He searched back in his memory, trying to place the sound that had awakened him. It hadn’t been loud, merely unusual. It had been a noise that shouldn’t have been made in the stateroom. It had been a quiet sound, really, but for the life of him, Mike couldn’t remember what it had sounded like.
But the evidence of his nerves told him there was someone else in the room besides himself. Somewhere near him, something was radiating heat; it was definitely perceptible in the air-conditioned coolness of his room. And, too, there was the definite smell of warm oil—machine oil. It was faint, but it was unmistakable.
And then he knew what the noise had been.
The soft purr of caterpillar treads against the floor!
Casually, Mike the Angel moved his hand to the wall plaque and touched it lightly. The lights came on, dim and subdued.
“Hello, Snookums,” said Mike the Angel gently. “What are you here for?”
The little robot just stood there for a second or two, unmoving, his waldo hands clasped firmly in front of his chest. Mike suddenly wished to Heaven that the metallic face could show something that Mike could read.
“I came for data,” said Snookums at last, in the contralto voice that so resembled the voice of the woman who had trained him.
Mike started to say, “At this time of night?” Then he glanced at his wrist. It was after seven-thirty in the morning, Greenwich time—which was also ship time.
“What is it you want?” Mike asked.
“Can you dance?” asked Snookums.
“Yes,” said Mike dazedly, “I can dance.” For a moment he had the wild idea that Snookums was going to ask him to do a few turns about the floor.
“Thank you,” said Snookums. His treads whirred, he turned as though on a pivot, whizzed to the door, opened it, and was gone.
Mike the Angel stared at the door as though trying to see beyond it, into the depths of the robot’s brain itself.
“Now just what was that all about?” he asked aloud.
In the padded silence of the stateroom, there wasn’t even an echo to answer him.
CHAPTER 14
Mike the Angel spent the next three days in a pale blue funk which he struggled valiantly against, at least to prevent it from becoming a deep blue.
There was something wrong aboard the Brainchild, and Mike simply couldn’t quite figure what it was. He found that he wasn’t the only one who had been asked peculiar questions by Snookums. The little robot seemed to have developed a sudden penchant for asking seemingly inane questions.
Lieutenant Keku reported with a grin that Snookums had asked him if he knew who Commander Gabriel really was.
“What’d you say?” Mike had asked.
Keku had spread his hands and said: “I gave him the usual formula about not being positive of my data, then I told him that you were known as Mike the Angel and were well known in the power field.”
Multhaus reported that Snookums had wanted to know what their destination was. The chief’s only possible answer, of course, had been: “I don’t have that data, Snookums.”
Dr. Morris Fitzhugh had become more worried-looking than usual and had confided to Mike that he, too, wondered why Snookums was asking such peculiar questions.
“All he’ll tell me,” the roboticist had reported, wrinkling up his face, “was that he was collecting data. But he flatly refused, even when ordered, to tell me what he needed the data for.”
Mike stayed away from Leda Crannon as much as possible; shipboard was no place to try to conduct a romance. Not that he deliberately avoided her in such a manner as to give offense, but he tried to appear busy at all times.
She was busy, too. Keeping herd on Snookums was becoming something of a problem. She had never attempted to watch him all the time. In the first place, it was physically impossible; in the second place, she didn’t think Snookums would develop properly if he were to be kept under constant supervision. But now, for the first time, she didn’t have the foggiest notion of what was going on inside the robot’s mind, and she couldn’t find out. It puzzled and worried her, and between herself and Dr. Fitzhugh there were several long conferences on Snookums’ peculiar behavior.
Mike the Angel found himself waiting for something to happen. He hadn’t the slightest notion what it was that he was waiting for, but he was as certain of its coming as he was of the fact that the Earth was an oblate spheroid.
But he certainly didn’t expect it to begin the way it did.
A quiet evening bridge game is hardly the place for a riot to start.
Pete Jeffers was pounding the pillow in his stateroom; Captain Quill was on the bridge, checking through the log.
