Entities: The Selected Novels of Eric Frank Russell (62 page)

“So the crew died and you’ve not the faintest notion of where their ship is planted?” inquired King, by this time toying with the theory that Harper was off his nut but puzzled to find a plausible reason why so shrewd an individual as Jameson had become equally cracked. “Nevertheless you
know
that the ship has returned?”

“I’d bet a million dollars on it.”

“It made the trip all on its ownsome? A unique spatial convulsion flung it thirty million miles or more across the void and dumped it someplace unknown to all and unsuspected by anyone but you?”

“Your sarcasm is pointless, doesn’t help any and furthermore it gives me a pain in the seat,” snapped Harper, becoming tough. “The ship was brought here by a bunch of Venusians. How d’you like that, eh?”

King didn’t like it at all. His mind unhesitatingly rejected the bald statement, started sorting out a dozen objections and deciding which to voice first.

The bespectacled man on his right took advantage of the pause to chip in and speak to Harper as one would do a wayward child.

“Piloting a space-ship is not an easy matter.”

“No, Mr. Smedley, I guess it isn’t.”

“It’s highly technical. It requires a great deal of know-how.”

“That,” said Harper, “is precisely the hell of it.”

“What do you mean?”

“Anyone who can hijack a ship and run it forthwith, without any tuition, can take over anything else we’ve got with as little trouble.” He gave them a few seconds to stew the point, then added for good measure, “Bit by bit, piece by piece, until they have everything and we have nothing—not even our souls.”

“That idea is detestable,” said King, beginning to feel cold.

“It should be,” agreed Harper. “And further, you’d do well to abandon this latest notion you’re concocting.”

“What notion?”

“That I’m the agent of a scheming gang across the ocean who, in some mysterious way, are trying to pull a fast one. All that feuding is over as from today. They’re in the same mess along with the rest of humanity and the sooner that’s realized the better. They’re going to become just as scared as I am right now.”

“I doubt it. They’ll be equally suspicious. They’ll blame us for trying to disturb the world with a better and bigger bogey.”

“It won’t matter a cuss who blames whom when we’re no longer human. Come to that, we won’t be mentally capable of apportioning blame.”

King argued stubbornly, “It seems to me that you’re taking a devil of a lot for granted on the basis of very little evidence. That evidence may be real enough to you. To us it comes secondhand. Even if we accept Jameson’s statement that you are a genuine telepath, even if we take at face value the symptoms of it which you have displayed in this room, the fact remains that you’re just as capable as anyone else of imagining things. I can conceive no logical reason for supposing that a telepath is impervious to delusions. Do you seriously expect us to alert the entire defenses of this country on the strength of an unproven story?”

“No, I don’t,” admitted Harper. “I’m not that daft.”

“Then what do you expect of us?”

“Firstly, I wanted official confirmation of my suspicion that a ship really has been sent somewhere beyond the Moon. That is why I came all the way here and avoided being picked up by local police who know too little and bark too much. Somehow or other I
had
to learn about that ship.”

“Secondly?”

“I now expect action within reasonable limits. If it produces the proof you require I expect further action on a national scale.”

“It is far easier to talk about getting proof than to go out and dig it up. If proof exists why didn’t you find it yourself and bring it with you? Surely your own commonsense should tell you that the wilder a story the more proof it requires to make convincing?”

“I know,” said Harper. “And I reckon I could have got enough to make you leap out of your shirt if only I’d possessed an item hidden in your top-secret files.”

“To what are you referring?”

“The photographs of those three spacemen.” He eyed King and his confreres with the sorrowful reproof of one surprised by their inability to perceive the obvious. “We have a witness who got a good, close look at two of those three and made careful note of them. Show him your pictures. If he says they’re the boys, that settles it. The balloon goes up next minute.”

Jameson waggled his eyebrows and put in, “Yes, that is the logical move. It should decide the matter one way or the other. We can do better than that, too. We can remove any element of doubt.”

“How?” inquired King.

