Earthbound (Winston Science Fiction Book 1) (14 page)

“Aren’t you bored now?”

Joe grinned, “Yeah. Not much do here. Listen radio. Eat food. Sleep.”

“Well, how would you like to go away from here, by jet sled, to Little America.”

“Young explorer make big joke. That dangerous trip.”

“I know it’s dangerous. I also know it’s necessary. Listen, Joe, what do you think we’re all doing down here?”

“Explore, like all others before —”

“No. We’re not explorers. Do you know about space-travel, Joe?”

The Indian seemed insulted. “Do I know? I got uncle colonist on Mars. He mine for silver, make good fortune, come back every year to Tierra del Fuego in rich coat to gloat. Sure I know space.”

“All right. Do you know what a pirate is?”

“Pirate go in ship after other ship. Make
boom-boom
, take cargo.”

“All right again, Joe. Well, our friends here are pirates. I’ve got to get to Little America, and then maybe far north to the United States, to report them. I want you to help me.”

Ushuaia Joe’s face was very solemn. He looked at Pete a long time without saying anything, and then he began to laugh softly, for apparently he did not want to disturb the sleepers, but his whole body rocked with mirth.

“What’s so funny?” Pete demanded.

And Joe said, “Nothing. Don’t mind me, Hodges. I merely thought I was hopelessly trapped with you pirates down here and now I find someone’s on my side.”

“What? Huh? What happened to your pidgin-English?”

“It was a sham, but thank the Lord I can forget about it for a while.”

Pete could hardly believe his ears. “I don’t get it. Does that mean you’re not an Indian?”

“Let me answer your question with one of my own: do you think this is the eighteenth century or something? Most Indians are civilized now, you know.”

“Then — then what does all this add up to?”

“Simple. I’m an Indian, name of Ushuaia Joe, or Joe Cloud, or Joe Dawson. I answer to all of them. But I’m also a United States Government agent.”

“What?”

“You heard me. Antarctica is the last frontier, Hodges. We have to keep it covered at all times. I live in Tierra del Fuego, and it’s my job to come down here with any expedition that doesn’t look on the up-and-up. You know they might want to do some illegal mining or something like that. Nine times out of ten it turns out to be a false alarm. But this time — I heard that radio conversation, Hodges. I also did some exploring down here. There’s a jet sled, but it would take two to handle it —”

“That’s exactly what I was thinking!”

“Okay. If we can get out of here on that sled, Fairchild and the others will be trapped. They won’t have any way of getting out at all, not until late spring, and by then they’ll be on their way to jail, anyway. How does it sound?”

“It’s still exactly what I was thinking,” Pete told him. “Only catch is, we’re liable to have some trouble getting that sled upstairs with all the equipment we’ll need.”

Joe shrugged. “You want to do something and there are ways. Don’t get me wrong, I’m just talking off the top of my head now, but there’s a lock on that bunk-room door. If we can get all of them, or most of them, inside, we can probably bring the sled upstairs before they can hammer their way out.”

Pete nodded eagerly. “Why not?” he demanded. “Why not?”

Joe was laughing softly. “How do you feel about it right now?”

“Why — fine!”

“Well, I don’t want to rush you or anything, but they’re all asleep inside. All we have to do is lock the door and beat it. . .”

They had been whispering, and when they suddenly heard a loud voice, it startled them both. Sam Smith stood in the doorway, a blaster in his hand.

“Ain’t that nice,” he said. “Ain’t that just dandy!” Joe started toward him, cat-quick.

“No — keep back! That’s right, friend. Don’t take another step. As for you, Petey-boy, I’m surprised at you. I thought you was one of the crew.”

Tears of rage and frustration welled up in Pete’s eyes. If only he could wipe that insolent leer off Sam’s face. Trouble was, every time it looked as if he could extricate himself from this mess, he only succeeded in digging himself in a little deeper. The way things shaped up now, it could go on indefinitely, for once the pirate ships came to Earth he’d have no choice but to help them land.

“. . . lucky I’m a restless sleeper,” Sam was saying, “And you guys whisper like a couple of bullfrogs arguing. I think we’ll step inside to the bunk room and let everyone know what you was thinking.”

He waved his blaster, prodded them ahead of him through the hallway. Soon they stood in the large bunk room, and Sam walked around for a moment.

After everyone was awake, after Mr. Fairchild lighted his inevitable cigarette, Sam quickly related all that had happened. No embroidery. Merely the facts. But that was enough.

