“Huh? Of course not.”
“Too bad. For as near as I was able to find out, that constable is the only cop who isn’t looking for you, which is why I rallied around—even though you, you dirty name, ran off without bothering to alert me.”
“I told you I was sorry!”
“And I forgave you. I’ll let you forget it in ten years or so.”
“What’s this nonsense about this constable? And why should everybody be out after me? Aside from Chief Dreiser, I mean?”
“Because he has put out a general alarm and offered a reward for Lummie, alive or dead…preferably dead. They are serious about it, Johnnie…terribly serious. So whatever plan you had we now junk and shift to a good one. What did you have in mind? Or did you?”
John Thomas turned pale and answered slowly, “Well… I meant to keep on like this for a night or two, until we reached a place to hide.”
She shook her head. “No good. In their stumbling official way they will have concluded by now that this is where you would head…since it is the only place near Westville where a creature the size of Lummox could possibly hide. And…”
“Oh, we’d get off the road!”
“Of course. And they will search this forest tree by tree. They really mean it, chum.”
“You didn’t let me finish. You know that old uranium mine? The Power and Glory? You go over Dead Wolf Pass and then take off north on a gravel road. That’s where we’re heading. I can put Lummox completely out of sight there; the main tunnel is big enough.”
“Flashes of sense in that. But not good enough for what you are up against”
She was silent. Johnnie stirred uneasily and said, “Well? If that’s no good, what do we do?”
“Pipe down. I’m thinking.” She lay still, staring up at the deep blue mountain sky. At last she said, “You didn’t solve anything by running away.”
“No…but I sure mixed it up.”
“Yes, and so far so good. Everything ought to be turned upside down occasionally; it lets in air and light. But now we’ve got to see that the pieces fall back where we want them. To do that we’ve got to gain time. Your notion of the Power and Glory Mine isn’t too bad; it will do until I can make better arrangements.”
“I don’t see why they would ever find him there. It’s about as lonely as you can get.”
“Which is why it is sure to be searched. Oh, it might fool Deacon Dreiser; I doubt he could find his own hat without a search warrant. But he’s dug up an air posse the size of a small army; they are certain to find you. You took your sleeping bag and food; therefore you are camping out. I found you, they will find you. I did it by knowing what makes you tick, whereas they have to work by logic, which is slower. But just as certain. They’ll find you…and that’s the end of Lummox. They won’t take chances…bomb him, probably.”
John Thomas considered the dismal prospect. “Then what’s the sense of hiding him in the mine?”
“Just to gain a day or so, because I’m not ready to take him out yet.”
“Huh?”
“Of course. We’ll hide him in town.”
“What? Slugger, the altitude has got you.”
“In town and under cover…because it is the only place in the wide, wide world they won’t look for him.” She added, “Maybe in Mr. Ito’s greenhouses.”
“Huh? Now I know you’re crazy.”
“Can you think of a safer place? Mr. Ito’s son is not hard to reason with; I had a nice talk with him just yesterday. I stood short and looked up at him and let him explain things. One of his greenhouses would be perfect…snug, maybe, but this is an emergency. You can’t see through that milky glass they are built out of and nobody would dream that Lummie might be inside.”
“I don’t see how you can do it.”
“You let me handle it. If I don’t get the greenhouse…but I will!…then I’ll get an empty warehouse or something. We’ll put Lummie in the mine tonight, then I’ll fly back and arrange things. Tomorrow night Lummie and I will go back to town and…”
“Huh? It took us two nights to get this far—and it will take us most of tonight to get to the mine. You can’t ride him back in one night.”
“How fast can he go when he tries?”
“But nobody can ride him when he gallops. Not even me.”
“I won’t ride him; I’ll fly over him, pacing him and making him slow down for curves. Three hours, maybe?…and another hour to sneak him into the greenhouse.”
“Well…maybe it would work.”
“It will because it’s got to. Then you get caught”
“Huh? Why don’t I just go home?”
