Synthetic Men

by Ed Earl Repp

  A terrific explosion thundered against Dave’s ear-drums. Then the sound was superseded by a vast, empty silence. The young physicist dived at the receiver. But Charles Weston’s message was concluded. Throughout the five minutes Dave sweated over the controls, not another word boiled through. He rocked back in his chair at last, stunned.

  His eyes wandered to the moonlight flooded scene beyond the window. Out there m the waterless deadly world of sand and red rock was his father. Not a hope this time, but a certainty.

  Again and again the things Weston had said drummed through his brain: “—a valley of death—wealth untold—the very air is deadly!”

  What fantastic thing had happened to him out there? Had he lost his mind?

  Then he remembered the first explosion. That, at least, had been no one’s imagination. At the recollection of the second, apprehension claimed him.

  After a while he got up and began casting glances about the room, as if he hoped to find there the secret of Lost Valley. His eyes fastened on a little collection of minerals he had picked up in the desert. All at once he stood stock still.

  His mind had flashed back to Helen Lodge, to the rock she had found, to the music she claimed to hear . . . Could that have anything to do with the mystery of the hidden valley?

  Abruptly, Dave had sprung to the door and torn it open. He went through the house at a gallop, nearly scaring Mac and Bill out of their seats in the front room.

  “Pack the burros and be ready in an hour!” he flung at them. “We’re leaving at last!”

  CHAPTER III

  Lost Valley

  Brand Kaley’s place lay at the foot of a jagged little peak, a quarter of a mile out of town. The gaunt, brittle branches of a palo fierro screen patterned the warm rectangles of light along the front and side of the house. A familiar form appeared before one of the windows as Weston swung up the path. His impatient pounding brought hurried steps to the door.

  The light behind Helen Lodge threw her face into shadow, but her golden hair glowed softly about her head. There was open dislike in her face as she said coldly, “I thought I made it clear, Mr. Weston, that I am keeping that rock . . .”

  Dave gestured impatiently: “Keep it—that isn’t why I came. Not exactly, anyway. I need your help, Miss Lodge!”

  He kept right on talking as she started to shake her head. “My father is in danger somewhere out in the valley. I heard him over short wave not fifteen minutes ago. God knows where he is, but wherever that voice came from, there is death all about. I think you can help me find him . . .!”

  “I?” The girl’s slim shoulders lifted slightly in an aloof shrug; but Dave read a quickening of interest in her features, a trace of sympathy.

  “Maybe I’m off on a tangent,” the young scientist jerked, “but I’ve got a hunch that rock you found—” His voice broke like a snapped twig at the sound of heavy footfalls from the interior.

  Then a hardness settled in this face, matching the stiffening of his body. “Kaley!” he bit out. Under the frowning black bar his brows made, his eyes whipped over the other’s blocky figure.

  Brand Kaley thrust a stubby arm before the girl, forcing her rudely back from the door. He planted his balled fists against his hips and canted a bullet head forward on wide, thick shoulders. Oblique eyes, alive with malevolence, slotted dangerously at either side of his flattened nose.

  Kaley, the scientist, looked more like a veteran of the prize-ring; but those who had come in contact with him knew the cruel, hair-trigger genius of his mind.

  “You’ve got crust, coming here, Weston,” he broke out angrily. “What do you want?”

  “Nothing that concerns you,” Dave snapped. “I was talking to your secretary before—”

  “Before I butted in?” Kaley cut in, grinning. “Consider your little talk at an end. While Miss Lodge is in my employ, she will have very little to say to you, I believe.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong.” Dave’s gaze slid past the beefy features to the girl’s apprehensive countenance. He took a single step into the room, when Kaley planted his palm against his chest.

  “Get out!” he barked.

  Dave clubbed his arm down with a chopping blow. “I’ll get out when I’ve talked to her!” he responded angrily. “You got away with swindling my father, but you won’t be the cause of his death if I can help it.”

  “His death!” Kaley echoed harshly. “Weston, you’re letting your imagination run wild. As for my ‘swindling’ him, I refer you to Kaley versus Weston—the court decided that question.”

