The Golden Age of Science Fiction Novels Vol 04

by Anthology

  Maria cut in to confirm that they were receiving and ready to record. The Berkeley operator chuckled as he came back. "That's the one I like to hear," he said. "That 'Scandahoovian' accent is real cute. Just as soon as things get rolling again I'm coming out there to see what else goes with it."

  "He's an idiot," Maria said.

  "But probably a pretty nice guy," Ken said.

  They listened carefully as the Berkeley operator read a number of pages of reports by Dr. French and his associates, concerning experiments run in the university laboratories. These gave Ken a picture of the present stage of the work on the comet dust. He felt disheartened. Although the material had been identified as a colloidal compound of a new, transuranic metal, no one had yet been able to determine its exact chemical structure nor involve it in any reaction that would break it down.

  It seemed to Ken that one of the biggest drawbacks was lack of sufficient sample material to work with. Everything they were doing was by micromethods. He supposed it was his own lack of experience and his clumsiness in the techniques that made him feel he was always working in the dark when trying to analyze chemical specimens that were barely visible.

  When the contact was completed and the stations signed off, Maria told Ken what she had heard over the air during the time he was in the hospital. Several other amateur operators in various parts of the country had heard them with their own battery-powered sets. They had asked to join in an expanded news net.

  Joe and Al had agreed to this, and Ken approved as he heard of it. "It's a good idea. I was hoping to reach some other areas. Maybe we can add some industrial laboratories to our net if any are still operating."

  "We've got three," said Maria. "General Electric in Schenectady, General Motors in Detroit, and Hughes in California. Amateurs working for these companies called in. They're all working on the dust."

  Through these new amateur contacts Maria had learned that Chicago had been completely leveled by fire. Thousands had died in the fire and in the rioting that preceded it.

  New York City had suffered almost as much, although no general fire had broken out. Mob riots over the existing, scanty food supplies had taken thousands of lives. Other thousands had been lost in a panicky exodus from the city. The highways leading into the farming areas in upstate New York and New England areas were clogged with starving refugees. Thousands of huddled bodies lay under the snow.

  Westward into Pennsylvania and south into Delaware it was the same. Here the refugees were met with other streams of desperate humanity moving out of the thickly populated cities. Epidemics of disease had broken out where the starving population was thickest and the sanitary facilities poorest.

  On the west coast the situation was somewhat better. The population of the Bay Area was streaming north and south toward Red Bluff and Sacramento, and into the Salinas and San Joaquin valleys. From southern California they were moving east to the reclaimed desert farming areas. There were suffering and death among them, but the rioting and mob violence were less.

  From all over the country there were increasing reports of groups of wanderers moving like nomadic tribesmen, looting, killing, and destroying. There was no longer any evidence of a central government capable of sufficient communication to control these elements of the population on even a local basis.

  Maria played the tapes of these reports for Ken. She seemed stolid and beyond panic as she heard them again. To Ken, hearing them for the first time, it seemed utterly beyond belief. It was simply some science-fiction horror story played on the radio or television, and when it was over he would find the world was completely normal.

  He looked up and saw Maria watching him. He saw the little tin-can stove with a few sticks of green wood burning ineffectively. He saw the large rack of batteries behind the transmitter. Unexpectedly, for the first time in many days, he thought of the Italian steamship alone in the middle of the Atlantic.

  "The White Bird," he said to Maria. "Did you hear anything more of her?"

  "One of the amateurs told me he'd picked up a report from the ship about a week ago. The radio operator said he was barricaded in the radio room. Rioting had broken out all over the ship. Dozens of passengers had been killed; the ones who were left were turning cannibalistic. That was the last report anyone has heard from the ship."

  Ken shuddered. He glanced through the window and caught a vision of Science Hall on College Hill. A fortress, he thought. There were maybe a dozen other such fortresses scattered throughout the world; in them lay the only hope against the enemy that rampaged across the Earth.

  In the sky, he could see the comet's light faintly, even through the lead-gray clouds from which snow was falling.

