The Red Peri's glance was faintly speculative. "I don't see," she said thoughtfully, "that it makes much difference. If you're telling the truth, it simply means that you're a very unlucky expedition, because I certainly can't let you go, and I haven't any particular desire to keep you here. In other words, it still looks very much as if you were destined to die." She paused. "What are your names?"
"This is Smithsonian's Professor Solomon Nestor," he said, "and I'm Frank Keene, radiation engineer."
Her green eyes shifted to the old man. "I've heard of Solomon Nestor," she observed slowly. "I really shouldn't like to kill him, but I don't see exactly what other course is open." She flashed her gaze back to Keene. "Do you?" she asked coolly.
"You could take our words not to give out any information," he grunted.
She laughed. "The Red Peri trusts very little to promises," she retorted. "Anyway, would you give your word to that?"
For a full half minute he stared into her mocking eyes. "I wouldn't," he said at last. "When I entered the Smithsonian's service I took their usual oath to uphold the law in the far places. Maybe many of their explorers consider that oath just so many words; I know some of them have found wealth at the expense of the institute. But I keep my oaths."
The Red Peri laughed again. "No matter," she said indifferently. "I wouldn't trust my safety to any one's word. But the question of your disposal still remains!' She smiled with a faint hint of malice. "Would you prefer to die instantly, or do you think you can stand the torture of suspense while I check your story and think it over? Because frankly, I think it will he necessary to kill you anyway. I see no alternative."
"We'll wait," said Keene stolidly.
"Very well." She flipped away the stub of her cigarette, crossed her dainty legs, and said, "Another, Elza."
Keene looked sharply at the yellow-haired girl as she held a light to the cigarette. There was something dimly inimical in her manner, as if she were struggling to suppress a hatred, a hidden enmity. She withdrew the flame with an abrupt, irritable gesture.
"That's all," said the green-eyed leader. "I'll lock you up somewhere until I'm ready."
"Wait a minute," said Keene. "Now will you answer a few of my questions?"
She shrugged. "Perhaps."
"Are you the only Red Peri?"
"The one and only," she smiled. "Why?"
"Because you must have been born like Lao-tse at the age of eighty, then. These raids have been going on for fifteen years, and you're not a day over seventeen. Or did you start your career of piracy at the age of two?
"I'm nineteen," she said coolly.
"Oh. You began at four, I suppose."
"Never mind. Any further questions?"
"Yes. Who designed your ship, the Red Peri?"
"A very clever designer," she said, and then murmured softly, "a very clever one."
"He must have been!" snapped Keene angrily.
"He was. Have you anything else to ask?"
"You haven't answered one question so far," he growled. "But here's another. What do you think will happen when the Limbo doesn't arrive in Nivia when due? Don't you know that the next government rocket will be out to look for us? And don't you realize that they'll look for us first on Pluto? Your base here is bound to be discovered, and if you murder us it'll go just that much harder with you."
The Red Peri laughed. "That isn't even a good bluff," she said. "Titan isn't a quarter of the way between the Earth and Pluto, and it's getting farther from us every day. The next conjunction of Saturn and Pluto is fifty years in the future, and about the only time your clumsy rockets can make the jump is at conjunction. You ought to know that.
"And what's more, by the time you're missed, there won't be a thing to do but give you up as lost, and you'll not be the first Smithsonian expedition to be lost. And finally, if they did send out a searching party, how would they expect to find you? By blind reckoning?"
"By radio!" grunted Keene.
"Oh. And have you a radio on the Limbo?" she asked gently.
He groaned and subsided. Of course there was no radio on the little expeditionary rocket; all its precious space was occupied by fuel, food, and necessary equipment, and besides, what possible use could a radio be to explorers out in the lonely vastness of extraplanetary space? The nearest settlement, Nivia on Titan, was hundreds of millions of miles beyond range of the most powerful beam yet developed.
The Red Peri knew as well as he how utterly hopeless was the expectation of any search for himself and Nestor. They'd simply be given up, called martyrs to science, regretted by the few experimenters who were interested in their results, and then forgotten,
"Any more questions?" asked the flaming-haired one inoctingly.
