Lucky Starr and the Big Sun of Mercury

by Isaac Asimov

4. Over the Banquet Table

  "Urteil!" cried Bigman at once, with a ferocity that stiffened every muscle of his small body. "That dirty cobber. . . "

  "Why Urteil?" asked Lucky softly.

  "He warned us to watch our suits, Lucky. Remember?"

  "Of course. And it's exactly what I did. "

  "Sure. He set it up for us. We find a slashed suit and we think he's a great guy. Then we're cold meat for him next time around. Don't fall for that, Lucky. He's a. . . "

  "Now wait, Bigman, wait! Don't make your mind up so fast. Look at it this way. Urteil said Mindes had tried to kill him, too. Suppose we believe him. Suppose Mindes had tried to gimmick Urteil's suit and Urteil had spotted it in time. Urteil would warn us to watch out for the same trick. Maybe Mindes did this. "

  "Sands of Mars, Lucky, that can't be. This guy, Mindes, is ladled full of sleeping pills, and before that he wasn't out of our sight from the minute we got onto this miserable rock. "

  "All right. How do we know Mindes is asleep and under medication?" asked Lucky.

  "Gardoma says. . . " began Bigman, and fell silent.

  "Exactly. Gardoma says! We haven't seen Mindes, though. We only know what Dr. Gardoma said, and Dr. Gardoma is a great friend of Mindes's. "

  "The two of them are in it together," said Bigman, with instant conviction. "Jumping comets-- "

  "Wait, wait, don't you jump so. Great Galaxy, Big-man, I'm just trying to straighten out my thoughts, and you take me up on everything. " His tone was as disapproving as it could ever be with respect to his small friend. He went on, "Now you've complained a dozen times that I don't tell you everything on my mind until everything's done with. This is why, you blaster-happy nitwit. As soon as I advance a theory, you're off on a charge, all your weapons cocked and ready. "

  "I'm sorry, Lucky," said Bigman. "Go ahead. "

  "All right. Now Urteil is easy to suspect. Nobody likes him. Even Dr. Peverale doesn't. You saw how he reacted just to the mention of his name. We've met him only once and you dislike him-- "

  ''I'll say," muttered Bigman.

  "-while I don't exactly like him, either. Anyone can slash this suit and hope that suspicion will fall on Urteil if it should happen to be discovered, and it would be surely discovered after it's killed someone, if not before. "

  "I see all that, Lucky. "

  "On the other hand," went on Lucky smoothly, "Mindes has already tried to get rid of me with a blaster. If that were a serious attempt, he doesn't seem the type to do anything as indirect as suit-slashing. As for Dr. Gardoma, I don't see him involving himself in the murder of a Councilman just out of friendship for Mindes. "

  "Then what's the decision?" cried Bigman impatiently.

  "There isn't any so far," said Lucky, "except maybe that we go to sleep. " He turned down the bed sheets and stepped into the washroom.

  Bigman looked after him and shrugged his shoulders.

  Scott Mindes was sitting up in bed when Lucky and Bigman entered his quarters the next morning. He was pale and looked tired.

  "Hello," he said. "Karl Gardoma told me what happened. You don't know how sorry I am. "

  Lucky passed it off with a shrug. "How do you feel?"

  "Wrung out but all right, if you know what I mean. I'll be at the dinner party old Peverale is giving tonight. "

  "Is that wise?"

  "I won't leave Urteil there holding the fort," said Mindes, hatred suddenly flooding his face with momentary color, "telling everyone I'm crazy. Or Dr. Peverale, either, for that matter. "

  "Dr. Peverale doubts your sanity?" asked Lucky softly.

  "Well. . . Look, Starr, I've been scouting the Sunside in a small rocket-scooter ever since the accidents started getting bad. I had to do it. It's my project. Twice, now, I-I've seen something. "

  Mindes paused and Lucky prodded Mm. "Seen what, Dr. Mindes?"

  "I wish I could say for sure. I saw it only from a distance each time. Something moving. Something that looked human. Something in a space-suit. Not one of our inso-suits, our special insulated jobs, you know. It looked more like an ordinary space-suit. Ordinary metal, you know. "

  "Did you try to get closer?"

  "Yes, and I lost it. And the photographs showed nothing either. Just spots of light and dark that might have been something, or nothing. But it was something, all right. Something that moved under the Sun as though it didn't care a thing for the heat and radiation. It would even stand still in the Sun for minutes at a time. That's what got me. "

  "Is that strange? Standing still, I mean?"

