The Space Opera Megapack: 20 Modern and Classic Science Fiction Tales

by John W. Campbell

  “Trickery!” exclaimed Georg. “But he knows the people may believe it. Some of them undoubtedly will.”

  “And you cannot thwart your public,” Maida said. “Even your Earth Council, secure in its power, cannot do that.”

  “Exactly,” Georg rejoined. He was indignant, as well he might have been. “Tarrano is trying to avoid being attacked. Time—any delay—is what he wants.”

  The note went on. Tarrano—seeking only the welfare of the people—could not stand by and see the Earth Council wreck its public. Tarrano had reconsidered his former note. The Brende model was vital, and since the Earth Council demanded the model (for the benefit of its people) the people should have it. In a few days it would be in Washington. Tarrano himself would not come to Washington. His doing that could not help the public welfare, and he was but human. The Earth Council had made itself his enemy; he could not be expected to trust his life in enemy hands.

  The note closed with the suggestion that the Council withdraw its patrol from Venia. This talk of war was childish. Withdraw the patrol, and Tarrano himself might go back to Venus. He would wait a day for answer to this request; and if it were not granted—if the patrol were not entirely removed—then the Brende model would be destroyed. And if the publics of three worlds wished to depend upon a conceited, ignorant young man like Georg Brende for the everlasting life, they were welcome to do so.

  A clever piece of trickery, and it was awkward to deal with. One had only to watch its effect upon the public to realize how insidious it was. Tarrano had told us—in the tower in Venia: “I shall have to bargain with them.” And chuckled as he said it.

  A series of notes from the Earth Council and back again, followed during the next few days. But the patrol was not withdrawn; nor was war declared. The Earth Council knew that Tarrano had not ordered the model back—nor would he destroy it. Yet if the Earth forces were to overwhelm Tarrano, and the model were lost, a revolution upon Earth could easily take place before Georg could convince the people that he was able to build them another model.

  This delay—while Tarrano was held virtually a prisoner in Venia—was decided upon at the instigation of Georg himself. He—Georg—would address the publics of the three worlds. With Maida beside him to influence her own public in Venus, they would convince everyone that Georg had the secret—and that he alone would use it for the public good.

  Youthful plans! Youthful enthusiasm! The belief that they could win confidence to their cause by the very truthfulness in their hearts! The belief that right makes might—which Tarrano would have told them was untrue!

  Yet it was a good plan, and the Earth Council approved it, since it could do no harm to try. And it perhaps would have been successful but for one thing, of which even at that moment I—in Venia—was aware. Tarrano’s trickery was not all on the surface. He had written into that note—by a code of diabolically ingenious wording—a secret message to his own spies in Washington. Commands for them to obey. A dozen of his spies were in the Earth government’s most trusted, highest service—and some of them were there in Washington, close around Georg and Maida as they made their altruistic plan.

  The attempt was to be made from the high-power sending station in the mountains of West North America.13 Our observatory was there; and the only one of its kind on the Earth. It was equipped to send a radio voice audibly to every part of the Earth; and by helio, also to Mars and Venus, there to be re-transformed from light to sound and heard throughout those other worlds. And moving images of the speakers, seen on the finders all over the Earth, Venus and Mars simultaneously. The power, the generating equipment was at this station; and no matter where in the sky Venus or Mars might be, from the Mountain Station the vibrations of mingled light and sound were relayed elsewhere on Earth to other stations from which the helios could be flashed direct.

  To Skylan, as the Mountain Station was popularly called, Georg and Maida were taken in official aero under heavy convoy. Yet, even then, at their very elbows, spies of Tarrano must have been lurking.

  The official flyer landed them on the broad stage amid deep, soft snow. It was night—a brief trip from the late afternoon, through dinner and they were there. A night of clear shining stars—brilliant gems in deep purple. Clear, crisp, rarefied air; a tumbling expanse of white, with the stars stretched over it like a close-hung canopy.

