Collected Short Fiction, page 355
“If they have,” Cartwright said, “we’ll remind them again.”
The shaft of Earthshine, through the port, struck Pat Wayland’s face. It softened her smooth features, and her blond hair shone. Her eyes were dark and grave.
“I wonder,” she whispered, “what has happened to Lyman.”
“We all do, I guess,” Cartwright said. “Perhaps we’ll find out, on Earth. But, first we eat.”
“And shave,” said Captain Drumm. Five hours later, the Pioneer dropped toward Star City, on the Pacific coast. Three decades had made it a splendid metropolis, the graceful pylons of its buildings wide-scattered across verdant parklands.
The parks were crowded today, for the Utopians had planned a festival to honor the return of the Four. An escort of gay-painted geoflexor ships guided the Pioneer to the entrance of the splendid new white glass hall of the Congress of Man, where the committee of welcome was waiting.
AN aging, white-haired man came smiling to take their hands.
“Welcome, Four,” his cracked voice said. “Perhaps you don’t remember me. I am the first man you taught, after the Oblivion. I am the leader of Eden Tower, in the east. Remember?”
Cartwright remembered the tall man who had worn a hotel doorman’s uniform. He nodded, listening.
“We have made a great festival in your honor. For we remember that you came to our aid, after the Oblivion, and taught us how to build Utopia. We have planned displays, to show you the greatness and the splendor that we owe to you.”
Martin Worth’s eyebrows flickered sardonically.
“What about the Holocaust?” Cartwright demanded. “What progress have you made toward saving Earth from collision with the nebula?”
“There is our observatory.”
The aged Utopian beckoned at the dark arid mountains beyond the city. Like a white jewel, shining on a peak, they glimpsed the dome of it.
“The scientists are working there,” he said. “And now the Congress of Man is waiting to receive you. There will be speeches by the greatest of the leaders, and our foremost scientists.”
“Just what, definitely,” Cartwright asked, “have they accomplished?”
“They are following a hundred lines of research,” said the Utopian. “None of them is yet complete—but we have two hundred years, before the Holocaust.”
“Which,” Cartwright said, “is a pretty short time, against the job you have to do.”
“Wait,” the Utopian urged him, “until you see all that we have done—our splendid cities, our new machines, our painting and sculpture, our athletes—all of Utopia.
“Ours is a cooperative world. We have made a place for every individual. There is no hunger or want or idleness. Competition is eliminated. There is no strife or disorder, because all of us hold the same ideals. Every need of every individual is provided for. We are each a part of the one great Plan. Now, the speakers are waiting. Will you receive welcome?”
“Wait,” Cartwright said. “One more question. What about the renegades?”
“They trouble us no more.” The old Utopian shook his head. “They have been almost exterminated. We still keep guards posted in the towers of the barrier, but they seldom even glimpse any of the few renegades that remain.”
“Silver Skull—did you ever learn any more of him?”
“Nothing,” said the Utopian. “He was never seen, after you pursued him back into the forbidden places. The Congress is waiting.”
At last the speeches were done, the tour of cities and factories and laboratories ended. Cartwright made his final promise that the Four would return again in the year 62 of the Oblivion, and every thirty years until the Holocaust. For a last time he urged the tremendous importance of finding a way to escape the nebula. And the Pioneer rose again from Star City.
Looking back at the far-spread splendor of the Utopian metropolis, Cartwright doubtfully shook his yellow head.
“I’M not quite happy about it all,” he said. “It seems to me there is too much ceremony and too many games and too much respect for the Law—and not enough real hard work on the problem.”
“After all,” said Captain Drumm, “they still have two hundred years.”
“That’s just the trouble,” Cartwright said. “Men never have worried very much about what was going to happen to their great-great-grandchildren. Not even the ideophore can make them do that.”
“Anyhow,” Drumm said, “the danger will become more real to them as time goes on. With the fine beginning they have already made, they can’t help going ahead.”
“We’ll see,” said Cartwright, “in the year two thousand and two.
