One and Wonder (7 page)

“Then I'll take your full report, Mr. Lord,” he said decisively. “Right now.”

“But Cameron has a weapon,” Lord protested desperately. “Something that strikes like lightning—”

“Then the entire task force may be in peril,” Hudd cut in. “Now let's have it—at once.”

Lord talked rapidly, while sweat burst out in great bright drops on his narrow face and soaked dark blotches into his uniform. Hudd listened gravely, now and then turning to Doyle or me with a sharp question.

It was Doyle who told him how Lord and the two guards had shot the couple named Hawkins. Hudd's heavy, sagging jaw hardened at the news. When the report was finished, he must have started his habitual nervous drumming—his hands were hidden below the screen, but the speaker brought a worried rapping.

“You made two blunders.” His small, troubled eyes peered accusingly at Lord. “You let Cameron get away with the vital information I sent you for. And you killed those people before they had a chance to talk. I'm afraid you have gravely compromised our objectives, Victor—and your own future.”

All his swagger gone, Lord twisted and cringed before the steady eyes of Hudd. Still perspiring, he seemed to fawn and cower like a punished dog, as the loud, aggressive voice of his master continued:

“We must take bold, immediate action, Victor, to restore the situation.”

“Right, Mr. Hudd,” Lord said eagerly. “Shall we blast off, now?”

“You will remain where you are,” Hudd said. “Get in touch with the inhabitants, if you can. Offer apologies and compensation for the killing. Stall for time. Find out all you can about the weapons, the military establishment, and the government of the inhabitants.” Lord gulped uneasily, nodding.

“Post a reward for Cameron.” Hudd's big mouth set hard. “My mistake, to trust him. Get hold of him. Use extreme interrogation. Make him talk, then liquidate him. He has gone too far.”

Hudd shook his head regretfully.

“Too bad,” he added. “I always liked him.”

I felt cold and ill. Hudd's loud words had struck me like numbing blows. That harsh command was no surprise to me, but it brought me a dull sickness of regret, because I had failed Cameron when he asked me to go with him.

Lord was protesting again:

“Mr. Hudd, I think we'll be attacked—”

“I'll support you,” Hudd assured him, and turned to speak to his signal officer: “Change the scramble code—we don't know who is trying to listen.”

The unseen officer on the flagship droned out a code number, repeating each digit. Our officer droned it back. The screen darkened, flickered. Then the image of Hudd came back, huge and resolute, declaring:

“Whatever happens, Victor, I intend to restore the Directorate. I am taking prompt action, to that end. The
Valley Forge
and the
Hiroshima
are proceeding to the moon. They will land a new garrison, with the necessary repairs to bring Fort America back into effectiveness. The
Yorktown,
the
Rio Plata
and the
Leningrad
will stand by, spaced on an orbit ten thousand miles from the earth, to relay communications and bombard any targets we discover.

“With the
Great Director,
I'm coming to earth.”

Lord licked his thin, colorless lips.

“You're too daring, Mr. Hudd,” he protested shrilly.

“It took audacity to establish the Directorate.” The great boom of Hudd's voice in the speaker visibly startled Lord. “It's worth audacity to restore it. I'm coming, at full thrust, to take personal command.”

Lord remained aboard the life-craft that night. His uneasy fancy must have dwelt upon the fused metal we had found beside that skeleton in the weeds and the sudden bolt that struck that tree as Cameron fled. Perhaps he thought of the two still bodies in the gully; no doubt he peopled the dark valley with vengeful enemies.

My own imagination, I know, was busy enough. Staring out into the
thickening night, I felt myself die helpless spectator of stupendous forces sweeping grandly toward collision.

On one side, there was the Atomic Age itself, expressed in the rekindled might of Fort America, in the fine discipline of the task force, in sleek guided missiles, in the determined sagacity of Mr. Julian Hudd.

On the other side, there was that unknown power that had swept the old garrison from the moon and driven men from the cities and destroyed the Directorate. All I had seen of it was a piece of twisted wire, a blasted tree, and the change in Jim Cameron. But that was enough—I waited for the fireworks.

After dark, Captain Doyle volunteered to go back to the house.

“Mr. Hudd wants us to get in touch with the inhabitants,” he reminded Lord. “And we saw some kind of telephone.” With evident reluctance, Lord agreed.

