He looked up from the papers and his eyes opened wide. A ludicrous expression of stunned amazement spread slowly over his features.
For the pilot had removed the close-fitting leather helmet—revealing long, beautiful blue-black hair that fell in swirling waves to her shoulders.
Mace stared helplessly, unable to speak. His hard square features turned a slow red and his big hands balled into heavy fists.
“Is anything the matter?” the girl asked. She sat down and crossed her legs. Mace couldn’t help noticing the lithe grace of her movements, but he was in no mood to be appreciative.
“You’re damn right there is,” he snapped. “Perhaps you can tell me the meaning of this joke.”
The girl was lighting a cigarette. She looked up through a haze of blue smoke and said coolly, “what joke?”
Mace stood up angrily.
“I asked Earth for fighting pilots, not adolescent girls,” he said bitterly. “This isn’t a pink tea party I’m running here.”
The girl’s level brown eyes studied him calmly but her pale cheeks were lighted with points of angry color.
“My licenses and credentials are in order,” she said. “My application was approved by the Earth selection bureau and I was appointed for service here. What more do you want?”
Mace stared down at the girl, his jaw grim.
“Get this straight: I don’t give one damn about Earth’s selection bureau. They sent you up here, but I’m sending you back,”
THE girl jumped to her feet, her eyes smouldering in her pale face.
“That’s not fair,” she cried. “You’ve got to at least give me a chance.”
“Impossible,” Mace said shortly. “It’s too dangerous.”
“Do you think I’m afraid of the risk?” the girl asked scornfully.
Mace looked at her a humorless smile on his lips.
“I wasn’t thinking of you,” he said. “I was thinking of the supplies and equipment. I can’t risk a shipload of vital materials by putting them in the hands of a silly, romantic girl.”
“I’ve had more actual experience than half of your pilots,” the girl said stormily. “You’re no right to discriminate against me just because I happen to be a woman.”
Mace ran his hand through his rumpled red hair in an exasperated gesture.
“That’s reason enough,” he said ironically.
The girl picked up her leather helmet with a swift, angry motion.
“It’s easy,” she said, “for you to send me back to Earth. But what of your pilots who’re operating short-handed right this minute? The guns on my ship might save one of those pilot’s lives. And what of the men defending the Asteroid Belt? The supplies and ammunition I could bring there might save a hundred lives, might give some chance to men who don’t have a chance now.”
Mace frowned. The girl’s arguments were hard to answer. Did he have the right to refuse any pilot who could help carry aid to the Asteroid Belt?
“I don’t suppose those things concern you,” the girl continued in a blaze of anger. “You sit here in a warm, safe office, far from any actual battle, and your stupid prejudice is keeping supplies on the ground when they might be heading for the Belt. But that doesn’t bother you. As long as you’re in a nice comfortable spot I suppose you’re quite happy.”
Mace fought to control his rising anger. He could feel the pulse at his temple throbbing heavily. If a man had spoken those words to him he would have broken him in two, but now he held himself in check.
“Is that all?” he asked.
“Yes, that’s all,” the girl answered. “You can send me back now whenever you like.
Mace regarded her steadily.
“I’m not going to send you back. Report to pilot’s barracks and I’ll see that a room is prepared for you. I’m going to take you at your word and give you some of the action you’re asking for. I’ll let you know when I want you. That’s all.”
The girl returned his gaze unwaveringly.
“I’ll be ready,” she said. She paused with her hand on the door. “I’m sorry you don’t want me here, but I won’t let that make any difference in my work.”
Mace didn’t answer and the girl left the office and closed the door after her.
MACE stood up and lit his pipe, a worried frown on his face. He paced up and down the small room for several moments, clouds of blue smoke billowing about his head. Finally he took his leather jacket from a peg on the wall and left the office. He walked to the pilot’s barracks and stopped in front of the small shack occupied by Reese.
He knocked and Reese’s voice said, “come in.”
Mace entered and nodded to Reese who was stretched out on a narrow iron cot.