Pat Wayland had been staring silently back at the Earth. Her platinum head turned abruptly, and her blue eyes were grave.
“In Two Thousand Two,” she whispered. “I was thinking of Lyman. By then, he’ll be dead. If he isn’t already. I was just wondering what the ideophore did to him. If—”
Her troubled eyes looked at Cartwright, and Drumm, and Worth.
“Can we land in New York?” she asked. “We might find what became of Silver Skull.”
“I’d like to know,” Cartwright said.
“There’s danger,” Worth reminded them. “The renegades weren’t too friendly to begin with, and thirty years of imprisonment in the barrier fences can’t have made them any kinder.”
“We beat them once,” declared Captain Drumm. “We can do it again.”
They turned the Pioneer toward what had been New York. The sun sank behind them as they approached the ruins. Thirty years, they saw, had made a change. Beyond the white towers that studded the barrier, and the green well-ordered countrysides of Utopia, the old metropolis made a dark, rust-stained blot.
Cartwright brought the ship down in Times Square, to the very spot from which he had watched the Oblivion come. Time-stained buildings towered lonely about them, hail-shattered windows staring blankly.
Weeds had conquered the pavements. Abandoned taxis made little mounds of debris beside the curbs. A few white human bones, here and there, still spoke their mute tales of the Oblivion.
“I wonder—” Cartwright shook his head. “It’s queer there’s no sign at all of the renegades.”
He moved the Pioneer up and down Broadway, dropping to the pavement at a dozen different spots. But there were only weeds and rust and tumbling buildings and those time-bleached bones.
“It’s no use,” said Martin Worth. “The Utopian guards have probably exterminated them.”
Cartwright nodded.
“I think we may as well give it up.”
He had lifted the Pioneer again, when Pat Wayland caught at his arm.
“Look—there’s someone in Central Park. A girl, I think. It looks as if she’s picking flowers.”
CARTWRIGHT brought the little ship down again. The girl stood watching, as it landed near her. She wore a simple brief little dress of flowered print—that, Cartwright knew, must have been manufactured before the Oblivion. She was tall and darkhaired, and her arms and legs were tanned. Holding the bunch of wild flowers against her breast, she watched them, unafraid.
“Pretty,” murmured Captain Drumm.
“Let’s go out and talk to her,” Pat’s blue eyes were shining eagerly. “Probably she can tell us what became of Silver Skull.”
“Better go armed.” Worth thrust paralysis guns at Cartwright and Drumm. “She might not be the simple angel that she looks.”
Cartwright opened the valve, and led the way down to the thick-matted grass. The girl began to retreat from them, toward the old subway entrance at Columbus Circle.
“Hello,” Pat Wayland called to her. “We won’t hurt you.”
“Go away,” the watchful girl shouted back. “I don’t like Outsiders.”
“We just want to talk to you,” returned Pat. “Where are your people?”
“I have no people,” said the girl. “My people are all dead.”
“Did you know Silver Skull?” Pat Wayland’s face was white. “We were friends of Silver Skull.”
“Come, if you were friends of Silver Skull,” the girl called back. “I show you the grave where he is buried.” She let them approach within a few yards of her, and then led the way again toward the old subway. Tall and strong and tanned, moving with an alert quick grace, she was almost beautiful. But some hint of restrained hostility made Cartwright apprehensive. He gripped the little paralysis gun.
“You need have no fear,” she called softly, “for I am all alone. This is the grave of my father.”
She bent over a tangled clump of weeds—and then suddenly rose and swung to face them, with a well-oiled sub-machine gun cradled in her brown arms. Her clear voice pealed out, triumphantly.
“Father! Sam! Harry!”
A little band of silent, grim-faced men rose magically out of the weeds. They were bristling with knives and guns, and came forward with a wary alertness.
Captain Drumm’s hand moved, with the paralysis gun. And the tanned girl swung her heavy weapon to cover him. Her brown face held a mocking smile.
