Complete Short Fiction, page 60
“But we must expect an attack of some kind. I only hope one of the great Galactics doesn’t take part in it.”
“One of them!” Her whisper was a gasp, then she snapped irritably, “Don’t try to scare me. You’ve told me time and again that—”
“All right, all right!” He spoke grudgingly, wearily. “A million years have proven that they consider us beneath their personal attention. And”—in spite of his appalling weakness, scorn came—“let any of the kind of agents they have in these lower category planets try to stop us.”
“Hush!” Her whisper was tense. ““Footsteps! Quick, get to your feet!”
He was aware of the shadowed form of her rising; then her hands were tugging at him. Dizzily, he stood up.
“I don’t think,” he began wanly, “that I can—”
“Jeel!” Her whisper beat at him; her hands shook him. “It’s a man, and a woman. They’re ‘life,’ Jeel, ‘life’ !”
Lite!
He straightened with a terrible effort. A spark of the unquenchable will to live that had brought him across the black miles and the blacker years, burst into flames inside him. Lightly, swiftly, he fell into, step beside Merla, and strode beside her into the open. He saw the shapes of the man and the woman.
In the half-night under the trees of that street, the couple came towards them, drawing aside to let them pass; first the woman came, then the man—and it was as simple as if all his strength had been there in his muscles.
He saw Merla launch herself at the man; and then he was grabbing the woman, his head bending instantly for that abnormal kiss—
Afterwards—after they had taken the blood, too—grimness came to the man, a hard fabric of thought and counterthought, that slowly formed into purpose; he said:
“We’ll leave the bodies here.”
Her startled whisper rose in objection, but he cut her short harshly: “Let me handle this. These dead bodies will draw to this city news gatherers, news reporters or whatever their breed are called on this planet; and we need such a person now. Somewhere in the reservoir of facts possessed by a person of this type must be clues, meaningless to him, but by which we can discover the secret base of the Galactic Observer in this system. We must find that base, discover its strength, and destroy it if necessary when the tribe comes.”
His voice took on a steely note: “And now, we’ve got to explore this city, find a much frequented building, under which we can bury our ship, learn the language, replenish our own vital supplies—and capture that reporter.
“After I’m through with him”—his tone became silk smooth—“he will undoubtedly provide you with that physical diversion which you apparently crave when you have been particularly chemical.” He laughed gently, as her fingers gripped his arm in the darkness, a convulsive gesture; her voice came: “Thank you, Jeel; you do understand, don’t you?”
II.
Behind Leigh, a door opened. Instantly the clatter of voices in the room faded to a murmur. He turned alertly, tossing his cigarette onto the marble floor, and stepping on it, all in one motion.
Overhead, the lights brightened to daylight intensity; and in that blaze he saw what the other eyes were already staring at: the two bodies, the man’s and the woman’s, as they were wheeled in.
The dead couple lay side by side on the flat, gleaming top of the carrier. Their bodies were rigid, their eyes closed; they looked as dead as they were, and not at all, Leigh thought, as if they were sleeping.
He caught himself making a mental note of that fact—and felt abruptly shocked.
The first murders on the North American continent in twenty-seven years. And it was only another job. By Heaven, he was tougher than he’d ever believed.
He grew aware that the voices had stopped completely. The only sound was the hoarse breathing of the man nearest him—and then the scrape of his own shoes as he went forward.
His movement acted like a signal on that tense group of men. There was a general pressing forward. Leigh had a moment of hard anxiety; and then his bigger, harder muscles brought him where he wanted to be, opposite the two heads.
He leaned forward in dark absorption. His fingers probed gingerly the neck of the woman, where the incisions showed. He did not look up at the attendant, as he said softly:
“This is where the blood was drained?”
“Yes.”
Before he could speak again, another reporter interjected: “Any special comment from the police scientists? The murders are more than a day old now. There ought to be something new.”
Leigh scarcely heard. The woman’s body, electrically warmed for embalming, felt eerily lifelike to his touch. It was only after a long moment that he noticed her lips were badly, almost brutally, bruised.
His gaze flicked to the man; and there were the same neck cuts, the same torn lips. He looked up, questions quivered on his tongue—and remained unspoken as realization came that the calm-voiced attendant was still talking. The man was saying:—normally, when the electric embalmers are applied, there is resistance from the static electricity of the body. Curiously, that resistance was not present in either body.”
Somebody said: “Just what does that mean?”
“This static force is actually a form of life force, which usually trickles out of a corpse over a period of a month. We know of no way to hasten the process, but the bruises on the lips show distinct burns, which are suggestive.”
There was a craning of necks, a crowding forward: and Leigh allowed himself to be pushed aside. He stopped attentively, as the attendant said: “Presumably, a pervert could have kissed with such violence.”
“I thought,” Leigh called distinctly, “there were no more perverts since Professor Ungarn persuaded the government to institute his brand of mechanical psychology in all schools, thus ending murder, theft, war and all unsocial perversions.” The attendant in his black frock coat hesitated; then: “A very bad one seems to have been missed.” He finished: “That’s all, gentlemen. No clues, no promise of an early capture, and only this final fact: We’ve wirelessed Professor Ungarn and, by great good fortune, we caught him on his way to Earth from his meteorite retreat near Jupiter. He’ll be landing shortly after dark, in a few hours now.”
