by Don Wilcox
Susette screamed, grew weak, as she waited for the sight of the rocket explosion. Sickening realization—Stan had fought and lost!
But Stan’s frantic effort gave Ebb his cue. He slid out of his cache carrying an object three times his size—a space cannon. A split second before the rockets fired off, the big gun blazed at the flivver’s nose, blew the control room to smithereens.
The great space liner sped toward Venus.
Three chests of jewels rode in the cabin of Ajo Baustobub. A prisoner named Kiger found it was no use to wrench at his irons, grew silent. Three persons in the control room made merry.
“I must tell you, Kendrick,” said King Ajo, “that Miss Udell is a different person since the ship is in your hands. I knew she was in love with a handsome scientist, but she did not tell me you were also a dashing daredevil.”
“I didn’t know it myself,” laughed Susette, and Stan smiled as she kissed him.
“But tell me more of this strange Ebbtide,” the king urged. “You say he blew up the ship as it charged off, then everything floated back. But why did he not come with us?”
“He preferred to be picked up on our return trip,” said Stan, “so he’ll have more time for space combing. It’s a mania with him. Just now he has three more uniforms to piece together.”
A silence followed.
“It must have been very hard for him to give up those gems,” the king said thoughtfully. Then his face lightened with inspiration. “By the way, I wonder if . . . After all, he saved the day for all of us.”
Ajo scribbled a note of appreciation, signed his name, tucked it under a trunk lid; then rolled the trunk onto the automatic disposal trap and let it drop into space.
DICTATOR OF PEACE
First published in Amazing Stories, November 1939
Dr. Retterlic placed a silver plate in Gade Lasher’s skull. He knew it would bring agony if the dictator shouted for war. But he couldn’t know the operation would be doubly successful . . .!
CHAPTER I
The Doctor’s Secret
“Are we going to knuckle down before the demands of nations that would rob us of our heritage?” cried the bombastic little ruler of the Troxian Empire, waving his arms. Beyond the platform stretched a sea of listeners in brilliant green uniforms and bright colored holiday clothes.
“NO!” came the roar of twenty thousand lusty throats.
“Are we going to be kicked, cheated, spat upon by the powers of the world?”
“NO! NO!” the massed soldiers and civilians thundered, en rapport with every word and gesture of their fiery leader.
“Are we going to be bluffed—”
A pistol barked.
The Troxian ruler slapped a hand to his head as he reeled and toppled. Before twenty thousand horrified spectators he went down! Their leader!
Shot!
Screams and shrieks cut the air. The terror maddened mob tried to crush forward. The assassin, spotted in the front ranks, cried his last. He crumpled under a bath of lead. As if every green uniform were duty bound to help tear him limb from limb, the angry stampede surged by thousands, rode over itself in terrific frenzy.
Voices came through the amplifiers.
“Be calm. Keep your places. The ruler is not dead! He is only stunned—”
Sporadic cheers went up as these words reached out to the panic stricken multitude. The emergency announcers demanded silence. At last, crushed and breathless, the great crowd hushed to listen.
“His head has only been scratched—
His head! A low tragic groan spread over the sea of people. Then came an official pronouncement:
“Citizens of Troxia. In a few days our leader will address us again from this platform. Now go to your homes, and remain quiet.”
The radio newspapers of millions of homes and offices throughout the civilized world blazoned the story.
And what a story! The dreaded Lasher almost assassinated! What reverberations this would have upon a jittery, peace-starved world!
“If the assassin had only been a better shot!” bemoaned an editorial from Timovia, the state which lay in the path of Troxia’s conquests.
The same bitter note sounded among other nations. Before the news was an hour old the outside world declared its verdict: a narrow escape from peace!
For Gade Lasher was the most feared man in the world. He knew all the tricks of the earlier dictators of his century. His peaceful gestures were simply strategies of aggression. His appetite for hate drove him on. He was apparently destined to outdo all his predecessors in remaking the map of the world.