“Don’t move,” she warned. “So you thought my father was dead?”
With a soft little cry, Pat Wayland stared.
Cartwright saw the tall, gray-bearded man striding from the old subway entrance. Despite the wrinkles above the beard, and the stoop of years upon the great shoulders, Cartwright knew him.
It was Silver Skull, who had been Lyman Galt.
CHAPTER XIII
The Meteor
GALT! Staring at the gnarled, stooped old man, Cartwright felt a prickle along his spine. It was uncanny. For it seemed only a few days ago, instead of thirty years, that Lyman Galt had been a young and vigorous man, burning with enthusiasm for his great Plan.
Using his iron-tipped spear for a cane, old Silver Skull came up to them. He beckoned, and two lean men with leveled rifles stepped alertly up beside the tanned girl. Cartwright wondered at something familiar in their darkhaired strength, and then knew that they were the sons of Silver Skull.
Little Mart Worth grinned sardonically at Pat.
“So the ideophore changed him?” he whispered. “It taught him how to set neat little traps.”
The man who had been Lyman Galt spoke in a thin, cracked voice that was still queerly familiar:
“You Outsiders come into Manhat. You kill us when we go out. You fence us in. You shoot us from your towers. Now you come into Manhat. We kill you.” His seamed face grinned at them, amiably. “Is that not right?”
He beckoned to the girl, and she moved to his side with the machine gun. The paralysis gun flashed in the hand of Captain Drumm. But one of the rifles cracked, and the little weapon went spinning away. Drumm nursed his fingers.
“Don’t do that,” Silver Skull grinned wider. “I think we better kill you now.”
Pat Wayland ran suddenly toward him.
“Lyman—wait!” Her voice was urgent, pleading. “Don’t you remember us—your Plan—me?”
Silver Skull stopped her with the point of his spear.
“You pretty, eh?” His hollow eyes surveyed her pale, trembling form. “My sons, Sam, Harry, take you if they want. But I don’t think they want.” He spat. “Outsider women no good. Too soft. You beat them, they die.”
Pat pressed forward until the spear came against her body. She held out her slim arms imploringly.
“Please—Lyman—remember!” Her husky voice was frantic. “Remember that you are Lyman Galt. Remember the nebula! Remember your great Plan, to save mankind from the Holocaust!”
Silver Skull grunted, and shook his gray head.
“I am no Lymangal. I am Silver Skull. I am chief of Manhat. I never saw you. I think you only try to trick me. I think we better kill you.”
He thrust a little with the spear, and the girl went white. She gripped the shaft, and her blue eyes clung desperately to the bearded man.
“Lyman—try to remember. Can’t you remember—long ago—that you loved me?”
Old Silver Skull stepped back a little, and lowered the spear. His gnarled fingerswiped a crimson drop from the point. His hollow eyes stared at the girl. He tugged bewilderedly at his beard.
“I remember a dream,” he mumbled. “He came riding on a horse”—he jerked his head at Captain Drumm—“and killed me with a little death. And I saw a dream.”
His blurred eyes stared past them, and he scratched at his unkempt head.
“The dream showed me many things. I saw a cloud of fire. It’s name is Holocaust. It is coming to burn the world. The Outsiders must try to find a way to escape. If they can.”
HE peered again at Pat and the others.
“You were in the dream. You were called the Four.” His gray head shook, bewilderedly. “You were young in the dream. That was before Sam and Harry came. You still are young.
I don’t know.”
“Oh, Lyman,” sobbed Pat, “I knew you would remember!”
Silver Skull spat.
“I don’t remember. It was a dream. But go.” He shook the spear, angrily. “Get out. Go away. Don’t come back. I think I let you go, this time. But I kill you if you come back again. For I am Silver Skull, chief of Manhat.” Cartwright caught Pat’s arm, and they all started back toward the Pioneer.
“Well, Mart,” the girl said, shakily, “I think the ideophore saved our lives, after all!”
