Explorers of Space Read online

  I never thought, when I joined the Professor’s expedition, that I should end up like an African porter in one of those old adventure stories, carrying a load on my head. Especially when that load was a sixth of a spaceship (being so short, Professor Forster wasn’t able to provide very effective help). Now that its fuel tanks were half empty, the weight of the ship in this gravity was about two hundred kilograms. We squeezed beneath, heaved, and up she went—very slowly, of course, because her inertia was still unchanged. Then we started marching.

  It took us quite a while to make the journey, and it wasn’t quite as easy as we’d thought it would be. But presently the two ships were lying side by side, and nobody had noticed us. Everyone in the Henry Luce was fast asleep, as they had every reason to expect us to be.

  Though I was still rather short of breath, I found a certain schoolboy amusement in the whole adventure as Searle and Fulton drew the refueling pipeline out of our airlock and quietly coupled up to the other ship.

  “The beauty of this plan,” explained Groves to me as we stood watching, “is that they can’t do anything to stop us, unless they come outside and uncouple our line. We can drain them dry in five minutes, and it will take them half that time to wake up and get into their spacesuits.”

  A sudden horrid fear smote me.

  “Suppose they turned on their rockets and tried to get away?”

  “Then we’d both be smashed up. No, they’ll just have to come outside and see what’s going on. Ah, there go the pumps.”

  The pipeline had stiffened like a fire hose under pressure, and I knew that the fuel was pouring into our tanks. Any moment now the lights would go on in the Henry Luce and her startled occupants would come scuttling out.

  It was something of an anticlimax when they didn’t. They must have been sleeping very soundly not to have felt the vibration from the pumps, but when it was all over nothing had happened and we just stood around looking rather foolish. Searle and Fulton carefully uncoupled the pipeline and put it back into the airlock.

  “Well?” we asked the Professor.

  He thought things over for a minute.

  “Let’s get back into the ship,” he said.

  When we had climbed out of our suits and were gathered together in the control room, or as far in as we could get, the Professor sat down at the radio and punched out the “Emergency” signal. Our sleeping neighbors would be awake in a couple of seconds as their automatic receiver sounded the alarm.

  The TV screen glimmered into life. There, looking rather frightened, was Randolph Mays.

  “Hello, Forster,” he snapped. “What’s the trouble?”

  “Nothing wrong here,” replied the Professor in his best deadpan manner, “but you’ve lost something important. Look at your fuel gauges.”

  The screen emptied, and for a moment there was a confused mumbling and shouting from the speaker. Then Mays was back, annoyance and alarm competing for possession of his features.

  “What’s going on?” he demanded angrily. “Do you know anything about this?”

  The Professor let him sizzle for a moment before he replied.

  “I think you’d better come across and talk things over,” he said. “You won’t have far to walk.”

  Mays glared back at him uncertainly, then retorted, “You bet I will!” The screen went blank.

  “He’ll have to climb down now!” said Bill gleefully. “There’s nothing else he can do!”

  “It’s not so simple as you think,” warned Fulton. “If he really wanted to be awkward, he could just sit tight and radio Ganymede for a tanker.”

  “What good would that do him? It would waste days and cost a fortune.”

  “Yes, but he’d still have the statue, if he wanted it that badly. And he’d get his money back when he sued us.”

  The airlock light flashed on and Mays stumped into the room. He was in a surprisingly conciliatory mood; on the way over, he must have had second thoughts.

  “Well, well,” he said affably. “What’s all this nonsense in aid of?”

  “You know perfectly well,” the Professor retorted coldly. “I made it quite clear that nothing was to be taken off Five. You’ve been stealing property that doesn’t belong to you.”

  “Now, let’s be reasonable. Who does it belong to? You can’t claim everything on this planet as your personal property.”

  “This is not a planet—it’s a ship and the laws of salvage operate.”

  “Frankly, that’s a very debatable point. Don’t you think you should wait until you get a ruling from the lawyers?”

