The Five Gold Bands (11 page)

“Now enough of this nonsense,” she said. “We’ve got the most important job that’s ever been and all you talk about is Maeve women…”

“Just one little kiss,” pleaded Paddy. “Just so that if the Shauls get us, I’ll die happy. Just a little kiss.”

“No—well, just one… oh, Paddy… All right now, get away from me or I’ll dose your food until you won’t know a woman from a barn owl.”

The next day was quiet. During the morning Fay pursued the ostensible purpose of their visit by making biographical memoranda concerning the life of the late Son at the Propaganda Office.

Paddy visited Dane, the electrician, and took delivery of the ultra-violet projector.

Dane was proud of his work—an aluminum case eight or nine inches on a side with a handle for carrying. Four lenses opened into the front, a power-pack fitted into clips at the back. In a row along the top were four tuners with vernier settings, four output valves, four switches.

“And is it accurate” Paddy asked skeptically.

“Accurate?” cried Dane. “It’s as accurate as the Interworld Standard that I calibrated it by! Three times I checked each one of the circuits and there’s never an offbeat!”

“Good enough and here’s your money with a bit of a bonus.”

During the afternoon a messenger delivered the prints to the pictures they had made the previous day. None was missing nor were there any deletions.

Evening came with its violent flare of color. Paddy and Fay stacked their equipment on the dilapidated old air-boat, rose over Aevelye, took off for Fumighast Ventrole.

Over the mouth of the hole the guard ship pulled up alongside.

The same corporal saluted them, glancing at their makeshift equipment with contemptuous amusement.

“What is it now? More pictures? It’s dark.”

“We’d like to get some night shots,” said Fay. “To get the effect of the lighting and the fluorescence of the rocks. We’ve brought along an ultra-violet projector.”

“So
that’s
why you had that thing built!” said the corporal. He shrugged. “Go to it.”

They dropped away from him into the chasm. “‘So
that’s
why you had that thing built,’” Paddy mimicked in a girlish falsetto. “Strange he didn’t ask when our wedding was to be—they seem so interested in all our doings.”

They landed on the terrace in front of the house and the darkness, faintly luminescent, was like the fog of dreams.

Fay sighed. “If I weren’t so scared and nervous I’d be in love with the place.”

“Maybe we’ll come here on our honeymoon,” said Paddy. She peered at him through the darkness to see whether or not he was serious.

A voice at their elbow said, “Good evening.” It was the Shaul major-domo. “More pictures?”

“More pictures is right,” said Paddy. “We’d like some shots of you making the beds and maybe dumping the garbage down the chute or maybe putting away the famous silver.”

“I’m sorry, I’m afraid that is impossible.”

“In that case, with your permission we’ll just infest the outer grounds.”

“My permission has not been sought,” replied the major-domo with a soft silken edge to his voice. “The orders to throw the grounds open to anyone who chose to drop in came from Aevelye.”

Paddy grinned. “You and I now—we’d made a good pair on the stage.”

The major-domo’s cowl vibrated rapidly. He turned and walked off.

For an hour they took pictures of the villa and the silent garden, using a variety of ultra-violet frequencies. At last they worked their way around to the back terrace.

Paddy turned the projector against the back wall. It fluoresced beautifully in striking patterns of red, fiery yellow, gold, lemon-white. He played frequencies at random over the wall while Fay took pictures.

“Now, Paddy,” whispered Fay. “The four.”

Paddy set the dials. “Got the number of your films?”

“Yes. Three hundred six through three hundred nine, inclusive.”

For a flickering instant Paddy pressed all four switches at once and in that instant the random glowings, lines and loops in the significant square coalesced to form lines of legible characters. They even showed the same pattern as had the other data sheets—two preliminary paragraphs and two columns of figures.

“That’s it,” said Paddy. “Now—one at a time.”

Using each frequency separately, they made four photographs.

“We’ll make a few more,” said Fay, “and then we’ll go.”

“Wonder of wonders,” said Paddy. “I think we’ve got it.”

When at last they rose above Fumighast Ventrole the guardship as before pulled up alongside and the captain requested the camera, the film pack and the ultra-violet projector.

“If the censor finds nothing wrong,” he told them, “you’ll have everything back tomorrow.” Paddy and Fay flew back to their ship.

Again during the morning Fay noted information regarding the dead Shaul Son while Paddy, under the pretext of sealing a leak in the waterline, sought through the ship for spy cells without success.

