“I’m not talking about shooting anybody, but it might be a good idea. They’ve got you trapped on this planet!”
“I abhor violence,” said Izzy. “Excuse me, Mr. Jet, but you said you wanted to see me about matter conversion.”
Heller looked back at his huge desk and waved his hand at it. “Well, for starters, here are a couple of matter converters.”
Lying there were two metal objects, duplicates. They had a lot of parts and intricate curves. Oh, those were just those two elementary-school demonstration machines he had taken out of the box in Connecticut—the educational models. They were even all there. The rods for electrical discharge and the bags to catch the gas were included. Heller picked one up. The three girls promptly did baton twirls with three screwdrivers and presented them. He took one. The other two twirled theirs and put them back in their bags.
He started dismantling the object. He extended his hand, more baton twirls and he got more tools.
He began to shed parts all over in front of Izzy.
“I’ve got two,” said Heller, as he worked. “So dismantling one is all right.”
Izzy was staring at about forty parts, spread before him.
Heller took the one he had not dismantled. “Now, see here.” He pointed to the top. “You put a rod of pure carbon in the top. The machine then reduces it by atomic conversion. Oxygen comes out this side and hydrogen comes out the other side. Electrical charge comes out on these two wires.”
“Oh, dear,” said Izzy.
Heller put out his hand and, after the baton twirl, got a pen.
“It’s simple chemistry,” said Heller. And he began to write. “Carbon has six electrons. Oxygen has eight electrons. Hydrogen has one electron. The machine simply shifts electrons in the atoms. Carbon loses its identity as carbon. Its electrons shift up and down on the periodic chart and you get oxygen and hydrogen. You then have the formula C2 → H4 + O.”
He tossed the paper at Izzy. “Oxygen and hydrogen burn when combined. Got it?”
“But . . . but . . .” floundered Izzy.
“Actually,” said Heller, “the amount of energy available is higher in terms of electrical potential and the planet needs electrical engines. But nearly everything right now is powered by internal-combustion engines—cars and all that. It’s a silly sort of engine. You put fuel in to get heat and then you have a cooling system to take the heat away and waste it. But people seem addicted to it so we will use it. This machine makes oxygen and hydrogen out of carbon and there’s an almost unlimited supply of carbon on this planet so we’re in.”
“Any kind of carbon?” gaped Izzy.
“Sure. Oil, asphalt, old weeds, rags. The amount of gas volume—and I mean gas, not gasoline—you get out of solid matter approaches a billion to one. Gas is awfully full of space. So you can put a chunk of carbon in the top here. You put a pressure tank on each side of this machine to catch the gas. You put a lever to feed the amount of carbon in the top, you put a valve to use as an accelerator to regulate the gas flow into the engine itself, and you’ve got it.”
“I haven’t got it,” mourned Izzy. “I’d need full engineering drawings showing every part.”
Heller sighed. He held out his hand, some kind of a finger signal. One of the girls set up a drawing board with a flourish. The second waved a piece of drawing paper like a flag and pinned it on the board. The third baton-twirled two pens.
Heller went smoothly and rapidly to work. With motions so fast his hand blurred, he began to freehand perfect engineering drawings using Earth symbols.
More paper was waved and put on the board, more pens twirled and offered.
He shortly had fifteen complete engineering drawings. All of the general and particular parts of the device.
Izzy seemed suddenly to be all business. He was rolling the drawings up. “Can I have one of these models?”
Screwdrivers were baton-twirled, wrenches spun. Parts grew and the device was reassembled.
Izzy took it and put it carefully in a box.
“I’ll get all this patented,” he said. “I’ll attribute it to an anonymous team of engineers. We don’t want your name associated with anything here—because of Bury, you know.” He paused. “I think the patents should be in the name of Multinational. I control that.”
“Patent away,” said Heller. Didn’t he realize Izzy was stealing his patent? The fool. “I’ve got to work on this other one. I have to make the tanks and fit it on the car once I’ve got the car tested with its own fuel.”
“You go right ahead, Mr. Jet,” said Izzy. “But don’t connect any part of that activity with these companies or Multinational.”
