's brow was heavy with fear, Van Huys gnawed his full lower lip
savagely. Only the gleaming metalwork of the corridor was impassive;
that and the heavy door that barred us from a traitor and an enemy. A
grilled square, high in the walls of the corridor, was like a great,
fanged, laughing mouth. I stared at it.
"Mallory!" I whispered the name. "What is that?"
"Eh?" He followed my glance. "Oh--that? Part of the ventilation system.
But, why--?" Then he grasped the reason for my sudden eagerness. "Yes,
Brian. It feeds into every chamber. We'll give you a hand. Bruce--"
Krassner's voice came to us, suspicious. "What are you whispering about
out there? I warn you, don't attempt to enter this room. If you do,
we'll all die together!"
Mallory somehow managed to keep his tone steady.
"Krassner, you're an intelligent man. Listen--"
"Keep him talking, Doctor!" I whispered. I nodded to MacGregor; his
huge hands cupped to give me a hand-up to the grill. My fingers tore
at the four studs that bolted it into position. One came out. Another.
All eyes were upon me as I lifted the heavy grill from its position,
lowered it into the outstretched hands. Only Mallory continued talking,
pleading, arguing, reassuring. Stalling for precious time.
I nodded, MacGregor's shoulders heaved, and I was scrambling into the
smooth bore of the ventilating system. It was narrow, but not too
narrow; the air was cool, clean-smelling. I crept from the opening, was
lost in darkness.
A native sense of direction, keen-edged by years of guerrilla warfare,
aided me in threading that black labyrinth. How long the creeping
journey took, I had no way of knowing. It seemed endless, for I moved
slowly, cautiously, dreading the revelatory scrape of clothing upon
metal, the sound that might send Krassner suddenly into action.
A turn, a rise, a descent, and another turn. Then before me loomed
a networked square of light. And the sound of Krassner's voice was
no longer muffled; it reached my ears loudly. "--fine organization,
O'Shea, where the soldiers address their 'captain' by his first name.
But we will teach you obedience, you Yankee up-starts! We--"
I was at the grill. There was no way to unscrew it from the inside.
What could be done must be done--and in a single, sure move--from here.
Krassner stood a few yards from the barred and bolted door. He had
not been bluffing. He had prepared the way for the destruction of the
_Jefferson_ in the event his demands were refused, his scheme went
awry. The end of a coiled fuse lay beside him, he toyed nervously with
an electro-lighter as he talked. But now his patience was wearing thin.
He said, "But enough of this conversation! Are you, or are you not,
going to turn about? Your answer now, or by the Banner--"
Mallory answered reluctantly, "Krassner, once more I beg of you to
listen to reason."
"The time for reason is past. I want action. You, O'Shea! Speak to me!
Are you going to turn the ship?"
Silence. I eased my revolver from its bolster with infinite slowness.
I saw a puzzled look appear on Krassner's features, turn to a look of
sudden doubt.
"O'Shea! Where are you? Speak to me!"
My gun spoke for me.
* * * * *
Krassner never suffered for the misery he brought on others. He never
knew what struck him. My shot crashed into his brain like a Jovian
bolt. Without a word, a whimper, a groan, he collapsed where he stood,
his lips still parted in the question he had been hurling at the door
upon which, now my comrades were battering.
But even in death, Krassner was destined to throw a last blow amongst
us. My cavernous eyrie echoed with a roaring blast; when my deafened
ears could hear again they heard a sizzling crackle. The stench of
burning powder stung my nostrils.
I craned to look down through the grill; saw there that which damped
my forehead coldly. Krassner's weapon had been the hand flame-thrower
of our enemy. The stricken convulsion of his fist had shot a withering
blast of flame upon the fuse. Now a charred line of fire was racing to
the charge Krassner had prepared.
In frantic haste I screamed this knowledge to those beyond the
door. "You've got to get in somehow! Stop that fuse!" Their efforts
redoubled. I heard the ringing crash of metal upon metal which meant
they had brought up a pry, then came a hissing sound, and at the
doorjamb, by the hinges, metal warmed, turned orange, glowed cherry
red. A blowtorch!
I could do no good behind this grill. It was the act of a contortionist
to turn in that meager space, but somehow I accomplished it, scrambled
desperately toward the corridor grill through which I had entered the
air-duct.