  "You should get back to bed," said Maria. "You look as if you had been hit two hours ago instead of two weeks."

  "Yeah, I guess I'd better." Ken arose, feeling weak and dizzy. "Can you get that report typed for Dad tonight? It would be good for him to be able to take it to the lab with him in the morning."

  "I'll get it done," said Maria. "You get off to bed."

  As much as he rebelled against it, Ken was forced to spend the next two days in bed. Dr. Adams allowed him to be up no more than a few hours on the third day. "I'm afraid you took a worse beating than any of us thought," the doctor said. "You'll just have to coast for a while."

  It was as he was finally getting out of bed again that he heard Art Matthews, when the mechanic came to the door and spoke with Ken's mother.

  "This is awfully important," Art said. "I wish you'd ask him if he doesn't feel like seeing me for just a minute."

  "He's had a bad relapse, and the doctor says he has to be kept very quiet for a day or two longer."

  Dressed, except for his shoes, Ken went to the hall and leaned over the stair railing. "I'll be down in just a minute, Art. It's okay, Mom. I'm feeling good today."

  "Ken! You shouldn't!" his mother protested.

  In a moment he had his shoes on and was racing down the stairs. "What's happened, Art? Anything gone wrong?"

  The mechanic looked downcast. "Everything! We got the Norton elevator motor and hooked it up with the gas engine. It ran fine for a couple of days, and we got a lot of batteries charged up."

  "Then it quit," said Ken.

  "Yeah—how did you know?"

  "I've been afraid we had missed one bet. It just isn't enough to supply filtered air to the engines built of new parts. The parts themselves are already contaminated with the dust. As soon as they go into operation, we have the same old business, all over again.

  "Unless some means of decontamination can be found these new parts are no better than the old ones."

  "Some of these parts were wrapped in tissue paper and sealed in cardboard boxes!" Art protested. "How could enough dust get to them to ruin them?"

  "The dust has a way of getting into almost any corner it wants to," said Ken. "Dad and the others have found it has a tremendous affinity for metals, so it seeps through cracks and sticks. It never moves off once it hits a piece of metal. What parts of the engine froze?"

  "Pistons, bearings—just like all the rest."

  "The generator shaft, too?"

  Art nodded. "It might have gone a few more revolutions. It seemed loose when we started work, but as soon as we broke the bearings apart they seemed to fasten onto the shaft like they were alive. How do you account for that? The bearings were new; I just cast them yesterday."

  "They were contaminated by dust between casting and installation in the protected room. We've got to dig a lot deeper before we've got the right answer. It might be worthwhile setting up another rig just like the one we have in order to get some more juice in our batteries. Do you think you could do it again, or even several times? That engine lasted about 90 hours, didn't it?"

  "Eighty-eight, altogether. I suppose I could do it again if you think it's worth it. The trouble is getting generators. Maybe we could machine the shaft of this one and cast a new set of bearings to fit. I'll try if you think
it's worth it."

  "Get it ready to run," said Ken. "The battery power for our radio isn't going to last forever. We'll be in a real jam if we lose touch with the outside."

  Chapter 11.

  The Animals Are Sick

  That night, Ken reported to his father the fate of the engine assembled by Art.

  "It did seem too good to be true," said Professor Maddox. He stretched wearily in the large chair by the feeble heat of the fireplace. "It bears out our observation of the affinity of the dust for metals."

  "How is that?"

  "It attaches itself almost like a horde of microscopic magnets. It literally burrows into the surface of the metal."

  "You don't mean that!"

  "I do. Its presence breaks down the surface tension, as we had supposed. The substance actually then works its way into the interstices of the molecules. As the colloid increases in quantity, its molecules loosen the bond between the molecules of the metal, giving them increased freedom of motion.

  "This can be aggravated by frictional contacts, and finally we have the molecular interchange that binds the two pieces into one."