Keene shrugged, but suddenly and unexpectedly old Solomon Nestor spoke. "That entrance," he squeaked irrelevantly, pointing to the arch of the cave. "How do you keep the air here from rushing out?"
Keene whirled and stared in amazement. It was true; the cave was open to the frigid, airless outdoors; he could see the dusky Plutonian twilight through an unglassed, unblocked archway.
"At least that question is sensible," said the Red Peri. "We do it with a field."
"A field!" echoed Keene. "What sort—"
"You've asked enough questions," she cut in tartly. "I answer no more." She turned. "Elza, take these two into any unoccupied room with a metal door. If they're hungry, send them food. That's all."
She rose without a glance at the prisoners. Keene's eyes followed the exquisitely graceful figure as she trod as lightly as if she walked an Earthly corridor, followed by the five men who remained. Her radiant hair glowed far down the length of the passage until she turned aside and vanished.
He and Nestor followed the flaxen-haired Elza, and behind them, grimly silent, came the two men who had first appeared with her. She led them past a number of niches, side aisles, and several obviously artificial chambers. The cavern seemed to stretch indefinitely into the depths of the Plutonian mountain, and was undubitably a natural cave, though here and there the floor or walls showed signs of human workmanship. At last the girl indicated a chamber to the right, and they entered a small room, furnished comfortably enough with an aluminum chair, a table, and two couches. These last were covered with deep and gloriously beautiful brocades, beyond doubt plunder from some freighter's cargo.
"This is yours," said Elm, and turned toward the door. She paused. "Are you hungry?" she asked.
"No," said Keene. He saw the two men standing in the corridor, and lowered his voice. "But will you talk to us a while, Elza? Alone?"
"Why?"
"I'd like to ask you something."
"What is it?"
He dropped his voice to a whisper. "You hate the Red Peri, don't you, Elza? As much as we do?"
She turned abruptly to the door. "Father," she said evenly, "will you and Basil bring something to eat? I'll stay here; you can bolt the door on us."
There was a murmur without.
"Hush!" she said. "You heard. These two are gentlemen." The door closed and she faced them. "Well?"
"Can we be heard here?" asked Keene, glancing around the rock-walled chamber.
"Of course not. The Peri has no need to spy on her followers. She's clever enough to read men's feelings in their glances and the tone of their voices."
"Then she must know you hate her, Elza."
"I haven't said that I hate her."
"But you do. Does she know it?"
"I hope not."
"But you just said that she could read—"
"I said men," cut in the flaxen-haired girl.
Keene chuckled. "Why do you hate her, Elza?"
Her blue eyes hardened. "I will not say."
"Well, it doesn't matter, I suppose." He shrugged. "Elza, is there any chance of our escaping? Would you help us to—say, to steal the Red Peri? Our own ship's useless."
"They've gone to repair it. As for the Red Peri, I don't think you could operate i
t. It doesn't control like your rocket. I don't know how to run it."
"I could make a good try at it," said Keene grimly. "It would have to be the Red Peri anyway. They could run the Limbo down in three hours and blast it." A thought struck him. "Unless we could cripple the Red Peri first."
"I don't see how you could," said Elza. "She has the key to it hidden somewhere. And how could you even reach it? The space suits are locked up, too. You can't even step beyond the entrance."
That brought a new thought. "How do they seal the air at the entrance, Elm?"
"I don't understand how."
Solomon Nestor spoke. "I know that. She said they used a field. She meant—"
"Never mind now," said Keene. "Elza, are there any others here that might—well, side with us against the Peri?"
"No men. All of them worship her and"—her face darkened —"half of them love her."
"For which you can hardly blame them," muttered Keene. "She's about as lovely a female devil as you'd find this side of hell. Still, one would think she'd have some enemies, if only because of her cruel nature."
"She isn't cruel," said Elm reluctantly. "She's ruthless and arrogant and proud, but she isn't cruel—not exactly. I don't think she really enjoys torture."