In the officers’ wardroom Mike the Angel was looking down at two hands of cards, wondering whether he’d make his contract. His own hand held the ace, nine, seven of spades; the ten, six, two of hearts; the jack, ten, nine, four, three, and deuce of diamonds; and the eight of clubs.
Vaneski, his partner, had bid a club. Keku had answered with a take-out double. Mike had looked at his hand, figured that since he and Vaneski were vulnerable, while Keku and von Liegnitz were not, he bid a weakness pre-empt of three diamonds. Von Liegnitz passed, and Vaneski had answered back with five diamonds. Keku and Mike had both passed, and von Liegnitz had doubled.
Now Mike was looking at Vaneski’s dummy hand. No spades; the ace, queen, five, and four of hearts; the queen, eight, seven, and six of diamonds; and the ace, king, seven, four, and three of clubs.
And von Liegnitz had led the three of hearts.
It didn’t look good. His opponents had the ace and king of trumps, and with von Liegnitz’ heart lead, it looked as though he might have to try a finesse on the king of hearts. Still, there might be another way out.
Mike threw in the ace from dummy. Keku tossed in his seven, and Mike threw in his own deuce. He took the next trick with the ace of clubs from dummy, and the singleton eight in his own hand. The one after that came from dummy, too; it was the king of clubs, and Mike threw in the heart six from his own hand. From dummy, he led the three of clubs. Keku went over it with a jack, but Mike took it with his deuce of diamonds.
He led the seven of spades to get back in dummy so he could use up those clubs. Dummy took the trick with the six of diamonds, and led out with the four of clubs.
Mike figured that Keku must—absolutely must—have the king of hearts. Both his take-out double and von Liegnitz’ heart lead pointed toward the king in his hand. Now if.…
Vaneski had moved around behind Mike to watch the play. Not one of them noticed Lieutenant Lew Mellon, the Medical Officer, come into the room.
That is, they knew he had come in, but they had ignored him thereafter. He was such a colorless nonentity that he simply seemed to fade into the background of the walls once he had made his entrance.
Mike had taken seven tricks, and, as he had expected, lost the eighth to von Liegnitz’ five of diamonds. When the German led the nine of hearts, Mike knew he had the game. He put in the queen from dummy, Keku tossed in his king triumphantly, and Mike topped it with his lowly four of diamonds.
If, as he suspected, his opponents’ ace and king of diamonds were split, he would get them both by losing the next trick and then make a clean sweep of the board.
He threw in his nine of diamonds.
He just happened to glance at von Liegnitz as the navigator dropped his king.
Then he lashed out with one foot, kicking at the leg of von Liegnitz’ chair. At the same time, he yelled, “Jake! Duck!”
He was almost too late. Mellon, his face contorted with a mixture of anger and hatred, was standing just behind Jakob von Liegnitz. In one hand was a heavy spanner, which he was bringing down with deadly force on the navigator’s skull.
Von Liegnitz’ chair started to topple, and von Liegnitz himself spun away from the blow. The spanner caught him on the shoulder, and he grunted in pain, but he kept on moving away from Mellon.
The medic screamed something and li
fted the spanner again.
By this time, Keku, too, was on his feet, moving toward Mellon. Mike the Angel got behind Mellon, trying to grab at the heavy metal tool in Mellon’s hand.
Mellon seemed to sense him, for he jumped sideways, out of Mike’s way, and kicked backward at the same time, catching Mike on the shin with his heel.
Von Liegnitz had made it to his feet by this time and was blocking the downward swing of Mellon’s arm with his own forearm. His other fist pistoned out toward Mellon’s face. It connected, sending Mellon staggering backward into Mike the Angel’s arms.
Von Liegnitz grabbed the spanner out of Mellon’s hand and swung it toward the medic’s jaw. It was only inches away when Keku’s hand grasped the navigator’s wrist.
And when the big Hawaiian’s hand clamped on, von Liegnitz’ hand stopped almost dead.
Mellon was screaming. “You——!” He ran out a string of unprintable and almost un-understandable words. “I’ll kill you! I’ll do it yet! You stay away from Leda Crannon!”
“Calm down, Doc!” snapped Mike the Angel. “What the hell’s the matter with you, anyway?”