  They were ushered into the low, rambling building. The attempt was to be made at once. Mars was mounting the eastern sky; and to the west, Venus was setting. Both visible from direct helios at that moment—Red Mars, from this mountain top, glowing like the tip of an arrant-cylinder up there.

  In the brief time since the party had left Washington, the worlds had been notified. The eyes and ears of the millions of three planets were waiting to see and hear this Georg Brende and this Princess Maida.

  The sending room was small, circular, and crowded with apparatus. And above its dome, opened to the sky, wherein the intensified helios shaded so that no ray of them might blind the operators, were sputtering as though eager to be away with their messages.

  With a dozen officials around him, Georg prepared to enter the sending room. He had parted from Maida a few moments before, when she had left him to be shown to her apartment by the women attendants.

  As she moved away, on impulse he had stopped her. “We shall succeed, Maida.”

  Her hand touched his arm. A brave smile, a nod, and she had passed on, leaving him standing there gazing after her with pounding heart. Pounding, not with excitement at the task before him in that sending room; pounding with the sudden knowledge that the welfare of this frail little woman meant more to him than the safety of all these worlds.

  At last Georg stood in the sending room. The officials sat grouped around him. Maida had not yet arrived from her apartment. There was a small platform, upon which she and Georg were to stand together. He took his place upon it, waiting for her.

  Before him was the sending disc; it glowed red as they turned the current into it. Then they illumined the mirrors; a circle of them, each with its image of Georg upon the platform. The white lights above him flashed on, beating down upon him with their hot, dazzling glare. The reflected beams from the mirrors, struck upward into the dome overhead. The helios up there were humming and sputtering loudly.

  Beyond the circle of intense white light in which Georg was standing, the spectators sat in gloom behind the mirrors. Maida had not come. The Skylan Director, impatient ordered a woman to go for her.

  Then, suddenly, Georg said to this Director:

  “I—these lights—this heat. It makes me feel faint—standing here.”

  Georg had stumbled from the platform. Between two of the mirrors, shaded from the glare, the perturbed Director met him. Moisture beaded Georg’s forehead.

  “I’ll—be quite all right in a moment. I’m going over there.” He smiled weakly. A dozen feet away there was an opened outer casement. It looked down twenty feet, perhaps, to the deep snow that covered the station’s grounds. The Director started with Georg; but Georg pushed him violently away.

  “No! No! You let me alone!” His accents were those of a spoiled child. The Director hesitated, and Georg, with a hand to his forehead, wavered toward the casement. The Director saw him standing there; saw him sway, then fall or jump forward, and disappear.

  They rushed outside. The snow was trampled all about with heavy footprints, but Georg had vanished. From the women’s apartment, the attendant came back. The Princess Maida could not be found!

  And in those moments of confusion, from outside across the starlit snow, an aero was rising. Silent, black—and no one saw it as it winged away into the night.

  CHAPTER XII

  Tara

  I must revert now to those moments in the tower room when Tarrano dissolved the isolation barrage which Wolfgar had thrown around us. Georg escaped, as I have recounted. Tarrano—there in the tower room—rendered me unconscious. I came to myself on the broad divan and found Elza bend
ing over me.

  I sat up, dizzily, with the room reeling.

  “Jac! Jac, dear—” She made me lie back, until I could feel the blood returning to my clammy face; and the room steadied, and the clanging of the gongs in my ears died away.

  “I—why, I’m—all right,” I gasped. And I lay there, clinging to her hand. Dear little Elza! In that moment of relief that I had come to my senses, she could not hide the love which even now was unspoken between us. Tarrano! I lay there weak and faint; but with the pressure of Elza’s hand, I did not fear that this Tarrano could win her from me.

  Wolfgar was standing across the room from us. He came forward.

  “You did not die,” he said; and smiled. “I told her you would not die.”

  It was now morning. Wolfgar and Elza told me I had been unconscious some hours. We were still imprisoned as before in the tower. Georg had escaped with Maida, they said; or at least, they hoped so. And they described the burning of the other tower. The city had been in a turmoil. It still was; I could hear now the shouts of the crowd outside. And turning as I lay there, through the casement I could see the blackened, still smoking ruins of Maida’s tower; the broken iron terrace; the spider bridge melted away, hanging loose and dangling like an aimless pendulum.

