Three to Conquer

by Eric Frank Russell

  Three to Conquer

  Eric Frank Russell

  This is the story of a lone telepath who has to stop an invasion of an intelligent virus from Venus which takes control of people's bodies.

  Eric Frank Russell

  Three to Conquer

  1. The Voice Within

  He was a squat man with immense breadth of shoulder, hairy hands and bushy eyebrows. Wade Harper maintained constant, unblinking attention on the road as he drove into trouble at sixty miles an hour.

  It was April 1, 1980—All Fools' Day, he thought wryly. They had two or three moving roadways in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York; there were also six airtight stations up on the Moon. But except for rear engines and doped-alcohol fuel, motorcars were little different from those of thirty years ago.

  For the past ten years there had been talk of mass-produced helicopters at two thousand dollars apiece. Nothing had ever come of it. Maybe it was just as well, considering the likely death-roll when drunks, halfwits and hot-rod enthusiasts took to the skies.

  For the same ten years popular science articles-had been forecasting a landing upon Mars within the next five; nothing had come of that, either.

  His train of thought snapped when an unknown voice sounded within his peculiar mind, saying, "It hurts! Oh, God, it… hurts!"

  The road was wide, straight and thickly wooded on both sides. The only other vehicle in sight was a lumbering tanker, mounting a slight slope, two miles ahead. A glance in the rearview mirror confirmed that there was nothing behind. Despite this, the squat man registered no surprise.

  "Hurts!" repeated the voice, weakening rapidly. "Didn't give me a chance!"

  The squat man slowed until his speedometer needle fell below twenty. He made a dexterous U-tum and drove back to a rutted dirt road, knowing that the voice had come from that direction.

  In the first five hundred yards there were two sharp bends, one to the right, one to the left. Around the second bend a car stood squarely in the middle of the road, effectively blocking to all comers. The squat man braked hard, and swerved over the grass verge to avoid a collision.

  He got out, leaving his door open; he stood still and listened with his mind, rather than with his ears.

  "Betty…" whispered the eerie voice. "Three fellows and a pain in the guts. Darkness. Can't get up. Ought to tell Forst. Where are you, Forst?"

  Turning, the squat man ran heavily along the verge, clambered down a short bank and found the man in the ditch. He did not look long, not more than two seconds. Mounting the bank with furious hate, he dug a flask out of his car-pocket and took it down to him.

  Raising the other's head, Harper poured a thin trickle of spirit between pale lips. He did not say anything; he asked no questions, uttered no words of comfort and encouragement. Cradling the head on his forearm, he tried only to maintain the fading spark of life. And while he did it, he listened — not with his ears.

  "Tall, blond guy," murmured the other's mind, coming from a vast distance. "Blasted at me… others got out… slung me off the road. Betty, I'm…"

  The mental stream cut off. The squat man dropped his flask, lowered the other's head and examined him without touching. Dead beyond doubt. He made note of the number on the badge fixed to the uniform jacket.

  Leaving the body in the ditch, he went to the stalled car and sat in the driver's seat. He found a hand-microphone and held it while he fumbled with switches.

  "Hello!" he called, working a likely looking lever. "Hello!"

  Immediately a voice responded, "State police barracks. Sergeant Forst."

  "My name is Wade Harper. Can you hear me?"

  "Barracks," repeated the voice, a trifle impatiently. "Forst speaking."

  Evidently, Forst couldn't hear. Harper tried again, with a different adjustment. "Hello! Can you hear me?"

  "Yes. What goes on there?"

  "I'm calling from Car Seventeen. One of your officers is dead in a ditch nearby." He gave the badge number.

  There sounded a quick intake of breath, then, "That's Bob Alderson. Where are you now?"

  Harper gave detailed directions, and added, "He's been shot twice, once in the belly and once through the neck. It must have happened recently because he was still living when I got to him. He died in my arms."

  "Did he tell anything?"

  "Yes, a tall, fair-haired fellow did it. There were others with him — no number stated, no descriptions."