Apparently! But how amazed that world would have been, had it looked in upon the ruler’s palace that night. Strange forces were at work, reshaping the destinies of nations—the strange forces of four powerful characters who played their game behind the scenes. Even the inner governmental circle of the Troxian Empire were not aware of the personal interplay among these four—dictator, general, doctor, and female secretary. Nor did anyone know that one of these would play a secret scientific trump on this night.
Two hours after the attempted assassination, the propaganda artists proclaimed, at the command of General Blegoff, that Lasher’s miraculous deliverance from the bullet proved the protecting hand of God. The churches must hold demonstrations of thanksgiving. Prayer for the leader’s quick recovery was in order.
At Lasher’s palace, however, the activities were less ceremonial. Gade Lasher lay unconscious under the spell of ether, his face very white under his famous coal-black pointed mustache and sharp beard. His personal physician and surgeon, Dr. Retterlic, waited while the best diagnosticians of the Troxian capitol came to an agreement.
It was quickly reached. A clot was forming on the brain. The pressure of the depressed skull must be relieved immediately. A section of the bone must be removed.
Retterlic, by virtue of his position, accepted full responsibility for this plan of action. The operation proceeded under the scrutiny of Troxia’s most able scientists. By the time his surgeons removed the clot, Retterlic was ready with a perfectly shaped silver plate to replace the discarded section of bone.
A perfect job. In a few days Lasher’s fine black hair would grow back to hide the seams in the scalp. The scientists exchanged congratulations upon the swift and perfect workmanship. New reassurances sounded over the empire’s radios. The presses rolled out new headlines.
“LASHER REGAINS CONSCIOUSNESS.”
“LASHER FEELING FINE.”
“LASHER REGIME WILL CONTINUE UNBROKEN.”
At midnight Retterlic left his precious charge in competent hands and went off duty. His face showed strain as he emerged from the medical quarters. He scorned the swarming cameramen and reporters who wanted to make a hero of him, and marched directly to the palace dining room. At last a chance to breathe again and reflect upon the bold thing he had done.
He found Doraine at his favorite table. She was always welcome company.
“The man of the hour!” she hailed him with youthful verve. “Shall we drink to the most important event of your career?”
She and the doctor were close friends in spite of their difference in age. She loved his baldish head, his genial fat face, the sharp glitter of his eyes. Moreover, she appreciated his importance. As confidential secretary to the dictator, she was the only person who knew what the doctor meant to the Lasher regime.
“Most important event?” he asked gruffly. “Why do you say so?”
“Haven’t you just snatched the world’s most powerful man from death?”
“Not for the first time.” As Doraine well knew, he referred to an incident of the great war, a score of years previous, when he dragged Gade Lasher out of a shell hole. “First time I laid eyes on him he was more corpse than corporal. I suppose that will always be called my big moment.”
“But you couldn’t foresee then that he’d become our dictator.”
The doctor grunted. “No more than I can foresee now what may
come out of this operation.”
Doraine studied the furrows in his high forehead. His manner was strange tonight. He was holding back something.
“At least,” he continued, “I hope he’ll be more moderate when he gets back on his feet.”
“Do you have any reason for hoping that?” the girl asked anxiously.
“That’s a bad question to ask a tired doctor after a strenuous evening. You never know how things will work out. Do you think I’d have pulled him out of that shell hole and dragged him back to life if I’d known he would live to tear the peace of the world wide open—”
“To the glory of Troxia!” Doraine put in hastily.
“I should have known what a fire eater he’d be even then. When I found him wounded the air was blue from his cursing. He was a volcano of hate from that day. Now he’s got to be calmer. These violent speeches are bad for him. I’ve told him he’s got to stop them.”
“Is Lasher’s welfare your only concern?” Doraine asked bluntly.
“It’s my only official concern,” the doctor snapped.
But there was no need to hide his humanitarian motives from her. There was an unspoken understanding. Neither of them cared to see Lasher go on with his brutal conquests. The leader’s commanding personality magnetized them; they, like millions of other Troxians, would follow him unquestioningly. And yet Doraine often marveled at the influence of restraint this quiet, strong willed doctor wielded. In these erratic times he was the invisible balance wheel of the inner circle.
Still, his own peace motives were plain to her.
“Let me warn you,” she said quietly, “General Blegoff’s appetite for moderators is growing sharper.”
“He’ll purge me one of these days.” The doctor made a neat slice through the air with his hand.
Doraine looked at him in alarm. Memories of recent vacancies in the inner circle were fresh in her mind. “No, I didn’t mean that—”
“I mean it,” said the doctor calmly. “And he may have good reason. Good night, Doraine.”
He rose abruptly and departed for his quarters.
Someone in green uniform waited at the entrance of his suite. Narrow-eyed General Blegoff. The points of his V waxed mustache reached out like the antennae of a trouble-hunting insect.
“Come in,” said Dr. Retterlic, unlocking the door. The general entered, refused a chair, accepted a cigaret, and came to the point.
“No complaint on the operation proper . . . But after he came to consciousness, you were somewhat too free with your advice.”
“What advice?” The doctor blinked coolly through his spectacles.
Blegoff advanced a step as if his authority was challenged. “You told Lasher to forget his conquests—”
“For awhile. He needs to rest.”
“—and lay off his violent speeches—”
“Yes! By all means!”
“You’re treading on dangerous ground, Retterlic, dictating to the dictator.”
“For his own good—”
“You’re being very presumptuous. If you and Lasher weren’t such close friends you’d have faced insubordination charges before this. We all know about that famous rescue of yours when Lasher was lost in a shell hole, but some day you’ll overplay your hand.” The doctor lit a pipe calmly to quell the tumult that raged within him. Insubordination! Soft words. If Blegoff only knew what a subtle scientific crime went into that operation—but Retterlic bet his life the general would never know.
“Lasher is very high strung,” the doctor drawled. “I’m responsible for his health. If he isn’t cautious he’ll break down.”
“A cautious leader is inconsistent with the Troxian ideal. Your advice is destructive. I officially warn you not to repeat this indiscretion in the future.”
The general’s jutted jaw, square shoulders, crisp gold braided uniform, made him the personification of authority. He tugged his mustache with finality, whirled, and strode out.
Retterlic locked the door after him and snorted. There was one sure bet. The general was suspicious, but his deepest suspicion fell far short of the truth. For the humanitarian doctor had his own stake in world affairs. Be it crime, treachery, treason—the seed of restraint was planted, let the purge fall where it may.
His scientific secret. No one would share it—except possibly Doraine. Her silence was golden.
“LASHER GAINS RAPIDLY.”
That headline was good for several days to follow. Troxia was stimulated to rejoice, demonstrate, and dream of more conquests. Timovia and other small states prepared for the worst. The green monster would soon move outward again. The world learned that Lasher, eager to make up for lost time, planned to address the hordes of the Troxian capital at an early date.
Visitors flocked to the palace to inquire whether the little giant who defied assassins was indeed ready for a comeback. They were more than reassured. Lasher’s intimate friends declared he was in higher spirits than ever before—a fact which even Dr. Retterlic was at a loss to understand.
Few were privileged to see the reviving leader; none, to read the speech he wrote. Attendants puzzled over his changed demeanor. It must be the rest, thought Retterlic. General Blegoff gave the reporters glowing descriptions. The ruler would undoubtedly launch an even more vigorous military program. The inner circle didn’t doubt it. Although Lasher did not commit himself, new purpose burned in his amber eyes.
Doraine grew tense with mounting worries as, day after day, she commanded her office force, relayed confidential messages, absorbed the shock of international pressures.