Reese said, “What’s up?”
Mace frowned and sat down.
“Hell to pay,” he said. “We got a skirt with the last batch of pilots.” Reese smiled thinly. “So I noticed,” he said.
“It’s a problem,” Mace said, sighing. “I won’t use her unless I have to, but it looks like I might have to pretty damn soon. How many of our last convoy returned?”
“Three,” Reese said. “We lost four ships and four pilots.”
“Fortunately it was on the return trip,” Mace said. “The material got through all right. But it leaves us short of pilots. If I send a convoy tomorrow I’ll have to use the girl.”
Reese raised himself on one elbow and lit a cigarette carefully. His thin-seamed face was sharp with interest, but his dark eyes were inscrutable. “So?” he said softly.
“I don’t want her to pilot the decoy ship,” Mace said. “Can that be arranged?”
Reese shrugged. “Why not?” He grinned wickedly. “Any lottery can be fixed so why not this one?”
Mace reached into his inner pocket and drew out a shining black marble. He tossed it to Reese.
“Talk to the men. If it’s not okay with them then the whole thing’s off, understand? I can’t very well ask them to take an extra chance on their lives, but you can.”
Reese slipped the black marble into his pocket.
“I’ll talk to ’em. There won’t be any trouble.”
Mace drew a relieved sigh.
“Thanks, Reese. I won’t forget this.
Talk to the men and then round up the girl and bring them all to my office. We’ll hold the drawing in my office tonight to see who pilots the decoy ship on this trip.”
“Okay,” Reese said. “We’ll be there in about an hour.”
Mace nodded and walked to the door. “Incidentally,” he said, turning, “I didn’t ask if this was all right with you.”
Reese grinned wryly.
“It’s okay with me. Leaving the girl out of the drawing for the decoy ship will slim down the odds a bit on the rest of us staying alive, but what the hell! I’m lucky.”
“I hope you stay that way,” Mace said. He left then.
CHAPTER III
Blackball!
MACE sat behind the desk in his office and blew clouds of smoke from the stubby black pipe in his teeth. He felt nervous and strangely tense. Reese had not shown up yet with the replacement pilots, but even as Mace was wondering about it, the office door banged open and Wallace entered with the three young replacement pilots following him.
Wallace’s round, good-natured face was blandly curious.
“Action already?” he asked, smiling. “Of a sort,” Mace admitted. He motioned the four men to chairs and shoved a square earthen jug to the center of his desk.
Then he settled back in his chair and waited. He couldn’t proceed until Reese and the girl showed up. This was one of the toughest jobs he had to face. Time after time he had sat here and watched a man draw a black marble from the earthen jug on his desk—and that black marble was the next thing to a death warrant. For the man who drew the one black marble was the man who piloted the decoy ship on the perilous trip through Lane 7.
He looked at the three young replacement pilots. They were all eager, anxious f
or battle. All clean-cut, courageous youngsters—heading for death.
Mace shook his head and puffed angrily on his pipe. Wallace, the oldest of this crop of replacements, was a little different story. He was a seasoned veteran, a man who had lived much of his life and for whom death would be just another adventure. But it was tough on these kids. And it was tougher on Mace to send them out trip after trip, knowing that some would never return.
His thoughts were interrupted by the entrance of the girl, Dale Mason, and Reese.
He nodded to them both, then swung his gaze around to the three young pilots and Wallace.
“We can go ahead now,” he said quietly. He wondered fleetingly if Reese had talked to the men about the drawing. He flicked a glance toward Reese but he learned nothing from his thin, expressionless face.
He put his elbows on the desk and covered the top of the earthen jug with his two big hands. Everyone in the room was watching him intently.
