Thistlethwaite was bitter, but Link consoled him as well as he could.
"You," he said kindly, "mistake the courtesies of business life for sentiments of deeper importance. You should reform." Thistlethwaite swore despairingly at him.
Darkness fell. Stars shone. The camp quieted. Then, at midnight, there was sudden and dithering uproar.
Tents collapsed. Unicorns made dismal noises, tried to bolt, and finding their tethers bitten through by uffts, high-tailed it for the mountain slopes, with heel-nips to urge them on. Men swore, under blanketing canvas. Men tried to run after the unicorns and uffts ran between their legs and upset them. Those who tried to haul collapsed tents off their fellows suffered similarly irritating upsets. When swearing men crawled out to the open air, uffts nipped their legs and they leaped madly. There was a swarm of shouting uffts all about, ripping at any human or other heel within reach, biting through any ropes that remained intact, and bellowing contradictory orders in fairly good imitations of human voices. They turned the camp into something close to primordial chaos.
Link grunted as one of his own guards was bowled over. He grabbed at Thistlethwaite. He led the way.
A small party of uffts formed around them, clearing the path. Twice, householders or their retainers seemed about to blunder into them, but each time they toppled as running uffts. .h.i.t their knees from behind. Then the entire escort ran zestfully over them in what they considered the fine tradition of the Die-hard Regiment. Before disbanding his army, Link had picked them out, dramatically, for possible secret military action. This was it.
He and Thistlethwaite arrived where the unicorns should be. Around them, their escort boasted of their achievement in releasing Link. He had to warn them that these unicorns, dimly seen in the starlight, were not to be stampeded.
Then he discovered that there were three unicorns, not two. Thana flung reins to Link.
"Come on!" she said fiercely. "Maybe they"ll follow!"
"I"ve got a rear guard," said Link, tranquilly, "and you"d better not come with us, Thana. Better turn your unicorn loose and get back to the camp."
"I won"t!" said Thana. "I told Harl what I was going to do. He asked me to apologize for not coming to see us off."
"Us?" Link"s mouth dropped open. Then he felt good. Remarkably good. He said warmly, "Harl has the best manners of anybody I know!"
They headed up the pa.s.s down which Link had come to surrender. The unicorns climbed. Thistlethwaite fumed and sputtered. He"d built a most extensive structure of dreams upon a supposedly firm business engagement with Old Man Addison. It was now wrecked. And Old Man Addison considered that he should be hanged.Andthe gait of riding-unicorns was excessively unpleasant. But he followed, dismally, the resolute figure of Thana, silhouetted against the stars. Link"s figure was often close to it. Very close.
In an hour they were over the pa.s.s. Thana would have led the way on past the narrow valley in which the Provisional Government had functioned for nine days. But Link turned the animals into the valley bottom and took the others up to the Ufftian Provisional National Capital.
"There"s something in the former Householder"s home that I want to pick up," said Link. "I worked all night at it."
By the time they reached the dreary building, Link had solved the fastening of the saddlebags before him on the unicorn. They were quite large enough for his purpose. He dismounted and pointed out where a cairn of peach-colored rocks had been considerably reduced in size. He explained to Thana why it had been partly pulled down, and what he wanted to carry away. When they entered the great hall of the chair of state she was with him. He showed her what he"d used the peach-colored rocks to be raw material for.
"Pretty!" said Thana.
She helped him with his burden. They had to make two trips, filling up the saddlebags. They remounted and headed down the valley again. Thana said interestedly, "They"re beautiful! I never saw anything like that before!" They went on. And on. And on. When the hills were well behind, Link said, "Thistlethwaite, you welded up everything, including the lifeboat blister. Where"s the oxygen torch?"
Thistlethwaite sputtered a reply.
"We can"t use the ship," said Link cheerfully. "With at least one hull-plate torn off and general structural weakness all over, we"ll have to use the lifeboat."
Thistlethwaite mumbled. A faint, faint light glowed, far away.
"That"s the Household," said Link. "Harl"s Household."
"Y-yes," said Thana in a singularly small voice.
"We can take you there."
"Do you want to?"
"No!" said Link explosively. "No!"
The feeble light in the Household was a guide. Presently they came to the ufft city and the unicorns"
night-vision helped them avoid both the burrows and the mounds of dirt dug out from them. They heard querulous, frightened voices around them. Link stopped.
"My friends," he said profoundly, "this is Link Denham, escaped from your oppressors. I go to function as a government in exile and to prepare for the resurgence of the Ufftian race! I will be back with the means to resume the struggle of the uffts to attain that recognition, that status, that independence of humanity which is their justified aspiration!"
There were cheers, but they were only half-hearted.
"Meanwhile," boomed Link, "follow us. In the ship there are gifts and treasures. You might call them the treasury of the Ufftian Republic. We will distribute them. You may use them in bargains with men! Follow us!"
To Thistlethwaite he said cheerfully, "I"ll pay for the cargo."
Thistlethwaite said bitterly, "If I can"t get it away, I don"t want Old Man Addison to have it!"
They went across the city. They were accompanied, escorted, surrounded by a swarm of uffts. They went beyond the city to the ship. Thistlethwaite, swearing corrosively, produced the oxygen torch.
There came squealings from the distance. Men on unicorns were headed for the ship. They would be, of course, pursuers of Link and Thistlethwaite, who hadn"t spent any time in a diversion like a trip to the Ufftian National Capital. Link rea.s.sumed command. He ordered the uffts to bite the heels of the riding-unicorns, to try to disperse and in any case to delay their pursuers. With a fine, brisk competence he took the oxygen torch and cleared the lifeboat blister so it could be entered and the lifeboat used. He heaved the saddlebags into the boat. He began to open the cargo compartments for the uffts. They swarmed into the ship. As a compartment door came open, they rushed in. They would be rich. They could make beautifully insulting bargains with the humans of Sord Three. They could- There was faint, faint gray light to the east. Link cut his way into the control room to get theGalactic Directory.He came back.
"Where"s Thana? Where"s Thana?" He grew alarmed. She appeared, scared but smiling.
"I . . . wanted to be sure you"d . . . miss me."
He bundled her into the s.p.a.ceboat with the directory. He shoved Thistlethwaite in after her. He opened the outer doors of the lifeboat blister and shouted to the swarming uffts below.
"I shall return! I shall return!"
There was a knot of riding-animals coming from the west. Uffts scurried and raced about them. The men on the unicorns advanced only very slowly in consequence.
Link leaped into the s.p.a.ceboat. He pressed appropriate b.u.t.tons and moved appropriate levers. The lifeboat seemed to topple outward. Its rockets roared furiously; it surged ahead.
It was a near thing. Lifeboats are designed to be launched in s.p.a.ce. But the nose of this one swung skyward, and its rockets thrust steadily and violently upward, and presently their roaring changed in that subtle fashion indicating pure emptiness outside the s.p.a.ceboat. Then it leaped toward the star-filled firmament.
Days later Thistlethwaite worked zestfully, with a portentous scowling, upon a new contract he proposed to Link. It was to form a new organization, the Sord Three Development Corporation. Link was to provide the entire working capital. Thistlethwaite was to have the final say in all business decisions. The details of the operation had been thrashed out in conversation, and Thistlethwaite was putting them into business phraseology, with at least one b.o.o.by-trap in each two paragraphs of the contract. Link would purchase and lead up a first-cla.s.s modern s.p.a.ceship. He would carry back to Sord Three samples of all needed alloying materials. He would establish a duplier by the seash.o.r.e to remove from flowing sea water-as raw material-the rare minerals needed to duply the large inventory of new, currently undupliable objects and instruments needed on Sord. Link, privately, had designed beer making equipment intended to be run by uffts. There would be enormous dislocations of the present economy when uffts didn"t need to trade with humans for beer. Humans would start to grow vegetation. They would, in fact, start to grow crops. Their dupliers would be more valuable extracting alloying metals than duplying roots, barks, herbs, berries, blossoms and flowers.
There would be h.e.l.l to pay on Sord Three when Link went back. It would provide novel experiences.