"Well, her green eyes look cruel enough. Say, Elza, that dark fellow she called Marco. What of him?"
The girl flushed. "He's Marco Grandi. Why do you ask me about him?"
"Because he looks like a sly, calculating, shrewd customer, and there's a big reward for the Peri. I thought we might work on him."
Elm's flush darkened to anger. "He's—he's wonderful!" she blazed. "And if you think money would tempt him—or any of us—you're wrong. Each of us has a dozen times the amount of the reward."
Keene saw his error. "I'm sorry," he said hastily. "After all. I just caught a glimpse of him." He paused. "Does he, by any chance, love the Red Peri?"
She winced. "He's no different in that way than the rest."
"I see. But you—perhaps—wish that he were different—in that way?"
Elza brushed a white hand across her face. "All right," she said sullenly. "I love him. I admit it. That's why I hate her. He's dazzled; he thinks she'll learn to care for him; he can't see how utterly heartless and indifferent she is. That's why I'll do what ever I can to hurt her, but nothing to endanger him. If I help you, you must swear to protect him. If you escape, you must swear to that."
"I'll swear to it, but—can you help us?"
"I don't know. I'll try. I don't think she really wants to kill you, or she'd have blasted you there in the corridor. It isn't her way to hesitate and temporize and think things over. But you are a problem to her."
"That's good news," said Keene. "Say, how many residents are there in this pirate's paradise?"
"A hundred and five, including the children."
"A hundred and—Lord! This must be a pretty well established colony. How old is it?"
"Sixteen years. Her father built it, and it's almost self-supporting. There are gardens off in the side passages." She frowned. "I've lived here since I was four. I'm twenty now."
"And have you never seen the Earth?" Keene saw a chance now to offer more tangible inducement for aid. "Elza, you've missed the most glorious planet in the system—green fields and white snow, great cities and rolling, blue oceans, life, people, gaiety—"
"I went to school there for five years, at Gratia," she interposed coolly. "Don't you suppose we all visit there? Only of late the Peri has refused to let me go. I—I suppose she suspects."
"If we escape," said Keene softly, "you'll be free to live there forever. There will be life and happiness for you, Elza, once this pirate queen is taken and her band destroyed."
"Destroyed?" Her face paled again. "Not Marco. Not my father and my brother Basil. You promise me that. Promise it!"
"I'll promise. All I want is to bring the Red Peri to justice. I don't care about the rest, but—he rubbed his nose—"I've a little score to settle with her. Just the Red Peri herself."
A knock sounded. "Elza!" came a voice.
"Yes, father. Unlock the door and I'll take the tray." She turned.
"But you'll help?" whispered Keene. "With the Red Peri gone, you and Marco—do you understand, Elza? Will you help—just against her?"
"To my last breath!" she whispered.
III
Keene woke with a sense of unaccustomed luxury, and for a moment was at a loss to account for it. Then he realized that it was the sweetness of the air, strange to his nostrils after so many months of an atmosphere that, despite the hard-working rectifiers of the Limbo, was anything but sweet. He wondered casually where the Red Peri secured her colony's supply of oxygen.
The Red Peri! He sat up sharply at the memory of the fantastically lovely pirate princess, for despite the reassurance of the girl Elza, he mistrusted the intentions behind the Peri's mocking green eyes. He rose, fumbled for the light switch, and glanced at his wrist watch. Though night and day were one in the cavern, he perceived that Pluto's ten-hour night was past, and that whatever daylight the black planet enjoyed was trickling over it.
Old Nestor still slept. Keene pulled a hanging aside and found water in a tiny pool; he bathed and pulled on the shirt, shorts, and shoes that were the only clothing he possessed. He ran his hand over his sandy, one-day beard, but his razor was inaccessably remote on the Limbo. Then he turned to see old Solomon's pale-blue eyes blinking at him.
"Morning," he grunted. "Glad to see we weren't murdered in our sleep by our pleasant hostess."
Solomon Nestor nodded. "I haven't slept so well since we left Nivia," he quavered. "Fresh air is a blessing."
"Yes. Wonder where she gets it."