“No, that would be a giveaway. They catch you, you’ve been doing amateur uranium prospecting…I’ll fetch out a radiation counter. You don’t know where Lummox is; you kissed him goodbye and turned him loose, then came up here to forget your sorrows. You’ll have to be convincing…and don’t let them use a truth meter.”
“Yes, but… Look, Slugger, what’s the good? Lummie can’t stay in a greenhouse forever.”
“We’re simply buying time. They are ready to kill him on sight…and they will. So we keep him out of sight until we can change that.”
“I suppose I should have gone through with the sale to the Museum,” John Thomas answered miserably.
“No! Your instincts are sound, Johnnie, even though you’ve got less brains than a door knob. Look…do you remember the Cygnus Decision?”
“The Cygnus Decision? We had it in elementary Customs of Civilization?”
“Yes. Quote it.”
“What is this? A mid-semester quiz?” John Thomas frowned and dug into his memory. “‘Beings possessed of speech and manipulation must be presumed to be sentient and therefore to have innate human rights, unless conclusively proved otherwise.’” He sat up. “Hey! They can’t kill Lummox—he’s got hands!”
CHAPTER XI
“It’s Too Late, Johnnie”
“MIND your air speed,” she cautioned. “Do you know the old one about the man whose lawyer assured him that they could not put him in jail for that?”
“What was ‘that’?”
“Never mind. His client answered, ‘But, counsellor, I’m speaking from the jail.’ Point is, the Cygnus Decision is just theory; we’ve got to keep Lummox out of sight until we can get the court to change its mind.”
“Unh, I see. I guess you’re right.”
“I’m always right,” Betty admitted with dignity. “Johnnie, I’m dying of thirst; thinking is dry work. Did you bring any water up from the creek?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Got a bucket?”
“Yeah, somewhere.” He felt in his pockets, found it and pulled it out. He stopped to blow it up to semi-rigidity, then said, “I’ll fetch it.”
“No, give it to me. I want to stretch my legs.”
“’Ware fliers!”
“Don’t teach your grandmother.” She took it and went down hill, keeping to the trees until she reached the bank. Johnnie watched her slim figure catching shafts of cathedral light among the pines and thought how pretty she was…very nearly as good a head on her as a man and pretty to boot. Aside from being bossy the way females always were, Slugger was all right.
She came back carrying the plastic bucket carefully. “Help yourself,” she offered.
“Go ahead.”
“I drank from the creek.”
“All right” He drank deeply. “You know, Betty, if you weren’t knock-kneed, you’d be pretty good-looking.”
“Who’s knock-kneed?”
“And there’s always your face, of course,” he went on pleasantly. “Aside from those two shortcomings you’re not—”
He did not finish—she dived and hit him low. The water went all down his front and partly on her. The scuffle continued until he got her right arm locked up behind her, holding her helpless. “Say ‘Pretty please’,” he advised.
“Darn you, Johnnie Stuart! ‘Pretty please
.’”
“With sugar on it?”
“With sugar on it—and spit, too. Let me up.”
“All right.”
He got to his feet. She rolled to a sitting position, looked up at him and laughed. They were both dirty, scratched, and somewhat bruised and they both felt very fine indeed. Lummox had watched the mock fight with interest but no alarm, since Johnnie and Betty could never really be mad at each other. He commented, “Johnnie’s all wet.”
“He certainly is, Lummie—more ways than one.” She looked him over. “If I had two clothes pins, I’d hang you on a tree. By your ears, of course.”
“We’ll be dry in five minutes, a day like this.”
“I’m not wet, not through a flying suit. But you look like a dunked cat.”
“I don’t mind.” He lay down, found a pine needle and bit it. “Slugger, this is a swell place. I wish I didn’t have to go on up to the mine.”
“Tell you what—after we get this mess straightened out and before we start school, we’ll come back up here and camp a few days. We’ll bring Lummox, too—won’t we, Lummie?”
“Sure,” agreed Lummox. “Catch things. Throw rocks. Fun.”
