"That's all I saw too," said Green, "and that is all I would ever have
seen, if it hadn't been for the tale of Samdroo."
"Let me tell you how you got in!" chattered the boy excitedly. "I know
what you were thinking of, what you did. You stood before the wall
and you made a sign like this on it!"--He traced a rough outline of a
rocket against the cool white metal--"and the wall suddenly slid to one
side, and you had an entrance. See!"
A whole section had moved noiselessly into the wall, leaving a round
doorway.
"Yes, I remembered the story of Samdroo and, though it was ridiculous
to think that it would work, I did what the Sailor did. Remember that
the cannibals were after him, and he ran into the cave and came to just
such a blank wall. And he, wishing to protect himself against the evil
spirits that he was sure lived in the cave, traced the sign that is
supposed to prevent them from touching a man. And the door slid open
and he plunged on into the chambers of the wicked magician, the savages
howling frustratedly after him.
"And," continued Green, "I did just what he did, and the sign proved to
be an _Open, O Sesame_ for me."
"A what?"
"Never mind. The point is that the ancient maintenance men must
have used just such a gesture to open the door, or else used it in
conjunction with other means. And if they did, then they must also have
been repair technicians for the ships that landed here. Perhaps the
sign of the rocket was a secret symbol for their guild. I don't know,
but it sounds reasonable."
Ignoring the boy's flood of questions, he walked into a great room.
It was more bare than he'd expected when he had found it the first
time; it contained four machines or their fuel supplies, all concealed
in four large square metal containers. In the center of the room was
a chair and an instrument panel. The panel contained six TV windows,
several oscilloscopes, and dials whose purpose he didn't know. But the
controls attached to the arms of the chair seemed simple enough.
"The only trouble," he said, "is that I don't know where the activating
switch is. I tried to find it the other night and couldn't. Yet, it
must be so obvious that I'll feel like a fool when I do locate it."
Vainly he pulled at the little levers set in the arms.
"My failure to activate this was the main reason I returned to the
yacht and sailed on to Estorya. Of course, I had to go and find out
just what the situation was and get a good idea of my plan of campaign.
Perhaps if I'd stayed here and taken a chance on going into the city
blind, we'd have been better off. At least, your mother wouldn't now be
in prison, and we wouldn't have the additional worry of rescuing her."
He rose from the chair and began pacing back and forth.
"How ironic if I'd come this far and could get no farther! But then,
what else could I expect? It's up to me to solve this, and I'm not
infallible, omniscient. It should be functioning as of now. I know
that the ring of rocket-shapes has got it paralyzed so it can't act.
Nevertheless, unless it's blown a fuse, gone neurotic from frustration,
or just worn out, there should be some indication that it is still in
operation."
"What do you mean?" said Grizquetr. "How can the island be paralyzed?"
Green stopped pacing to gesture at the radarscopes. "See those? Well,
there should be some funny lines squiggling across it, or little dots
moving, or arcs sweeping across it. They would be indicating the shapes
of things in the immediate neighborhood outside the island, and the lay
of the land. Thus, I imagine that in the ancient days, when it spotted
a rocket shape, which would then have been a genuine spaceship and
not a mockup, it would have detoured around it. The whole island was,
in one of its functions, a field attendant, a scavenger. It removed
anything from the plain that wasn't supposed to be there. There's why
they now attack 'rollers and crush them and disintegrate the parts that
fall beneath their bases. That also explains why the island is trapped
by a ring of rocket-shaped towers. The radar detects a complete circle
and, being unable to molest any object shaped like a rocket, it squats
in one place until it runs down or the rocket shapes are removed.
"Of course, it worked automatically. But there were controls for a man
to operate it when there was a special job to do or if he had to take
it to another place it ordinarily wouldn't go when on automatic. These
controls must be the ones.
"The question is, does the island switch itself off and on at certain
intervals, scanning the area around it to see if the inhibiting objects
have gone? If so, there's no telling how long we may have to wait
before its next sweep. And we just can't afford to wait!"
He was in agony. As long as he could keep his body and brain in action,
he felt he was progressing. But as soon as he had to wait upon some
inanimate object that he couldn't attack, or came across a seemingly
unsolvable problem, he was lost. He just didn't have the patience.
Lady Luck whined. She was tired of being imprisoned in the bag at
Green's waist and felt that she had been a good girl long enough.
Absently, he lifted her out and put her on the table. She stretched,
yawned, licked her lips, and then padded across the table. Her tail
switched back and forth, and its tip brushed the surface of the
centrally located TV screen.
Immediately, a metal ball on the panel glowed red and a sharp whistle
sounded. Two seconds later, light sprang into being in all of the
viewers.
27
"Oh, you beauty, you doll, you lovely Lady Luck! Whatever would I do
without you!" shouted Green. He started forward to caress the cat but,
alarmed, she jumped from the table and sped across the room.
"Come back, come back!" he called. "I wouldn't hurt a single one of
your lovely black hairs! I'll feed you on beer and fish the rest of
your life, and you'll never have to put in a day's work!"
"What's the matter?" said Grizquetr.
Green hugged him, then sat down in the chair.
"Nothing, except that that wonderful cat showed me how to activate the
equipment. You do so by brushing your hand across this screen. See,
I'll bet you do the same when you want to de-activate it!"
He touched the screen. The whistle sounded again, the metal ball ceased
glowing and the screens went dead. Once again he touched it, and life
came back.
"Nothing to it. But chances are I'd never have found out how simple it
was."