The thundering voice went on, “Final warning, John Stuart. Come out with your hands empty. We’ll send a ship down for you.”
John Thomas shouted back, “Send it down and we’ll wreck it!” He added hoarsely to Lummox, “Got some rocks, Lummie?”
“Huh? Sure! Now, Johnnie?”
“Not yet. I’ll tell you.”
The voice remained silent; no ship came down to them. Instead a ship other than the command ship dropped swiftly, squatted a hundred feet above the pines and about the same distance from them laterally. It started a slow circle around them, almost a crawl.
Immediately there was a rending sound, then a crash as a forest giant toppled to the ground. Another followed at once. Like a great invisible hand a drag field from the ship knocked over trees and swept them aside. Slowly it cut a wide firebreak around them. “Why are they doing that?” Betty whispered.
“It’s a forestry service ship. They’re cutting us off.”
“But why? Why don’t they just do it and get it over with?” She began to shake, he put an arm around her.
“I don’t know, Slugger. They’re driving.”
The ship closed the circle, then faced them and seemed to settle back on its haunches. With the delicate care of a dentist pulling a tooth the operator reached in, selected one tree, plucked it out of the ground, and tossed it aside. He picked another—and still another. Gradually a wide path was being cut through the timber to the spot where they waited.
And there was nothing to do but wait. The ranger’s ship removed the last tree that shielded them; the tractor field brushed them as he claimed it, making them stagger and causing Lummox to squeal with terror. John Thomas recovered himself and slapped the beast’s side. “Steady, boy. Johnnie is here.”
He thought about having them retreat back from the clearing now in front of them, but there seemed no use in it.
The logging ship lay off; an attack ship moved in. It dropped suddenly and touched ground at the end of the corridor. Johnnie gulped and said, “Now, Lummox. Anything that comes out of that ship—see if you can hit it.”
“You bet, Johnnie!” Lummox reached with both hands for ammunition.
But he never picked up the rocks. John Thomas felt as if he had been dumped into wet concrete up to his chest; Betty gasped and Lummox squealed. Then he piped, “Johnnie! The rocks are stuck!”
John Thomas labored to speak. “It’s all right, boy, Don’t struggle. Just hold still. Betty, you all right?”
“Can’t breathe!” she gasped.
“Don’t fight it. They’ve got us.”
Eight figures poured out of the door of the ship. They looked not human, being covered head to foot with heavy metal mesh. Each wore a helmet resembling a fencer’s mask and carried as a back pack a field anti-generator. They trotted confidently in open double file toward the passage through the trees; as they struck the field they slowed slightly, sparks flew, and a violet nimbus formed around each. But on they came.
The second four were carrying a large metal-net cylinder, high as a man and of equal width. They balanced it easily up in the air. The man in the lead called out, “Swing wide of the beast. We’ll get the kids out first, then dispose of him.” He sounded quite cheerful.
The squad came up to the odd group of three, cutting around without passing close to Lummox. “Easy! Catch them both,” the leader called out. The barrellike cage was lowered over Betty and John Thomas, setting slowly until the man giving orders reached inside and flipped a switch—whereupon it struck sparks and dropped to the ground.
He gave them a red-faced grin. “Feels good to get the molasses off you, doesn’t it?”
Johnnie glared at him with his chin quivering, and replied insultingly while he tried to rub cramps out of his leg muscles. “Now, now!” the officer answered mildly. “No good to feel that way. You made us do it.” He glanced up at Lummox. “Good grief! He is a big beast, isn’t he? I’d hate to meet him in a dark alley, without weapons.”
Johnnie found that tears were streaming down his face and that he could not stop them. “Go ahead!” he cried, his voice misbehaving. “Get it over with!”
“Eh?”
“He never meant any harm! So kill him quickly…don’t play cat-and-mouse with him.” He broke down and sobbed, covering his face with his hands. Betty put her hands on his shoulders and sobbed with him.
The officer looked distressed. “What are you talking about, son? We aren’t here to hurt him. We have orders to bring him in without a scratch on him—even if we lost men in the process. Craziest orders I ever had to carry out.”