Mr. Fairchild dropped his glowing cigarette to the floor, stamped it out with a slippered foot. “How sneaking can they get?” he wanted to know. “The Government, I mean. Sending an agent along as an uneducated native of Tierra del Fuego. A man can’t trust his best friend —”

“You wouldn’t trust your best friend anyway,” Joe told him bitterly. “The only reason you trusted me was because you were fooled completely. Does that answer your question about the Government? With men like you around, it’s a necessary thing.”

“He even yaps like a Government pamphlet,” Sam sneered. “Boss, I could take them upstairs and let them see how it’s like to live in Antarctica.”

“Die, you mean!” cried Ganymede Gus. “No, I can’t let you do that. I may have been responsible for a lot of shady things in my time, but never any killing. You’re not going to kill anyone now.”

Mr. Fairchild smiled. “Who said anything about killing? Sam here has an overripe imagination. Don’t you realize that we need Pete, as much as ever? As for Mr. Ushuaia Joe, if you kill a Government man you’ll have every law-enforcing agency on the planet after you. But that poses a problem. It certainly does. If we ever let this Indian go, he’ll lead the police right to us.”

“In that case,” Clarence suggested, still rubbing sleep from his eyes, “we’ll have to . . .”

“Hey, listen, everybody!” Sam chortled. “Clare has an idea!”

“Aw, lay off! I was only — and don’t you call me that!”

Mr. Fairchild shook his head. “Stop your bickering and let me do the thinking. I don’t pay you two for that. At any rate, what we’ll have to do is this: we’ll have to arrange an accident for Mr. Ushuaia Joe, but I fear that will come much later, when we’re back in civilization and people can see that accident. Meanwhile, we’ll have to watch Joe, and Peter too. Remember, I don’t want anything to happen to Peter. We need him. He can still cooperate, or we can make him do what we want, but one way or the other we need him.

“Now,” Mr. Fairchild yawned, “I’m going to sleep.”

Gus muttered, “I think I’m sorry I ever got into this. I was a spaceman once, and a pretty good one, too. The life of the race they called me and my kind. But look at me now. Just look at me.”

“You’re being melodramatic,” Mr. Fairchild told him. “I’m sure you’ll get over it in the morning. Anyway, Gus, you and I can get some sleep, but I want Sam and Clarence to keep an eye on these two. Suppose you take them into the storeroom and watch them there.”

“Well,” Sam growled, “I’m kind of sleepy.”

“‘You’ll get a chance to sleep later. Take them inside.”

Still growling, Sam led Pete and the Indian back to the storeroom. Wordlessly, Clarence followed them.

An hour fled. Two. It was not particularly warm, but Pete began to sweat. If they didn’t act soon, they’d never get the chance. Once the pirate ships came in, things would become too complicated. They would not have two guards at any given time. They might have a dozen.

At first Sam and Clarence sat on packing cases, and Sam drew out a grubby pack of cards. They started to play Venus rummy. But Sam soon tired of it, stretched his long, muscular arms, leaned back against the wall. Before long he was snoring regularly. The sound must have made Clarence restless, for he began to fidget.

Clarence lit a cigarette, snuffed it out, lit another one. Pete and Ushuaia Joe were silent, utterly silent. Clarence got up, paced back and forth. Finally, he snapped:

“Say something, will you? That guy’s snoring can drive you crazy!” Clarence took out a handkerchief and began to polish the barrel of his blaster.

Joe shrugged. “What do you want us to talk about, Clare?”

“Clare! Don’t call me that. Only Sam, Sam’s the only one that does it. But no one else, see? I can’t help it if my mother named me Clarence.”

A thug with an inferiority complex
, Pete thought idly.

“A tough egg like you should have changed your name, Clare,” Joe persisted.

“Hey, cut it out!”

“You asked me to talk, Clare. I’m talking.
Clare
.”

Without warning, Clarence hit him, hard stinging blows with his open palm. Then he quickly jumped back gripping his blaster nervously. “Lay off,” he pleaded.

Joe
tch-tchd
before speaking. “I thought a big boy like you could hit much harder than that, Clare.”

“Shut up!”

“‘Relax, Clare. You’ll wake Sam. Then he’ll be real angry and he’ll call you Clare, Clare.”

As if in response to that, Sam grunted, shook himself. But he turned his head to the wall and soon he was snoring again.

“See, he’s asleep!” Clarence cried.