Exciting ones. From time to time there would doubtless be tumult. But if no other ship landed on Sord Three for just a very few years, when another ship landed there"d be no disaster. There"d be no dupliers in action. n.o.body would recognize the galaxy-wide disaster that could be brought about if certain mineral-extracting devices, working on sea water, were put to other uses. Everything would be swell!
Link pointed out a small crescent against the stars to be seen from the lifeboat"s ports.
"We"re going to land there?" asked Thana.
Link nodded. Thana said in a low tone, "Link, are you going to sign that contract he"s drawing up?"
"Of course not!" said Link. "But it makes him happy to write it. Actually, he"ll like the deal I"ll give him better than the trick one he"s contriving."
Thana said uneasily, "When we land-"
"I"ll go to see a jeweler," said Link mildly. "I"ll sell him a few carynths, a quart or so. I"ll start things working for our return trip. And then- Do you mind a quiet wedding?"
"N-not at all."
He nodded. They held hands as the lifeboat headed for the planet before them. There were seas, and continents, and ice-caps. There were cities. Four saddlebags full of carynths would hardly all be sold on one planet without breaking the price, but a discreet distribution by s.p.a.ceship to responsible jewelers in other worlds . . .
"We can start back," Link promised, "in a month or so."
And they did. But they were delayed a few days, at that. Link had arranged for something special and they had to wait for Thana"s second carynth necklace to be finished. It was said that she was the only woman in the galaxy who owned more than one.
The Fourth-Dimensional Demonstrator Pete Davidson was engaged to Miss Daisy Manners of the Green Paradise floor show. He had just inherited all the properties of an uncle who had been an authority on the fourth dimension, and he was the custodian of an unusually amiable kangaroo named Arthur. But still he was not happy; it showed this morning.
Inside his uncle"s laboratory, Pete scribbled on paper. He added, and ran his hands through his hair in desperation. Then he subtracted, divided and multiplied. But the results were invariably problems as incapable of solution as his deceased relative"s fourth-dimensional equations. From time to time a long, horselike, hopeful face peered in at him. That was Thomas, his uncle"s servant, whom Pete was afraid he had also inherited.
"Beg pardon, sir," said Thomas tentatively.
Pete leaned hara.s.sedly back in his chair.
"What is it, Thomas? What has Arthur been doing now?"
"He is browsing in the dahlias, sir. I wished to ask about lunch, sir. What shall I prepare?"
"Anything!" said Pete. "Anything at all! No. On second thought, trying to untangle Uncle Robert"s affairs calls for brains. Give me something rich in phosphorus and vitamins; I need them."
"Yes, sir," said Thomas. "But the grocer, sir-"
"Again?" demanded Pete hopelessly.
"Yes, sir," said Thomas, coming into the laboratory. "I hoped, sir, that matters might be looking better."
Pete shook his head, regarding his calculations depressedly. "They aren"t. Cash to pay the grocer"s bill is still a dim and misty hope. It is horrible, Thomas! I remembered my uncle as simply reeking with cash, and I thought the fourth dimension was mathematics, not debauchery. But Uncle Robert must have had positive orgies with quanta and s.p.a.ce-time continua! I shan"t break even on the heir business, let alone make a profit!"
Thomas made a noise suggesting sympathy.
"I could stand it for myself alone," said Pete gloomily. "Even Arthur, in his simple, kangaroo"s heart, bears up well. But Daisy! There"s the rub! Daisy!"
"Daisy, sir?"
"My fiancee," said Pete. "She"s in the Green Paradise floor show. She is technically Arthur"s owner. I told Daisy, Thomas, that I had inherited a fortune. And she"s going to be disappointed."
"Too bad, sir," said Thomas.
"That statement is one of humorous underemphasis, Thomas. Daisy is not a person to take disappointments lightly. When I explain that my uncle"s fortune has flown off into the fourth dimension, Daisy is going to look absent-minded and stop listening. Did you ever try to make love to a girl who looked absent-minded?"
"No, sir," said Thomas. "But about lunch, sir-"
"We"ll have to pay for it. d.a.m.n!" Pete said morbidly. "I"ve just forty cents in my clothes, Thomas, and Arthur at least mustn"t be allowed to starve. Daisy wouldn"t like it. Let"s see!"