CHAPTER XII
Concerning Pidgie-Widgie
MR. KIKU was feeling good. Breakfast was not a burning lump in his middle; he felt no need to shop in his pill drawer, nor even a temptation to get out his real estate folders. The Triangular Conference was going well and the Martian delegates were beginning to talk sense. Ignoring the various amber lights on his desk he began singing: “Frankie and Johnnie were lovers…and oh boy how they could love…swore to be true to each other…”
He had a fair baritone voice and no sense of pitch.
Best of all that silly, confused Hroshian affair was almost over…and no bones broken. Good old Doc Ftaeml seemed to think that there was an outside chance of establishing diplomatic relations, so delighted the Hroshii had been at recovering their missing Hroshia.
With a race as powerful as the Hroshii diplomatic relations were essential…they must be allies, though that might take a while. Perhaps not too long, he decided; they certainly did nip-ups at the sight of Lummox…almost idolatrous.
Looking back, the things that had confused them were obvious. Who would have guessed that a creature half as big as a house and over a century old was a baby? Or that this race attained hands only when old enough to use them? For that matter, why was this Hroshia so much bigger than its co-racials? Its size had misled Greenberg and himself as much as anything. Interesting point…he’d have the xenologists look into it.
No matter. By now Lummox was on his…her way to the Hroshian ship. No fuss, no ceremony, no publicity, and the danger was over. Could they actually have volatilized Terra? Just as well not to have found out. All’s well that ends well. He went back to singing.
He was still singing when the “urgent” light began jittering and he delivered the last few bars into Greenberg’s face: “…just as true as the stars above!” He added. “Sergei, can you sing tenor?”
“Why should you care, boss? That wasn’t a tune.”
“You’re jealous. What do you want, son? See them off okay?”
“Unh, boss, there’s a slight hitch. I’ve got Dr. Ftaeml with me. Can we see you?”
“What is it?”
“Let’s wait until we are alone. One of the conference rooms?”
“Come into the office,” Mr. Kiku said grimly. He switched off, opened a drawer, selected a pill and took it.
Greenberg and the medusoid came in at once: Greenberg flopped down in a chair as if exhausted, pulled out a cigarette, felt in his pockets, then put it away. Mr. Kiku greeted Dr. Ftaeml formally, then said to Greenberg, “Well?”
“Lummox didn’t leave.”
“Eh?”
“Lummox refused to leave. The other Hroshii are boiling like ants. I’ve kept the barricades up and that part of the space port around their landing craft blocked off. We’ve got to do something.”
“Why? This development is startling, but I fail to see that it’s our responsibility. Why the refusal to embark?”
“Well…” Greenberg looked helplessly at Ftaeml.
The Rargyllian said smoothly, “Permit me to explain, sir. The Hroshia refuses to go aboard without her pet.”
“Pet?”
“The kid, boss. John Thomas Stuart.”
“Exactly,” agreed Ftaeml. “The Hroshia states that she has been raising ‘John Thomases’ for a long time; she refuses to go home unless she can take her John Thomas with her. She was
quite imperious about it.”
“I see,” agreed Kiku. “To put it in more usual language the boy and the Hroshia are attached to each other. That’s not surprising; they grew up together. But Lummox will have to put up with the separation, just as John Thomas Stuart had to. As I recall, he made a bit of fuss; we told him to shut up and shipped him home. That’s what the Hroshia must do: tell her to shut up, force her, if necessary, into their landing craft and take her along. That’s what they came here for,”
The Rargyllian answered, “Permit me to say, sir, that by putting it into ‘more usual language’ you have missed the meaning. I have been discussing it with her in her own tongue.”
“Eh? Has she learned so quickly?”
“She has long known it. The Hroshii, Mr. Under Secretary, know their own language almost from the shell. One may speculate that this use of language almost on the instinctive level is one reason, perhaps the reason, why they find other languages difficult and never learn to use them well. The Hroshia speaks your language hardly as well as one of your four-year-old children, though I understand that she began acquiring it one of your generations ago. But in her own language she is scathingly fluent…so I learned, much to my sorrow.”