During the early afternoon a messenger brought them their prints. Fay fanned them out swiftly—306—307—308—309. All there, clean and distinct. When superimposed they would spell out the Shaul fifth of the space-drive engineering.

“I’m off to Room Twelve,” said Paddy. Trotting across the field to the Terminal Building he found Room 12 and recovered their power-arm and keys.

They filled watertanks, shipped two new energy cartridges. As Almach was dropping for its bath in the flaming evening vapors they took off. Presently Shaul was half of a bright orange globe below.

Paddy sighed. “Fay, I’ve lost ten pounds. I’ve—”

“Shhh,” said Fay. “We’d better check the ship for buttons and spy cells.” In an hour, while Paddy encouraged her, she found two audio buttons disguised as rivets and a spy cell on the knob of a high locker.

“Now,” she breathed. “Maybe we can talk—though I still feel jumpy.”

Paddy rose to his feet. “And maybe there’s time for a little kiss or two.”

Fay sighed. “Oh, all right… Now stop it,” she gasped. “
Stop
it, Paddy Blackthorne! You’d never marry a fallen woman and I intend to marry you honest and legal and make you squirm the rest of your life, so you behave yourself— until it’s legal.”

The boat drifted quietly in the great dark emptiness, as remote from the worlds of life as a soul after death. Paddy and Fay sat at the chart table in the observation dome, watching the far stars.

“It’s only now,” said Paddy, “with four-fifths of it behind us, that I’m getting the jitters.”

Fay smiled wanly. She looked tired. Her eyes glowed with an unhealthy brightness, her skin was transparent, her fingers thin, nervous. “That’s the way of anything, Paddy. If you’re desperate any gain looks good. But now—”

“When I was chained on that little asteroid,” said Paddy, “I could think of nothing finer than making off in that beautiful big-domed boat. Sure, I’d take any risk for it. There was nothing for me to lose. Now it’s different. I want to live.

I’ve something to live for.” He looked at her with a glance that was like stroking her hair.

For several minutes they sat in silence. The boat drifted through space at an unknown speed. Perhaps it hung motionless. There was no way of knowing.

Padding stirred. “See it out there—Mirach. It’s staring back at us, daring us to come closer.”

Fay’s hand trembled. She laughed uncertainly. “It does have a funny look. Like one of the Koton eyes.”

Paddy said, “Of all the Langtry races I hate only the Kotons.”

“Probably because they’ve deviated the most.”

Paddy shrugged. “I wonder. The Kotons and the Shauls resemble normal men the most of any. The Shauls have their skin cowls. The Kotons their saucer eyes.”

“It’s something beyond their mere appearance. It’s their psychology. The Shauls are not too far removed from men. Earthers can understand most of their motives. But the Kotons—they’re far far away from any Earthers comprehension. It’s as if they were stuff of their own twilight world.

“To speak to one you’d say here was the strangest most unique individual possible—a creature that might take to the wilderness to be alone with his own peculiarities. And then when you see them at one of their shoutings—”

“Or at a public torturing, like the time I was oiler on the
Christobel Rocket
.”

Fay winced. “—then they’re all the same and you can think of nothing but the rows and rows and rows of big saucer eyes. That’s all you see. Acres of eyes as big as clam-shells. And then you know that they’re all the same in their oddness.”

“Like a race of crazy people. But no,” mused Paddy, “I’d hardly call them mad—”

“It would mean little if you did. They have so few sensibilities in common with the root stock.”

“Few? There’s not
any
.”

“Oh—there are a few. Curiosity—anger—pride.”

“Well, that’s true,” Paddy conceded. “They’re a cowardly crew, some of them, and they have those sex festivals.”

Fay shook her head. “You’re emphasizing the wrong things. Their fear isn’t the fear of Earthers. It’s closer to what we’d call prudence. There’s nothing of panic or fright in it, nothing glandular. And their sex is no more emotional than scratching an itch. Maybe that’s their difference—the fact that their glands and hormones play such minor parts in their personalities.”

Paddy clenched his fists, shoved out his chin. “I hate the vermin as I hate flies and I feel no more pangs killing Kotons than killing flies.”

“I hardly blame you,” said Fay. “They’re very cruel.”

“I’ve heard that they eat human beings and with relish.”

Fay said mournfully, “And why not? Earthers eat pigs and that’s about their attitude.”

Paddy gritted his teeth. “They invented the nerve-suit. What more can you say to their discredit?” He ran his fingers through his hair. “I hate taking you out there, Fay, and putting you to the risk.”

