"My compliments, Mr. Haljan. I hope you have no strong religious convictions, else we will make your table here very miserable!"
The third pa.s.senger had evidently kept out of the argument. Snap introduced him as Rance Rankin. An American--a quiet, blond fellow of thirty-five or forty.
I ordered my breakfast and let the argument go on.
"Won"t make me miserable," said Snap. "I love an argument. You said, Sir Arthur--"
"I mean to say, I think I said too much. Mr. Rankin, you are more diplomatic."
Rankin laughed. "I am a magician," he said to me. "A theatrical entertainer. I deal in tricks--how to fool an audience--" His keen, amused gaze was on Ob Hahn. "This gentleman from Venus and I have too much in common to argue."
"A nasty one!" the Englishman exclaimed. "By Jove! Really, Mr. Rankin, you"re a bit too cruel!"
I could see we were doomed to have turbulent meals this voyage. I like to eat in quiet; arguing pa.s.sengers always annoy me. There were still three seats vacant at our table; I wondered who would occupy them. I soon learned the answer--for one seat at least. Rankin said calmly:
"Where is the little Venus girl this meal?" His glance went to the empty seat at my right hand. "The Venza, isn"t that her name? She and I are destined for the same theater in Ferrok-Shahn."
So Venza was to sit beside me. It was good news. Ten days of a religious argument three times a day would be intolerable. But the cheerful Venza would help.
"She never eats the midday meal," said Snap. "She"s on the deck, having orange juice. I guess it"s the old gag about diet, eh?"
My attention wandered about the salon. Most of the seats were occupied. At the Captain"s table I saw the objects of my search: George Prince and his sister, one on each side of the Captain. I saw George Prince in the life now as a man who looked hardly twenty-five.
He was at this moment evidently in a gay mood. His clean-cut, handsome profile, with its poetic dark curls, was turned toward me. There seemed little of the villain about him.
And I saw Anita Prince now as a dark-haired, black-eyed little beauty, in feature resembling her brother very strongly. She presently finished her meal. She rose, with him after her. She was dressed in Earth-fashion--white blouse and dark jacket, wide, knee-length trousers of gray, with a red sash her only touch of color. She went past me, flashed me a smile.
My heart was pounding. I answered her greeting, and met George Prince"s casual gaze. He, too, smiled, as though to signify that his sister had told him of the service I had done her. Or was his smile an ironical memory of how he had eluded me this morning when I chased him?
I gazed after his small white-suited figure as he followed Anita from the salon. And thinking of her, I prayed that Carter and Halsey might be wrong. Whatever plotting against the Grantline Expedition might be going on, I hoped that George Prince was innocent of it. Yet I knew in my heart it was a futile hope. Prince had been the eavesdropper outside the radio room. I could not doubt it. But that his sister must be ignorant of what he was doing, I was sure.
My attention was brought suddenly back to the reality of our table. I heard Ob Hahn"s silky voice. "We pa.s.sed quite close to the Moon last night, Mr. Dean."
"Yes," said Snap. "We did, didn"t we? Always do--it"s a technical problem of the exigencies of interstellar navigation. Explain it to them, Gregg. You"re an expert."
I waved it away with a laugh. There was a brief silence. I could not help noticing Sir Arthur Coniston"s queer look, and I have never seen so keen a glance as Rance Rankin shot at me. Were all three people aware of Grantline"s treasure on the Moon? It suddenly seemed so. I wished fervently at that instant that the ten days of this voyage were over. Captain Carter was right. Coming back we should have a cordon of Interplanetary Police aboard.
Sir Arthur broke the awkward silence. "Magnificent sight, the Moon, from so close--though I was too much afraid of pressure sickness to be up to see it."
I had nearly finished my hasty meal when another incident shocked me.
The two other pa.s.sengers at our table came in and took their seats. A Martian girl and man. The girl had the seat at my left, with the man beside her. All Martians are tall. The girl was about my own height.
That is, six feet, two inches. The man was seven feet or more. Both wore the Martian outer robe. The girl flung hers back. Her limbs were encased in pseudomail. She looked, as all Martians like to look, a very warlike Amazon. But she was a pretty girl. She smiled at me with a keen-eyed, direct gaze.
"Mr. Dean said at breakfast that you were big and handsome. You are."
They were brother and sister, these Martians. Snap introduced them as _Set_ Miko and _Setta_ Moa--the Martian equivalent of Mr. and Miss.
This Miko was, from our Earth standards, a tremendous, brawny giant.
Not spindly, like most Martians, this fellow, for all his seven feet in height was almost heavy set. He wore a plaited leather jerkin beneath his robe and knee pants of leather out of which his lower legs showed as gray, hairy pillars of strength. He had come into the salon with a swagger, his sword ornament clanking.
"A pleasant voyage so far," he said to me as he started his meal. His voice had the heavy, throaty rasp characteristic of the Martian. He spoke perfect English--both Martians and Venus people are by heritage extraordinary linguists. Miko and his sister Moa, had a touch of Martian accent, worn almost away by living for some years in Greater New York.
The shock to me came within a few minutes. Miko, absorbed in attacking his meal, inadvertently pushed back his robe to bare his forearm. An instant only, then it dropped to his wrist. But in that instant I had seen, upon the gray flesh, a thin sear turned red. A very recent burn--as though a pencil ray of heat had caught his arm.
My mind flung back. Only last night in the city corridor, Snap and I had been followed by a Martian. I had shot at him with a heat ray: I thought I had hit him on the arm. Was this the mysterious Martian who had followed us from Halsey"s office?
V
Shortly after that midday meal I encountered Venza sitting on the starlit deck. I had been in the bow observatory; taken my routine castings of our position and worked them out. I was, I think, of the _Planetara"s_ officers the most expert handler of the mathematical calculators. The locating of our position and charting the trajectory of our course was, under ordinary circ.u.mstances, about all I had to do. And it took only a few minutes every twelve hours.
I had a moment with Carter in the isolation of his chart room.
"This voyage! Gregg, I"m getting like you--too fanciful. We"ve a normal group of pa.s.sengers apparently, but I don"t like the look of any of them. That Ob Hahn, at your table--"
"Snaky looking fellow," I commented. "He and the Englishman are great on arguments. Did you have Princes" cabin searched?"
My breath hung on his answer.
"Yes. Nothing unusual among his things. We searched both his room and his sister"s."
I did not follow that up. Instead I told him about the burn on Miko"s thick arm.
He stared. "I wish we were at Ferrok-Shahn. Gregg, tonight when the pa.s.sengers are asleep, come here to me. Snap will be here, and Dr.
Frank. We can trust him."
"He knows about--about the Grantline treasure?"
"Yes. And so do Balch and Blackstone." Balch and Blackstone were our first and second officers.
"We"ll all meet here, Gregg--say about the zero hour. We must take some precautions."
Then he dismissed me.
I found Venza seated alone in a starlit corner of the secluded deck. A porthole, with the black heavens and the blazing stars was before her.
There was an empty seat nearby.
She greeted me with the Venus form of jocular, intimate greeting:
"Hola-lo, Gregg! Sit here with me. I have been wondering when you would come after me."
I sat down beside her. "Why are you going to Mars, Venza? I"m glad to see you."
"Many thanks. But I am glad to see you, Gregg. So handsome a man. Do you know, from Venus to Earth, and I have no doubt on all of Mars, no man will please me more."
"Glib tongue," I laughed. "Born to flatter the male--every girl of your world." And I added seriously, "You don"t answer my question.
What takes you to Mars?"