“So? Well, let her talk. Words can’t hurt us.”
“She has talked…she has given orders to the commander of the expedition to recover her pet at once. Otherwise, she states, she will remain here and continue raising ‘John Thomases.’”
“And,” Greenberg added, “the commander has handed us an ultimatum to produce John Thomas Stuart at once…or else.”
“‘Or else’ meaning what I think it means?” Kiku answered slowly.
“The works,” Greenberg said simply. “Now that I’ve seen their ground craft I’m not sure but what they can.”
“You must understand, sir,” Ftaeml added earnestly, “that the commander is as distressed as you are. But he must attempt to carry out the wishes of the Hroshia. This mating was planned more than two thousand of your years ago; they will not give it up lightly. He cannot allow her to remain…nor can he force her to leave. He is very much upset.”
“Aren’t we all?” Mr. Kiku took out two more pills. “Dr. Ftaeml, I have a message for your principals. Please convey it exactly.”
“I shall, sir.”
“Please tell them that their ultimatum is rejected with contempt. Please…”
“Sir! I beg of you!”
“Attend me. Tell them that and do not soften it. Tell them that we tried in every way to help them, that we succeeded, and that they have answered kindness with threats. Tell them that their behavior is unworthy of civilized people and that the invitation to join the Community of Civilizations is withdrawn. Tell them that we spit in their faces…find an idiom of equal strength. Tell them that free men may die, but they are never bullied.”
Greenberg was grinning widely and clasping both hands in the ancient sign of approval. Dr. Ftaeml seemed to grow pale under his outer chitin.
“Sir,” he said, “I greatly regret being required to deliver this message.”
Kiku smiled icily. “Deliver it as given. But before you do, find opportunity to speak to the Hroshia Lummox. You can do so?”
“Most assuredly, sir.”
“Tell her that the commander of the expedition, in his zeal, seems bent on killing the human, John Thomas Stuart. See that she understands what is threatened.”
The Rargyllian arranged his mouth in a broad smile. “Forgive me, sir; I underestimated you. Both messages will be delivered, in the proper order.”
“That is all.”
“Your good health, sir.” The Rargyllian turned to Greenberg, put a loose-jointed arm around his shoulders. “My brother Sergei, we have already found our way together out of one tight maze. Now, with the help of your spiritual father, we shall find our way out of another. Eh?”
“Right, Doc.”
Ftaeml left. Kiku turned to Greenberg and said, “Get the Stuart boy here. Get him at once, yourself, personally. Umm…bring his mother, too. He’s under age, isn’t he?”
“Yes. Boss, what’s the plan? You aren’t going to turn him over to them?…after that wonderful kick in the teeth you handed them?”
“Of course I am. But on my own terms. I don’t intend to let those animated pool tables think they can push us around, We’ll use this to get what we want. Now get going!”
“I’m gone.”
Mr. Kiku stayed at his desk, checking papers with part of his mind while letting his subconscious feel out the problem of Lummox. He had a strong hunch that tide was at flood…for humans. It was necessary to judge how to ride it. He was in this revery when the door opened and the Most Honorable Mr. Roy MacClure walked in. “There you are, Henry! Pull yourself together, man… Beulah Murgatroyd is coming to call.”
“Beulah who?”
“Beaulah Murgatroyd. The Beulah Murgatroyd.”
“Should I know?”
“What? Man, don’t you ever watch stereovision?”
“Not if I can possibly avoid it.”
MacClure shook his head indulgently. “Henry, you don’t get around enough. You bury yourself in here and push your little buttons and don’t even know what is going on in the world.”
“Possibly.”
“Positively. You’re out of touch, man…it’s a good thing you don’t have to deal with people.”
Mr. Kiku permitted himself a wintry smile, “I suppose so.”
“I’ll bet you three to one you don’t know who is ahead in the World Series.”
“The World Series? That’s baseball, isn’t it? I’m sorry but I haven’t even had time to follow the cricket matches of late years.”
“See what I mean? Though how you can mention cricket in the same breath with baseball… Never mind. Since you don’t know who the famous Beulah Murgatroyd is, I’ll tell you. She’s Pidgie-Widgie’s mother, so to speak.”