  The Professor was being icily polite, but I could see that the strain was terrific and an explosion might occur at any moment.

  “Listen, Mr. Mays,” he said with ominous calm. “What you’ve taken is the most important single find we’ve made here. I will make allowances for the fact that you don’t appreciate what you’ve done, and don’t understand the viewpoint of an archaeologist like myself. Return that statue, and we’ll pump your fuel back and say no more.”

  Mays rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

  “I really don’t see why you should make such a fuss about one statue, when you consider all the stuff that’s still here.”

  It was then that the Professor made one of his rare mistakes.

  “You talk like a man who’s stolen the ‘Mona Lisa’ from the Louvre and argues that nobody will miss it because of all the other paintings. This statue’s unique in a way that no terrestrial work of art can ever be. That’s why I’m determined to get it back.”

  You should never, when you’re bargaining, make it obvious that you want something really badly. I saw the greedy glint in Mays’s eye and said to myself, “Uh-huh! He’s going to be tough.” And I remembered Fulton’s remark about calling Ganymede for a tanker.

  “Give me half an hour to think it over,” said Mays, turning to the airlock.

  “Very well,” replied the Professor stiffly. “Half an hour—no more.”

  I must give Mays credit for brains. Within five minutes we saw his communications aerial start slewing around until it locked on Ganymede. Naturally we tried to listen in, but he had a scrambler. These newspapermen must trust each other.

  The reply came back a few minutes later; that was scrambled, too. While we were waiting for the next development, we had another council of war. The Professor was now entering the stubborn, stop-at-nothing stage. He realized he’d miscalculated and that had made him fighting mad.

  I think Mays must have been a little apprehensive, because he had reinforcements when he returned. Donald Hopkins, his pilot, came with him, looking rather uncomfortable.

  “I’ve been able to fix things up, Professor,” he said smugly. “It will take me a little longer, but I can get back without your help if I have to. Still, I must admit that it will save a good deal of time and money if we can come to an agreement. I’ll tell you what. Give me back my fuel and I’ll return the other—er—souvenirs I’ve collected. But I insist on keeping ‘Mona Lisa,’ even if it means I won’t get back to Ganymede until the middle of next week.”

  The Professor then uttered a number of what are usually called deep-space oaths, though I can assure you they’re much the same as any other oaths. That seemed to relieve his feelings a lot and he became fiendishly friendly.

  “My dear Mr. Mays,” he said, “You’re an unmitigated crook, and accordingly I’ve no compunction left in dealing with you. I’m prepared to use force, knowing that the law will justify me.”

  Mays looked slightly alarmed, though not unduly so. We had moved to strategic positions around the door.

  “Please don’t be so melodramatic,” he said haughtily. “This is the twenty-first century, not the Wild West back in 1800.”

  “In 1880,” said Bill, who is a stickler for accuracy.

  “I must ask you,” the Professor continued, “to consider yourself under detention while we decide what is to be done. Mr. Searle, take him to Cabin B.”

  Mays
sidled along the wall with a nervous laugh.

  “Really, Professor, this is too childish! You can’t detain me against my will.” He glanced for support at the Captain of the Henry Luce.

  Donald Hopkins dusted an imaginary speck of fluff from his uniform.

  “I refuse,” he remarked for the benefit of all concerned, “to get involved in vulgar brawls.”

  Mays gave him a venomous look and capitulated with bad grace. We saw that he had a good supply of reading matter, and locked him in.

  When he was out of the way, the Professor turned to Hopkins, who was looking enviously at our fuel gauges.

  “Can I take it, Captain,” he said politely, “that you don’t wish to get mixed up in any of your employer’s dirty business?”

  “I’m neutral. My job is to fly the ship here and take her home. You can fight this out among yourselves.”

  “Thank you. I think we understand each other perfectly. Perhaps it would be best if you returned to your ship and explained the situation. We’ll be calling you in a few minutes.”

  Captain Hopkins made his way languidly to the door. As he was about to leave he turned to Searle.