“We’re here to play a game,” he said deliberately, “but before we go ahead I want to say a few things to you. With the exception of Reese, you men are preparing to make your first trip through Lane 7 to the Asteroid Belt. Your job is very simple in some respects. You take off from this planetoid and follow a beam directly to the mooring towers on the Belt. That’s all there is to it. However, as you probably realize, hundreds of Venusian fighting ships are patrolling these areas, trying desperately to break this last supply route to the Belt. So far they haven’t succeeded. They haven’t succeeded because we’re using a system that, so far, has gotten at least fifty per cent of our ships through. Reese here, has made practically every trip through Lane 7 in the last three months. I’m going to ask him to explain the system we use. He’s better qualified for that than I am.”
REESE lounged against the wall and lit a cigarette deliberately.
“It’s not very intricate,” he said quietly. “We simply send a dummy ship with the convoy. That ship is heavily armed but very slow. It is also the largest space ship in the convoy. Generally an old freighter. It falls behind the regular convoy and draws the fire of the Venusian ships. Its size, plus the fact that it is so heavily armed, serves to convince the enemy that it is a rich prize. Actually it is unloaded and manned by only one pilot. It’s an easy target. That’s all there is to it. The decoy ship is lost but the convoy gets through.”
Mace looked around at the pilots.
“Understand?” he asked.
Wallace leaned back in his chair, smiling cheerfully.
“Sure,” he drawled, “but doesn’t the pilot of the decoy ship have any chance at all?”
“He has guns and ammunition,” Mace answered. “Sometimes he gets through. Reese has had the decoy ship twenty times and he’s still alive and kicking. But practically every other pilot who’s taken the decoy ship out hasn’t returned.”
“I’m kind of lucky,” Reese said quietly.
“Obviously,” Wallace grinned.
“How do you decide who takes out the decoy ship?” Dale Mason asked.
Mace looked briefly at her and noticed that her face was set in pale stiff lines. But her eyes and voice were steady.
He looked back to his hands which were still folded over the earthen jug.
“A good question, Miss Mason,” he said. “The pilots making the convoy draw for it. In this jug under my hands are six marbles. They are all alike, except that one is black. The others are white. You six in this room will leave tomorrow morning at dawn for the Belt. Tonight you draw to determine who pilots the decoy ship. Fair enough?”
“Suits me,” Wallace drawled.
“Certainly,” Dale Mason said.
The three young pilots nodded.
“Ladies first,” Mace said.
“Why?” Dale said quickly. “I don’t want any special advantage.”
“There’ll be no advantage,” Mace said patiently. “It’s as easy to draw the black ball on the first try as it is next to last.”
DALE looked uncertainly about the room and all of the men nodded their agreement. She shrugged her slim shoulders.
“If you want it that way,” she agreed quietly.
Mace removed one hand from the mouth of the jug.
“Go ahead,” he said. He had no worries about her drawing a black ball for there was no black ball in the jug. Reese had the black marble in his possession.
With set jaw the girl reached into the jug, but Mace could feel the trembling of her hand as it brushed against his own. He felt a moment of quick compassion for her. He had seen space hardened veterans blanch during this drawing. It was a pretty tough deal for a young girl.
She drew out a marble, looked at it, then rolled it on the desk. It was white.
“That eliminates you, Miss Mason,” he said.
Reese stepped up to the desk.
“I’ll take a crack at it now if no one minds,” he said, with a faint grin.
The girl rubbed her forehead and turned away from the desk. She didn’t see Reese slip a black marble from his pocket and drop it in the jug before drawing. But Mace did and he felt a sudden relief.
This was as good a plan as any. The girl would go first in future drawings and there would be no possibility of her drawing a black marble. Reese could follow her and drop the black marble into the jug before drawing himself. It was the only thing that he and the men could do. Sending men out to what was almost a certain and horrible death was bad enough, but none of them could look at themselves in the mirror if they sent a young girl to the same fate.
Reese shook the jug slightly to circulate the marbles, then drew. It was white.
“I said I was kind of lucky,” he smiled.
“Obviously,” Wallace said.