  "The only metal that would be clean would be that which had been hermetically sealed since before the appearance of the comet," said Ken. "Look—wouldn't this affinity of the dust for metal provide a means of purifying the atmosphere? If we could run the air through large filters of metal wool, the dust would be removed!"

  "Yes, I'm very sure we could do it that way. It would merely require that we run the atmosphere of the whole Earth through such a filter. Do you have any idea how that could be done?"

  "It would work in the laboratory, but would be wholly impractical on a worldwide scale," Ken admitted. "How will we ever rid the atmosphere of the dust! A colloid will float forever in the air, even after the comet is gone."

  "Exactly," Professor Maddox said, "and, as far as we are concerned, the whole atmosphere of the Earth is permanently poisoned. Our problem is to process it in some manner to remove that poison.

  "During the past few days we have come to the conclusion that there are only two alternatives: One is to process the whole atmosphere by passing it through some device, such as the filter you have suggested. The second is to put some substance into the air which will counteract and destroy the dust, precipitate it out of the atmosphere."

  "Since the first method is impractical what can be used in carrying out the second?"

  "We've set ourselves the goal of discovering that. We're hoping to synthesize the necessary chemical compound to accomplish it."

  "It would have to be a colloid, too, capable of suspension in the atmosphere," said Ken.

  "Correct."

  "If we do find such a substance we still have the problem of decontaminating existing metals. We couldn't build a moving piece of machinery out of any metal now in existence without first cleaning the dust out of its surface."

  "That's part of the problem, too," said his father.

  * * * * *

  Ken resumed his duties in the laboratory the following morning. Dr. Adams had warned him not to walk up College Hill, so he had borrowed the horse Dave Whitaker still had on loan from his uncle. He felt self-conscious about being the only one enjoying such luxury, but he promised himself he would go back to walking as soon as Dr. Adams gave permission.

  On the third day, the horse slipped and fell as it picked its way carefully down the hill. Ken was thrown clear, into the deep snow, but the horse lay where it had fallen, as if unable to move. Ken feared the animal had broken a leg. He felt cautiously but could find no evidence of injury.

  Gently, he tugged at the reins and urged the horse to its feet. The animal finally rose, but it stood uncertainly and trembled when it tried to walk again.

  Ken walked rather than rode the rest of the way home. He took the horse to the improvised stable beside the science shack. There he got out the ration of hay and water, and put a small amount of oats in the trough. The animal ignored the food and drink.

  After dinner, Ken went out again to check. The horse was lying down in the stall and the food remained untouched.

  Ken returned to the house and said to his father, "Dave's horse slipped today, and I'm afraid something serious is wrong with him. He doesn't seem to have any broken bones, but he won't eat or get up. I think I should go for the vet."

  His father agreed. "We can't afford to risk a single horse, considering how precious they are now. You stay in the house and I'll go to Dr. Smithers' place myself."

  Ken protested. He hated to see his father go out again on such a cold night.

  Dr. Smithers grumbled when Professor Maddox reached his house and explained what he wanted. As one of the town's two veterinarians, he had been heavily overworked since the disaster struck. The slightest sign of injury or illness in an animal caused the Mayor's livestock committee to call for help.

  "Probably nothing but a strained ligament," Smithers said. "You could have taken care of it by wrapping it yourself."

  "We think you ought to come."

  When the veterinarian finally reached the side of the animal, he inspected him carefully by the light of a gasoline lantern. The horse was lying on his side in a bed of hay; he was breathing heavily and his eyes were bright and glassy.

  Dr. Smithers sucked his breath in sharply and bent closer. Finally, he got to his feet and stared out over the expanse of snow. "It couldn't be," he muttered. "We just don't deserve that. We don't deserve it at all."

  "What is it?" Ken asked anxiously. "Is it something very serious?"

  "I don't know for sure. It looks like—it could be anthrax. I'm just afraid that it is."

  Dr. Smithers' eyes met and held Professor Maddox's. Ken did not understand. "I've heard that name, but I don't know what it is."