“‘Pidgie-Widgie’?” Mr. Kiku echoed.
“You’re pulling my leg. The creator of the Pidgie-Widgie stories for children. You know—Pidgie-Widgie on the Moon, Pidgie-Widgie Goes to Mars, Pidgie-Widgie and the Space Pirates.”
“I’m afraid I don’t.”
“That’s hard to believe. But you don’t have any kids, do you?”
“Three.”
But Mr. MacClure was still talking. “Now she’s taken Pidgie-Widgie on the air and it’s really something. For the kids of course but so comical that the grown-ups follow it, too. You see, Pidgie-Widgie is a puppet about a foot high. He goes zooming through space, rescuing people and blasting pirates and having a grand ole time…the kids love him. And at the end of each installment Mrs. Murgatroyd comes on and they have a bowl of Hunkies together and talk. You like Hunkies?”
Mr. Kiku shuddered. “No.”
“Well, you can just pretend to eat them, I suppose. But it is the biggest breakfast-food show on the air, reaches everybody.”
“And this is important?”
“Important? Man, do you know how many people eat breakfast every morning?”
“No. Not too many, I hope. I wish I had not.”
Mr. MacClure glanced at his watch. “We’ll have to hurry. The technicians are setting up the gear now. She’ll be here any moment.”
“Technicians?”
“Didn’t I say? Mrs. Murgatroyd will interview us, with Pidgie-Widgie in her lap and taking part. Then they’ll patch it into the show. A wonderful boost for the department.”
“No!”
“Eh? Mr. Kiku, did I understand you correctly?”
“Mr. Secretary,” Mr. Kiku said tensely, “I couldn’t possibly do that. I… I’m subject to stage fright.”
“What? Why, that’s absurd! You helped me open the Triangular Conference. You spoke without notes for thirty minutes.”
“That’s different. That’s shop talk, with other professionals.”
The Secretary frowned. “I hate to insist, if it really makes you nervous. But Mrs. Murgatr
oyd asked for you especially. You see…” MacClure looked mildly embarrassed. “…Pidgie-Widgie preaches racial tolerance and so forth. Brothers under the skin…the sort of thing we all want to encourage. So?”
Mr. Kiku said fimly, “I’m sorry.”
“Come now! Surely you’re not going to force me to insist?”
“Mr. Secretary,” Kiku answered quietly, “you will find that my job description does not require me to be a stereovision actor. If you will give me a written order, I will submit it to our legal bureau for opinion, then answer you officially.”
Mr. MacClure frowned. “Henry, you can be a stubborn little beast, can’t you? I wonder how you got so high in the heap?”
Mr. Kiku did not answer; MacClure went on, “I won’t let you pull the rule book on me; I’m too old a fox. Though I must say I didn’t think you would do that to me.”
“Sorry, sir. I really am.”
“So am I. I’ll try to. convince you that it is important to the department, whether a civil servant can be ordered to do it or not. You see, Beulah Murgatroyd is the power behind ‘The Friends of Lummox.’ So…”
“‘The Friends of Lummox’?”
“I knew you would see it differently. After all, you’ve been handling that whoop-te-do. Therefore…”
“What in heaven’s name are ‘The Friends of Lummox’?”
“Why, you set up the original interview with them yourself. But if I hadn’t happened to lunch with Wes Robbins, we might have missed the boat on it.”
“I seem to recall a memorandum. A routine matter.”
“Mrs. Murgatroyd is not routine, I’ve been trying to tell you. You precedent-and-protocol boys lose touch with the people. If you don’t mind my saying so, that’s why you never quite get to the top.”
“I don’t mind in the least,” Mr. Kiku said gently.
“Eh?” The Secretary looked slightly embarrassed. “I mean, there’s a place for a grass-roots politician, like me, with his finger on the pulse…though I admit I don’t have your special training. You see?”
“There is work for both our talents, sir. But go on. Perhaps I did ‘miss the boat’ in this instance. The ‘Friends of Lummox’ memorandum must have come through before the name meant anything to me.”
The Star Beast Page 17