Reese tossed the white marble onto the desk and Wallace stepped up. “Let’s see how lucky I am,” he said. He reached into the jug and drew out a marble. He looked at it and the faint grin on his face faded. He stood for a moment, his fist closed tightly over the marble, then he rolled it onto the desk before Mace.
“Obviously not very,” he said with a wry grin.
The marble that he had dropped from his hand was black.
MACE looked at Wallace carefully.
“You’re it,” he said.
Wallace shrugged carelessly.
“It’s okay with me. Maybe I’ll get through. Reese has been lucky. It might work that way with me. And anyway, who in hell wants to live forever?”
He sauntered to the door, a grin on his round, red face.
“See you in the morning,” he said. He opened the door and walked into the darkness of the night.
“The rest of you had better turn in,” Mace said. “Your ships will be ready in the morning.”
The three young pilots filed out and the girl followed them. Mace motioned Reese to remain.
When the door had closed on the pilots he said to Reese, “Thanks a lot. I gather that you talked to the other men about the drawing.”
Reese nodded. “They were all agreeable. As long as she draws first there’s not a chance of her drawing a black marble. I go second, drop the black marble into the jug and the drawing goes on as normal.”
“Fine,” Mace said. “We’ll keep it that way.”
“Okay.”
Reese strolled to the door.
“By the way are you shipping the U-235 tomorrow?”
“Nope. Can’t take a chance. It’ll have to be soon, though.”
“The men on the Belt are running awfully short,” Reese said idly.
“I’ll have to figure something out,” Mace said worriedly. “I don’t want to send it in a regular shipment. I’m afraid the enemy will be getting wise to our decoy ship in a few more trips. Maybe on the next convoy I can work out something.”
“Okay,” Reese said, “see you in the morning.”
“Good luck,” Mace said. He went out, banging the door.
CHAPTER IV
Six Ships Info Space
THE next morning Mace stood at the d
oor of his office and watched the six space freighters blast off, one by one, from the planetoid’s central mooring tower. Reese was in the lead ship, followed by the girl. Mace watched anxiously as the slim speedy ship piloted by Dale Mason disappeared into the void, a shower of sparks trailing in its wake.
Wallace blasted off last. Piloting the lumbering, heavily armed decoy freighter. The first five ships had vanished into the void and were well on their way to Lane 7 when his ship roared sluggishly through the planetoid’s atmosphere.
Mace jammed his hands into his pockets and entered his office. The six ships were gone now, heading for the treacherous dangers of Lane 7, and there was nothing he could do about it. He felt a moment of irritation as he stared at the work awaiting him at his desk.
He felt no stomach for forms and correspondence this morning. He lit his pipe and sat down heavily. A hell of a note. A hundred pound girl blasting through the void, carrying the vital supplies to the Belt while he sat at a desk charting courses and sending reports to Earth.
“Damn it!” he muttered.
He glowered at the confusion of his desk, his mind worrying the problem of how he was to get the desperately needed U-235 to the embattled men on the Belt.
He devised and discarded a dozen ideas without coming close to any solution. His thoughts were interrupted then by the jangling of the mail machine in the corner of the office.
It was a square metal receptacle, constructed of heavy riveted steel. Inside the receptacle was a materialization unit which reassembled the dematerialized matter flashed through the void from Earth. Mace made the necessary adjustments on the receiving rheostats. A moment later a thin, wax-sealed letter slid into a groove at the base of the metal box.
Mace picked it up. It was addressed to Guy Wallace, care of Mace McAllister, agent Inter-Planetary Space Co. He thought of Wallace, blasting through the void at the controls of the decoy ship and he wondered if he would ever read this letter. He shook his head in irritation. Thinking like that didn’t help anything. He tossed the letter onto his desk and went to work.
THREE days later, as the swirling hazy dusk was shrouding the planetoid, Mace walked out of his office and peered into the sky. A space ship was flashing into the planetoid’s atmosphere. He found himself automatically clenching and unclenching his hands. This was the first of the convoy to return.
Collected Fiction (1940-1963) Page 124