“I’m no better than you are,” she said.

Paddy rose to his feet. “In any case there’s only nonsense in frightening ourselves. Maybe we’ll have it easy.”

Fay read from the last little piece of parchment. “‘The Plain of Thish, where Arma-Geth shows the heroes to the wondering stars. Under my mighty right hand.’ Do you know anything about Arma-Geth, Paddy?”

He nodded, turned to stare at the stars ahead. “It’s a sort of heroes’ memorial in the middle of the plain—‘which may not be marred or imprinted on pain of sore death.’”

Fay stared. “And why do you say the last?”

“That’s their law. It’s a big plain, fifty miles square, I’d say, and as flat as a table. They used a million Armasian and Kudthu and Earther slaves to lay it out level. There’s not a hit of gravel the size of a pea to mar the flat. At the center of the plain are the great statues of all the old Sons. And Sam Langtry himself sits at the head of the aisle.”

“You sound as if you’ve been there.”

“Oh, not me. There’s no one allowed near the plain but the Kotons and few of them. A drunken Shaul woman told me about it once.”

Fay said dully, “You make it sound difficult.”

“If we had an armed cruiser now,” said Paddy, “we might drop smash down beside it, shoot up everything but what we wanted, take off before they could get to us.”

Fay shook her head. “Not on Koto. There are five satellite forts covering every square mile on the planet. They’d have your cruiser broken and white-hot before ten seconds had passed.”

“Oh, well,” said Paddy, “I was just talking—letting my mind loose on wild schemes.”

Fay frowned, bit nervously at her lips. “We’ve got to think of something. With four-fifths of the space-drive in our hands we can’t allow ourselves to be captured.”

“With or without as far as that goes.”

They sat in silence a moment. Then Paddy said, “You’ll drop me low and I’ll parachute into the very center of Arma-Geth. In the dark I’ll get our last sheet and I’ll come out on the plain. There you’ll drop by and pick me up once more.”

“Paddy—are you serious?” Fay asked gently. “Faith and how could I be otherwise? The very thought of the project raises the goose-bumps on my neck.”

“Paddy—you’re too young to die.”

“That I know,” Paddy agreed. “That I know.” He darted a glance across the gulf toward Mirach. “Especially on the public platforms.”

“Just getting near the planet is dangerous,” said Fay. “The forts detect anything coming down to Koto that’s off the regular lanes. They’re not free and easy like the other planets. And if we land at the Montras Field, we’d have to go through that examination again. Except that it probably would be a great deal more thorough.”

Paddy pursed his lips. “If luck’s with us we could make it past the forts.”

“We can’t trust to luck,” said Fay. “We’ve got to use our brains.”

“It’s the old Blackthorn luck,” Paddy reminded her. After a moment he added, “Of course it’s the Blackthorn brains too, which evens it up.”

“Well, use them then!” snapped Fay. “Suppose when I dropped you down you were caught and they tortured everything you knew out of you? All about Delta Trianguli?”

Paddy screwed up his face. “Don’t talk so. It takes away my heart for the venture.”

“But suppose it happened for a fact? And we lost the four sheets? Then they’d have everything.”

Paddy said, “Faith, I believe that if it came to seeing poor Paddy out of the nerve-suit or making sure of the space-drive you’d leave Paddy bellowing there like Bashan’s Bull.”

She inspected him as if from a distance. “Maybe I would.”

Paddy shuddered. “Of all the millions of tender-hearted women in the universe it’s you I went and picked out for a shipmate, one like the Hag of Muckish Mountains, who sold her man to the devil for a groat.”

Fay said coolly, “Control of space means a great deal to Earth. Right now those sheets are hardly safer than if we had them right here in the cabin. Neither one of us can risk being caught.”

Paddy drummed the table with his fingers. “Now if we could only get them safe to the right people on Earth there wouldn’t be this conflict and uncertainty and doubt between us.”

“There’s no conflict and doubt as far as I’m concerned,” said Fay with a trace of bravado. “I love my life and I love you— no, now keep away from me, Paddy—but I love Earth and the old continents and oceans and the good Earth people more.”

“You’re an awful hard woman,” said Paddy. “You’re one of these fanatics.”

She shrugged. “I don’t think so at all. You feel the same way if you’d only stop and put it into words.”

Paddy was not listening. He rubbed his chin, frowned. “Now I wonder—”