The lights dimmed. As Leigh stood frowning, watching the bodies being wheeled out, a phrase floated out of the gathering chorus of voices:
“—The kiss of death—”
“I tell you,” another voice said, “the captain of this space liner swears it happened—the spaceship came past him at a million miles an hour, and it was slowing down, get that, slowing down—two days ago.”
“—The vampire case! That’s what I’m going to call it—”
That’s what Leigh called it, too, as he talked briefly into his wrist communicator. He finished: “I’m going to supper now, Jim.”
“O.K., Bill.” The local editor’s voice came metallically. “And say, I’m supposed to commend you. Nine thousand papers took the Planetarian Service on this story, as compared with about forty-seven hundred who bought from Universal, who got the second largest coverage.
“And I think you’ve got the right angle for today also. Husband and wife, ordinary young couple. taking an evening’s walk. Some devil hauls up alongside them, drains their blood into a tank, their life energy onto a wire or something—people will believe that, I guess. Anyway, you suggest it could happen to anybody; so be careful, folks. And you warn that, in these days of interplanetary speeds, he could be anywhere tonight for his next murder.
“As I said before, good stuff. That’ll keep the story frying hard for tonight. Oh, by the way—”
“Shoot!”
“A kid called half an hour ago to see you. Said you expected him.”
“A kid?” Leigh frowned to himself.
“Name of Patrick. High school age, about sixteen. No, come to think of it, that was only my first impression. Eighteen, maybe twenty, very bright, confident, proud.”
“I remember now,” said Leigh, “college student. Interview for a college paper. Called me up this afternoon. One of those damned persuasive talkers. Before I knew it, I was signed up for supper at Constantine’s.”
“That’s right. I was supposed to remind you. O.K.?”
Leigh shrugged. “I promised,” he said. Actually, as he went out into the blaze of late afternoon, sunlit street, there was not a thought in his head. Nor a premonition.
Around him, the swarm of humankind began to thicken. Vast buildings discharged the first surge of the five o’clock tidal wave—and twice Leigh felt the tug at his arm before it struck him that someone was not just bumping him.
He turned, and stared down at a pair of dark, eager eyes set in a brown, wizened face. The little man waved a sheaf of papers at him. Leigh caught a glimpse of writing in longhand on the papers. Then the fellow was babbling:
“Mr. Leigh, hundred dollars for these . . . biggest story—”
“Oh,” said Leigh. His interest collapsed; then his mind roused itself from its almost blank state; and pure politeness made him say: “Take it up to the Planetarian office. Jim Brian will pay you what the story is worth.”
He walked on, the vague conviction in his mind that the matter was settled. Then, abruptly, there was the tugging at his arm again.
“Scoop!” the little man was muttering. “Professor Ungarn’s log, all about a spaceship that came from the stars. Devils in it who drink blood and kiss people to death!”
“See here!” Leigh began, irritated; and then he stopped physically and mentally. A strange ugly chill swept through him. He stood there, swaying a little from the shock of the thought that was frozen in his brain:
The newspapers with those details of “blood and “kiss” were not on the street yet, wouldn’t be for another five minutes.
The man was saying: “Look, it’s got Professor Ungarn’s name printed in gold on the top of each sheet, and it’s all about how he first spotted the ship eighteen light years out, and how it came all that distance in a few hours . . . and he knows where it is now and—”
Leigh heard, but that was all. His reporter’s brain, that special, highly developed department, was whirling with a little swarm of thoughts that suddenly straightened into a hard, bright pattern; and in that tightly built design, there was no room for any such brazen coincidence as this man coming to him here in this crowded street.
He said: “Let me see those!” And reached as he spoke.
The papers came free from the other’s fingers into his hands, but Leigh did not even glance at them. His brain was crystal-clear, his eyes cold; he snapped:
“I don’t know what game you’re trying to pull. I want to know three things, and make your answers damned fast! One: How did you pick me out, name and job and all, here in this packed street of a city I haven’t been in for a year?”
He was vaguely aware of the little man trying to speak, stammering incomprehensible words. But he paid no attention. Remorselessly, he pounded on:
“Two: Professor Ungarn is arriving from Jupiter in three hours. How do you explain your possession of papers he must have written, less than two days ago?”
“Look, boss,” the man chattered, “you’ve got me all wrong—”
“My third question,” Leigh said grimly, “is how are you going to explain to the police your preknowledge of the details of—murder?”
“Huh!” The little man’s eyes were glassy, and for the first time pity came to Leigh. He said almost softly:
“All right, fellah, start talking.”
The words came swiftly, and at first they were simply senseless sounds; only gradually did coherence come.
“—And that’s the way it was, boss. I’m standing there, and this kid comes up to me and points you out, and gives me five bucks and those papers you’ve got, and tells me what I’m supposed to say to you and—”
“Kid!” said Leigh; and the first shock was already in him.
