The Potter of Firsk and Other Stories (12 page)

Chook gestured to a steaming pot. “Stew.” His voice came from his stomach, a heavy rumble. “Stew is good.” A gust of wind brought the yelping closer. Chook’s arms twitched.

“What causes that outcry, Chook?” demanded Magnus Ridolph, turning a curious ear toward the disturbance.

Chook looked at him quizzically. “Them the Howling Bounders. Very bad. Kill you, kill me. Kill everything. Eat up ticholama.”

Magnus Ridolph seated himself. “Now—I see.” He smiled without humor. “I see!…
Hmph
.”

“Like stew?” inquired Chook, pot ready…

Next morning Magnus Ridolph arose early, as was his habit, strolled into the kitchen. Chook lay on the floor, curled into a gray leathery ball. At Magnus Ridolph’s tread he raised his head, showed an eye, rumbled from deep inside his body.

“I’m going for a walk,” said Magnus Ridolph. “I intend to be gone an hour. When I return we shall have our breakfast.”

Chook slowly lowered his head and Magnus Ridolph stepped out into the cool silence, full into the horizontal light of Naos, just rising from the ocean like a red-hot stove-lid. The air from the ticholama fields seemed very fresh and rich in oxygen, and Magnus Ridolph set off with a feeling of well-being. A half-hour’s walk through the knee-high bushes brought him to the base of the outlying spur and to the patch of land which Blantham had termed poor soil.

Magnus Ridolph shook his head sadly at the devastation. Ticholama plants had been stripped of the purple tubes, ripped up, thrown into heaps. The line of ruin roughly paralleled the edge of the spur. Once again Magnus Ridolph shook his head. “A hundred and thirty thousand munits poorer. I wonder if my increment of wisdom may be valued at that figure?”

He returned to the cottage. Chook was busy at the stove, and greeted him with a grunt.

“Ha, Chook,” said Magnus Ridolph, “and what have we for breakfast?”

“Is stew,” said Chook.

Magnus Ridolph compressed his lips. “No doubt an excellent dish. But do you consider it, so to speak, a staple of diet?”

“Stew is good,” was the stolid reply.

“As you wish,” said Magnus Ridolph impassively.

After breakfast he retired to the study and called into Garswan on the antiquated old radiophone. “Connect me with the T.C.I. office.”

A hum, a buzz. “Terrestrial Corps of Intelligence,” said a brisk male voice. “Captain Solinsky speaking.”

“Captain Solinsky,” said Magnus Ridolph, “I wonder if you can give me any information concerning the creatures known as the Howling Bounders.”

A slight pause. “Certainly, sir. May I ask who is speaking?”

“My name is Magnus Ridolph; I recently acquired a ticholama plantation here, on the Hourglass Peninsula. Now I find that it is in the process of despoliation by these same Howling Bounders.”

The voice had taken a sharper pitch. “Did you say—Magnus Ridolph?”

“That is my name.”

“Just a moment, Mr. Ridolph! I’ll get everything we have.” After a pause the voice returned. “What we have isn’t much. No one knows much about ’em. They live in the Bouro Badlands, nobody knows how many. There’s apparently only a single tribe, as they’re never reported in two places at the same time. They seem to be semi-intelligent simians or anthropoids—no one knows exactly.”

“These creatures have never been examined at close hand?” asked Magnus Ridolph in some surprise.

“Never.” After a second’s pause Solinsky said: “The weird things can’t be caught. They’re elastic—live off ticholama, eat it just before it’s ready to harvest. In the day time they disappear, nobody knows where, and at night they’re like locusts, black phantoms. A party from Carnegie Tech tried to trap them, but they tore the traps to pieces. They can’t be poisoned, a bullet bounces off their hides, they dodge out of heat-beams, deltas don’t phase them. We’ve never got close enough to use supersonics, but they probably wouldn’t even notice.”

“They would seem almost invulnerable, then—to the usual methods of destruction,” was Magnus Ridolph’s comment.

“That’s about it,” said Solinsky brightly. “I suppose a meson grenade would do the trick, but there wouldn’t be much specimen left for you to examine.”

“My interest in these creatures is not wholly impersonal,” said Magnus Ridolph. “They are devouring my ticholama; I want to halt this activity.”

