“You’re not,” said Krell grimly. “All I want right now is to get within reach of Jandron.”
“There’s small chance of any of us doing that,” Crain told them. “There’s not a single space-helmet on the Martian Queen.”
“You’ve searched?” Liggett asked.
“Every cubic inch of the ship,” Crain told him. “No, Jandron’s men made sure there were no helmets left here, and without helmets this ship is an inescapable prison.”
“Damn it, there must be some way out!” Kent exclaimed. “Why, Jandron and his men must be starting to pump that fuel into the Pallas by now! They’ll be sailing off as soon as they do it!”
Crain’s face was sad. “I’m afraid this is the end, Kent. Without helmets, the space between the Martian Queen and the Pallas is a greater barrier to us than a mile-thick wall of steel. In this ship we’ll stay, until the air and food give out, and death releases us.”
“Damn it, I’m not thinking of myself!” Kent cried. “I’m thinking of Marta! The Pallas will sail out of here with her in Jandron’s power!”
“The girl!” Liggett exclaimed. “If she could bring us over space-helmets from the Pallas we could get out of here!”
Kent was thoughtful. “If we could talk to her—she must still have that suit-phone I gave her. Where’s another?”
Crain quickly detached the compact suit-phone from inside the neck of his own space-suit, and Kent rapidly tuned it to the one he had given Marta Mallen. His heart leapt as her voice came instantly from it:
“Rance! Rance Kent—”
“Marta—this is Rance!” he cried.
He heard a sob of relief. “I’ve been calling you for minutes! I was hoping that you’d remember to listen!
“Jandron and ten of the others have gone to that wreck in which you found the fuel,” she added swiftly. “They unreeled a tube-line behind them as they went, and I can hear them pumping in the fuel now.”
“Are the others guarding you?” Kent asked quickly.
“They’re down in the lower deck at the tanks and airlocks. They won’t allow me down on that deck. I’m up here in the middle-deck, absolutely alone.
“Jandron told me that we’d start out of here as soon as the fuel was in,” she added, “and he and the men were laughing about Krell.”
“Marta, could you in any way get space-helmets and get out to bring them over here to us?” Kent asked eagerly.
“There’s a lot of space-suits and helmets here,” she answered, “but I couldn’t get out with them, Rance! I couldn’t get to the airlocks with Jandron’s seven or eight men down there guarding them!”
Kent felt despair; then as an idea suddenly flamed in him, he almost shouted into the instrument:
“Marta, unless you can get over here with helmets for us, we’re all lost. I want you to put on a space-suit and helmet at once!”
There was a short silence, and then her voice came, a little muffled. “I’ve got the suit and helmet on, Rance. I’m wearing the suit-phone inside it.”
“Good! Now, can you get up to the pilot-house? There’s no one guarding it or the upper-deck? Hurry up there, then, at once.”
Crain and the rest were staring at Kent. “Kent, what are you going to have her do?” Crain exclaimed. “It’ll do no good for her to start the Pallas: those guards will be up there in a minute!”
“I’m not going to have her start the Pallas,” said Kent grimly. “Marta, you’re in the pilot-house? Do you see the heavy little steel door in the wall beside the instrument-panel?”
“I’m at it, but it’s locked with a combination-lock,” she said.
“The combination is 6–34–77–81,” Kent told her swiftly. “Open it as quickly as you can.”
“Good God, Kent!” cried Crain. “You’re going to have her—?”
“Get out of there the only way she can!” Kent finished fiercely. “You have the door open, Marta?”
“Yes; there are six or seven control-wheels inside.”
“Those wheels control the Pallas’ exhaust-valves,” Kent told her. “Each wheel opens the valves of one of the ship’s decks or compartments and allows its air to escape into space. They’re used for testing leaks in the different deck and compartment divisions. Marta, you must turn all those wheels as far as you can to the right.”
“But all the ship’s air will rush out; the guards below have no suits on, and they’ll be—” she was exclaiming. Kent interrupted.
“It’s the only chance for you, for all of us. Turn them!”