“Yeah, kid about sixteen; no, more like eighteen or twenty . . . and he gives me the papers and—”
“This kid,” said Leigh, “would you say he was of college age?”
“That’s it, boss; you’ve got it. That’s just what he was. You know him, eh? O.K., that leaves me in the clear, and I’ll be going—”
“Wait!” Leigh called, but the little man seemed suddenly to realize that he need only run, for he jerked into a mad pace; and people stared, and that was all. He vanished around a corner, and was gone forever.
Leigh stood, frowning, reading the thin sheaf of papers. And there was nothing beyond what the little man had already conveyed by his incoherent word of mouth, simply a vague series of entries on sheets from a loose-leaf notebook.
Written down, the tale about the spaceship and its occupants lacked depth, and seemed more unconvincing each passing second. True, there was the single word “Ungarn” inscribed in gold on the top of each sheet but—
Leigh shook himself. The sense of silly hoax grew so violently that he thought with abrupt anger: If that damned fool college kid really pulled a stunt like—
The thought ended; for the idea was as senseless as everything that had happened.
And still there was no real tension in him. He was only going to a restaurant.
He turned into the splendid foyer that was the beginning of the vast and wonderful Constantine’s.
In the great doorway, he paused for a moment to survey the expansive glitter of tables, the hanging garden tearooms; and it was all there.
Brilliant Constantine’s, famous the world over—but not much changed from his last visit.
Leigh gave his name, and began: “A Mr. Patrick made reservations, I understand—”
The girl cut him short. “Oh, yes, Mr. Leigh. Mr. Patrick reserved Private for you. He just now phoned to say he’d be along in a few minutes. Our premier will escort you.”
Leigh was turning away, a vague puzzled thought in his mind at the way the girl had gushed, when a flamelike thought struck him: “Just a minute, did you say Private 3? Who’s paying for this?”
The girl glowed at him: “It was paid by phone. Forty-five hundred dollars!”
Leigh stood very still. In a single, flashing moment, this meeting that, even after what had happened on the street, had seemed scarcely more than an irritation to be gotten over with, was become a fantastic, abnormal thing.
Forty-five—hundred—dollars! Could it be some damned fool rich kid sent by a college paper, but who had pulled this whole affair because he was determined to make a strong, personal impression?
Coldly, alertly, his brain rejected the solution. Humanity produced egoists on an elephantiastic scale, but not one who would order a feast like that to impress a reporter.
His eyes narrowed on an idea: “Where’s your registered phone?” he asked curtly.
A minute later, he was saying into the mouthpiece: “Is that the Amalgamated Universities Secretariat? . . . I want to find out if there is a Mr. Patrick registered at any of your local colleges, and, if there is, whether or not he has been authorized by any college paper to interview William Leigh of the Planetarian News Service. This is Leigh calling.”
It took six minutes, and then the answer came, brisk, tremendous and final: “There are three Mr. Patricks in our seventeen units. All are at present having supper at their various official residences. There are four Miss Patricks similarly accounted for by our staff of secretaries. None of these seven is in any way connected with a university paper. Do you wish any assistance in dealing with the impostor?”
Leigh hesitated; and when he finally spoke, it was with the queer, dark realization that he was committing himself. “No,” he said, and hung up.
He came out of the phone box, shaken by his own thoughts. There was only one reason why he was in this city at this time. Murder! And he knew scarcely a soul. Therefore—
It was absolutely incredible that any stranger would want to see him for a reason not connected with his own purpose. He shook the ugly thrill out of his system; he said:
“To Private 3, please—”
Tensed but cool, he examined the apartment that was Private 3. Actually that was all it was, a splendidly furnished apartment with a palacelike dining salon dominating the five rooms, and one entire wall of the salon was lined with decorated mirror facings, behind which glittered hundreds of bottles of liquors.
The brands were strange to his inexpensive tastes, the scent of several that he opened heady and—quite uninviting. In the ladies’ dressing room was a long showcase displaying a gleaming array of jewelry—several hundred thousand dollars’ worth, if it was genuine, he estimated swiftly.
Leigh whistled softly to himself. On the surface, Constantine’s appeared to supply good rental value for the money they charged.
“I’m glad you’re physically big,” said a cool voice behind him. “So many reporters are thin and small.”
It was the voice that did it, subtly, differently toned than it had been over the phone in the early afternoon. Deliberately different.
The difference, he noted as he turned, was in the body, too, the difference in the shape of a woman from a boy, skillfully but not perfectly concealed under the well-tailored man’s suit—actually, of course, she was quite boyish in build, young, finely molded.
And, actually, he would never have suspected if she had not allowed her voice to be so purposefully womanish. She echoed his thought coolly:
“Yes, I wanted you to know. But now, there’s no use wasting words. You know as much as you need to know. Here’s a gun. The spaceship is buried below this building.”
Leigh made no effort to take the weapon, nor did he even glance at it. Instead, cool now, that the first shock was over, he seated himself on the silk-yielding chair of the vanity dresser in one corner, leaned heavily back against the vanity itself, raised his eyebrows, and said:
