Star of Ill-Omen

by Dennis Wheatley

  ‘What the hell are you talking about?’

  ‘About the way you killed him, of course. He died of radium burns, and it was—’

  ‘How d’you know?’

  ‘Kruger Harsbach told me. He recognised the symptoms when he came here soon after midday and found Estévan delirious. He told me, too, how you had removed that lead screen without warning yesterday from in front of Estévan. Neither of them had any idea at the time that so short an exposure would have such terrible results. And Kruger is much too decent to suspect anything. He thinks you mistook the signal and removed the screen prematurely by accident; but I know how ruthless you are at heart. I guessed at once.’

  ‘Then you guessed wrong!’ Kem cut her short, his eyes dark with anger. ‘As for that liar Harsbach, as soon as he turns up I’ll wring his neck.’

  ‘You were talking of me,’ said a quiet voice in heavily accented Spanish.

  Swivelling round, Kem saw that the Herr Doktor must have followed him from the plant, as he now stood just inside the doorway.

  Taking a pace towards him, Kem cried: ‘I was! Can you give me any good reasons why I shouldn’t bash your face in for having poisoned Carmen’s mind against me?’

  ‘Yes!’ came the German’s prompt reply. ‘This!’ and from his hip pocket he drew a small automatic.

  Kem’s scowl deepened. He was sorely tempted to turn a somersault and kick the gun from the German’s hand. But there was always the risk that it would go off, and either of them, or Carmen, might get the bullet. Now that their attempt to escape from Mars was so near, it would be criminal to chance prejudicing it by one of them being hors de combat. He decided that, whatever provocation, he must, for the time being, avoid violence.

  With a cynical smile Harsbach went on: ‘You may have had good reasons for getting rid of Escobar, but I did not accuse you of it. I merely said that when we were packing up yesterday evening you removed the screen that protected him sooner than you should have done.’

  ‘I did so at your signal.’

  ‘Then you admit that you did move it?’ Carmen put in.

  ‘Of course I did,’ Kem snapped. ‘You were there at the time and must have seen me; but nothing was said about it then, and I was working under Harsbach’s directions.’

  The Herr Doktor shrugged, and pocketed his pistol. ‘I have already said that I thought your act due to a misunderstanding of my order. To draw attention to it was pointless, as if damage had been done there was no remedy we could apply. I was hoping that Estévan had stepped aside in time, or at least been exposed for so brief a period that he would suffer no serious injury. Even this morning I could hardly believe that an exposure of a few seconds would prove fatal. A stronger man would have thrown off the effects by now, but Escobar was in poor health and that, no doubt, explains why he succumbed.’

  ‘Yes; his heart gave out,’ said Carmen, her accusing eyes still fixed on Kem. ‘But that was due to the pain he was suffering. Whether it was or was not an accident, it is you who are responsible for his death.’

  ‘Thanks for the implied doubt,’ replied Kem sarcastically.

  ‘Oh, Kem!’ she burst out. ‘Knowing how cheaply you hold life, and all the circumstances, how could I help suspecting you? But I would give anything to believe that it was an accident. Swear to me that it was and I will believe you.’

  ‘I’ll do nothing of the kind,’ he retorted. ‘If you’re not prepared to believe me innocent without that, you can believe what you damn’ well like.’

  For a moment they stared at one another: Kem’s round face distorted by furious anger, Carmen’s showing misery and indecision. Then Harsbach said:

  ‘Since you elect to leave us in doubt I think decency demands that you should relieve Carmen of your presence. I suggest that you should either take up your quarters again in Anna’s cell or find somewhere else to sleep.’

  ‘Just as you wish.’ Kem stepped forward to collect his mats; but, to his surprise, Carmen checked him by a swift gesture.

  ‘No!’ she said in a sharp, high voice. ‘Before the end of another week we shall all either be dead or gone from here. These last few nights many things will have to be discussed. We agreed in the beginning that we must never allow personal differences to divide us in the face of our common enemy. That is more important than ever now.’