Lasher being in seclusion, she was the hub of the inner circle—an efficient mechanism. Only when off duty could she reflect upon the bitter seriousness of it all. Then she saw life as a rocket ride through uncharted perils. Every new move brought danger of a crash. Demonstrations of power, urges, intimidations of minorities, bloodless conquests, diplomatic thievery! How helpless she was within it all.
The mighty little man with the severe black mustache and beard often gave her a word of praise; sometimes after hours of tension he seemed to crave her conversation. But the doctor was right, his record proved him a volcano of hate. She could not hope to understand his chaotic nature.
She shared confidences with no one except the baldish doctor. Tonight at their secluded table in the dining hall she poured out her fears. Retterlic listened and ate.
“I can’t understand what he’s about,” she concluded. “He’s on fire with power as never before. I’m afraid he’ll never stop until he brings the whole mad world down on us.”
The doctor was deliberate about responding. His manner had been reserved since the night of the operation. He searched her eyes. “You hate to see him drench the world in blood, don’t you? . . . You even feel a personal fondness for him.”
Doraine was on the defensive. “He’s the ruler of Troxia. It’s my duty to respect him.”
“But you are fond of him,” the doctor persisted.
The girl faced the challenge honestly. “Of course. I’m thrilled—stimulated—by the very sight of him. I’m swept off my feet by his masterful personality. But who isn’t? That’s what has happened to all of Troxia. We’ve been overwhelmed by a powerful actor!”
“Actor—yes,” the doctor groaned. “And to think, as a boy he was a stage hand who wanted to act—and they wouldn’t give him a chance! Now the world’s his stage, and he takes its hatred for applause.”
A waiter came and went, leaving silence in his wake. Retterlic studied the girl’s troubled face. Now was the time to tell her.
“I’ve something to confide, Doraine.”
“I’ve been waiting,” she answered quietly, “and I know it must be something very serious.”
“Yes.” The doctor sought his pipe and lit it. “Lasher is politically dead. That is, I’ve deliberately thrown a fatal wrench in his machinery.”
“How could that be possible?”
“By a scientific trick. It came to me jus
t before we operated. I acted on impulse. By the time the other surgeons removed the clot I was ready.” Terror came into the girl’s face. “Don’t be frightened,” said Retterlic. “If Lasher obeys my orders and keeps his voice down when he speaks—”
“But he can’t do that! Whenever the crowds cheer him he has to come back in that awful rousing vioce—”
“And they thrill to that voice. That’s why they share his hatreds. The vicious circle! The key to Troxia’s madness!” The doctor shook his head bitterly. “But from now on, Gade Lasher will avoid that rabble-rousing tone.”
“And if he doesn’t—?”
“He’ll get a shattering headache too painful to endue. That plate I put in his skull was more than just a slab of silver. It’s a delicate instrument made to resound to the shrill pitch of his rabble-rousing voice. I turned it to a phonograph record of one of his speech. When that vibrates in his skull—”
The doctor cut short. Loud speakers boomed through the dining hall.
“Official announcement! Next Friday at two o’clock Gade Lasher will speak to the citizens of Troxia form the Capitol Park. His message will be broadcast to the world.”
CHAPTER II
Lasher, the Mystery Man
The world held its breath, waited for Friday. Every statesman speculated; so did every professor, barber, soldier, office boy. Words rolled from the presses by millions to explain what Gade Lasher would probably do.
Was he determined to march his green army straight across Timovia? If so, he would come face-to-face with a stubborn barrier of world powers. Unfriendly ones. Was he set to fight the world? Thousands of questions were involved. The world dared think only in questions. For Gade Lasher revealed nothing.
As one sharp international correspondent observed, “All our predictious may be idle. Gade Lasher is a mystery man. He has said so little since the bullet ridged his head that no one knows what is is planning. He has isolated himself from everyone, even his own inner circle. His few statements since his operation boil down to: ‘I feel better every day . . . I’m a new man . . . I regret this waste of time . . . My course is clear . . . I shall speak to the world on Friday . . . I have much to do . . .’