There was a moment of silence, and Kent was going to repeat the order when her voice came, lower in tone, a little strange:
“I understand, Rance. I’m going to turn them.”
There was silence again, and Kent and the men grouped round him were tense. All were envisioning the same thing—the air rushing out of the Pallas’ valves, and the unsuspecting guards in its lower deck smitten suddenly by an instantaneous death.
Then Marta’s voice, almost a sob: “I turned them, Rance. The air puffed out all around me.”
“Your space-suit is working all right?”
“Perfectly,” she said.
“Then go down and tie together as many space-helmets as you can manage, get out of the airlock, and try to get over here to the Martian Queen with them. Do you think you can do that, Marta?”
“I’m going to try,” she said steadily. “But I’ll have to pass those men in the lower-deck I just—killed. Don’t be anxious if I don’t talk for a little.”
Yet her voice came again almost immediately. “Rance, the pumping has stopped! They must have pumped all the fuel into the Pallas!”
“Then Jandron and the rest will be coming back to the Pallas at once!” Kent cried. “Hurry, Marta!”
The suit-phone was silent; and Kent and the rest, their faces closely pressed against the deck-windows, peered intently along the wreck-pack’s edge. The Pallas was hidden from their view by the wrecks between, and there was no sign as yet of the girl.
Kent felt his heart beating rapidly. Crain and Liggett pressed beside him, the men around them; Krell’s face was a mask as he too gazed. Kent was rapidly becoming convinced that some mischance had overtaken the girl when an exclamation came from Liggett. He pointed excitedly.
She was in sight, unrecognizable in space-suit and helmet, floating along the wreck-pack’s edge toward them. A mass of the glassite space-helmets tied together was in her grasp. She climbed bravely over the stern of a projecting wreck and shot on toward the Martian Queen.
The airlock’s door was open for her, and, when she was inside it, the outer door closed and air hissed into the lock. In a moment she was in among them, still clinging to the helmets. Kent grasped her swaying figure and removed her helmet.
“Marta, you’re all right?” he cried. She nodded a little weakly.
“I’m all right. It was just that I had to go over those guards that were all frozen.… Terrible!”
“Get these helmets on!” Crain was crying. “There’s a dozen of them, and twelve of us can stop Jandron’s men if we get back in time!”
Kent and Liggett and the nearer of their men were swiftly donning the helmets. Krell grasped one and Crain sought to snatch it.
“Let that go! We’ll not have you with us when we haven’t enough helmets for our own men!”
“You’ll have me or kill me here!” Krell cried, his eyes hate-mad. “I’ve got my own account to settle with Jandron!”
“Let him have it!” Liggett cried. “We’ve no time now to argue!”
Kent reached toward the girl. “Marta, give one of the men your helmet,” he ordered; but she shook her head.
“I’m going with you!” Before Kent could dispute she had the helmet on again, and Crain was pushing them into the airlock. The nine or ten left inside without helmets hastily thrust steel bars into the men’s hands before the inner door closed. The outer one opened and they leapt forth into space, floating smoothly along the wreck-pack’s
border with bars in their grasp, thirteen strong.
Kent found the slowness with which they floated forward torturing. He glimpsed Crain and Liggett ahead, Marta beside him, Krell floating behind him to the left. They reached the projecting freighters, climbed over and around them, braced against them and shot on. They sighted the Pallas ahead now. Suddenly they discerned another group of eleven figures in space-suits approaching it from the wreck-pack’s interior, rolling up the tube-line that led from the Pallas as they did so. Jandron’s party!
Jandron and his men had seen them and were suddenly making greater efforts to reach the Pallas. Kent and his companions, propelling themselves frenziedly on from another wreck, reached the ship’s side at the same time as Jandron’s men. The two groups mixed and mingled, twisted and turned in a mad space-combat.
