Andre Norton (ed) (38 page)

wife
and children from the mob that would be
following close behind him . . .

Tumbling end over end with his light but
bulky burden, he sprawled at the threshold of the airlock, where the guard,
posted there, had stepped hastily out of his way. Again, capricious luck,
surprise, and swift action were on his side. He pressed the control-button of
the lock, and squirmed through its double valves before the startled guard
could stop him.

Then he slammed his jets
wide, and aimed for the horizon.

It was a wild journey—for, to fly straight in
a frictionless vacuum, any missile must be very well balanced; and the inertia
and the slight but unwieldy weight of
Neely's
bulk
disturbed such balance in his own jet-equipped space suit. The journey was
made, then, not in a smooth arc, but in a series of erratic waverings. But what
Endlich lacked in precise direction, he made up in sheer reckless, dread-driven
speed.

From the very start of that wild flight, he
heard voices in his helmet phones:

"Damn
pun'kin-head greenhornl
Did
you see how he hit Neely,
Schmidt?
Yeah—by surprise . . . Yeah—Kuzak.
I saw. He
hit without warning . . . yella yokel . . . Who's comin' along to get him
? .
.

Sure—there was another side to it—other
voices:

"Shucks—
Neely
had it coming to him. I hope the farmer really murders
that big lunkhead . . . You ain't kiddin', Muir. I was glad to see his face
splatter like a rotten
tamata .
.

Okay—fine.
It was good to know you had some sensible guys on your side. But what good was
it, when the camp as a whole was boiling over from its internal troubles? There
were more than enough roughnecks to do a mighty messy job—fast.

Panting
with tension, Endlich swooped down before his greenhouse, and dragged
Neely
inside through the airlock. For a fleeting instant
the sights and sounds and smells that impinged on his senses, as he opened his
face-window once more, brought him a regret. The rustle of com, the odor of
greenery,
the chicken voices—there
was home in all of
this. Something pastoral and beautiful and orderly—gained with hard work. And
something brought back—restored—from the remote past. The buzzing of the
tay-tay bug was even a real echo from that smashed yet undoubtedly once
beautiful world of antiquity.

But these were fragile concerns, beside the
desperate question of the immediate safety of Rose and the kids . . . Already
cries and shouts and comments were coming faintly through his helmet phones
again:

"Get the yokel! Get
the bum! . . . We'll fix his wagon good . . ."

The
pack was on the way—getting closer with every heartbeat. Never in his life had
Endlich experienced so harrowing a time as this; never, if by some miracle he
lived, could he expect another equal to it.

To
stand and fight, as he would have done if he were alone, would mean simply that
he would be cut down. To try the peacemaking of
appeasement,
would have probably the same result-plus, for himself, the dishonor of
contempt.

So,
where was there to turn, with grim, unanswering blank-ness on every side?

John Endlich felt mightily an old
yearning—that of a fundamentally peaceful man for a way to oppose and win
against brutal, overpowering odds without using either serious violence or the
even more futile course of supine submission. Here on Vesta, this had been the
issue he had faced all along. In many ages and many nations—and probably on
many planets throughout the universe—others had faced it before him.

To
his straining and tortured mind the trite and somewhat mocking answers came:
Psychology.
Salesmanship.
The selling of respect for
one's self.

Ah, yes. These were fine words.
Glib words.
But the question, "How?" was more
bitter and derisive than ever.

Still, he had to try something—to make at
least a forlorn effort. And now, from certain beliefs that he had, coupled with
some vague observations that he had made during the last hour, a tattered
suggestion of what form that effort might take, came to him.

As for his personal defects that had given
him trouble in the past—well—he was lugubriously sure that he had learned a
final lesson about liquor. For him it always meant trouble. As for wanderlust,
and the gambling and hell-raising urge—he had been willing to stay put on
Vesta, named for the goddess of home, for weeks, now. And he was now about to
make his last great gamble. If he lost, he wouldn't be alive to gamble again.
If, by great good-fortune, he won—well he was certain that all the charm of
unnecessary chance-taking would, by the memory of these awful moments, be
forever poisoned in him.

Now Rose and the youngsters
came hurrying toward him.

"Back so soon, Johnny?" Rose
called. "What's this? What happened?"

"Who's the guy, Pop?" Evelyn asked.
"Oh—Baloney Nose . . . What are you doing with him?"

But
by then they all had guessed some of the tense mood, and its probable meaning.

"Neely's pals are coming, Honey,"
Endlich said quietly. "It's the showdown. Hide the kids.
And yourself.
Quick.
Under the house, maybe."

Rose's pale eyes met his. They
were comprehending
, they were worried, but they were cool.
He could see that she didn't want to leave him.

Evelyn looked as though she might begin to
whimper; but her small jaw hardened.

Bubs' lower lip trembled. But he said
valiantly: "I'll get the guns, Pop, I'm stayin' with yuh."

"No you're not, son," John Endlich
answered. "Get going.
Orders.
Get the guns to
keep with you—to watch out for Mom and Sis."