He moved away from the desk and surveyed the laboratory with a predatory air. It was not exactly a homey place. There was a skeletonlike thing of iron rods, some four feet high. Thomas had said it was a tesseract-a model of a cube existing in four dimensions instead of three.
To Pete, it looked rather like a medieval instrument of torture-something to be used in theological argument with a heretic. Pete could not imagine anybody but his uncle wanting it. There were other pieces of apparatus of all sizes, but largely dismantled. They looked like the product of someone putting vast amounts of money and patience into an effort to do something which would be unsatisfactory when accomplished.
"There"s nothing here to p.a.w.n," said Pete depressedly. "Not even anything I could use for a hand organ, with Arthur subst.i.tuting for the monkey!"
"There"s the demonstrator, sir," said Thomas hopefully. "Your uncle finished it, sir, and it worked, and he had a stroke, sir."
"Cheerful!" said Pete." What is this demonstrator? What"s it supposed to do?"
"Why, sir, it demonstrates the fourth dimension," said Thomas. "It"s your uncle"s life work, sir."
"Then let"s take a look at it," said Pete. "Maybe we can support ourselves demonstrating the fourth dimension in shop windows for advertising purposes. But I don"t think Daisy will care for the career."
Thomas marched solemnly to a curtain just behind the desk. Pete had thought it hid a cupboard. He slid the cover back and displayed a huge contrivance which seemed to have the solitary virtue of completion.
Pete could see a monstrous bra.s.s horseshoe all of seven feet high. It was apparently hollow and full of cryptic cogs and wheels. Beneath it there was a circular plate of inch-thick gla.s.s which seemed to be designed to revolve. Below that, in turn, there was a ma.s.sive base to which ran certain copper tubes from a refrigerating unit out of an ice box.
Thomas turned on a switch and the unit began to purr. Pete watched.
"Your uncle talked to himself quite a bit about this, sir," said Thomas. "I gathered that it"s quite a scientific triumph, sir. You see, sir, the fourth dimension is time."
"I"m glad to hear it explained so simply," said Pete.
"Yes, sir. As I understand it, sir, if one were motoring and saw a pretty girl about to step on a banana peel, sir, and if one wished to tip her off, so to speak, but didn"t quite realize for-say, two minutes, until one had gone on half a mile-"
"The pretty girl would have stepped on the banana peel and nature would have taken its course," said Pete.
"Except for this demonstrator, sir. You see, to tip off the young lady one would have to retrace the half mile and the time too, sir, or one would be too late. That is, one would have to go back not only the half mile but the two minutes. And so your uncle, sir, built this demonstrator-"
"So he could cope with such a situation when it arose," finished Pete. "I see! But I"m afraid it won"t settle our financial troubles."
The refrigeration unit ceased to purr. Thomas solemnly struck a safety match.
"If I may finish the demonstration, sir," he said hopefully. "I blow out this match, and put it on the gla.s.s plate between the ends of the horseshoe. The temperature"s right, so it should work."
There were self-satisfied clucking sounds from the base of the machine. They went on for seconds. The huge gla.s.s plate suddenly revolved perhaps the eighth of a revolution. A humming noise began. It stopped. Suddenly there was another burnt safety match on the gla.s.s plate. The machine began to cluck triumphantly.
"You see, sir?" said Thomas. "It"s produced another burnt match. Dragged it forward out of the past, sir.
There was a burnt match at that spot, until the gla.s.s plate moved a few seconds ago. Like the girl and the banana peel, sir. The machine went back to the place where the match had been, and then it went back in time to where the match was, and then it brought it forward."
The plate turned another eighth of a revolution. The machine clucked and hummed. The humming stopped. There was a third burnt match on the gla.s.s plate. The clucking clatter began once more.
"It will keep that up indefinitely, sir," said Thomas hopefully.
"I begin," said Pete, "to see the true greatness of modern science. With only two tons of bra.s.s and steel, and at a cost of only a couple of hundred thousand dollars and a lifetime of effort, my Uncle Robert has left me a machine which will keep me supplied with burnt matches for years to come! Thomas, this machine is a scientific triumph!"