  "Were they in a car?"

  "He didn't say, but you can bet on that."

  "Stay where you are, Mr. Harper. We'll be right out."

  A sharp click sounded and a new voice broke in with, "Car Nine, Lee and Bates. We picked that up, Sarge, and are on our way. We're two miles off."

  Replacing the microphone, Harper returned to the top of the bank and gazed down upon the body. Somebody named Betty was going to know heartbreak this night.

  Within a few minutes, heavy tires squealed on the main artery; a car came into the dirt road. Harper raced round the bend and signalled the car down, lest it hit the block. Two state troopers piled out. They had a bitter air…

  They went down into the ditch, came up, said, "He's gone all right. Some louse is going to be sorry."

  "I hope so," said Harper.

  The taller of the two surveyed him curiously and asked, "How did you happen to find him way up here?"

  Harper was prepared for that; he had practiced the art of concealment since childhood. At the ripe age of nine, he had learned that knowledge can be resented, and that certain means of acquiring it can be feared.

  "I had to pay dog-respects to a tree, and found this car planted in the road. At first, I thought somebody else had the same idea; then I heard him moan in the ditch."

  "Five hundred yards is a long way to come just for that," observed the tall one. "Fifty would have been enough, wouldn't it?"

  "Maybe."

  "How much farther would you have gone if the road hadn't been blocked?"

  "Couldn't say." Harper shrugged indifferently. "A fellow just looks for a spot that strikes his fancy and stops there, doesn't he?"

  "I wouldn't know," said the trooper.

  The second trooper chipped in with, "Lay off, Bert. Ledsom will be here any minute. Let him handle this; it's what he's paid for."

  Bert grunted, and the pair started hunting for evidence. In a short time they found fresh tire-tracks across a soft patch twenty yards higher up the road. Soon afterward, they discovered a shell in the grass. They were examining the shell when three more cars arrived.

  * * *

  A man with a bag got down into the ditch, came up after a while and said wearily, 'Two bullets, about.32 caliber. Either could have caused death. No burn marks. Fired from range of a few yards. The slugs aren't in him."

  Another, with captain's chevrons, spoke to the two nearest troopers. "Here's the ambulance — lift him out of there." To several others, "You boys look for those slugs. We've got to find them." To Lee and Bates he said, "Put a plank over those tracks; we'll make moulage casts of them. See if you can pick up the other shell. Work up the road for the gun as well; the punk may have thrown it away."

  He joined Harper. "I'm Captain Ledsom. It was smart of you to use Alderson's radio to get us."

  "Seemed the sensible thing to do."

  "People don't always do the sensible thing, especially if they're anxious not to be involved." Ledsom surveyed him with cool authority. "How did you find Alderson?"

  "I trundled up here to answer the call of nature — and there he was."

  "Came up quite a piece, didn't you?"

  "You know how it is. On a narrow track like this, you tend to look for a spot where you can turn the car to go back."

  "Yes, I guess
so. You wouldn't want to park on a bend, either." He appeared satisfied with the explanation, but Harper could see into Ledsom's mind with complete clarity. He suspected everyone within a fifty-mile radius. "Exactly what did Alderson say before he passed out?"

  "He mumbled about Betty, and—"

  "His wife," interjected Ledsom, frowning. "I hate having to tell her about this."

  "He mentioned a big, blond fellow shooting at him, and that there were others who tossed him into the ditch. He gave no more details, unfortunately; he was on his last lap and his mind was rambling."

  "Too bad." Ledsom shifted attention as a trooper came up. "Well?"

  "Cap, the tracks show that a car turned up here with Alderson following. The car stopped by the verge. Alderson pulled up behind, but in the middle of the road. He got out, went toward the first car, was shot down. At least two men picked him up and dumped him out of sight." He held out his hand. "Here's the other shell." He pointed. "It was lying right there."

  ".32 automatic," said Ledsom, studying the small brass cylinders. "Any sign of Alderson's car having been edged off the road and put back again?"