Rose took the kids away with her, without a
word. Endlich wondered how to describe what
was maybe her
last look at him
. There were no fancy words in his mind.
Just Love.
And deep concern.

Alf
Neely
was
showing signs of returning consciousness.
Which was good.
Still dragging him, Endlich went and got a bushel basket. It was filled to the
brim with ripe, red tomatoes, but he could carry its tiny weight on the palm of
one hand, scarcely noticing that it was there.

For
an instant Endlich scanned the sky, through the clear plastic roof of the great
bubble. He saw at least a score of shapes in space armor, arcing nearer—specks
in human form, glowing with reflected sunlight, like little hurtling moons
among the stars. Neely's pals. In a moment they would arrive.

Endlich
took Neely and the loaded basket close to the transparent side of the
greenhouse, nearest the approaching roughnecks. There he removed
Neely's
oxygen helmet, hoping that, maybe, this might deter
his friends a little from rupturing the plastic of the huge bubble and letting
the air out. It was a feeble safeguard, for, in all probability, in case of
such rupture, Neely would be rescued from death by smothering and cold and the
boiling of his blood, simply by having his helmet slammed back on again.

Next,
Endlich dumped the contents of the basket on the ground, inverted it, and sat
Neely
upon it. The big man had recovered consciousness
enough to be merely groggy by now. Endlich slapped his battered face
vigorously, to help clear his head—after having, of course, relieved him of the
blaster at his belt.

Endlich left his own face-window open, so
that the sounds of
Neely's
voice could penetrate to
the mike of his own helmet phone, thus to be transmitted to the helmet phones
of Neely's buddies.

Endlich
was anything but calm inside, with the wild horde, as irresponsible in their
present state of mind as a pack of idiot baboons, bearing down on him. But he
forced his tone to be conversational when he spoke.

"Hello,
Neely," he said. "You mentioned you liked tomatoes. Maybe you were
kidding. Anyhow I brought you along home with me, so you could have some. Here
on the ground, right in front of you, is a whole bushel. The regular asteroids
price-considering the trouble it takes to grow 'em, and the amount of dough a
guy like you can make for himself out here, is five bucks apiece. But for you,
right now, they're all free. Here, have a nice fresh, ripe one,
Neely
."

The big man glared at his captor for a
second, after he had looked dazedly around. He would have leaped to his
feet—except that the muzzle of his own blaster was leveled at the center of his
chest, at a range of not over twenty inches. For a fleeting instant,
Neely
looked scared and prudent. Then he saw his pals,
landing like a flock of birds, just beyond the transparent side of the
greenhouse. And he heard their shouts, coming loudly from Endlich's
helmet-phones:

"We
come after you,
Neely
! We'll get the damn yokel off
your neck . . . Come on, guys—let's turn the place upside down! . . ."

Neely
grew courageous—yes, maybe it did take a certain animal nerve to do what he
did. His battered and bloodied lip curled.

"Whatdayuh think you're up to,
Pun'kin-head!" he snarled slowly, his tone dripping contempt for the
insanely foolish. He laughed sourly, "Haw-haw-haw." Then his face
twisted into a confident and mocking leer. To carry the mockery farther, a big
paw reached out and grabbed the proffered tomato from Endlich's hand.
"Sure—thanks.
Anything to oblige!"
He took a
great bite from the fruit,
clowning
the action with a
forced expression of relish. "Ummm!" he grunted. In danger, he was
being the showman, playing for the approval of his pals. He was proving his
comic coolness—that even now he was master of the situation, and was in no
hurry to be rescued. "Come on, punk!" he ordered Endlich. "Where
is the next one, seeing you're so generous? Be polite to your guest!"

Endlich handed him a second tomato. But as he
did so, it seemed all the things he dreaded would happen were breathing down his
back. For the faces that he glimpsed beyond the plastic showed the twisted
expressions that betray the point where savage humor imperceptibly becomes
murderous. A dozen blasters were leveled at him.

But the eyes of the men outside showed, too,
the kind of interest that any odd procedure can command. They stood still for
a moment, watching, commenting:

"Hey—Neelyl See if you can down the next
one with one
bitel .
..
Don't eat 'em all,
Neely
! Save some for usl . .
."

Endlich was following no complete plan. He
had only the feeling that somewhere here there might be a dramatic touch that,
by a long chance, would yield him a toehold on the situation. Without a word,
he gave
Neely
a third tomato. Then a fourth and a
fifth . . .

Neely kept gobbling and
clowning.

Yeah—but can this sort of horseplay go on
until one man has consumed an entire bushel of tomatoes? The question began to
shine speculatively in the faces of the onlookers. It began to appeal to their
wolfish sense of comedy. And it started to betray itself—in another manner—in
Neely's
face.

After the fifteenth tomato, he burped and
balked. "That's enough kiddin' around, Pun'kin-head," he growled.
"Get away with your garden truckl I should be beatin' you to a grease-pot
right this minutel Why—I—"

Then
Neely
tried to lunge for the blaster. As Endlich
squeezed the trigger, he turned the weapon aside a trifle, so that the beam of
energy flicked past
Neely's
ear and splashed garden
soil that turned incandescent, instantly.