  Mindes laughed shortly. "On the Mercury Sun-side? It sure is. Nobody stands still. Insulated suit and all, you go about your business as fast as you can and get out from under as fast as you can. This near the Terminator the heat isn't so bad. It's the radiation, though. It's just good practice to take as little of it as possible. The inso-suits aren't complete protection against gamma rays. If you must stand still, you move into the shade of a rock. "

  "What's your explanation of it all?"

  Mindes's voice fell to an almost shamed whisper. "I don't think it's a man. "

  "You're not going to say it's a two-legged ghost, are you?" said Bigman suddenly, before Lucky could nudge him into silence.

  But Mindes only shook his head. "Did I use that phrase on the surface? I seem to remember-- No, I think it's a Mercurian. "

  "What?" cried Bigman, sounding as if he thought that were worse.

  "How else could it endure the Sun's radiation and heat so?"

  "Why would it need a space-suit then?" asked Lucky.

  "Well, I don't know. " Mindes's eyes flashed, and a restless wildness settled upon them. "But it's something. When I got back to the Dome, every man and every suit could be accounted for each time. Dr. Peverale won't authorize an expedition to make a real search. He says we're not equipped for it. "

  "Have you told him what you told me?"

  "He thinks I'm crazy. I'm sure of it. He thinks I'm seeing reflections and building men out of them in my imagination. But that's not so, Starr!"

  Lucky said, "Have you contacted the Council of Science?"

  "How can I? Dr. Peverale wouldn't back me. Urteil would say I was mad and they would listen to him. Who would listen to me?"

  "I would," said Lucky.

  Mindes sat up in bed with a jerk. His hand shot out as though it were ready to grasp the other's sleeve but then held back. He said, in a choked voice, "Then you'll investigate it?"

  "In my way," promised Lucky, "I will. "

  The others were already at the banquet table that evening when Lucky and Bigman arrived. Above the hum of greeting that rose as they entered and the beginning of the introductions, there were obvious signs that the gathering was not entirely a pleasant one.

  Dr. Peverale sat at the head of the table, his thin lips set and his sunken cheeks quivering, the picture of dignity maintained under difficulty. At his left was the broad-shouldered figure of Urteil, lounging back in his chair, thick fingers playing delicately with the rim of a drinking glass.

  Toward the foot of the table was Scott Mindes, looking painfully young and tired as he stared with angry frustration at Urteil. Next to him was Dr. Gardoma, watching with an anxious and thoughtful eye as though ready to interfere in case Mindes grew rash.

  The remaining seats, except for two empty ones at Dr. Peverale's right, were occupied by several of the senior men of the Observatory. One in particular, Han-ley Cook, second in command at the Dome, leaned his tall, lean body forward and took Lucky's hand firmly in his own.

  Lucky and Bigman took their seats and the salads were served.

  Urteil said at once in a harsh voice that effectively took over the conversation, "We were wondering just before you came in whether young Mindes ought not to tell you of the great wonders in store for Earth as a result of his experiments. "

  "No such thing," snapped Mindes, "and I'll do my own talking
if you don't mind. "

  "Oh, come on, Scott," said Urteil, grinning broadly, "don't be bashful. Well, then, look here, I'll tell the man. "

  Dr. Gardoma's hand fell, as though by accident, on Mindes's shoulder, and the young engineer swallowed a cry of indignation and remained silent.

  Urteil said, "Now I warn you, Starr, this is going to be good. It. . . "

  Lucky interrupted, "I know something of the experiments. The grand result of an air-conditioned planet is quite possible, I think. "

  Urteil scowled. "That so? I'm glad you're optimistic. Poor Scott can't even make the pilot experiment work. Or at least he says he can't, don't you, Scott?"

  Mindes half rose, but again Dr. Gardoma's hand was on his shoulder.

  Bigman's eyes traveled from speaker to speaker, resting on Urteil with black distaste. He said nothing.

  The arrival of the main course stopped the conversation momentarily, and Dr. Peverale tried desperately to turn it into less explosive channels. For a while he succeeded, but then Urteil, with the last of his helping of roast beef impaled on his fork, leaned toward Lucky and said, "So you go for the project Mindes is running, do you?"

  "I think it's a reasonable one. "

  "You have to think that, being a member of the Council of Science. But what if I told you that the experiments here were phony; they could be run on Earth for one per cent of the cost if the Council were only interested enough in the taxpayers' money to save a little of it. What would you say if I told you that?"