Von Liegnitz was still straining, trying to get away from Keku to take another swipe at the medic, but the huge Hawaiian held him easily. The navigator had lapsed into his native German, and most of it was unintelligible, except for an occasional reference to various improbable combinations of animal life.
But Mellon was paying no attention. “You! I’ll kill you! Lecher! Dirty-minded, filthy.…”
He went on.
Suddenly, unexpectedly, he smashed his heel down on Mike’s toe. At least, he tried to; he’d have done it if the toe had been there when his heel came down. But Mike moved it just two inches and avoided the blow.
At the same time, though, Mellon twisted, and Mike’s forced shift of position lessened his leverage on the man’s shoulders and arms. Mellon almost got away. One hand grabbed the wrench from von Liegnitz, whose grip had been weakened by the paralyzing pressure of Keku’s fingers.
Mike had no choice but to slam a hard left into the man’s solar plexus. Mellon collapsed like an unoccupied overcoat.
By this time, von Liegnitz had quieted down. “Let go, Keku,” he said. “I’m all right.” He looked down at the motionless figure on the deck. “What the hell do you suppose was eating him?” he asked quietly.
“How’s your shoulder?” Mike asked.
“Hurts like the devil, but I don’t think it’s busted. But why did he do it?” he repeated.
“Sounds to me,” said Keku dryly, “that he was nutty jealous of you. He didn’t like the times you took Leda Crannon to the base movies while we were at Chilblains.”
Jakob von Liegnitz continued to look down at the smaller man in wonder. “Lieber Gott” he said finally. “I only took her out a couple of times. I knew he liked her, but—” He stopped. “The guy must be off his bearings.”
“I smelled liquor on his breath,” said Mike. “Let’s get him down to his stateroom and lock him in until he sobers up. I’ll have to report this to the captain. Can you carry him, Keku?”
Keku nodded and reached down. He put his hands under Mellon’s armpits, lifted him to his feet, and threw him over his shoulder.
“Good,” said Mike the Angel. “I’ll walk behind you and clop him one if he wakes up and gets wise.”
Vaneski was standing to one side, his face pale, his expression blank.
Mike said: “Jake, you and Vaneski go up and make the report to the captain. Tell him we’ll be up as soon as we’ve taken care of Mellon.”
“Right,” said von Liegnitz, massaging his bruised shoulder.
“Okay, Keku,” said Mike, “forward march.”
* * * *
Lieutenant Keku thumbed the opener to Mellon’s stateroom, shoved the door aside, stepped in, and slapped at the switch plaque. The plates lighted up, bathing the room in sunshiny brightness.
“Dump him on his sack,” said Mike.
While Keku put the unconscious Mellon on his bed, Mike let his gaze wander around the room. It was neat—almost too neat, implying overfussiness. The medical reference books were on one shelf, all in alphabetical order. Another shelf contained a copy of the International Encyclopedia, English edition, plus several dictionaries, including one on medical terms and another on theological ones.
On the desk lay a copy of the Bible, York translation, opened to the Book of Tobit. Next to it were several sheets of blank paper and a small traveling clock sat on them as a paperweight.
His clothing was hung neatly, in the approved regulation manner, with his shoes in their proper places and his caps all lined up in a row.
Mike walked around the room, looking at everything.
“What’s the matter? What’re you looking for?” asked Keku.
“His liquor,” said Mike the Angel.
“In his desk, lower left-hand drawer. You won’t find anything but a bottle of ruby port; Mellon was never a drinker.”
Mike opened the drawer. “I probably won’t find that, drunk as he is.”
Surprisingly enough, the bottle of wine was almost half full. “Did he have more than one bottle?” Mike asked.
“Not so far as I know. Like I said, he didn’t drink much. One slug of port before bedtime was about his limit.”
Mike frowned. “How does his breath smell to you?”
“Not bad. Two or three drinks, maybe.”
“Mmmm.” Mike put the bottle on top of the desk, then walked over to the small case that was standing near one wall. He lifted it and flipped it open. It was the standard medical kit for Space Service physicians.