  It was Helen who spoke next. “Perhaps he’s right, Doctor,” she ventured. “The thing I found might be of some use. If it is—”

  “Keep out of this,” rapped Haley. “I told you to get out, Weston. I won’t waste my breath again.”

  Dave stood quietly watching him, a tall, alert figure in his dusty breeches and khaki shirt open down to the third button. “For a broken-down chemist like you were when Dad took you in, you’ve grown to something mighty dictatorial,” he breathed. “You’d still be working in a lab for forty a week, if he hadn’t recognized your brilliance and taken you on. You didn’t have enough get-up to succeed on your own. But under his direction you helped him perfect his invention—and then stole it from him! If wolves ever masquerade as men, Kaley, I’m looking at one now!”

  Kaley struck then, the force of his fist hurling Dave against the door jamb. A slow trickle of blood wormed out of the corner of the younger man’s mouth. With a muttered oath he drove himself forward.

  They met with the shock of two angry grizzlies colliding at full tilt. An elation that was like strong wine flamed up within Dave. Every savage blow he sank into Kaley’s body and face made his blood pound faster.

  The chemist was hard, his bulky body well-muscled with heavy sinews. For the first half minute they slugged and grunted and swore, each taking as much punishment as he gave. Dave’s face felt hot and swollen on the right side from a roundhouse blow.

  Kaley’s punches began to lose their sting. As if to bolster his own confidence, he tucked his bullet head down and waded in with both arms pumping. Dave sensed the change in his tactics and contented himself with blocking his fists as fast as they flew. Then Kaley’s arms came down and he waited, panting heavily.

  Immediately Dave jabbed a left in his face that straightened him up. He followed with a right that came from the floor, smashing heavily into his jaw. Kaley started falling backwards. Dave got a hand behind his head and held him there a moment. The chemist floundered sideways, swinging automatically at the bloody, grinning face before him.

  For the last time Dave hit, his bare knuckles slashing down across Kaley’s face and bringing a torrent of blood from his nose. A dazed, stricken look came into his eyes.

  Then he seemed to fold up, like a split-open sack of meal.

  Dave’s first reaction, as he glanced up from Kaley’s lax form, was to apologize. But the girl acted as though she hadn’t heard him.

  “He never told those things to me,” she said wonderingly. “He said it was your father who—who only helped on the invention . . . instead of himself. Is it true that Kaley returned Charles Weston’s good will the way you said?”

  Somberly, Dave nodded. Then, abruptly, he remembered what had brought him here. “The rock—you’ve got it here?”

  Helen indicated a battered old desk in one corner. “He was studying it when you came.”

  Dave walked over and picked up the strange lump of amber-gold mineral. He handled it delicately, conscious that it might mean the difference between life and death for his father. When his eyes sought Helen’s again, his face was grave.

  “I’m going to tell you the reason I came tonight,” he began soberly. “It’s only fair you should know everything—because I’m going to ask you to do something I have no right to ask.”

  Briefly, then, he told of his father’s search for the lost meteorite, of his failing to report, and of the conversation of a ha
lf hour ago. Helen’s eyes were doubting at first, but finally believing.

  “But what can I do?” she wanted to know.

  “You thought you could tell what direction that music came from before,” Dave said tensely. “If that’s true, and if, as I think, this piece of mineral has some strong connection with the meteorite, you should be able to lead us to Lost Valley!”

  It was not doubt and mistrust that came into the girl’s face. It was eagerness—eagerness that Dave stopped with a raised hand.

  “What I’m asking you is, to take the risk of dying of thirst if we get lost, perhaps of being followed by gold-hungry adventurers—Kaley not excepted. It’s a thing any man could steer clear of and not be called a coward. Knowing that, do you still want to help me?”

  Helen said quietly, “It means all those risks—but doesn’t it also mean a chance for your father to come back alive?” Her face glowed with a quiet, sincere emotion that made Dave’s pulses hammer.

  Impulsively, Dave seized her hand—to gasp with surprise as she cried out and slipped to the floor!