“He won’t stay asleep if you keep yelling like that, Clare.”

Pete had been too deep in thought until now to realize what the Government agent was attempting. But now he said, “I’ll bet you’re sleepy too, Clare.”

“Naw, I — stop that! Don’t call me that.”

“Clare,
shh!
” Smiling, Joe raised a finger to his lips for silence. “Go ahead. Show us what a big tough thug you are by hitting me again while you have a blaster in your hand — Clare.”

“I’m warning you. My name is Clarence. C-l-a-r —”

“What? No nickname? Well, Clare will do.”

“Stop it!” And Clarence took two quick steps toward him, lifted his blaster high overhead and brought it down. Usuaia Joe was quicker.

He brought his hands up, grabbing Clarence’s wrist. Startled, the thug began to struggle, but in another moment the blaster clattered to the floor. Joe’s hand clamped over Clarence’s mouth and his screams were muffled.

The commotion had disturbed Sam’s sleep and he shook himself like a big jungle animal. He got to his feet groggily, took the situation in with one glance and darted toward the struggling figures.

Pete scooped the blaster off the floor and waved him back. “Keep out of it,” he said, then turned halfway to face the writhing, kicking Clarence. “That’s enough, Clare. It’s all right, Joe, you can release him. If either one of them makes a sound, this blaster goes off.” Pete almost smiled when he said that. He did not quite know if he meant it or not. He didn’t think he could bring himself to shoot anyone, but neither Sam nor Clarence would know that.

Clarence stood in a corner, panting. But Sam was still cocky. “Okay, so you have the blaster. Only what are you going to do now?”

“See that sled?” Ushuaia Joe asked. “We’re not going to do anything. But you and Clare are going to take that sled through the hall, and you’re going to carry it upstairs for us. Now.”

The jet sled was heavy, and Sam grumbled as he lifted one end of it. Clarence did not make a sound as he lifted the other. Joe climbed into a fur coat, boots, a hood. Then he took the blaster from Pete. Soon they both were bundled in winter garments.

“Ready?” Joe demanded.

Pete nodded.

“All right, you two. Let’s move.”

Struggling with the heavy sled, Sam and Clarence got as far as the bunk room door. Sam, who was in front, paused. The hallway was narrow, and with Clarence and the sled in front of them, Pete and his companion could only urge Sam on with hoarse whispers.

“I’m going,” he responded. “I’m — heck, I’m sorry!”

It was as simple as that. He dropped the sled.

It bounced off the wall, slammed against the door, crashed to the floor. The noise might not be enough to awaken the dead, Pete realized, but it would be more than sufficient to awaken Mr. Fairchild. . . .

He came through the door almost at once, another blaster in his hands. “What’s going on? Where do you think you’re taking that sled? What — oh!”

He’d seen Pete and Joe. “I can’t even get some sleep,” he said, “without trouble. I don’t want to sound trite, Mr. Ushuaia Joe, but how does the old expression go: drop that gun? Drop it!”

Joe looked at Pete. Pete looked back at Joe, shrugged helplessly. Mayhem wasn’t their idea. They wanted out in the worst sort of way, but mayhem wouldn’t be the answer. If they wanted to, they could fall down behind the sled and start blasting, but it would be far from pretty in the narrow confines of that hallway. Explosive pellets would ricochet off the walls, turning the place into a slaughterhouse.

Ushuaia Joe dropped his blaster to the floor. Clarence worked his way back along the edge of the sled to retrieve it, as Mr. Fairchild said:

“Peter we still need, although I suspect the boy will never learn. Joe, however, is a different case. Joe’s useful qualities were doubtful at best, and now they have vanished completely. We have no choice but to eliminate him.”

“Let me,” Clarence suggested hopefully, still working his way back to the blaster.

“Well, I suppose —”

But Mr. Fairchild did not finish. Something leaped on his back, brought him down to the floor. Ganymede Gus!

The two of them rolled over against the side of the sled, grappled there. Gus was shouting almost hysterically as they fought. “I heard what you said about murder. That’s enough for me! Maybe for the last twenty years I’ve been wrong. I don’t know. But I’m not going to be wrong any more. No sir, not me! I was — proud once — and I — had a — right to be. Me, a spaceman. The life of the race, like I said. Then I guess — I — kind of — degenerated, but now — I’ve learned — my lesson.”

They fought for the blaster as he spoke, but Mr. Fairchild still held it, forced it slowly in toward Gus, forced it closer. . . .