“I promise,” said Heller.
The three girls did a sort of dance and one of them said, “Can we have some ice cream sodas now? We’ve got to get back to baton-twirling school.”
“Give them some sodas,” said Heller and the bartender went to work.
“Gee, ain’t he cute?” said one of the girls as she sat down on a stool.
Bah, they weren’t his secretaries at all, just some students from a school on the same floor. And the slinky girls who had been at the bar must be just from the model school. They were cadging ice cream sodas. Typically New York. Decadent.
The bartender brought Heller a nonalcoholic Swiss beer.
Just as he was about to drink it, a man came bursting in the door, followed by some others with cases. The tailor!
“I’m so sorry, sir,” the tailor said. “I would have waited until you were back at your rooms. But the whole production line stalled.”
Heller drank some nonalcoholic beer.
A tailor’s assistant came up. He had a costume. It was blue. It was like a jump suit but the front lapel buckled across the front very boldly. Another one came up. He was holding an incomplete suit just like it.
“The color,” said the tailor. “We got into a dispute about the color. Blue is more ethereal. But then it suddenly occurred to us about the blood.”
“Blood?” said Heller.
“Yes, you see, racing is a dangerous sport. And you want to be very suitably dressed. TV cameras are always around at racing wrecks and if you wore red, it won’t show the blood. So we had to get your opinion. Don’t you think red is best?”
Heller sort of snorted into his beer. Maybe it was too strong for him. “Maybe you better put some padding across the front flap. It will absorb the blood better.”
“Ah,” said the tailor. “Make a note of that, Threadneedle. More padding on the front. Then red will do?”
“The car is red,” said Heller.
“Ah, that’s such a relief. Forgive us for bothering you.” They all rushed off.
Izzy had not left. He was nervously wringing his hands. “Mr. Jet. He spoke of blood. Are you sure I had not better hire security guards for you twenty-four hours a day?”
“Nonsense,” said Heller. “I’ve got weeks of work ahead of me. Nobody will get wind of this.”
“Mark my words, Mr. Jet,” said Izzy. “I am responsible for you even if the companies have no connection. Rockecenter will be put right out of business if you popularize that carburetor. It could be the end of the oil industry.”
“No, no,” said Heller. “It can burn oil, it just won’t burn much of it. And it will be totally clean.”
“It could ruin him just the same,” said Izzy.
I went cold. Suddenly I understood what Heller was about to do! Those (bleeped) children’s demonstration kits. He was using it for a carburetor! For any car or engine!
My Gods! The very worst was happening! If Delbert John Rockecenter lost a fortune, he could also lose his control of IG Barben Pharmaceutical! Lombar was right! Our arrangements with IG Barben would vanish! And that would be the end of Lombar’s fondest dreams on Voltar!
It WAS an emergency!
And I had not caught it!
This would not wait for Krak! I had only a few weeks!
I must ACT!
PART TWENTY-FIVE
Chapter 4
I had to get something effective going on this at once. Up to now, I realized, I hadn’t been heavy enough on Heller.
On flying feet, I sprinted down the long, long tunnel to the office of Faht Bey.
I burst in. “Get Raht and Terb on this at once!”
He wasn’t at his desk.
I tore into his living area. He was stuffing himself at the table. His wife was just getting ready to hand him another platter of kadin budu—“woman’s thigh,” a dish of meatballs and rice. I snatched at his arm. His wife leaped back and the platter spilled all over the floor.
Urgently, I dragged him into his office. “There’s trouble in New York!” I shouted at him. “I’ve got to get Raht and Terb on this at once!”
He was wiping at his mouth with a napkin. He didn’t look very cooperative.
“I’m working on it!” I shouted into the air.
Faht Bey said, “Raht and Terb are still in the hospital, thanks to whatever you did. They won’t be out for two weeks and you know it.”
Oh, Gods! That was true.
“The New York office!” I cried. “You’ve got to send something out to the New York office. They can begin to work on it at once!” Then I lifted my head and yelled, “I’m being industrious!”