John Thomas looked at her reprovingly. “And get me talked about all over town? No, thanks.”
“Don’t be prissy. We’re here now, aren’t we?”
“This is an emergency.”
“You and your nice-nice reputation!”
“Well, somebody ought to watch such things. Mum says that boys had to start worrying when girls quit. She says things used to be different”
“Of course they were—and they will be again. They run the whole program over and over again.” She looked thoughtful. “But, Johnnie, you pay too much attention to what your mother says.”
“I suppose so,” he admitted.
“You had better break yourself of it. Otherwise no girl is going to take a chance on marrying you.”
He grinned. “That’s my insurance policy.”
She dropped her eyes and blushed. “I wasn’t speaking for myself! I don’t want you—I’m just taking care of you for practice.”
He decided not to pursue that angle. “Honestly,” he said, “a person gets in the habit of behaving a certain way and it’s hard to stop. For instance, I’ve got an aunt—my Aunt Tessie, remember her?—who believes in astrology.”
“No! She doesn’t!”
“Surest thing. She doesn’t look nutty, does she? But she is and it’s embarrassing because she will talk about it and mother insists that I have to be polite. If I could just tell her she has holes in her head, it wouldn’t matter. But oh no! I have to listen to her rave and pretend that she’s a sane, responsible adult—when she can’t count above ten without an abacus.”
“An ‘abacus’?”
“You know—a slipstick with beads. I said ‘abacus’ because there isn’t a prayer that she could ever learn to read a slipstick. She likes being a lame brain—and I have to cater to it.”
“Don’t do it,” Betty said suddenly. “Pay no attention to what your mother says.”
“Slugger, you are a subversive influence.”
“Sorry, Johnnie,” she answered mildly. She added, “Did I ever tell you why I divorced my parents?”
“No, you never did. That’s your business.”
“So it is. But I think I’ll tell you, you might understand me better. Bend down.” She grabbed him by an ear, whispered into it.
As John Thomas listened he took on an expression of extreme surprise. “Not really?”
“Fact. They didn’t contest it so I never had to tell anyone. But that’s why.”
“I don’t see how you put up with it.”
“I didn’t I stood up in court and divorced them and got a professional guardian who doesn’t have nutty ideas. But look, Johnnie, I didn’t bare my soul just to make your chin drop. Heredity isn’t everything; I’m myself, an individual. You aren’t your parents. You’re not your father, you are not your mother. But you are a little late realizing it.” She sat up straight. “So be yourself, Knothead, and have the courage to make your own mess of your life. Don’t imitate somebody else’s mess.”
“Slugger, when you talk that stuff, you make it sound rational.”
“That’s because I’m always rational. How well fixed are you for groceries? I’m hungry.”
“You’re as bad as Lummox. The grub sack is over there.”
“Lunch?” inquired Lummox, hearing his name.
“Umm… Betty, I don’t want him tearing down trees, not in daylight. How long will it take them to track me down?”
“I wouldn’t count on over three days, big as this place is.”
“Well… I’ll hold back food for five, just in case.” He selected a dozen canned rations and gave them to Lummox. He did not open them as Lummox rather liked having the packages suddenly become hot when he bit into them. He finished them off before Betty had their own lunches opened.
After they ate Johnnie started to bring up the subject again. “Betty, do you really think that—” He broke off suddenly. “Hear anything?”
She listened, then nodded solemnly.
“How fast?”
“Not over two hundred.”
He nodded. “Then they are scanning. Lummox! Don’t move a muscle!”
“I won’t, Johnnie. Why not move a muscle?”
“Do it!”
“Don’t get excited,” Betty advised. “They are probably just laying out their search pattern. Chances are they couldn’t identify us either in the scope or visually with these trees to break up the image.” But she looked worried. “I wish Lummie were already in the mine tunnel, though. If anyone is smart enough to run a selective scan straight down that road while we’re on it tonight…well, we’ve had it.”