  The latest news, Elza and Wolfgar could not give me. The instrument room of our tower had been disconnected by Tarrano when he left some hours before. As they said it, we heard a familiar buzz; then the drone of an announcer’s voice. Tarrano’s guard had doubtless observed my recovery and had had orders to throw current into our instruments. Strange man, this Tarrano! He wished the news spread before us again. Confident of his own dominance over every crisis, he wanted Elza and me to hear it as it came from the discs.

  We went to the instrument room. I found myself weak, but quite uninjured. Elza left us there, and went to prepare food which I needed to strengthen me.

  The public events of those hours and days following, I have recounted as Georg saw them and took part in them in Washington. We observed them, here in the tower, with alternate hopes and fears. Our life of imprisonment went on much as before. Occasionally, Tarrano visited us, always making us sit like children before him, while at his ease he reclined on our divan.

  But he would never give us much real information; the man always was an enigma.

  “Your friend Georg has a wonderful plan,” he announced to us ironically early one evening. He smiled his caustic smile. “You have seen the tape?”

  “Yes,” I said. It was Georg’s plan to address with Maida, the publics of Earth, Venus and Mars.

  Tarrano nodded. “He and the Princess are going to convince everyone that I am an impostor.”

  I did not answer that; and abruptly he chuckled. “That would be unfortunate for me—if they could do that. Do you think they’ll be able to?”

  “I hope so,” I said.

  He laughed openly. “Of course. But they will not. That long note of mine to your government—you read it, naturally. But you didn’t read in it my secret instructions to my agents in Washington, did you? Well, they were there in it—my commands—the letters ending its words made another message.”

  He was amused at our discomfiture. “Simple enough? Yet really an intricate code in itself. It made the phrasing of the main note a little difficult to compose, that was all.” He sat up with his accustomed snap of alertness, and his face turned grim. “Georg will never address his audience. Nor the Princess—she will never appear before those sending mirrors. I have seen to that.” Again he was chuckling. “No, no, I could not let them do a thing like that. They might turn people against me.”

  Elza began indignantly: “You—you are—”

  His gesture checked her. “Your brother is quite safe, Lady Elza. And the Princess Maida also. Indeed, they are on the point of falling in love with each other. Natural! And perfectly right. It is as I would have it.”

  His strong brown fingers were rubbing each other with his satisfaction. “Curious, Lady Elza—how fortunate I am in all my plans.”

  “I don’t think you are,” I said. “Our government has you a prisoner here. They didn’t withdraw the patrol as you demanded, did they?”

  He frowned a trifle. “No. That was too bad. I rather hoped they would. It would have been a stupid thing for them to do—but still, I almost thought they’d do it.”

  I shook my head. “What they will do is sweep down here and overwhelm you.”

  “You think so?”

  “Yes.”

  He shifted himself to a more comfortable position. “They are playing for time—so that when I fail to produce the model as I agreed, then the public will realize I am not to be trusted.”

  “Exactly,” I said.

  “Well, I am playing for time, also.”

  He seemed so willing to discuss the thing that I grew bolder.

  “What have you to gain by playing for time?” I demanded.

  He stared. “You would question me, Jac Hallen? How absurd!” He looked at Elza, as though to share with her his amazement at my temerity.

  Wolfgar said suddenly to Tarrano: “You will gain nothing.”

  Tarrano’s face went impassive. I understood him better now; that cold, inscrutable look often concealed his strongest emotions. He said evenly:

  “I should prefer you not to address me, Wolfgar. A traitor such as you—the sound of your voice offends me.”

  It struck me then as very strange—as it had for days before—that Tarrano should have failed to punish Wolfgar. I would have expected death; least of all, that Tarrano would have allowed Wolfgar to live here in the tower, in comparative ease and comfort. Tarrano’s words now answered my unspoken questions. He was not looking at Wolfgar, but at Elza.