  Kem shrugged. ‘Very well. I’ll stay if you like. You’re certainly right about our sticking together, and that there will be all sorts of things we’ll need to talk over. As a matter of fact, I think the time has come when we ought to ask Anna to rejoin us here; so that she can have her say, too.’

  The others agreed, and they sat down in awkward silence until, shortly before dark, Anna returned from the plant. She did not seem particularly surprised at finding Escobar dead, but soon sensed the tension between Kem and Carmen, and asked Harsbach in Russian why they should both appear so upset at an event which could be no matter for great grief to either of them.

  Carmen, who could now understand enough Russian to get the gist of the question, told her sharply to mind her own business; but Harsbach said that as a member of the party she was entitled to know what had happened, and gave her a brief summary of the situation. Then he added:

  ‘I’ve been waiting for you before doing anything about the body. It’s far too cold for us to go out and dig a grave after sunset; but, to facilitate discussing our plans, we want you to move back in here, anyway. If you will do so at once we can then put the body in your cell for the night and bury it tomorrow.’

  Anna agreed to that, but the matter of the burial was taken out of their hands. Just as she was going off to fetch her mats, Uncle Sam and John Bull arrived with the evening’s rations. They gave one startled glance at Escobar’s still form and ran cackling from the cell.

  A few minutes later they reappeared in the doorway and a bevy of bee-beetles flew in past them. The insects made a swift inspection of the corpse, then issued silent orders to the two monsters. With evident reluctance, they came in and picked Escobar up.

  Carmen naturally wished to see her husband receive proper burial; so she made a futile attempt to prevent them, at the same time appealing to Harsbach to intervene.

  During the past two months the German had made considerable progress in conveying his thoughts to the insects and receiving theirs, and he now endeavoured to influence them telepathically; but without success. As the giants carried the body from the cell, he said:

  ‘I’m sorry, but they are determined to dispose of the corpse without a moment’s delay, in order to prevent the least possibility of its germinating disease.’

  ‘It couldn’t do that in this temperature,’ remarked Kem with a shiver.

  ‘I know,’ Harsbach agreed. ‘But if I am interpreting their minds correctly they are so scared of the reintroduction of harmful bacteria through putrefaction that they don’t even allow the giants to die naturally. They have some means of killing them off when they become decrepit, and so making certain of their being buried immediately they are dead. If I am right, that would explain the alarm these two displayed at the sight of a body that had been dead several hours.’

  When the giants and bee-beetles had gone, Carmen gave herself up to prayer and the others settled down for the night; but for Kem that did not mean to sleep. He was terribly upset that Carmen should have jumped to the conclusion that he had killed Escobar, yet he had to admit to himself that she had not done so without good reason. Considered dispassionately, his wartime exploits, the Zadovitch affair, opportunity, and a motive that stood out a mile, combined to form a damning case against him—that was when once it had been suggested that there was a case at all. In spite of their discussion about the annulment, and everything else, he did not believe that the faintest suspicion of him would ever have entered her mind had not Harsbach told her about the moving of the lead screen.

  Their atomic workshop was naturally a very amateurish and makeshift affair, so certain of the screens had to be erected and
dismantled daily. As Kem always attended to that, and no mention of the incident had been made at the time, he could not even recall it. There was a possibility that he had been careless, but, if so, it seemed strange that Escobar, as the person exposed to danger, had not noticed and remarked upon the fact.

  Kem wondered if Harsbach had made the whole thing up. A motive for his having done so was not far to seek. During Kem’s long absence, and even up to a fortnight ago, he had enjoyed a monopoly of Carmen’s company. Being so much older than she was he had cleverly adopted the pose of the kindly, amusing uncle; but Kem had no doubt at all that he was in love with her. No doubt, too, the German had a very shrewd idea how matters stood between Carmen and himself. If so, what better means could he adopt of discrediting his rival than leading her to suppose that he had murdered her husband? There could have been more to it even than that. By the same stroke Harsbach might have got Kem banished from Carmen’s presence, so that he would be left a free field for the ensuing nights alone with her in the cell. He had certainly attempted to bring that situation about; and it was, perhaps, only Carmen’s realisation that in such circumstances he might become troublesome which had led her to veto so promptly his proposal that Kem should leave.