  Dave cursed himself as he pocketed the amber rock and helped her up. “Stupid ass that I am!” he scourged himself. “I forgot I was holding that stuff. It seems to work like electricity—and my taking your hand closed the circuit!”

  “It did this good at least,” Helen smiled weakly. “I heard the music from about the same direction as before—over towards the Last Chance Mountains.”

  “Good!” Dave nodded. “I’ve got burros, guides and food ready. With you to put us on the track once a day, we can’t go wrong!”

  Before the brassy sun had rolled to its zenith the next day, the little cavalcade of four was winding through the broken, tortuous pass in the Panamints. At either side, gaunt, reddish cliffs climbed above them in crumbling steps.

  The day was hot already, with a parching heat that made them glad for the flopping water-bags and canteens festooning the sides of one of the pack animals. By turns they rode and walked, resting the small burros as much as possible.

  Harrigan stalked along in the lead, shaking his head glumly. Mac gave the party a circus-parade aspect, as he dragged discordant music from his rusty harmonica. Optimistic as ever, he swayed easily to the lurchings of his saddle beast, playing one tune after the other.

  At noon they stopped at a small, anemic waterhole and ate a hurried lunch. Then they were pressing on again. In the distance the purple ranks of the Last Chance Mountains shimmered through heat waves that gave them an unreal appearance.

  Some time in the middle of the afternoon Dave heard a faint, alien sound. Hurriedly he turned back and shot a look into the sky. Far behind them, a tiny black speck was lined against the blue cup of the heavens. A buzzard, perhaps, or—

  “By heck!” Mac explained. “An airyplane. Ain’t no mail route goes over thisaway.”

  Helen gasped. “Doctor Kaley has his plane out here. Do you suppose he’s—?”

  “I’d take a bet on it,” Dave ground out. “He’d stop at nothing for a little gold to line his pockets.”

  Helplessly, they waited out there while the speck expanded into a tiny black cross, and then became a roaring, dipping monoplane. All of them were kept busy trying to pacify the terrified burros as Kaley dived at them and then sent the craft into a steep climb. Unexpectedly, then, he went curving back toward Copper Springs.

  “So that’s his game,” Dave muttered. “He’ll keep track of us that way until we seem to be reaching somewhere. Then—”

  Abruptly he went to digging the lump of amber-colored material from his pocket. “Helen, we’ve got to reach there while he’s back on one of his waiting periods. He’ll be shooting out here every four or five hours, I’ll bet. Let’s check on our direction and push on.”

  She nodded gamely, though as Dave slipped his arm about her waist to support her, he could feel her body trembling slightly. A feeling of guilt assailed him, at the part he was forced to play.

  But as her eyes fluttered open after touching the rock, she became excited. “It’s louder now!” she exclaimed. “And it’s straight toward the nearest peak of the mountains.”

  Bill threw his long leg across his burro. “I fear me,” he growled. “We’re plumb makin’ our beds with cactus for blankets an’ rocks for pillows if we go further.”

  “But we’re going, nevertheless,” Weston snapped. “The fact that the sounds are louder indicates that we’re getting closer. There’ll be mighty little stopping until we reach Lost Valley.”

  Mac slapped the big old revolver that hung at the hip of his baggy trousers. “I got pizen for wolves like Kaley,” he said darkly. “If he comes close enough ag’in, I’ll put so many holes in him he’ll look like a flying colander!”

  The sun dropped lower, sinking all too soon behind the bony upthrusts of the Inyo Range. They were in the real badlands now. The next waterhole was fifteen miles away. Everywhere, the flat bed of the ancient sea they were crossing was pitted with great potholes. And everywhere their view was impeded by the small, flat-topped islands that jutted their eroded shapes from the floor like small mesas.

  Night came, bringing a blessed coolness and a heavy darkness soon to be broken by the full moon. They made camp, to rest themselves and the burros for a few hours before shoving on.