John Thomas was not really listening. He was leaning forward, cupping his ears with both hands. “Hush!” he whispered, “Betty—they’re coming back!”
“Don’t panic. It’s probably the other leg of the search pattern.”
But even as she said it she knew that she was wrong. The sound came over them, hovered and dropped in pitch. They looked up, but the denseness of the forest and the altitude of the craft kept them from seeing it.
Suddenly there was a light so bright that it made the sharp sunlight seem dusky when it passed. Betty gulped. “What was that?”
“Ultraflash photo,” he answered soberly. “They’re checking what they picked up on the scope.”
The sound above them squealed higher, then dropped; the eyeburning flash occurred again. “Stereoed it,” Johnnie announced solemnly. “They’ll really see us now, if they only suspected before.”
“Johnnie, we’ve got to get Lummox out of here!”
“How? Take him up on the road and let them pinpoint him with bomb? No, kid, our only hope now is that they decide he is a big boulder—I’m glad I made him stay tucked in.” He added, “We mustn’t move, either. They may go away.”
Even that outside hope passed. One after another, four more ships were heard. Johnnie ticked them off. “That one has taken station to the south. The third one was north, I think. Now they’ll cover to the west…a pinwheel guard. They’ve got us boxed, Slugger.”
She looked at him, her face dead white. “What do we do, Johnnie?”
“Huh? Why, noth—No, Betty look. You duck down through the trees to the creek. Take your flight harness with you. Then follow the stream a good distance and take to the air. Keep low until you get out from under their umbrella. They’ll let you go—they don’t want you.”
“And what will you be doing?”
“Me? I stay here.”
“And so do I.”
Johnnie said fretfully, “Don’t make me any trouble, Slugger. You’d just be in the way.”
“What do you think you can do? You don’t even have a gun.”
“I have this,” John Thomas answered grimly, touching his sheath knife, “—and Lummox can throw rocks.”
She stared at him, then laughed wildly. “What? Rocks indeed! Oh, Johnnie—”
“They’re not going to take us without a fight. Now will you get out of here—fast!—and quit being a nuisance?”
“No!”
“Look, Slugger, there isn’t time to argue. You get clear and fast. I stay with Lummox; that’s my privilege. He’s mine.”
She burst into tears. “And you’re mine, you big stupid oaf.”
He tried to answer her and could not. His face began to break in the spasmodic movements of a man trying to control tears. Lummox stirred uneasily. “What’s the matter, Johnnie?” he piped.
“Huh?” John Thomas replied in a choked voice. “Nothing.” He reached up and patted his friend. “Nothing at all, old fellow. Johnnie’s here. It’s all right.”
“All right, Johnnie.”
“Yes,” agreed Betty faintly. “It’s all right, Lummie.” She added in a low voice to John Thomas. “It’ll be quick, won’t it, Johnnie? We won’t feel it?”
“Uh, I guess so! Hey! None of that—in just one half second I’m going to punch you right on the button…and then dump you off the bank. That ought to protect you from the blast.”
She shook her head slowly, without anger nor fear. “It’s too late, Johnnie. You know it is. Don’t scold me—just hold my hand.”
“But—” He stopped. “Hear that?”
“More of them.”
“Yeah. They’re probably building an octagon…to make sure we don’t get out.”
A sudden thunderclap spared her the need to answer. It was followed by the squeal of a hovering ship; this time they could see it, less than a thousand feet over their heads. Then an iron voice rumbled out of the sky. “Stuart! John Stuart! Come out in the open!”
Johnnie took out his sheath knife, threw back his head and shouted, “Come and get me!”
Betty looked up at him, her face shining, and patted his sleeve. “Tell ’em, Johnnie!” she whispered. “That’s my Johnnie.”
The man behind the giant voice seemed to have a directional mike trained on him; he was answered: “We don’t want you and we don’t want to hurt anybody. Give up and come out.”
He threw back a one-word defiance and added, “We aren’t coming out!”
The Star Beast Page 16