“That Thunderbug must have come from somewhere. It may have traveled hundreds of miles before reaching the fateful spot. A dozen, twenty or forty people may have noticed it and the three men with it. I can put agents on the job of tracing that back-track and finding the witnesses. If all of them say the same thing, namely, that those three men are your missing pilots—” He let it die out, thereby making it sound highly sinister.

“To enable you to do that,” King pointed out, “we would have to get those photographs released from secret files and provide you with a large number of copies."

“Of course.”

“But that means the general dissemination of reserved data.”

Harper emitted a loud groan, rubbed his jaw and recited the names of the twelve apostles.

Staring at him distastefully, King said, “I’ll see what the appropriate department decides.”

“While you’re at it,” Harper suggested, “you can persuade some other appropriate department to seize the body of Jocelyn Whittingham and subject it to an expert autopsy. I don’t know whether that will tell us anything, but it might. The bet is worth taking, anyway.”

“I’ll see what they decide,” repeated King. He went out with visible unwillingness. The remaining three fidgeted and registered the discomfort of men compelled to hold a buck that cannot be passed.

“Have you got a gun?” Harper asked Jameson.

“Yes.”

“Better hold on to it good and tight.”

“Why?”

“Because if he gets nowhere with the higher-ups I’m going to run amok.”

“You’d better not!” warned lameson.

“I’d rather die quickly in a fracas here than slowly someplace else,” said Harper fervently.

The three watched him with open apprehension.

King was gone a long time. Eventually he returned with a heavily built, military-looking man named Benfield. The latter grasped three large photographs which he exhibited to Harper as he spoke.

“Know these fellows?”

“No.”

“Sure of that?”

“I’m positive. They’re complete strangers to me.”

“Humph! Can you say that they answer to the descriptions of the trio you have in mind?”

“Fairly well. I could be more definite if those pics were in color. The uniforms convey nothing in black and white.”

"They are dark green uniforms with silver buttons, gray shirts, green ties.”

“Apart from the silver buttons the details match up.”

“All right. We’ll make an immediate check. Who’s this witness?”

Harper told him about the oldster at the filling station while Benfield made note of it on a scratch-pad.

Benfield said to Jameson, “We’ll try this one first. If the check proves confirmatory we’ll run off enough clear copies to enable your men to follow the back trail. Meanwhile, we’ll radio a set to your office out there. Won’t take them long to determine whether or not this is a gag, will it?”

“A couple of hours,” said Jameson.

“A couple of minutes would be better,” observed Harper. “And how about taking the heat off me while you’re at it?”

“We’ll think about that when the report comes in. If it makes hay of your story we’d better have you examined by a mental specialist.”

“That would be fun,” Harper assured. “He’d play all the kings and I’d play all the aces. In the end you’d have to put
him
away.”

Benfield let it pass. He was taking this tale of telepathic power and all the rest of the story with a sizeable dose of salt. The sole feature that impressed him was that somehow or other a wanted felon had succeeded in talking his way into the higher echelons of Washington. That suggested either a modicum of incredible truth or a superb gift of the gab. But he was just. He was willing to pursue the matter for the sake of finding any factual grain that might be lying around.

“Put him somewhere safe,” Benfield ordered Jameson, “and hold him until we get our reply.”

Harper protested, “D’you think I’m going to run off after coming all the way here?”

“No, I don’t think so—because you’re not going to be given the chance.” He threw Jameson a look of warning, departed with the photographs in his hand.

“We’ll phone you at your H.Q. immediately we hear,” promised King. He stared Harper out of face in effort to reassert authority, continued to stare at the other’s broad back as he went out. But his thoughts skittered wildly around and were not free from fear.

Sitting boredly in Jameson’s office Harper said, “Thanks for the lunch. Before long you can buy me dinner as well.’’ He glanced at his wrist-watch. “It’s three-forty. Why don’t they report direct to you? They’re your men, aren’t they?”

“They have their orders.”

“Yes, I know. Orders from somebody else. At this moment you’re pondering the fact that this business isn’t properly within your bailiwick. The F.B.I. has been called upon to hunt most everything but prodigal space-pilots. That’s how you look at it. And you can’t decide whether anything is likely to come of it.”

