SO WE waited. And at last we saw those ships blast off.
“That leaves the coast clear for us,” Wimp said.
Then Hektorum wrote something in a hurry.
“Those ships are not headed for Mars,” he said.
“No,” said the robot. “By their course I would say they were making for somewhere much farther out. Jupiter, unless I am mistaken.”
Adam Link had performed a whole series of elaborate figureworks in his head in a few seconds.
“I don’t understand,” Wimp said.
“I think I do,” said Hek. “Suppose those men were not Venus space-cops, as they pretended to be!”
“What?”
“Suppose they were somebody else, disguised, and now have Emperor Usulor in their power!”
“Get Mars at once on the radio on a tight beam,” snaps Wimp.
We did, and Wimp demands to speak to high officials at once.
No, Emperor Usulor had not returned to Mars. Neither could the astronomers with their telescopes see any sign of the rocket-blasts of a space-boat taking him back.
“Attention everybody,” snaps Wimp. “I have reason to think that my much-loved father has been abducted. The kidnapers, who are disguised as spacecops from Venus, are in two ships. One of those ships is the former pirate-ship, the Ace of Spades. The other looks like a Venus patrol vessel. The two ships are now headed Jupiterward with the Emperor and General Dattease apparently prisoners on board. I am following in a space-boat since the ships cannot be allowed to get out of sight. Every space-ship on Mars that can take off must follow me. Call Venus and get all the help you can.”
* * *
IT HAD been a sudden idea to Emperor Usulor to pretend that the general and he came from Ganymede.
To say who he really was would have meant being held to ransom for some enormous amount. He didn’t want that. It would mean Belangor scoring a big success and, with the money he would get, going in for piracy and murder in a much bigger way. If he admitted they were Martians but not of enough account to be worth a ransom they would have been flung into space to die, two more of Belangor’s countless victims.
Belangor, smooth butcher with a smile, was not going to score him if he could help it. So, he told the only other story he could think of, and one that might lead to anything. Usulor, noisy blusterer as he was sometimes, was no coward.
“The Ganymedans,” said Belangor, “must be well treated. We must make them tell us where the riches of Ganymede are and whether there are any patrol fleets or space navies to watch for. Ask about the land defenses of Ganymede. What do they use for money. Gold, radium, energy units, platinum or what-not. Are any other satellites of Jupiter inhabited. And so on.”
“Aren’t you going a bit fast?” asked his lieutenant.
“How?”
“Those guys can’t even talk like men.”
“Then get someone to learn their language. Go easy as first. Treat ’em good. Pretend we are taking them back home. Later, if they get shy and don’t talk plenty, we can turn on the heat. When we’ve found out all we need, get rid of them.”
“Call that a language,” growled the lieutenant. “Sounds like a home for wild animals at feeding-time.”
“Do it, I say. But go easy at first. Pretend to be their long lost daddies. Now, I’m taking them to my cabin for a real slap-up feed. Bring the officers.”
“All of them?”
“Yes. And see they know their parts. See they smile nicely at our guests. If they have forgotten how to, tell them to practice in front of a glass. Get cracking.”
Usulor and the general listened to all this, keeping their faces as blank as two turnips. They were not supposed to know what was being talked about.
Then Belangor, with a bow and a smile, made signs that they should follow him. Neither Usulor nor the general found it easy to smile back innocently at the slimy reptile, but they made it, good enough to pass, anyhow.
Then the two “Ganymedans” had a real tasty feed. The pirate officers were very polite, pushing more and more food at the guests and nearly fighting for the right to fill their glasses.
Then Belangor made a speech. He explained his plans.
“If they won’t talk we’ll make them talk,” he said. “Breaking their finger-joints and a few other tricks.” As he said it he bowed and smiled, and all the company bowed and smiled. “So that, either way, it’s a one way trip for them.”
Amid a burst of applause, bowing, smiling and banging of plates on the table, he sat down.
Then General Dattease rose to reply. Naturally, it sounded like the roaring of lions, the bellowing of bulls and the squawking of parrots. But suddenly, Emperor Usulor caught words. Words nearly drowned in the flood of other noises.
“Rip your lousy throats from ear to ear. Wuff, wuff! Squawk, squawk! Gouge out both your eyes with my own thumbs.”
The general’s voice was beginning to come back. And he did not know it. Usulor wondered whether any of the pirate officers could hear. They would not be listening so carefully as he was.
The Emp of Mars began banging a plate on the table in applause. Might stop the others hearing, he thought.
All the same, he was glad when somebody came in and said, “Captain Belangor! There is something in the viewing plate we think you ought to see. Looks like we are being followed.”
“Followed?”
“Venus space-cops!”
“Let me see!”
“Bet you it’s only a meteor.”
They all piled out, leaving the food and drinks.
USULOR wrote on a piece of paper, “Your voice is coming back. Be careful,” and handed it to the general. The general read. Then Usulor burned the paper and crumbled the ashes.
Then, from sheer habit, he took out his vitamin tablets. Most people in Mars take vitamin tablets with their meals. Without them nobody could live long in a sunless underground world.