Kent had been grasped by one of Jandron’s men and raised his bar to crack the other’s glassite helmet. His opponent caught the bar, and they struggled, twisting and turning over and over far up in space amid a half-score similar struggles. Kent wrenched his bar free at last from the other’s grasp and brought it down on his helmet. The glassite cracked, and he caught a glimpse of the man’s hate-distorted face frozen instantly in death.
Kent released him and propelled himself toward a struggling trio nearby. As he floated toward them, he saw Jandron beyond them making wild gestures of command and saw Krell approaching Jandron with upraised bar. Kent, on reaching the three combatants, found them to be two of Jandron’s men overcoming Crain. He shattered one’s helmet as he reached them, but saw the other’s bar go up for a blow.
Kent twisted frantically, uselessly, to escape it, but before the blow could descend a bar shattered his opponent’s helmet from behind. As the man froze in instant death Kent saw that it was Marta who had struck him from behind. He jerked her to his side. The struggles in space around them seemed to be ending.
Six of Jandron’s party had been slain, and three of Kent’s companions. Jandron’s four other followers were giving up the combat, floating off into the wreck-pack in clumsy, hasty flight. Someone grasped Kent’s arm, and he turned to find it was Liggett.
“They’re beaten!” Liggett’s voice came to him! “They’re all killed but those four!”
“What about Jandron himself?” Kent cried. Liggett pointed to two space-suited bodies twisting together in space, with bars still in their lifeless grasp.
Kent saw through their shattered helmets the stiffened faces of Jandron and Krell, their helmets having apparently been broken by each other’s simultaneous blows.
Crain had gripped Kent’s arm also. “Kent, it’s over!” he was exclaiming. “Liggett and I will close the Pallas’ exhaust-valves and release new air in it. You take over helmets for the rest of our men in the Martian Queen.”
In several minutes Kent was back with the men from the Martian Queen. The Pallas was ready, with Liggett in its pilot-house, the men taking their stations, and Crain and Marta awaiting Kent.
“We’ve enough fuel to take us out of the dead-area and to Neptune without trouble!” Crain declared. “But what about those four of Jandron’s men that got away?”
“The best we can do is leave them here,” Kent told him. “Best for them, too, for at Neptune they’d be executed, while they can live indefinitely in the wreck-pack.”
“I’ve seen so many men killed on the Martian Queen and here,” pleaded Marta. “Please don’t take them to Neptune.”
“All right, we’ll leave them,” Crain agreed, “though the scoundrels ought to meet justice.” He hastened up to the pilot-house after Liggett.
In a moment came the familiar blast of the rocket-tubes, and the Pallas shot out cleanly from the wreck-pack’s edge. A scattered cheer came from the crew. With gathering speed the ship arrowed out, its rocket-tubes blasting now in steady succession.
Kent, with his arm across Marta’s shoulders, watched the wreck-pack grow smaller behind. It lay as when he first had seen it, a strange great mass, floating forever motionless among the brilliant stars. He felt the girl beside him shiver, and swung her quickly around.
“Let’s not look back or remember now, Marta!” he said. “Let’s look ahead.”
She nestled closer inside his arm. “Yes, Rance. Let’s look ahead.”
THE MAN WHO SAW THE FUTURE
Jean de Marselait, Inquisitor Extraordinary of the King of France, raised his head from the parchments that littered the crude desk at which he sat. His glance shifted along the long stone-walled, torchlit room to the file of mail-clad soldiers who stood like steel statues by its door. A word from him and two of them sprang forward.
“You may bring in the prisoner,” he said.
The two disappeared through the door, and in moments there came a clang of opening bolts and grating of heavy hinges from somewhere in the building. Then the clang of the returning soldiers, and they entered the room with another man between them whose hands were fettered.
He was a straight figure, and was dressed in drab tunic and hose. His dark hair was long and straight, and his face held a dreaming strength, altogether different from the battered visages of the soldiers or the changeless mask of the Inquisitor. The latter regarded the prisoner for a moment, and then lifted one of the parchments from before him and read from it in a smooth, clear voice.