  "One of the most deadly diseases of warm-blooded animals. Spreads like wildfire when it gets a start. It can infect human beings, too. How could it happen here? There hasn't been a case of anthrax in the valley for years!"

  "I remember Dave Whitaker saying his uncle got two new horses from a farmer near Britton just a week before the comet," said Ken. "Maybe it could have come from there."

  "Perhaps," said Smithers.

  "What can we do?" asked Professor Maddox. "Can't we start a program of vaccination to keep it from spreading?"

  "How much anthrax vaccine do you suppose there is in the whole town? Before we decide anything I want to get Hart and make some tests. If he agrees with me we've got to get hold of the Mayor and the Council and decide on a course of action tonight."

  Hart was the other veterinarian, a younger man, inclined to look askance at Dr. Smithers' older techniques.

  "I'd just as soon take your word," said Professor Maddox. "If you think we ought to take action, let's do it."

  "I want Hart here first," said Smithers. "He's a know-it-all, but he's got a good head and good training in spite of it. Someday he'll be a good man, and you'll need one after I'm gone."

  "I'll go," said Ken. "You've already been out, Dad. It's only 4 or 5 blocks, and I feel fine."

  "Well, if you feel strong enough," said his father hesitantly. Fatigue was obvious in his face.

  Dr. Hart was asleep when Ken pounded on his door. He persisted until the veterinarian came, sleepily and rebelliously. Ken told his story quickly.

  Hart grunted in a surly voice. "Anthrax! That fool Smithers probably wouldn't know a case of anthrax if it stared him in the face. Tell him to give your horse a shot of terramycin, and I'll come around in the morning. If I went out on every scare, I'd never get any sleep."

  "Dr. Hart," Ken said quietly. "You know what it means if it is anthrax."

  The veterinarian blinked under Ken's accusing stare. "All right," he said finally. "But if Smithers is getting me out on a wild-goose chase I'll run him out of town!"

  Smithers and Professor Maddox were still beside the ailing horse when Ken returned with Dr. Hart. No one spoke a word as they came up. Hart went to work on his examination, Ken
holding the lantern for him.

  "Here's a carbuncle, right back of the ear!" he said accusingly. "Didn't anybody notice this earlier?"

  "I'm afraid not," Ken admitted. "I guess I haven't taken very good care of him."

  "Ken's been in the hospital," Professor Maddox said.

  "I know," Hart answered irritably, "but I think anybody would have noticed this carbuncle; these infections are characteristic. There's not much question about what it is, but we ought to get a smear and make a microscope slide check of it."

  "I've got a 1500-power instrument," said Ken. "If that's good enough you can use it."

  Hart nodded. "Get some sterile slides."

  * * * * *

  Afterward, Smithers said, "We've got to get Jack Nelson first and find out how much anthrax vaccine he's got in his store. Nobody else in town will have any, except maybe some of his customers who may have bought some lately. What about the college laboratories? Do they have any?"

  "I don't know," said Professor Maddox. "We'll have to contact Dr. Bintz for that."

  "Let's get at it," said Hart. "We've got to wake up the Mayor and the Council. The cattle committee will have to be there. Nelson and Bintz, too. We'll find out how much vaccine we've got and decide what to do with it."

  Two hours later the men met in the Council chambers of City Hall. Because of the lack of heat, they retained their overcoats and sheepskin jackets. The incrusted snow on their boots did not even soften. In soberness and shock they listened to Dr. Smithers.

  "Nobody grows up in a farming community without knowing what anthrax means," he said. "We've got a total of twenty-eight hundred head of beef and dairy cattle in the valley, plus a couple of thousand sheep, and about a hundred horses.

  "Jack Nelson's stock of vaccine, plus what he thinks may be in the hands of his customers, plus some at the college is enough to treat about a thousand animals altogether. Those that aren't treated will have to be slaughtered. If they prove to be uninfected they can be processed for meat storage.

  "Some vaccine will have to be held in reserve, but if we don't clean up the valley before next year's calf crop we won't stand a chance of increasing our herds. That's the situation we're up against, Gentlemen."