  "No."

  "Then they must have pushed straight ahead. They couldn't get out this way with that car stuck across the road." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, and went on, "This track meanders seventeen miles through forest, loops back and joins the main artery about ten miles farther along. So by now they've either got back on the main road or they've holed up somewhere in the woods."

  "Seventeen miles would take at least twenty minutes on a route like this one," ventured Harper. "Even if they're driving like crazy, they can't be far off it yet."

  "Yes, I know. I'll call the boys to put up roadblocks along the main run. We'll search the loop, too. It's used almost entirely by loggers. If those bums are familiar with it, the chances are they work, or once worked, for the logging outfits. We'll follow that line later."

  Entering his car, Ledsom spoke awhile on the radio. He came back and said, "That's fixed. Blocks will be established pretty soon. The local sheriff is on his way here with four deputies." He gazed moodily at surrounding woods. "Just as well they're coming. The fugitives may dump that car and take to their feet — in which case we'll need an army to go through this lot."

  "Any way I can help?" asked Harper.

  Ledsom looked him over for the third time, carefully, calculatingly, while his mind said to itself, "Some crazy coot might think it incontrovertible proof of innocence to stick his head in the lions mouth. I'd like to know more about this guy. All we've got to go on so far is his story."

  "Well?" encouraged Harper.

  "Finding the murder weapon could give us a lead," remarked Ledsom, in the manner of one idly musing. "And we can't afford to overlook any possibility no matter how remote." Then his eyes stared straight into Harper's and his voice became sharp, imperative. "Therefore we must search you and your car."

  "Naturally," responded Harper with bland indifference.

  "Wrong diagnosis," decided Ledsom's mind. "He's clean. We'll frisk him all the same."

  They raked the car from end to end, ran hands over Harper and extracted a tiny blued automatic from his right-hand pocket. Ledsom grabbed the gun eagerly, ejected the magazine from the hand-grip, examined it, jerked his eyebrows a bit.

  "Holy Smoke! What sort of rod is this supposed to be? Twenty in the mag with slugs the size of match-heads. Where did you get it?"

  "Made it myself. Up to fifty yards, it is very effective."

  "I can imagine. You got a permit for it?"

  "Yes." Harper produced the permit and handed it over.

  Ledsom glanced at it, registered more surprise. "Are you a Federal agent?"

  "No, Captain. The F.B.I, issued that for reasons of their own. If you want the reasons you'll have to ask them."

  "No business of mine," said Ledsom, a little baffled. He handed back the permit and the gun. "That toy isn't the weapon we want, anyway. Did you see or hear anything suspicious before or after finding Alderson?"

  "Not a thing."

  "No sound of a car beating it, for instance?"

  "No sound whatever."

  "You didn't hear the shots before you arrived?"

  "No."

  "Umph!" Ledsom was dissatisfied. "So they had at least two or three minutes' headstart. You're a material witness and we want a statement from you at the office. Sorry to put you to more trouble and delay but—"

  "Only too glad to assist," said Harper.

  * * *

  Ledsom directed two crews to explore the loop road, then led the way back to barracks. Reaching his office, he slumped behind his desk and sighed deeply.

  "It's a lousy business. I've yet to tell his wife. They hadn't been married long, either. God knows how she'll take it." He sighed again, dug an official form out of a drawer. "Have to do some clerking myself, seeing all the boys are busy. You got a card on you, Mr. Harper?"

  Harper slid one across to him.

  It read: WADE HARPER — FORGER.

  "So help me Mike," said Ledsom, blinking at it. "That's what I call advertising one's sins. Next thing one of them will write me on a business sheet headed: Baldy O'Brien — Heistman."

  "I'm a microforger."

  "What sort of animal is that?"

  "I make surgical and manipulatory instruments so tiny that they can be used to operate on a bacillus."

  "Oh, now, don't give me that!" said Ledsom. "A fellow couldn't see enough to use them."

  "He can — under a powerful microscope."