  “By the way, Kingsley,” he drawled. “Have you thought of torture? Do call me if you get around to it—I’ve some jolly interesting ideas.” Then he was gone, leaving us with our hostage.

  I think the Professor had hoped he could do a direct exchange. If so, he had not bargained on Marianne’s stubbornness.

  “It serves Randolph right,” she said. “But I don’t really see that it makes any difference. He’ll be just as comfortable in your ship as in ours, and you can’t do anything to him. Let me know when you’re fed up with having him around.”

  It seemed a complete impasse. We had been too clever by half, and it had got us exactly nowhere. We’d captured Mays, but he wasn’t any use to us.

  The Professor was standing with his back to us, staring morosely out of the window. Seemingly balanced on the horizon, the immense bulk of Jupiter nearly filled the sky.

  “We’ve got to convince her that we really do mean business,” he said. Then he turned abruptly to me.

  “Do you think she’s actually fond of this blackguard?”

  “Er—I shouldn’t be surprised. Yes, I really believe so.”

  The Professor looked very thoughtful. Then he said to Searle, “Come into my room. I want to talk something over.”

  They were gone quite a while. When they returned, they both had an indefinable air of gleeful anticipation, and the Professor was carrying a piece of paper covered with figures. He went to the radio and called the Henry Luce.

  “Hello,” said Marianne, replying so promptly that she’d obviously been waiting for us. “Have you decided to call it off? I’m getting so bored.”

  The Professor looked at her gravely. .

  “Miss Mitchell,” he replied. “It’s apparent that you have not been taking us seriously. I’m therefore arranging a somewhat—er—drastic little demonstration for your benefit. I’m going to place your employer in a position from which he’ll be only too anxious for you to retrieve him as quickly as possible.”

  “Indeed?” replied Marianne noncommittally—though I thought I could detect a trace of apprehension in her voice.

  “I don’t suppose,” continued the Professor smoothly, “that you know anything about celestial mechanics. No? Too bad, but your pilot will confirm everything I tell you. Won’t you, Hopkins?”

  “Go ahead,” came a painstakingly neutral voice from the background.

  “Then listen carefully, Miss Mitchell. I want to remind you of our curious—indeed our precarious—position on this satellite. You’ve only got to look out of the window to see how close to Jupiter we are, and I need hardly remind you that Jupiter has by far the most intense gravitational field of all the planets. You follow me?”

  “Yes,” replied Marianne, no longer quite so self-possessed. “Go on.”

  “Very well. This little world of ours goes around Jupiter in almost exactly twelve hours. Now there’s a well-known theorem stating that if a body falls from an orbit to the center of attraction, it will take point one seven seven of a period to make the drop. In other words, anything falling from here to Jupiter would reach the center of the planet in about two hours seven minutes. I’m sure Captain Hopkins can confirm this.”

  There was a long pause. Then we heard Hopkins say, “Well, of course I can’t confirm the exact figures, but they’re probably correct. It would be something like that, anyway.”

  “Good,” continued the Professor. “Now I’m sure you realize,” he went on with a hearty chuckle, “that a fall to the center of the planet is a very theoretical case. If anything really was dropped from here, it would reach the upper atmosphere of Jupiter in a considerably shorter time. I hope I’m not boring you?”

  “No,” said Marianne, rather faintly.

  “I’m so glad to hear it. Anyway, Captain Searle has worked out the actual time for me, and it’s one hour thirty-five minutes—with a few minutes either way. We can’t guarantee complete accuracy, ha-ha!

  “Now, it has doubtless not escaped your notice that this satellite of ours has an extremely weak gravitational field. It’s escape velocity is only about ten meters a second, and anything thrown away from it at that speed would never come back. Correct, Mr. Hopkins?”

  “Perfectly correct.”

  “Then, if I may come to the point, we propose to take Mr. Mays for a walk until he’s immediately under Jupiter, remove the reaction pistols from his suit, and—ah—launch him forth. We will be prepared to retrieve him with our ship as soon as you’ve handed over the property you’ve stolen. After what I’ve told you, I’m sure you’ll appreciate that time will be rather vital. An hour and thirty-five minutes is remarkably short, isn’t it?”