“We’ll know in due course.”

“They’re taking long enough to find out.” Harper brooded silently for a couple of minutes, then showed alarm. “What if that oldster is dead and no longer able to identify anything?”

“Any particular reason why he might be?” inquired Jameson, surveying him keenly. “Yes. Those three may have figured things out for themselves and returned to shut his mouth.”

“Why should they do that? Miss Whittingham’s evidence cleared them of suspicion. To involve themselves afresh would be a singularly stupid move; it would redirect attention their way after they’ve succeeded in averting it.”

“You’re examining it from the wrong angle,” declared Harper, “and you err on two counts.”

“Name them.”

“For one, you’re assuming that if guilty they will behave like any other Earthborn thugs who’ve killed a cop. But why should they? The crime doesn’t mean the same to them. For all I know to the contrary they thought as little of it as does some thick-headed farmer who sees a strange bird in the woods, points his gun and shoots it. Maybe it was the rarest bird in the world, now made extinct. Does he give a damn?”

“That’s pretty good reason why they should not come back to shut up the witness,” Jameson pointed out. “They don’t care enough to bother.”

“It’s nothing of the sort. It’s an argument against your supposition that Alderson’s death should be their primary concern. I reckon they’ve a worry far bigger.”

“Such as what?”

“Fear of being identified too soon. They’re not anxious to be recognized as spacemen and never mind the criminal angle. To be spotted as the missing space-crew would start up a transcontinental hunt. At this stage they don’t want to be recognized and pursued. They need time to do whatever they’ve come here to do.” “Since you’re so well-informed,” commented Jameson, a trifle sardonically, “perhaps you can reveal their purpose in coming.”

“God alone knows. But it’s a dirty one. Why else should they try do it on the sly? An honest motive warrants an open approach. The skulker in the shadows is up to no good.”

“You may be making the very same mistake that you’ve just tied on to me,” said Jameson. “You're weighing them up in human terms. That’s not a good way of judging alien purposes, is it?”

Harper sniffed his contempt. “In so far as their actions affect us we must look at them from our own viewpoint. It may well be that they are justifiably rated as the greatest adventurers and biggest patriots in Venusian history. But if their loyal shenanigans are going to cost me a toenail they’re a trio of prize stinkers so far as I’m concerned.”

“I agree with you there.”

“All right. Now that old geezer at the filling station cannot possibly finger them for the murder of Alderson. The most he can do with respect to that is point suspiciously. His evidence wouldn’t hang them in a month of Sundays.” He leaned forward, gaze intent. “But what he
can
do is exactly what they’re trying to get him to do right now. He can look at three pictures, give the nod and start the hunt. There’s only one sure way to prevent him and that is by closing his trap for keeps before it’s too late.”

“That’s clear enough reasoning,” said Jameson, “but it has one major flaw.”

“What is it?”

“All the news channels have publicized details of both the Alderson and Whittingham killings. Everyone from coast to coast knows that you’re wanted for the latter and suspected of the former. The three fugitives know that they don’t fit in this picture and that, in any event, your witness’s description of them would fit a thousand others. There’s nothing whatever in the news to suggest the remotest likelihood of a witness being shown photographs dug out of confidential files in Washington. So why should they deduce that possibility?”

“Because I shot down the Whittingham girl.”

“I don’t understand,” confessed Jameson, frowning.

“Look, I’ve given you the facts as I saw them. They picked up that girl for some reason or other, probably because the opportunity presented itself and they wanted to try their technique. Maybe they’re missionaries making converts and pass up no chances on the general principle of the more the merrier. Anyway, they turned her into another of their own kind. She ceased to be Jocelyn Whittingham but continued to masquerade as such. Don’t ask me how it was done because I don’t know and can’t guess.”

“Well?”

“The big question now is: were they able to learn and remember that girl’s Earth-identity? Or was it something they failed to record either because they viewed it as of no consequence or because it was incomprehensible to them?”