"Mines it, I don't doubt," said Nestor. "There are millions of tons of it frozen out on the surface."
"That's true."
"And," continued the old man, "did you notice anything queer about it?"
"No, except that it smells good and fresh."
"I did. When that yellow-haired girl—Elza—lighted the Peri's cigarettes, did you notice the cast of the flame? Purple, distinctly purple."
"So what?"
"Why, it means neon. Nitrogen is scarce here; Hervey and Caspari both said that, and so they use neon as their filler. No one can breathe pure oxygen, and neon is a good substitute for nitrogen, nearly the same density, and absolutely inert and nonpoisonous. That's important to remember. It may help us."
"Help us?"'
The old man waggled his head. "You'll see."
"Say," asked Keene suddenly, "what is the explanation of the cave entrance? We walked right through it—vacuum on one side, air on the other. She said they did it with a field remember?"
"I remember. She meant an electrostatic field. You know that like charges repel, and the molecules of air, battering against the field, acquire the same charge. They're repelled; they can't cross the field. It's like the electric wind from a static discharge, but here the wind that tries to blow in just balances the wind that tries to go out. Result, no wind either way."
"But we walked through it. Motion through a field produces a current. I didn't feel any."
"Of course not. You didn't walk through at a mile per second like a gas molecule, did you? Whatever current your motion produced was instantly grounded through your body and space suit, which are conductors. Air at normal pressure is a very poor conductor, so it retains its charge. Gases do retain static charges, as witness ball lightning."
"I see," muttered Keene. "Clever. Better than an air lock as far as convenience goes, though heat must radiate away through the field. But if they use atomic heat, they can afford a little waste."
"There'd be less loss there," said Nestor, "than to the rock walls. Heat could radiate, true enough, but it couldn't escape by conduction. A vacuum is the best heat insulator there is; look at our thermos containers on the Limbo. Radiation at temperatures below red heat is a very slow process. And remember that, too."
&nb
sp; "I will," grunted Keene, "but right now I'm remembering that we have had no breakfast. Do you suppose her method of execution is slow starvation?" He strode over to the door and pounded vigorously on it. "Hey! Hey, out there!"
There was no response. Irritably, he seized the knob and rattled it, and almost fell backward as the door swung smoothly open. It was unbarred!
"I'll be hanged!" he exploded. He peered into the deserted corridor. "Do you suppose this is Elza's doing?"
"If it is, it's not much help," said old Solomon.
"No. All the same, I'm going to take a look around. Come on; perhaps we can find some space suits."
"You'd need the key to the Red Peri, too, or at least the key to the Limbo, if they've locked it. I think"—old Nestor's brow wrinkled—"I'll sit right here and figure out something I've been thinking of. Even old heads sometimes get ideas."
"Suit yourself," grunted Keene, with very little faith in the potential ideas of the impractical old scientist. He strode boldly into the passageway.
There was no one visible. He turned left and proceeded toward the entrance of the cavern. Ahead of him a figure came suddenly out of an aisle—a feminine figure. He recognized the girl Elza, carrying a bright aluminum spade, and called her name softly.
She turned. "Hello," she said briefly, as he fell into step beside her.
"Been burying some pirate treasure, Elza?"
"No. Just some seeds in the garden."
"Did you unlock our door?" he asked.
"I? Yes. The Peri ordered it unlocked."
"Ordered it! Why?"
"Why not? Can you escape from here?" She gestured at a massive metal door as they passed. "Behind that is her room, and behind another within it are the space suits and the keys to both ships. You're as much a prisoner as ever."
"I know, but isn't she afraid—well, of violence? We could kill her."
"She isn't afraid of anything," said Elza. "Anyway, what good would killing her do? It would be simply committing suicide."
"That's true," said Keene. They were approaching the entrance with its invisible electrostatic seal; now they stood staring out over the dismal, black, airless, Plutonian valley, where a thousand feet away was the dark cylinder of the Limbo. Suddenly a flare of light appeared beside it, flashed a moment, then vanished.
The Lost Master - The Collected Works Page 136