“Henri Lothiere, apothecary’s assistant of Paris,” he read, “is charged in this year of our lord one thousand four hundred and forty-four with offending against God and the king by committing the crime of sorcery.”
The prisoner spoke for the first time, his voice low but steady. “I am no sorcerer, sire.”
Jean de Marselait read calmly on from the parchment. “It is stated by many witnesses that for long that part of Paris, called Nanley by some, has been troubled by works of the devil. Ever and anon great claps of thunder have been heard issuing from an open field there without visible cause. They were evidently caused by a sorcerer of power since even exorcists could not halt them.
“It is attested by many that the accused, Henri Lothiere, did in spite of the known diabolical nature of the thing, spend much time at the field in question. It is also attested that the said Henri Lothiere did state that in his opinion the thunderclaps were not of diabolical origin, and that if they were studied, their cause might be discovered.
“It being suspected from this that Henri Lothiere was himself the sorcerer causing the thunderclaps, he was watched and on the third day of June was seen to go in the early morning to the unholy spot with certain instruments. There he was observed going through strange and diabolical conjurations, when there came suddenly another thunderclap and the said Henri Lothiere did vanish entirely from view in that moment. This fact is attested beyond all doubt.
“The news spreading, many hundreds watched around the field during that day. Upon that night before midnight, another thunderclap was heard and the said Henri Lothiere was seen by these hundreds to appear at the field’s center as swiftly and as strangely as he had vanished. The fear-stricken hundreds around the field heard him tell them how, by diabolical power, he had gone for hundreds of years into the future, a thing surely possible only to the devil and his minions, and heard him tell other blasphemies before they seized him and brought him to the Inquisitor of the King, praying that he be burned and his work of sorcery thus halted.
“Therefore, Henri Lothiere, since you were seen to vanish and to reappear as only the servants of the evil one might do, and were heard by many to utter the blasphemies mentioned, I must adjudge you a sorcerer with the penalty of death by fire. If anything there be that you can advance in palliation of your black offense, however, you may now do so before final sentence is passed upon you.”
Jean de Marselait laid down the parchment, and raised his eyes to the prisoner. The latter looked round him quickly for a moment, a half-glimpsed panic for an instant in his eyes, then seemed to steady.
“Sire, I cannot change the sentence you will pass upon me,” he said quietly, �
�yet do I wish well to relate once, what happened to me and what I saw. Is it permitted me to tell that from first to last?”
The Inquisitor’s head bent, and Henri Lothiere spoke, his voice gaining in strength and fervor as he continued.
“Sire, I, Henri Lothiere, am no sorcerer but a simple apothecary’s assistant. It was always my nature, from earliest youth, to desire to delve into matters unknown to men; the secrets of the earth and sea and sky, the knowledge hidden from us. I knew well that this was wicked, that the Church teaches all we need to know and that heaven frowns when we pry into its mysteries, but so strong was my desire to know, that many times I concerned myself with matters forbidden.
“I had sought to know the nature of the lightning, and the manner of flight of the birds, and the way in which fishes are able to live beneath the waters, and the mystery of the stars. So when these thunderclaps began to be heard in the part of Paris in which I lived, I did not fear them so much as my neighbors. I was eager to learn only what was causing them, for it seemed to me that their cause might be learned.
“So I began to go to that field from which they issued, to study them. I waited in it and twice I heard the great thunderclaps myself. I thought they came from near the field’s center, and I studied that place. But I could see nothing there that was causing them. I dug in the ground, I looked up for hours into the sky, but there was nothing. And still, at intervals, the thunderclaps sounded.
“I still kept going to the field, though I knew that many of my neighbors whispered that I was engaged in sorcery. Upon that morning of the third day of June, it had occurred to me to take certain instruments, such as loadstones, to the field, to see whether anything might be learned with them. I went, a few superstitious ones following me at a distance. I reached the field’s center, and started the examinations I had planned. Then came suddenly another thunderclap and with it I passed from the sight of those who had followed and were watching, vanished from view.
The Edmond Hamilton Megapack: 16 Classic Science Fiction Tales Page 47