  Through that weary night they plodded on, skirting holes and erosion-islands in their fight to bring help to Dave’s father. Dave himself was stolidly silent, plagued by merciless fears. Mac Barwell still tortured their ears with music and Bill continued to prophesy the worst. But Dave knew by now he could not have found a more loyal pair in all of Death Valley.

  Shortly after dawn the ominous thunder of Brand Kaley’s plane again struck their ears. Dave rushed the burros ahead, hoping to reach the shelter of the first slope of the Last Chances. In one of the many gullies slashing the foot of the mountain, they could prevent his frightening the animals as he had done before. Diving upon them would be too dangerous there.

  Leading his burro, he ran past the last of the weird little islands. Then he was stopping in amazement, his eyes going wide.

  Before them stretched what looked like a small lake. Yet it had none of the deep blue of water—simply a soft, rippling sheen that hovered over the desert’s face. Dave’s first thought was that it was a mirage. But as they recovered from their shock and hurried ahead, the sight came closer.

  Weston was first to reach the shore of it. He saw now that it filled a low spot in the valley’s floor—how deep he could not tell, because, despite its soft appearance, it was utterly opaque. Gingerly, he placed a foot in the “water.”

  Helen gasped, and Mac and Bill stared. Dave’s foot had disappeared, as though cut off at the ankle!

  Cautiously, inch by inch, he waded out into that uncanny, five-mile-wide lake. To the others, watching tensely, it was like seeing a man sink deeper and deeper into the sand. Up to his hips, now, Dave looked like a man cut off at the middle.

  And still the scientist heard the grating of his boots in gravel. Suddenly he was possessed of an eagerness to know what lay ahead. He started walking swiftly forward into the lake.

  The rippling surface crept past his belt, past his armpits, lapped his chin. For one fleeting instant he peered along a silver plane that tilted slightly above him. The plane became a thread stretched before him. One more step he took—and plunged himself into another world . . .

  CHAPTER IV

  The Rebel City

  The desert’s floor was there again, rough and dry, sloping sharply down from him to form a bowl-shaped valley broken by countless peaks and hummocks. Above his head was a rippling canopy that had been a lake’s surface before. A harsh green light illuminated the setting.

  But Dave’s eyes were for the glittering towers and buildings in the center of the valley. Spire after spire of shining metal thrust itself from the graceful mass, pyramidal in shape, that formed the bulk of the city. The strange city was small—perhaps not more than a half-mile square—yet it
hinted at wonders Dave could scarcely envision.

  Surrounding the cluster of buildings was a high wall that seemed to shut out the prosaic things of the desert. Caught in the wonder of it, Dave started forward.

  Then a cry behind him drew him back. Helen stood there with the top of her head apparently cut off—still above the plane. Mac and Bill were two pairs of running feet that lengthened into legs and finally became men.

  All of them stood and gazed for a full minute. It was Dave who spoke first. “Lost Valley! You’ve led us to it, Helen. Let’s—let’s go down!”

  The spires gained height as they drew closer to the wall. One in particular rose above the rest. From top to bottom its needle-like tower was encircled by a series of rings that appeared to be floating in their places. It occupied the central spot in the city.

  Something close to fear clutched all four of them as a gate appeared in the wall and strange beings poured out. They waited while a horde of tall, copper-faced men hurried towards them. Then a new element stopped even the running men.

  A great roar came into the valley, the deafening echoes tumbling down from the flat sky. Without warning something rocketed through the dividing plane—Kaley’s ship!

  Too late he saw what he had done. He tried to pull the monoplane up in a vertical climb. The engine whined, the struts screamed. But Kaley’s landing gear was struck by one of the erosion-peaks that spun it around like a toy. The ship flipped over on its nose and sank slowly back.

  The gangling, awkward other-worldlings veered their course to the wrecked plane. Dave and his party stood watching them.

  It was then, for the first time, that Weston realized someone had been calling his name.

  “Dave!” the call came again. “For the love of heaven, come here!”

  He spun about. In the next moment he was running toward the white-haired figure standing atop a high mesa a hundred yards away. The others had heard the urgent summons too. Dave paused to grip Helen’s hand as she hurried up; then all four were racing toward the beckoning figure.