The general began to shake his head quickly and point to his throat.
“What?” asked the Emperor, puzzled.
Then he got it.
The general was trying to say that it was the new vitamin that had made their voices go funny.
“Nonsense!” thought Usulor. How could a vitamin do that?
And while he was wondering General Dattease took the whole bottle of tablets of the new vitamin and emptied it into the big whiskey bottle on the table.
Then Belangor and his officers came back.
“Never saw anything like it before,” one was saying.
“Such a tiny boat following us,” said another.
“I reckon it can’t be much bigger than an ordinary space-lifeboat.”
“Must be mad.”
“Tired of life I reckon.”
Belangor came in.
“What are we going to do?” one asked him.
“Nothing yet,” said Belangor. “But—!”
“When we get a chance to kill some of them Venusians—”
“I wouldn’t let them go.”
“They may not be Venusians,” said Belangor. “In any case, we can’t kill them yet.”
“Why not?”
“They are so far away that we can only just sec the tiny glow of their rocket-jets in the screen. As soon as they saw a radio-controlled rocket-shell coming at them they would turn off their rockets and we would not be able to see them. No. Let them come on. You are not afraid of such a small boat, are you?”
“Can’t we put on more power and lose them?”
“Not so easy. Our rocket-jets can be seen an enormous distance away. I’ll arrange a trap for them to fall in. Now, gentlemen, a tot of whiskey to all before we go back to our jobs.”
CHAPTER VII
The General and the Germ
SEVERAL hours later, the officer of the watch decided that the ship was veering a little off course. He rang the intercommunication phone.
“Woof! Woof! Baroo! Baroo!” he barked at the man who answered. And rang off, thinking he
had given quite a clear order.
The man turned to his buddy. “What’s the major playing at? Hear that noise he made?”
“Sure I heard it. Loud enough, wasn’t it?”
“What do you make of it?”
“Too much whiskey I suppose.” Presently the major noticed that his order had not been obeyed. He rang again.
“Wallawalloo!” he shouted, furiously.
“Sure, sure!” was the soothing answer. “We’ll see to it.”
“And what do you make of that?” the man asked the buddy.
“Search me,” said the buddy. “Didn’t seem drunk. I hear the boss wants someone to learn the language of the Ganymedans, but I didn’t know they’d practice on us.”
Then the major rang again. He was real mad this time.
“Oroof, aroof! Whee, whee, whee, walla!” he roared.
“Sure,” was the answer. “And a wang, wang, tiddly pom-pom!”
That made the balloon go up. Because, although the strange vitamin the major had taken had altered his voice he didn’t know it. He though his voice was still okay. But his ears were not changed. He heard what the other people said all right.
He slammed down the instrument and charged out.
“You seemed to have stepped on his corns,” said the buddy. “He’s coming to roast you.”
“If you ask me, the major has gone nuts,” said the other. “We can’t handle this. I’ll call the boys.”
So that when the major got there a dozen of the crew, just woke up out of sleep, were waiting for him. The major pointed at the first man and bellowed, “Scree! Scree! Bruahhh! Womwom!” He was saying, “Lock that man in the cells!” Or thought he was.
“Would you mind saying that again, sir?” asked one man.
The major did.
“It’s right!”
“The major’s nuts!”
“Put him away and call the colonel.”
“Lock him up before he does any harm.”
A dozen pair of arms took hold of the angry major.
“Help! Help! Mutiny!” he screamed with all his strength. It did not sound like that.
A jangling bell woke the colonel. With a grunt, he took the instrument, and squawked into it like a drunken peacock.
“The colonel too!”
“What’s got loose here?”
“After him, boys!”
The colonel’s door flew open, and very soon he was helpless, his arms handcuffed behind him, and flung into a cabin beside the major. The two officers tried to ask each other what was wrong, but soon gave up. Each thought the other mad.
But before the colonel was carried off he managed to set off a secret alarm bell that rang in every officer’s cabin on the ship.
“GENERAL alarm! Mutiny!” was the message that pulled every pirate officer, from Belangor to the newest lance-jack, out of bed.
Belangor was awake in an instant. Mutiny, huh? A nuisance that. It was not easy to get reliable new crews. But he would deal with these mutineers in a way that would not be forgotten. Future crews would not mutiny against him in a hurry.
His secret teleview showed him the crew rousing one another. They were carrying their deathrays. He saw one officer come out of a cabin and wave his arms. He seemed to be ordering the men back to their posts. If Belangor’s spying television had had a microphone to it he would have thought the officer’s voice sounded strange, like the gibbering of monkeys and the braying of donkeys. But it didn’t have a microphone to it.
He saw the crew leap on the third mad officer, as they thought, from behind, and carry him off.
“All right,” thought the pirate chief. “I’m ready.”
Many steps sounded in the passage. Someone knocked.
“Chief! Wake up! Let us in. We have an urgent report to make. A vital matter urgently affecting the safety of the ship.”
Oh, yeah? thought Belangor. Do they think they can fool me with that old trick? Once in here they will leap upon me, as they did upon the others.