The intercom speaker squeaked once before Captain Quill’s voice came over it. “Mister Gabriel?”
“Yes, sir?” said Mike without turning around. There were no eyes in the private quarters of the officers and crew.
“How is Mister Mellon?” A Space Service physician’s doctorate is never used as a form of address; three out of four Space Service officers have a doctor’s degree of some kind, and there’s no point in calling 75 per cent of the officers “doctor.”
Mike glanced across the room. Keku had finished stripping the little physician to his underclothes and had put a cover over him.
“He’s still unconscious, sir, but his breathing sounds all right.”
“How’s his pulse?”
Keku picked up Mellon’s left wrist and applied his fingers to the artery while he looked at his wrist watch.
Mike said: “We’ll check it, sir. Wait a few seconds.”
Fifteen seconds later, Keku multiplied by four and said: “One-oh-four and rather weak.”
“You’d better get hold of the Physician’s Mate,” Mike told Quill. “He’s not in good condition, either mentally or physically.”
“Very well. As soon as the mate takes over, you and Mister Keku get up here. I want to know what the devil has been going on aboard my ship.”
“You are bloody well not the only one,” said Mike the Angel.
CHAPTER 15
Midnight, ship time.
And, as far as the laws of simultaneity would allow, it was midnight in Greenwich, England. At least, when a ship returned from an interstellar trip, the ship’s chronometer was within a second or two, plus or minus, of Greenwich time. Theoretically, the molecular vibration clocks shouldn’t vary at all. The fact that they did hadn’t yet been satisfactorily accounted for.
Mike the Angel tried to make himself think of clocks or the variations in space time or anything else equally dull, in the hope that it would put him to sleep.
He began to try to work out the derivation of the Beale equations, the equations which had solved the principle of the no-space drive. The ship didn’t move through space; space moved through the ship, which, of course, might account for the variation in time, because—
—the time is out of joint.
The time is out of joint: O cursed spite,
That ever I was born to set it right!<
br />
Hamlet, thought Mike. Act One, the end of scene five.
But why had he been born to set it right? Besides, exactly what was wrong? There was something wrong, all right.
And why from the end of the act? Another act to come? Something more to happen? The clock will go round till another time comes. Watch the clock, the absolutely cuckoo clock, which ticked as things happened that made almost no sense and yet had sense hidden in their works.
The good old Keku clock. Somewhere is icumen in, lewdly sing Keku. The Mellon is ripe and climbing Jakob’s ladder. And both of them playing Follow the Leda.
And where were they heading? Toward some destination in the general direction of the constellation Cygnus. The transformation equations work fine on an interstellar ship. Would they work on a man? Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to transform yourself into a swan? Cygnus the Swan.
And we’ll all play Follow the Leda.…
Somewhere in there, Mike the Angel managed to doze off.
* * * *
He awoke suddenly, and his dream of being a huge black swan vanished, shattered into nothingness.
This time it had not been a sound that had awakened him. It had been something else, something more like a cessation of sound. A dying sigh.
He reached out and touched the switch plaque.
Nothing happened.
The room remained dark.
The room was strangely silent. The almost soundless vibration of the engines was still there, but.…
The air conditioners!
The air in the stateroom was unmoving, static. There was none of the faint breeze of moving air. Something had gone wrong with the low-power circuits!
Now how the hell could that happen? Not by accident, unless the accident were a big one. It would take a tremendous amount of coincidence to put all three of the interacting systems out of order at once. And they all had to go at once to cut the power from the low-load circuits.
The standard tap and the first and second stand-by taps were no longer tapping power from the main generators. The intercom was gone, too, along with the air conditioners, the lights, and half a dozen other sub-circuits.
Mike the Angel scrambled out of bed and felt for his clothing, wishing he had something as prosaic as an old-fashioned match, or even a flame-type cigarette lighter. He found his lighter in his belt pocket as he pulled on his uniform. He jerked it out and thumbed it. In the utter darkness, the orange-red glow gave more illumination than he had supposed. If a man’s eyes are adjusted to darkness, he can read print by the glow of a cigarette, and the lighter’s glow was brighter than that.
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