  All the same, it seemed unlikely that Harsbach had invented the whole story; otherwise what had caused Escobar’s death? His complaint about acute pains in his bones certainly tied up with radium poisoning. Yet, once more, why had he said nothing about Kem having accidentally exposed him to the radium rays? Perhaps, though, it had not happened like that at all. Perhaps Harsbach had seized on an opportunity when they were alone together, and Escobar had his back turned for a few minutes, to expose him to a powerful concentration. But why should he? Surely that was going a bit far simply to discredit a rival? Could he have any other reason for murdering his colleague? Yes. They were hoping shortly to return to Earth. In working with Harsbach these three months past Escobar must have learnt many of the German’s scientific secrets. His usefulness was finished. Harsbach could quite well put the final touches to the bombs unaided. Now was the time to get rid of Escobar quietly, and, without arousing Carmen’s animosity, preserve for the Soviet Union any atomic data he had picked up while on Mars. To utilise the murder to detach Carmen from Kem had probably been only a secondary consideration, but nevertheless one highly gratifying to the diabolical mind that had conceived it.

  The more Kem thought over these theories the more convinced he became that they were the only ones that satisfactorily explained Escobar’s death; but they did little to relieve his unhappiness, as he knew that it would be practically impossible to prove them. And next day, when he managed to get hold of Carmen for a few moments, it was only with the greatest difficulty that he succeeded in persuading her to give him a hearing at all.

  Having listened reluctantly to what he had to say, she said coldly: ‘Poor Estévan undoubtedly died from the effects of radium poisoning. He told me himself before he became delirious that he recognised the symptons. That he had never, as far as he knew, been exposed to the rays, and could not understand why he should have been so seriously affected, even if he had been exposed for a short time accidentally, is neither here nor there. You always arranged the screens and removed them. Kruger Harsbach had nothing whatever to do with that; so I do not think you have the least justification for bringing an accusation against him. I would rather not discuss the matter any further.’

  During the four days that followed she did not discuss that or anything else with Kem; and, at nights, he found himself virtually sent to Coventry. Now that Carmen’s Russian was fairly proficient, on the excuse of giving her further practice in it Harsbach always talked to her in that language; while Anna, who was now bitterly regretting that she had deprived herself of Zadovitch, and regarded Kem with additional hatred because he had proved such an unsatisfactory substitute for the Russian, seized on the chance to drop back to her native tongue whenever she wished to make any remark.

  The only times they now used German were when they had to say something to Kem while working at the plant, or at night when they wished to have his opinion on some point connected with their plans for getting away. It was the fifth night after Escobar’s death that such a point, and in this case one that looked like wrecking their attempt now, at the eleventh hour, before it had started, was put to the whole of their small company by Harsbach.

  For several weeks past they had all been labouring under the happy delusion that they had successfully sold to their captors the idea that, when all was ready, he and his companions should go up in a Saucer as its crew, and give a demonstration of atomic bombing in one of the Martian deserts. To this end a Saucer had been converted in accordance with Harsbach’s requirements. Doors large enough for human beings to use had been cut in the sections of the control tower passing through both the upper and lower decks, and the machinery inside it had been rearranged in such a way that there would be space enough for them to clamber up or down from one deck to another.

  That day the two bombs had been passed up through bomb ports in the underside of the Saucer and slung by specially constructed cradles from its lower deck. By evening the final adjustments had been completed; and, when the others had returned to barracks, Harsbach had remained behind to inform the bee-beetles who were supervising the work that he was ready to give the demonstration the following morning.