  “You, Wolfgar—deserve death. You know why I cannot kill you? Why I let you stay here in the tower?” A faint, almost wistful smile parted his thin lips; he did not take his eyes from Elza.

  “I am greatly handicapped, Wolfgar. The Lady Elza here would not like to have me put you to death. She would not even care to have me mistreat you. She is very tender hearted.” He raised a deprecating hand. “Ah, Lady Elza, does that surprise you? You never told me I must be lenient with this traitor? Of course not.”

  “I—” Elza began, but he stopped her.

  “You see, Lady Elza, I have already learned to obey you.” He was smiling very gently. “Learned to obey even your unspoken commands.”

  I wondered how much of this attitude might be sincere, and how much calculated trickery. Could Elza, indeed, control him?

  She must have had much the same thought, for she said with a forced smile: “You give me a great deal of power. If you—wish to obey me, you’ll set us free—send us all to Washington.”

  That amused him. “Ah, but I cannot do that.”

  She gained confidence. “You are willing to be very gracious in things which do not inconvenience you, Tarrano. It is not very impressive.”

  He looked hurt. “You misinterpret. I will do for you anything I can. But you must remember, Lady Elza, that my judgment is better than yours. I would not let you lead us into disaster. You are a gentle little woman. Your instincts are toward humane treatment of everyone—toward mercy rather than justice. In all such things, I shall be guided by you. Justice—tempered with mercy. A union very, very beautiful, Lady Elza… But, you see, beyond that—you are wrong. I am a man, and in the big things I must dominate. It is I who guide, and you who follow. You see that, don’t you?”

  The sincerity in his voice was unmistakable. And my heart sank as I watched Elza. Her gaze fell, and a flush mantled her cheeks. Tarrano added quietly: “We shall have no difficulty, you and I, Lady Elza. Each of us a place, and a duty. A destiny together.…”

  He broke off and rose quickly to his feet. “Enough. I have been weak to say so much as this.”

  He turned to leave us, and I became aware of a woman’s figure standing in the shadows of the archway across the room. She started forward as Ta
rrano glanced her way. A Venus woman of the Cold Country. Yet, obviously, one of good birth and breeding. A woman of perhaps 30 years, beautiful in the Venus cast; dressed in the conventional bodice breast-plates and short skirt, with grey stockings and sandals.

  Within the room, she regarded Tarrano silently. There was about her a quiet dignity; she stood with her tall, slim figure drawn to its full height. Her pure white hair was coiled upon her head, with a rich metal ornament to fasten it. And from it, a mantle of shimmering blue fabric hung down her back.

  Tarrano said: “What are you doing up here? I told you to wait below.”

  Her face showed no emotion. But there was a glitter to her eyes, a glow in their grey depths like alumite in the hydro-flame of a torch.

  She said slowly: “Master, I think it would be very correct if you would let me stay here and serve the Lady Elza. I told you that before, but you would not listen.”

  Tarrano, with sudden decision, swung toward Elza. “This is the Elta14 Tara. She was concerned that I should allow you to dwell here alone with this Jac Hallen, and this traitor from Mars.” His tone conveyed infinite contempt for us.

  The woman said quickly: “The Lady Elza would be glad of my companionship.” She shot a swift glance to Elza. What it was meant to convey, I could not have said. Perhaps Elza understood it, or thought she did. She spoke up.

  “I would like to have you very much, indeed.” She added to Tarrano, and there was on her face a look of feminine guile:

  “You, of course, could not refuse me so small a favor? After all your protestations—”

  He gestured impatiently. “Very well.” And he added to Tara: “You will serve the Lady Elza as she directs.”

  He stalked away into the darkened passage. In the gloom there, he stopped and again faced us; the light from a small blue tube in there illumined him dimly. He was smiling ironically.

  “I shall maintain the instruments for you. The mirrors will show you Georg and Maida. They are just about arriving at the Mountain Station. Watch them! You will see how far they progress with their wonderful speeches.”