  "Every year they think up something new," marvelled Ledsom. "You can't keep up with it."

  "There's nothing new about this," Harper assured. "It started back in 1899, with a Dutchman named Dr. Schouten. Since then, the only considerable improvement on his technique has been gained by de Fonbrune's one-hand pneumatic micromanipulator. I make variations on that gadget, too."

  "You must be kept busy," remarked Ledsom, wondering how many or how few people wanted to dissect a germ.

  "I get by. There aren't more than a couple of dozen competent microforgers in the world. The demand is just enough to keep pace with the supply."

  "So the F.B.I, think they can't afford to lose you?"

  "You're making guesses," said Harper.

  "This bacteriological warfare business, maybe?"

  "You're still guessing."

  "Okay; I know when to mind my own business."

  Ledsom got to work on the official form, put down the witness's name, address and occupation, followed it with a dictated account of what had occurred and shoved it across for the other to read and sign.

  When Harper had gone, Ledsom grabbed the phone, made a long-distance call. He'd just finished talking when Sergeant Forst entered the office and eyed him curiously.

  "Something broken, Cap?"

  "That Harper guy fed me a line that would do credit to the best con man in the business. So I just called his home town to see if he has a record."

  "And he has?"

  "Yes."

  "Jumping Judas!" said Forst, dropping a couple of books on the desk and making for the door. "I'll put out a pick-up call for him."

  "No." Ledsom looked pensive. "His home-town cops send him love and kisses. He's helped them solve several tough cases, and he's shot down three culprits for good measure."

  "What is he, a private dick?"

  "Nothing like that. They say he has a habit of falling headlong over something that everybody else is looking for. They say he's done it time and again, and it's uncanny." He sought for a satisfactory theory, found it and ended, "Reckon he suffers from beginner's luck and makes a hobby of exploiting it."

  If the subject of this conversation had been within half a mile, he'd have picked up that notion and smiled.

  * * *

  Driving at fast pace along the main road, Harper passed through three successive road-blocks without incident. His mind was working as he tooled along. If, he argued, a chased car switched
into a side road, the odds would be at least fifty to one on the driver choosing a turn-off on his own side, rather than one across the artery and on the far side.

  Since the loop-road was somewhere ahead of Harper, and on his wrong side, it was very likely that Alderson and the chased car had come from the opposite direction, or towards him.

  He glanced at his watch. It said six-twenty. He had found Alderson at four-ten, a little over two hours ago. That could put the murderers the best part of a hundred miles away, if they'd kept going non-stop. Probably the police had been alerted over a huge area by an eight-state alarm.

  It wouldn't do much good. There was no adequate description of the fugitives and none at all of their car. "A tall, blond fellow" just wasn't enough to go upon.

  He let a few miles go by until he saw a service-station on the opposite side — the side that, in Harper's theory, Alderson and the killers had used. He crossed and pulled up near the pumps; two attendants came over.

  "Were you fellows on duty around four o'clock?"

  Both nodded.

  "See anything of a prowl car driven by a trooper named Alderson? Car Seventeen, it was."

  "I know Bob Alderson," said one. "He was around a couple of times this morning."

  "Not between three and four?"

  "No." He thought a bit. "Or if he was, I didn't see him."

  "Me neither," said the other.

  Their minds told that they spoke truth; Harper knew it with absolute sureness. So far as he was concerned, they need not have opened their mouths.

  "Anyone else here who might have noticed him around that time?"

  "Only Satterthwaite. Want me to ask him?''

  "I'd appreciate it."

  The attendant went out of sight around the back of the building. It made no difference. Harper could hear them mentally, though their voices were out of reach.

  "Hey, Satty, a fellow here wants to know if you saw anything of Bob Alderson two or three hours back."

  "Nary a sign."

  He came back. "No luck, Satty didn't see him."

  "Anyone now off-duty who was here at that time?"

  "No, mister." He showed curiosity. "Like me to tell Bob you're looking for him, if he happens along?"