“If you contact anybody, call for the government,” he ordered. “Offer a reward for Cameron.” His sleepy eyes glittered cunningly. “If anybody mentions those two dead peasants, we're holding them—alive—for Cameron's return.”

Doyle went down through the valves, accompanied by the signal officer to help him work the strange radiophone. They were lost in the pale moonlight among the young apple trees. They didn't come back.

After an hour, Lord sent me after them, with one of his gunmen for escort. Soft lights came on of themselves, when I opened the door. I tried to call Doyle's name, and found that my voice had gone to a grating whisper. Walking through the silent rooms, we found nobody.

The little radiophone, oddly, was also gone. At midnight, Hudd called again. At the news of Doyle's apparent desertion, he muttered forebodingly:

“It's something pretty sinister, that takes so true a man.” The interstellar cruiser landed, just at dawn. The thunder of it woke me out of a nodding doze. Moving groggily to a port, I saw a glare that burned all color out of the valley, so that everything was black or blinding white. I had to cover my smarting eyes. The wind rocked the life-craft on its stabilizers, and the earth shuddered.

When the thunder ceased and that cruel light was gone, I saw the cruiser standing two miles down the valley. Dark smoke billowed up about the base of it from the green woods burning. Its tall peak, towering out of the night in the valley, was already incandescent with sunlight.

Immensely high, the great flat turrets swung with ominous deliberation. The huge bright tubes of rifles and launchers lifted out of their housings, implacably purposeful. Hudd called again, looking as massively indomitable as his flagship.

“Have you met the inhabitants, Mr. Lord?”

“Not yet, Mr. Hudd.” Relieved by the great ship’s coming, Lord had his swagger back.

“Then you soon will,” Hudd told him. “Our lookout reports a flying vehicle, approaching you now. Make contact, and report immediately.”

We all turned to the ports, in time to see the red glint of sunlight on the rotor of a small helicopter. It landed among the young apple trees. Three people got out. One of them began waving a bit of white cloth. With a shock of dismay, I recognized Jim Cameron.

VIII

The three walked slowly down toward us across the young orchard. The other two paused by the dam, one of them bending to look at the bodies under the blanket. Cameron came on halfway to us, before he stopped and stood waiting.

Watching through a port in the signal room, Lord nervously wet his lips. Beneath a puzzled unease, his beady eyes had a glare of yellow elation. He sent me out to find what Cameron wanted.

Grinning with pleasure to see me, Cameron put down the stick with his handkerchief tied to it. Fatigue had drawn his stubbled face and smudged blue shadows under his eyes.

“Jim, you shouldn't have come back.” I pitched my voice too low for Lord's gunmen, covering us from the valve. “Because you made a fool of Lord, when you got away. He'll never forgive that. He's got Hudd's permission to liquidate you.”

He grinned wearily, glancing at the two behind him.

“You can tell Mr. Lord that he's in no position to liquidate anybody. On the contrary—these neighbors of the Hawkins couple have come to arraign him and his guard for the murder.”

I must have gasped with astonishment.

“I'm afraid Lord will be unreasonable.” He frowned, regretfully. “I came along to try to prevent any needless destruction. There's not much use for Lord to resist, and no need for others to be killed. Better tell him that.”

Back aboard the life-craft, I told Lord what the strangers wanted. His pale, peering eyes rounded with wonderment, then narrowed to hard yellow slits. He glared malevolently out at Cameron.

“I suppose that damned feather merchant is the chief witness? Well, I'll fix the lot of them!” He shouted up the ladder-well to the astrogator, now acting as signal officer, “Get me Mr. Hudd!”

I followed him into the narrow signal room.

“It's your pet civilian,” he shouted bitterly when Hudd's face appeared
huge and interrogative on the screen. “And a couple of yokels with some nonsense about arresting me for murder.”

“So?” Thoughtfully Hudd rubbed his blue, multiple chin. “I want to talk to them. Offer them all three safe-conduct to come aboard. Tell them I'll discuss compensation for the killing. You can bring them on the life-craft, Mr. Lord.”

The negotiations which ensued were somewhat involved. I went back and forth, between Lord and Cameron. Cameron returned to consult with the watchful two by the ravine. Hudd and Lord conferred by television, Lord's nasal voice rising steadily with ill-concealed anger, Hudd frowning with increasing concern.