  “Professor!” I gasped, “You can’t possibly do this!”

  “Shut up!” he barked. “Well, Miss Mitchell, what about it?”

  Marianne was staring at him with mingled horror and disbelief.

  “You’re simply bluffing!” she cried. “I don’t believe you’d do anything of the kind! Your crew won’t let you!”

  The Professor sighed.

  “Too bad,” he said. “Captain Searle—Mr. Groves—will you take the prisoner and proceed as instructed.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” replied Searle with great solemnity.

  Mays looked frightened but stubborn.

  “What are you going to do now?” he said, as his suit was handed back to him.

  Searle unholstered his reaction pistols. “Just climb in,” he said. “We’re going for a walk.”

  I realized then what the Professor hoped to do. The whole thing was a colossal bluff: of course he wouldn’t really have Mays thrown into Jupiter; and in any case Searle and Groves wouldn’t do it. Yet surely Marianne would see through the bluff, and then we’d be left looking mighty foolish.

  Mays couldn’t run away; without his reaction pistols he was quite helpless. Grasping his arms and towing him along like a captive balloon, his escorts set off toward the horizon—and toward Jupiter.

  I could see, looking across the space to the other ship, that Marianne was staring out through the observation windows at the departing trio. Professor Forster noticed it too.

  “I hope you’re convinced, Miss Mitchell, that my men aren’t carrying along an empty spacesuit. Might I suggest that you follow the proceedings with a telescope? They’ll be over the horizon in a minute, but you’ll be able to see Mr. Mays when he starts to—er—ascend.”

  There was a stubborn silence from the loudspeaker. The period of suspense seemed to last for a very long time.

  Was Marianne waiting to see how far the Professor really would go?

  By this time I had got hold of a pair of binoculars and was sweeping the sky beyond the ridiculously close horizon. Suddenly I saw it—a tiny flare of light against the vast yellow back-cloth of Jupiter. I focused quickly, and could just make out the three f
igures rising into space. As I watched, they separated: two of them decelerated with their pistols and started to fall back toward Five. The other went on ascending helplessly toward the ominous bulk of Jupiter. I turned on the Professor in horror and disbelief. “They’ve really done it!” I cried. “I thought you were only bluffing!”

  “So did Miss Mitchell, I’ve no doubt,” said the Professor calmly, for the benefit of the listening microphone. “I hope I don’t need to impress upon you the urgency of the situation. As I’ve remarked once or twice before, the time of fall from our orbit to Jupiter’s surface is ninety-five minutes. But, of course, if one waited even half that time, it would be much too late. . . .”

  He let that sink in. There was no reply from the other ship.

  “And now,” he continued, “I’m going to switch off our receiver so we can’t have any more arguments. We’ll wait until you’ve unloaded that statue—and the other items Mr. Mays was careless enough to mention—before we’ll talk to you again. Good-bye.”

  It was a very uncomfortable ten minutes. I’d lost track of Mays, and was seriously wondering if we’d better overpower the Professor and go after him before we had a murder on our hands. But the people who could fly the ship were the ones who had actually carried out the crime. I didn’t know what to think.

  Then the airlock of the Henry Luce slowly opened. A couple of space-suited figures emerged, floating the cause of all the trouble between them.

  “Unconditional surrender,” murmured the Professor with a sigh of satisfaction. “Get it into our ship,” he called over the radio, “I’ll open up the airlock for you.”

  He seemed in no hurry at all. I kept looking anxiously at the clock; fifteen minutes had already gone by. Presently there was a clanking and banging in the airlock, the inner door opened, and Captain Hopkins entered. He was followed by Marianne, who only needed a bloodstained ax to make her look like Clytemnestra. I did my best to avoid her eyes, but the Professor seemed to be quite without shame. He walked into the airlock, checked that his properly’ was back, and emerged rubbing his hands.