  "The same thing I would say if you told me anything at all," retorted Lucky composedly. "I would say, Mr. Urteil, that the chances are that you're lying. It's your greatest talent and, I believe, pleasure. "

  Instantly a great silence fell on the banqueters, even on Urteil. His thick cheeks seemed to sag in surprise and his eyes to bulge. With sudden passion, he leaned directly across Dr. Peverale's place, rising from his seat and bringing his right hand down hard and flat just short of Lucky's platter.

  "No Council lackey-" he began in a roar.

  And as he did that, Bigman moved, too. No eye at the table saw the details of that move, since it flashed with the speed of a striking snake, but Urteil's roar ended in a shout of dismay.

  Urteil's hand, which had come down with such hard finality, now showed the carved metallic haft of a force-knife growing out of it.

  Dr. Peverale scraped his chair back suddenly, and there was a cry or an exclamation from every man there but Bigman himself. Even Lucky seemed startled.

  Bigman's tenor voice rose in delight. "Spread your fingers, you tub of mineral oil. Spread them and then grease back down into your seat. "

  Urteil stared at his small tormenter without understanding for a moment and then very slowly spread his fingers. His hand was not hurt, not a sliver of skin had been removed. The force-knife stood quivering in the hard plastic table top, an inch of its waveringly luminescent force-blade (it wasn't matter, merely a thin field of immaterial force) in sight. The knife had entered the table, working its way neatly and unerringly between the second and third finger of Urteil's hand.

  Urteil snatched Ms hand away as though it were suddenly in flames.

  Bigman crowed with delight and said, "And next time you reach a hand in Lucky's direction or in mine, you cobber, I chop it right off. What would you say if I told you that? And whatever you say, say it politely. " He reached out for the force-knife, deactivating the blade as he seized the haft, and returned it to its inconspicuous holster on his belt.

  Lucky said, with a light frown, "I wasn't aware that my friend was armed. I'm sure he's sorry for having disturbed the meal, but I believe Mr. Urteil may take this incident to heart. "

  Someone laughed and there was a tight smile on Mindes's face.

  Urteil looked with hot eyes from face to face. He said, "I won't forget this treatment. It's obvious to me that the senator is receiving little co-operation, and he'll hear of that. And meanwhile, I'm staying right here. " He folded his arms as though daring anyone to make Mm leave.

  Little by little the conversation grew general.

  Lucky said to Dr. Peverale, "You know, sir, it seems to me that your face is familiar. "

  "Is it?" The astronomer smiled in a strained fashion. "I don't think I ever met you before. "

  "Well, were you ever on Ceres?"

  "Ceres?" The old astronomer looked at Lucky with some surprise. He had obviously not yet recovered from the force-knife episode. "The largest observatory in the Solar System is on that asteroid. I worked there as a young man, and I frequently visit it even now. "

  "Then I wonder if I didn't perhaps see you there. "

  Lucky couldn't help thinking, as he spoke, of those exciting days when the chase was on for Captain Anton and the pirates who were making their lair in the asteroids. And particularly the day when the pirate ships raided the very heart of Council territory, onto the surface of Ceres itself, winning out temporarily by the very daring of their undertaking.

  But Dr. Peverale was shaking his head in gentle good humor. "I would have been certain, sir, had I had the pleasure of seeing you there. I am sure I did not. "

  "Too bad," said Lucky.

  "The loss is mine, I assure you. But then it was my season for loss. As a result of an intestinal ailment, I missed all the excitement in connection with the pirate raid. I knew of it only through the conversations I overheard among my nurses. "

  Dr. Peverale looked about the table now, his good humor restored. The dessert was being served by the mechanical tray-carrier. He said, "Gentlemen, there has been some discussion of Project Light. "

  He paused to smile benignly, then went on. "It isn't exactly a happy subject under the circumstances, but I have been thinking a good deal about the accidents that have disturbed so many of us. It seems it would be a good time for me to give you all my thoughts on the matter. After all, Dr. Mindes is here. We have had a good meal. And, finally, I have something interesting to say. "

  Urteil broke a long silence to ask grimly, "You, Dr. Peverale?"

  The astronomer said mildly, "Why not? I have had interesting things to say many times in my life. And I will say what's on my mind now. " There was a sudden gravity about him. "I believe I know the whole truth, the exact truth. I know who is causing the destruction in connection with Project Light and why. "