“Well—” Solinsky hesitated. “I don’t like to say it, Mr. Ridolph, but I’m afraid there’s very little you can do—except next year don’t raise so tempting a crop. They only go after the choicest fields. Another thing, they’re dangerous. Any poor devil they chance upon, they tear him to pieces. So don’t go out with a shotgun to scare ’em away.”

“No,” said Magnus Ridolph. “I shall have to devise other means.”

“Hope you succeed,” said Solinsky. “No one ever has before.”

Magnus Ridolph returned to the kitchen, where Chook was peeling starchy blue bush-apples. “I see you are preparing lunch,” said Magnus Ridolph. “Is it—?” He raised his eyebrows interrogatively. Chook rumbled an affirmative. Magnus Ridolph came over beside him, watched a moment. “Have you ever seen one of these Howling Bounders close at hand?”

“No,” said Chook. “When I hear noise, I sleep, stay quiet.”

“What do they look like?”

“Very tall, long arms. Ugly—like men.” He turned a lambent bottle-green eye at Magnus Ridolph’s beard. “But no hair.”

“I see,” said Magnus Ridolph, stroking the beard. He wandered outside, seated himself on a bench, and relaxed in the warm light of Naos. He found a piece of paper, scribbled. A buzz reached his ears, grew louder, and presently Blantham’s copter dropped into his front yard. Blantham hopped out, brisk, cleanly-shaven, his wide-set eyes bright, his jowls pink with health. When he saw Magnus Ridolph, he shaped his features into a frame of grave solicitude.

“Mr. Ridolph, a distressing report has reached me. I understand—I just learned this morning—that those devilish Bounders have been on your plantation.”

Magnus Ridolph nodded. “Yes, something of that nature has been called to my attention.”

“Words can’t convey my sense of guilt,” said Blantham. “Naturally I’d never have saddled you with the property if I’d known…”

“Naturally,” agreed Magnus Ridolph siccatively.

“As soon as I heard, I came over to make what amends I could, but I fear they can only be nominal. You see, last night, as soon as I banked your check, I paid off a number of outstanding debts and I only have about fifty thousand munits left. If you’d like me to take over the burden of coping with those beasts…” He paused, coughed.

Magnus Ridolph looked mildly upward. “That’s exceedingly generous of you, Mr. Blantham—a gesture few men would make. However, I think I may be able to salvage something from the property. I am not completely discouraged.”

“Good, good,” was Blantham’s hasty comment. “Never say die; I always admire courage. But I’d better warn you that once those pestiferous Bounders start on a field they never stop till they’ve run through the whole works. When they reach the cottage you’ll be in extreme danger. Many, many men and women they’ve killed.”

“Perhaps,” Magnus Ridolph suggested, “you will permit the harvester to gather such of my crop as he is able before starting with yours?”

Blantham’s face became long and doleful. “Mr. Ridolph, nothing could please me more than to say yes to your request, but you don’t know these Garswan contractors. They’re stubborn, inflexible. If I were to suggest any change in our contract, he’d probably cancel the entire thing. And naturally, I must protect my wife, my family. In the second place, there is probably little of your ticholama ripe enough to harvest. The Bounders, you know, attack the plant just before its maturity.” He shook his head. “With the best of intentions, I can’t see how to help you, unless it’s by the method I suggested a moment ago.”

Magnus Ridolph raised his eyebrows. “Sell you back the property for fifty thousand munits?”

Blantham coughed. “I’d hardly call it selling. I merely wish—”

“Naturally, naturally,” agreed Magnus Ridolph. “However, let us view the matter from a different aspect. Let us momentarily forget that we are friends, neighbors, almost business associates, each acting only through motives of the highest integrity. Let us assume that we are strangers, unmoral, predatory.”

Blantham blew out his cheeks, eyed Magnus Ridolph doubtfully. “Far-fetched, of course. But go on.”

“On this latter assumption, let us come to a new agreement.”

“Such as?”

“Let us make a wager,” mused Magnus Ridolph. “The plantation here against—say, a hundred thirty thousand munits—but I forgot. You have spent your money.”

“What would be the terms of the wager?” inquired Blantham, inspecting his finger-tips.