  To his consternation they had conveyed to him that the services of himself and his companions would not be required. Had the insects had a sense of humour and been capable of expressing it they would have laughed in his face. As it was they had registered contempt, and given him plainly to understand that they had allowed the alterations to the Saucer to be made only in order that he should not suspect their real intentions and, perhaps, refuse to complete his work on the bombs. They meant to make certain minor adjustments which would enable them to launch the bombs themselves, provision the Saucer for a long voyage, and try out the effect of the bombs against two of the largest cities of Earth.

  It was with mingled fury and horror the others learned that all their months of arduous work had brought them no nearer to escape; and worse—that the results of their labours were to be used in a trial attack against the people of their own world.

  Harsbach could not be blamed. All of them had been equally misled by such concessions as having for a long time past been allowed to use the trolleys, and to work only such hours as they wished, into the belief that the insects had come to trust them. That they had never really done so was now infuriatingly clear; and it was equally clear that unless some entirely new and audacious plan could be thought out during the night, there was very little chance that Harsbach or any of his companions would be allowed on board the Saucer next day. It would set off for Earth, just as they had planned that, at their own orders, it should; but they would not be in it. They would be prisoners still, condemned to await its return and, if the trial proved successful, find themselves subjected to the choice of death by starvation or labouring at making Atom bombs for the Martians, while living on a diet of beans and water, for the remainder of their lives.

  For a long time they gloomily discussed the bitterly disappointing impasse with which they had so unexpectedly been confronted, but none of them could suggest even a remotely possible way of getting out of it. At length Kem said:

  There is one thing that might be tried. It is based on a theory that I’ve toyed with ever since my first day here. The odds are that it is wrong. If so, to attempt it is suicidal. However, if there’s no chance of my getting away from here, I, personally, have no wish to go on living. And since you all hate my guts none of you will miss me, so:—’

  ‘Oh, Kem! Don’t say that!’ The cry of protest was wrung from Carmen.

  He ignored it, and went on: ‘I propose to go out on my own at dawn. All you have to do is to wait here and be ready to leave at a moment’s notice. If I don’t return within a couple of hours you’ll know that I’ve had it. Then it
will be up to you to do the best you can for yourselves.’

  The others all pressed him to at least give them an idea of what he meant to attempt; but he would not do so, and bade them a curt good night.

  Just as dawn was breaking he woke to find Carmen kneeling beside him. She said in a whisper: ‘Kem, darling! Please don’t go. Whatever you’ve done, I still love you. I can’t help it. If anything happens to you I’ll die, because I’ll have nothing left to live for.’

  He sat up, put an arm round her waist, and said gently: ‘I must go. I’m pledged to it. Besides, as far as I can see it is the only chance left for us. But I’ll go with a better heart from knowing that you still love me; and if you like I’ll give you my oath, now, that I didn’t kill Estévan.’

  ‘I don’t need it,’ she murmured. ‘The fact that you are willing to do so is enough. I haven’t slept all night, and my brain is so tired from turning things over and over these past four days that I can’t think straight any more; but I suppose I ought to ask your forgiveness for having thought you capable of so horrible an act.’

  Drawing her to him, he smiled. ‘Don’t bother; but you can kiss me now without having to reproach yourself. That will do instead.’

  Their lips met freely for the first time since they had left Earth; but almost at once they heard a stirring behind them and drew apart. Harsbach and Anna were waking, and a few minutes later the giants came in with the rations.

  Kem drank his water and ate four of his beans; then he asked Carmen if he might take her work-bag. On her nodding, he emptied out its contents and tied it to his waist. Over it he pulled a long matting cloak that he had made for himself against the cold. As he reached the door he held aloft the fifth bean and, before popping it into his mouth, said with a laugh:

  ‘Well, here goes the last bean I shall ever eat on Mars.’

  His gesture of bravado was made in an attempt to comfort and reassure Carmen; but his smile concealed a nervous twitching of the mouth, for he knew that the odds were on his being dead within the next half-hour.