It was just as I gained the opening that the hinges of the lock finally
gave way, the door burst open. Even I was not prepared for that which
appeared through the frame. The entire aperture was one solid sheet of
flame. Despite their eagerness, no one could blame my men for falling
back, horrified, from the scorching fingers that leaped out to grasp
them.
All but one! And that one was Dr. Thomas Mallory. Perhaps it was
because he alone realized the vital necessity of jerking that fuse
from its charge before everything ended in one coruscant moment. Arms
locked before his face, head lowered, he dashed recklessly into that
flaming hell!
I fell--or dropped, I know not which--from my outlet, found myself on
my feet, heard myself bellowing, "Water! We've got to stop that fire
before--"
But they knew that. Already someone had raced to the jets, another
was tugging desperately at a reel of fire hose. I suppose what I did
next was heroic. Either that or damned, blind foolishness. It could
not have been deliberate heroism, for there was no time to measure the
chances, weigh the consequences. I leaped through the doorway, followed
Dr. Mallory. And even so, there was another figure at my side. That of
burly Bruce MacGregor.
We found him at the same time. He lay face down on the floor, arms
outstretched before him. But in one blistered hand was--the end of the
fuse. Scant inches from its charred end stood piled boxes of Triple-X,
most deadly of all explosives. The flames had not yet quite reached it,
but in another moment--
Then the water came! Like a solid fist it caught me in the middle of
the back, shot me, sprawling, forward. The breath shot from my lungs
before that impact--but never had I been more grateful for a bruising
blow.
MacGregor, a sorry sight with his blistered cheeks, scorched hair,
spark-charred garments, bent his brute strength against the flood,
roared directions.
"Here! On these boxes first! Soak them, ruin them! We can fight the
fire later...."
* * * * *
We got Dr. Mallory out of that furnace. How long we battled the fire
after that is hard to say. At least an hour. Krassner had planned his
coup with deadly Teutonic thoroughness. Not only had he arranged the
fuse and explosive charge; he had also soaked walls, drapes, furniture,
with gasoline.
Against this, our water was useless. We had no sand. Men labored to
drag the lethal crates of explosive out of the danger zone; after
that we went back at the ever-spreading fire. Chemicals did the trick
finally. The last blaze succumbed to the stifling blanket of carbon
dioxide, a clean-up crew methodically swept up the last of the charred
débris.
Thus died Krassner--but at what a cost! Ten of my men in the hospital,
at least two of them seriously burned. Three whole bins of provisions
gone forever, devoured by the hungriest of all foes. A binful of
linens, clothing, blankets, burned to cinders. And every other room
that had been in that aft section of the ship gutted!
All these disasters paled into insignificance when, bandaged, cleaned,
reclad, I went to visit Dr. Mallory. One look at his face and I knew
that here was the heaviest price we were to pay for the destruction
of our last mortal foe. Only Mallory's eyes were visible under the
swaddling mask of bandage, and these were raw and bloodshot. But the
ghost of a smile lighted these fine old eyes, and his voice, sieved
through a layer of gauze, said weakly:
"I ... reached there in time ... Brian, lad."
"You did that," I told him huskily. "You saved us all, Doctor."
"Not only us, but ... mankind. We _had_ to live, Brian. You must
lead ... our people ... out of the wilderness."
I said, "Not I, Doctor. _You._ You are the only man who can save us,
reclaim the sleeping world--"
He said, as though not hearing me, "It's a good ... thing I showed
Maureen ... how to run the ship. Isn't it? Now she can take us to Luna.
"Brian, boy ... find the notes ... in my desk. They'll help you. I
believe ... you'll find the crater of Copernicus ... the best place to
land. There will be air there. Thin, maybe. But air. In the underground
grottoes ... should be ... water...."
* * * * *
A spasm shook him; his eyes closed for a moment in pain, then opened
again. They were febrilely bright.
"Most important of all ... Brian ... the spores. You must find a
way ... to destroy them. Go back to Earth ... and awaken man ... to
a new, a peaceful, world."
He was silent so long that I cried out, "Doctor!" I couldn't say more.
But he spoke again, and for the last time. "I am sure now ... Brian ...
you will find the answer ... in chlorophyll. Keep after it. The fate of
all ... mankind ... is in only your...."
And that was all. His eyes closed, then, as if they had finally found
peace. I turned away. Maureen covered his face tenderly. She came to my
side, and her voice was soft.
"He was right, Brian. You are our leader now. It is up to you to find
the antidote for Earth's illness."