John Endlich might have died in that moment,
cut down from behind. That he wasn't probably meant that, from the position of
complete underdog among the spectators, his popularity had
risen
some.

"Neely," he said with a grin, "how
can you start beatin', when you ain't done eatin'? Neely—here I am, trying to
be friendly and hospitable, and you aren't cooperating. A whole bushel of juicy
tomatoes—symbols of civilization way out here in the asteroids—and you haven't
even made a dent in 'em yetl
What's
the matter, Neely?
Lose your appetite? Herel Eat! . . ."

Endlich's tone was falsely persuasive.
For there was a steely note of command in it.
And the
blaster in Endlich's hand was pointed straight at
Neely's
chest.

Neely's
eyes began to look frightened and sullen. He shifted uncomfortably, and the
bushel basket creaked under his weight.

"You're yella as any damn pun'kinl"
he said loudly. "You don't fight fairl . . . Guys—what's the matter with
you? Get this nut with the blaster
offa
me! . .
."

"Hmm—yella,"
Endlich seemed to muse. "Maybe not as yella as you were once—coming around
here at night with a whole gang, not so long ago—"

"Call
me
yella?"
Neely hollered.
"Why, you
lousy yokel, if you didn't have that blaster—"

Endlich
said grimly, "But I got it, friendl" He sent a stream of energy from
the blaster right past
Neely's
head, so close that a
shock of the other's hair smoked and curled into black wisps. "And watch
your language—my wife and kids can hear you—"

Neely's
thick shoulders hunched. He ducked nervously, rubbing his head—and for the
first time there was a hint of genuine alarm in his voice. "All
right," he growled, "all right! Take it easy—"

Something deep within John Endlich relaxed—a
cold tight knot seemed to unwind—for, at that moment, he knew that
Neely
was beginning to lose. The big man's evident
discomfort and fear were the marks of weakness—to his followers at least; and
with them, he could never be a leader, again. Moreover, he had allowed himself
to be maneuvered into the position of being the butt of a practical joke, that,
by his own code, must be followed up, to its nasty, if interesting, outcome.
The spectators began to resemble Romans at the circus, with
Neely
the victim. And the victim's downfall was tragically swift.

"Come
on, Neelyl
You
heard what PunTdns said," somebody
yelled. "Jeez—a whole bushel. Let's see how many you can eat,
Neely
. . . . Damned if this ain't gonna be rich! Don't let
us down,
Neely
!
Nobody's hurtin'
yuh.
All you have to do is eat—all
them
nice
tamadas . . . Hey, Neely—if that bushel ain't enough for you, I'll personally
buy you another, at the reglar price. Haw-haw-haw . . . Lucky Neely! Look at
him!
Having a swell banquet.
Better than if he was
home . . . Haw-haw-haw . . . Come on, Pun'kins—make him eat! . . ."

Yeah, under certain conditions human nature
can be pretty fickle. Wonderingly, John Endlich felt himself to be respected—
the Top Man. The guy who had shown courage and ingenuity, and was winning, by
the harsh code of men who had been roughened and soured by space—by life among
the asteroids.

For a little while then, he had to be hard.
He thrust another tomato toward
Neely
, at the same
time directing a thin stream from the blaster just past the big nose. Neely ate
six more tomatoes with a will, his eyes popping,
sweat
streaming down his forehead.

Endlich's
next blaster-stream barely missed
Neely's
booted toe.
The persuasive shot was worth fifty-five more dollars in garden fruit
consumed. The crowd gave with mock cheers and bravos, and demanded more action.

"That
makes thirty-two . . . Come on,
Neely—
that's just a
good start. You got a long, long ways to go . . . Come on, Pun'kins— bet you
can stuff fifty into him . . ."

To
goad
Neely
on in this ludicrous and savage game,
Endlich next just scorched the metal at Neely's shoulder. It isn't to be said
that Endlich didn't enjoy his revenge—for all the anguish and real danger that
Neely
had caused him. But as this fierce yet childish sport
went on, and the going turned really rough for the big asteroid miner,
Endlich's anger began to be mixed with self-disgust. He'd always be a
hot-tempered guy; he couldn't help that. But now, satisfaction, and a hopeful
glimpse of peace ahead, burned the fury out of him and touched him with shame.
Still, for a little more, he had to go on. Again and again, as before, he used
that blaster. But, as he did so, he talked, ramblingly, knowing that the
audience, too, would hear what he said. Maybe, in a way, it was a lecture; but
he couldn't help that:

"Have another tomato,
Neely
.
Sorry to do things like this—but it's your own way. So why should you complain?
Funny, ain't it? A man can get even too many tomatoes.
Civilized
tomatoes.
Part of something most guys around here have been homesick
for, for a long time . . . Maybe that's what has been most of the trouble out
here in the asteroids. Not enough civilization. On Earth we were used to
certain standards—in spite of being rough enough there, too. Here, the traces
got kicked over. But on this side of