With geodes booming, the Pioneer carried them back to the fortress of the Moon. They dropped in the elevator to the vaults of sleep. Pat Wayland set the clocks to wake them again in the year Two Thousand and Two. The aromatic gas hissed into the sealed chambers, and they slept.
The Moon turned on its axis, spinning the months away. It swung with the Earth about the Sun, counting off the years. In the tiny swarm of the solar system’s worlds, it hurtled northward, decade after decade.
Above the rugged peaks of Arzachel, the Earth hung ever in the northward sky. It spun through its phases, from flaming crescent to misty disk, and disk to crescent again. The lazy blinding Sun crept for two long weeks across the stars, and set for two weeks more of night.
Out of the cosmic infinitude came an atom of metal. A mere few tons of nickel iron. Unglimpsed by the busy astronomers of Utopia, it flashed above the rim of Arzachel, and struck the central peak.
The Moon continued to measure off the months, and the Utopian astronomers saw no change in its rugged face. The Earth swung through the years, to Two Thousand and Two A. D.
That was the year 62 of the Oblivion, and all Utopia joined in a great festival to honor the second return of the Four. Scientists prepared to exhibit their discoveries, and the Congress of Man was called into session, to welcome the Four.
But the appointed day passed, the month, and the year, and the Four did not return.
“Perhaps,” suggested the speaker of the Congress, “the Four have paid Utopia a secret visit, without our knowledge. Or perhaps they were content to observe our work, from their own mysterious place. But surely they will return when another thirty years have gone. For they promised to visit every generation, so the task would not be forgotten.”
A new festival, therefore, was arranged in the year 92 of the Oblivion. But still the Four did not return. There was another festival in the year 122, and in 152, in 182, in 212. The Four did not appear.
“Now they will never come,” declared the director of the last festival. “For the predicted Holocaust will be upon us before another generation.”
And still the Moon and its mother planet moved through the well-ordered complexity of their motions, and the Sun drew its busy family northward. And, out of the galactic infinitude, a pinch of nebular dust moved toward an age-appointed rendezvous.
A rendezvous with the death of all life.
CHAPTER XIV
The World Beneath
CHIEF SILVER SKULL was a rude barbarian. The ideophore increased his knowledge and sharpened his wits, but otherwise it did not change him greatly. The second generation, however, made new advances.
The captured women had known how to write and read the simplified English of Utopia. The ideophore had taught the same art to Silver Skull. The language of the old books in the libraries of New York looked like a different tongue. But one of the sons of Silver Skull learned how to read them, and opened all the knowledge of the Old World to the renegades.
The raids into Utopia were interrupted for a few years by the building of the guarded barrier. But the prisoners in the old metropolis presently found a way to resume them, more cautiously.
From the very first days, the subways had proved useful. Because of the Law, the Utopians had never dared to enter them. They offered a way of passing unseen from one part to another of the ruins, and a sure hiding place from the scouting ships and the guards upon the towers.
It was natural to think of digging a tunnel out under the barrier. When it was done, a new degree of caution was essential to prevent discovery of the entrance. But, through the ideophore, Silver Skull knew enough of the Utopians to warn his sons of all the probable dangers, and their nocturnal forays were successful.
The lives of the renegades and their children were not easy. They lived dangerously in the shadow of Utopia. They got their food by hunting at night in the forests that swiftly reconquered the ruins, by furtively cultivating bits of ground, by fishing in the waters they could reach. They lived without certainty. But each difficulty that they conquered seemed always to prepare them to overcome another.
When the first tunnel was completed, they continued to dig others in search of mineral wealth. At first they dug laboriously, with hand tools. But the spies who went out into Utopia soon brought back the secret of the copper-cathode power tube.
The debris from the new excavations threatened for a time to clog the old subways. But a grandson of Silver Skull devised a compression-lock, through which it could be ejected upon the ocean floor.
Submarines powered by the copper-cathode tubes had no need to betray their existence by rising to the surface. Undersea fleets found the needed raw materials that could not be obtained upon the land.