“I'd accept Mr. Hudd's safe-conduct, myself,” Cameron told me. “But the Enlows don't want to trust him. They are willing to talk to Mr. Hudd, but he'll have to come out here.”

With a surprising boldness, Hudd agreed to do that.

“But, Mr. Hudd!” Lord protested sharply. “We can't treat with them—two savages and a mutineering feather merchant. Think of your own safety. Why not let us take off, sir, and then wipe them out with a salvo of radio-toxin shells from the cruiser?”

Hudd shook his head stubbornly.

“I'm coming over, Victor, to handle this myself.” His red, worried eyes turned to me. “Chad, you go back and tell Jim Cameron to wait till I get there.” Lord's eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“Don't you give me up, Hudd.” His angry nasal voice was hard and dangerous. “If you do, you're also giving up your New Directorate.”

“I know that,” Hudd assured him blandly. “You can trust me, Victor.”

Lord dismissed me, with a curt, sullen nod. I went back across the burned grass to tell Cameron that Hudd was coming.

“He's smart.” Cameron nodded approvingly. “Maybe he can save his neck.” He took up the white flag again. “Now we had better rejoin the Enlows,” he said. “They might misunderstand.”

We walked back to the people waiting at the dam. I thought of Lord's gunmen crouching in the lock behind us, and the skin on my back crawled uneasily.

The two were a man and a young woman. They were both tanned, lean, sturdy; dark hair and gray level eyes showed a family likeness. Tight with the shock of what they had seen under the blanket, their faces were hard with purpose. “Are they coming out?” The man's quiet voice was taut as his gaunt face.

“Not yet.” Cameron was urgently persuasive. “But please give me a chance to tell Mr. Hudd about the equalizer. I think he's smart enough to listen.”

The man nodded his weather-beaten head. I saw that he carried what looked like a bulky flare-pistol. His deep-set angry eyes peered up at the enormous flagship, not at all afraid.

“If he wants to listen,” he agreed. “But we're going to get the killers.”

“I'll try to get Mr. Hudd to give them up,” Cameron promised, and then he introduced me. “Chad Barstow. A likely candidate for the Brotherhood, as soon as he learns to use the equalizer.”

The girl wore a radiophone, much like the one we had seen in the house—it must have been such units that made those scrambled signals we had heard. The little plastic case was snapped to her belt, the headset over her lustrous hair. She had been listening to that, but now she looked at me, her eyes widening.

“Yes, he's Dane Barstow's son.” Seeing her troubled glance toward the gully, Cameron added quickly, “He had nothing to do with that.”

She gave me a strong handclasp.

“Jane Enlow,” Cameron said. “Her father, Frank Enlow.”

The gaunt man gripped my hand silently, but his angry eyes flashed back to the life-craft and the cruiser.

“Before the equalizer,” Cameron told him, “Mr. Enlow was a janitor in Tyler's Squaredeal Hall. He was just telling me about the Director's last days. After the equalizer, he smuggled Tyler out through the mob that was shouting for him under the balcony. Tyler lived for years in Mr. Enlow's house over the ridge, yonder, writing a history—trying to justify his career.”

“A nasty old man!” Jane Enlow pouted. “He wouldn't learn the equalizer. Dad had to take care of him.”

High up on the bright side of the cruiser, blue fire spurted. Frank Enlow crouched toward the ravine, swinging up his pistol-like device. Cameron called out, hastily:

“Don't shoot—that's probably Mr. Hudd.”

As the gaunt man relaxed, I studied his weapon with a shocked fascination. It looked like a miniature guided missile launcher, rather than a gun. It seemed fantastically small, yet the lank man had a strangely confident air of facing the cruiser's weapons on even terms.

The girl was listening again to her radiphone. She twisted knobs on the case at her belt, and finally shook her dark head.

“Nothing.” Her voice was gloomy. “They're taking too long.”

Hudd's life-craft approached us swiftly, a bright projectile floating nearly upright on a jet of screaming fire. It crossed the burning forest to land near the other craft. The valves slammed open as soon as the dust had cleared, and Hudd's aide jumped out.

The hard-bitten commander darted across the blasted ground and hurried up to us. He seemed upset by Hudd's decision. First he wanted
Cameron and the Enlows to come aboard the life-craft to talk; then he wanted to send a bodyguard with Hudd; finally he warned that a general bombardment of the surrounding country would begin at once, if anything happened to Hudd.