“A profit of sixty-nine thousand munits was mentioned in connection with the sale of the property. The advent of the—ah!—Howling Bounders made this figure possibly over-optimistic.”

Blantham murmured sympathetically.

“However,” continued Magnus Ridolph, “I believe that a profit of sixty-nine thousand munits is not beyond reason, and I would like to wager the plantation against 130,000 munits on those terms.”

Blantham gave Magnus Ridolph a long bright stare. “From the sale of ticholama?”

Magnus Ridolph eloquently held his arms out from his sides. “What else is there to yield a profit?”

“There’s no mineral on the property, that’s certain,” muttered Blantham. “No oil, no magnoflux vortex.” He looked across the field to the devastated area. “When those Bounders start on a field, they don’t stop, you know.”

Magnus Ridolph shrugged. “Protecting my land from intrusion is a problem to which a number of solutions must exist.”

Blantham eyed him curiously. “You’re very confident.”

Magnus Ridolph pursed his lips. “I believe in an aggressive attitude toward difficulties.”

Blantham turned once more toward the blighted area, looked boldly back at Magnus Ridolph. “I’ll take that bet.”

“Good,” said Magnus Ridolph. “Let us take your copter to Garswan and cast the wager into a legal form.”

In the street below the notary’s office later, Magnus Ridolph tucked his copy of the agreement into the microfilm compartment of his wallet.

“I think,” he told Blantham, who was watching him covertly with an air of sly amusement, “that I’ll remain in Garswan the remainder of the day. I want to find a copter, perhaps take back a few supplies.”

“Very well, Mr. Ridolph,” and Blantham inclined his head courteously, swung his dark blue cape jauntily across his shoulders. “I wish you the best of luck with your plantation.”

“Thank you,” said Magnus Ridolph, equally punctilious, “and may you likewise enjoy the returns to which you are entitled.”

Blantham departed; Magnus Ridolph turned up the main street. Garswan owed its place as Naos VI’s first city only to a level field of rock-hard clay, originally the site of native fire-dances. There was little else to commend Garswan, certainly no scenic beauty. The main street started at the space-port, wound under a great raw bluff of red shale, plunged into a jungle of snake-vine, inch-moss, hammock tree. The shops and dwellings were half of native-style, of slate slabs with curving gables and hollow end-walls; half dingy frame buildings. There was a warehouse, a local of the space-men’s union, a Rhodopian social hall, an Earth-style drug-store, a side street given to a native market, a copter yard.

At the copter yard, Magnus Ridolph found a choice of six or seven vehicles, all weatherbeaten and over-priced. He ruefully selected a six-jet Spur, and closing his ears to the whine of the bearings, flew it away to a garage, where he ordered it fueled and lubricated.

He stepped into the TCI office, where he was received with courtesy. He requested and was permitted use of the mnemiphot. Seating himself comfortably, he found the code for resilian, ticked it into the selector, attentively pursued the facts, pictures, formulae, statistics drifting across the screen. He noted the tensile strength, about the same as mild steel, and saw with interest that resilian dampened with hesso-penthol welded instantly into another piece of resilian.

He leaned back in his chair, tapped his pencil thoughtfully against his notebook. He returned to the mnemiphot, dialed ahead to the preparation of resilian from the raw ticholama. The purple tubes, he found, were frozen in liquid air, passed through a macerator, which pulverized the binding gums, soaked in hesso-hexylic acid, then alcohol, dried in a centrifuge, a process which left the fibres in a felt-like mat. This mat was combed until the fibers lay parallel, impregnated with hesso-penthol and compressed into a homogeneous substance—resilian.

Again Magnus Ridolph sat back, his mild blue eyes focused on space. Presently he arose, left the office, crossed the street to the headquarters of the local construction company. Here he spent almost an hour; then, returning to the garage, he picked up his copter, and rising high over the jungle, headed south. The jumble of the Bouro Badlands passed below. Hourglass Peninsula spread before him, with his plantation filling the landward half, that of Blantham the remainder.

Naos hung low over the sea when he landed. Chook was standing in the pointed doorway, eyes fixed vacantly across the ticholama field, arms dangling almost to the ground.