He pressed a switch.
A hidden deathray swept the corridor. The men in it all fell where they had been standing, without a sound.
Smiling grimly, Belangor came out. A nice collection of dead bodies. This would add to his reputation for terrorism, even if the dead men did have to be replaced. Teach ’em to defy Belangor the Butcher. Or even to think about doing so.
He climbed over the bodies and went to the door of the nearest officer and knocked. The man inside thought it might be mutineers knocking, and called nervously, “Who is there?” Or thought he did. Actually, he made a good imitation of the bray of a donkey.
“It is I, Belangor,” called the pirate chief. Or thought he did. What it sounded like inside I don’t know. The startled man inside at once played his deathray on the voice through the door. The pirate chief’s right arm fell useless to his side as the ray struck it. He fired back, using his left arm, and heard a body fall to the floor inside the cabin.
“Some of my officers on the side of the mutineers, eh?” Belangor thought.
“Nearly got me, too.”
Then three other doors opened at once and three officers came out. At once they began to talk in animal voices.
“Either this is a plot against me or they are mad,” Belangor thought. “Mad officers are no use to me.” And he turned his ray on them. The three were just wondering what had happened to one another. They were not looking for an attack in the flank from their boss. They just laid down on the floor like tired men.
He wished he knew what was happening. He could hear running, shouting, animal noises, fighting and falling bodies. He listened for the sound of the voice of an officer, any officer, whom he knew. He did not hear one.
All at once he felt lost and frightened. He ran back to his cabin and turned to his spying television.
Wild confusion. Officers being attacked everywhere. Some fighting each other. No two officers together. No sense, reason, or order to anything.
Another group of men came towards his own cabin, but turned back, alarmed, when they saw the bodies of the first lot.
Belangor locked and barred his door in a hurry. It was built to stand a siege. And the cabin had a secret catwalk to a lifeboat.
USULOR and General Dattease looked at each other as the noise and excitement went on around them.
“I seem to have set things moving out there,” Dattease said. His voice was nearly normal once more.
Usulor nodded. His voice was not.
“When they find out the trick we’ve played they may make it nasty for us. Still, we have to take chances in war. That right, Your Excellency?” said Dattease.
Usulor patted his shoulder. “Whatever comes we face it together,” he wanted to say. But couldn’t.
“Here it comes,” said the general at last.
The door opened. Several grim men were out there, men with torn clothes and blood on their faces.
“Here you, you Ganymedans,” said one. “You started this business. This animal voices business. Some of us think it would be best to get rid of you. Before you start any more trouble. What’s the meaning of it all? What have you done to our officers? Explain or we make an end of you.”
Their fingers played on the switches of their deathrays.
“Shucks!” said the general. “I can explain.”
“Found your voice, eh? Well, get on with it.”
“It’s a germ, a disease,” explained Dattease. “My buddy and I were suffering from it, and your officers must have caught it.”
“That’s it, is it? We understand. But say! Are we likely to catch it?”
“Oh, no. I should not worry about that. If you have not come into contact with any sufferers you are almost sure to be all right.”
“But we have. All of us have. Threw our arms round them from behind and carried them.”
“Did you really? That was foolish of you. My word! H’mmm! Well, that is awkward.”
“Look here,” drawled somebody
. “Is this disease real bad. If we get it won’t we get over it?”
“Oh yes, quite a number of you will get over it with luck. Doctors reckon that one out of every three sufferers gets better if he is carefully nursed and not allowed to get out of his bed on any account whatever. Some of them can even get out of their wheel-chairs after about ten years and walk about on crutches.”
“Crutches!”
“Oh, I’m so sorry. I should not have told you that. That’s only worrying you needlessly. That’s a long way off. You’ll be quite happy, most of you, for several days. Even after you lose your voices it will be days before the disease reaches your brains and you go mad.”
“Say! You got over it! And you are not on crutches. How come?”
“Oh, we had the cure.”
“Then give it to us. Quick!”
“Sorry. It’s all gone.”
“Then tell us where to get it. Or else.”
“Sure! I can take you to a hospital on Mars where—”
“On Mars! But they’d roast us all if we set foot on Mars.”
“They won’t,” said General Dattease, taking a big chance. “This is Emperor Usulor, Overlord of all Mars. See these papers proving it. See that photo?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Thought I knew him all along.”
“What did I tell you?”
“Emperor Usulor,” asked Dattease. “If these men all promise to give up pirating and surrender, will you promise for your part to receive them, cure their illness, pardon them and set them up in jobs or farms in your lands in Mars? Most of them would have given up this robbery and murder long ago if Belangor did not have them by the throat.”
Emperor Usulor wrote that he would, but only the crew. The officers must be handed over to justice.
And the pirate ship returned to Mars, Dattease at the controls and Usulor at the radio.
“GENERAL,” said Emperor Usulor, after, “I have much to thank you for. But for you I might have had trouble in handling that matter.”
“Possibly,” said the general.
“How can I reward you? You already hold every medal there is.”
The Complete Saga of Don Hargreaves Page 37