Faht Bey heard his wife crying as she tried to scrape the food off the other room’s floor. It made him scowl. “Every person in the New York office is gone. They’re flying all over the world trying to locate people on that list of criminals you sent. You knocked them right out of operation!”
I raised my head and shouted at the top of my lungs, “I’ll think of something!”
“Why are you yelling up in the air like that?” said Faht Bey.
“In case somebody is listening,” I said. Stupid fool, didn’t he realize this was a national emergency?
I didn’t wait for his answer. He was no use. He’d gummed it all up by leaving the New York office unmanned. His fault!
I fled back up the tunnel.
I flew around in circles in my room.
Karagoz was in the yard. I rushed out and asked him if Utanc was still alive.
He tried to answer me but I couldn’t wait. I raised my head and yelled, “It will all be handled!”
Karagoz was looking at me very strangely. He said, “The waiter just took out her supper dishes and she was fine.”
“She wasn’t writhing around the floor from poison?” I begged him.
He looked at me and shook his head. Somewhat sadly, I thought. No help from him.
I rushed back to my room.
I couldn’t think. I paced.
Then I got smart. I got a bag of hand grenades out of my locker and went out in the patio. I sat down in a wicker chair. I would sit there all night and if I heard the slightest sound of anybody trying to sneak up on Utanc, I would let them have it.
It was pretty cold as night wore on. The breath of coming winter was in the air.
It cooled me.
I also realized I couldn’t sit there every night for months. It was too cold.
I had just dozed when, in a flash, it came to me, totally and completely, how to stop Heller. An entire plan!
A few minor details were missing but they could be filled in as I went along.
I would go to New York, personally, myself.
I would cook Heller’s goose by recruiting the most powerful opponents possible.
Wait!
I did not dare leave Utanc here!
I would take her with me!
Another hour of shivering.
I dozed off again.
I woke up with a flash of inspiration!
I knew exactly how I could make Utanc go with me.
Dire emergencies can spawn some hefty ideas!
PART TWENTY-FIVE
Chapter 5
With daylight and the staff about, there was less risk of an attack upon her. I lay down on the floor of my bedroom, keeping the door slightly cracked open so I could watch the patio and the further door into the yard.
I had a long time to wait and I must have dozed. The sound of a car starting woke me.
Utanc! As I supposed she would, her fear had worn off and she was going into town. By the sun, it must be around ten o’clock. Usually she was gone for about two hours.
Now was the time!
Those two (bleeping) little boys would be alone! And I was going to handle them once and for all.
I knew they were dangerous. One of them might have a gun. This time, I wasn’t underestimating them. I must not fail.
In my earlier visit to Earth, I had bought a Colt .44 Magnum Single Action Peacemaker in a hock shop. It was a huge handgun, enough to break your wrist. I loaded it.
I had also acquired a Mannlicher “Safari,” over-and-under double-barreled .458-caliber elephant rifle. Its barrels were so big that when you looked down them, you got the feeling you could fall through them without touching the sides. I loaded it.
Melahat was in the yard cutting flowers. I walked up behind her and shoved the elephant-rifle muzzle under her chin. When I had brought her to, I hissed, “You’re going to get that door open and get me into Utanc’s room.”
She was white as paper. She wasn’t moving, her eyes fixated on the muzzle. Crossed.
“If you don’t do it,” I grated, “I will shoot the whole staff!”
She rose to the occasion, if a little shakily.
With me right beside her and the elephant gun close under her chin, after a couple tries she found her voice. She called out, “Boys! Utanc said when she left you were to have your present now to amuse you while she was gone.”
Silence.
Then a tiny, piping voice. “What is it?”
A jab of the elephant rifle.
“Open the doors and see.”
Curiosity won the day. The sound of the inside bar sliding up. The lock being turned. The creak of hinges as the door opened a crack.
CRASH! I was into that room like the New York Tactical Police Force!
The boy at the door went tumbling like a ball across the room. The other was in bed, sitting up, his face cased in bandages. He began to scream!
I kept the elephant rifle on the one on the floor. I pulled out the Colt .44 Magnum and trained it on the one in bed.
“Stand up against that wall!” I ordered. “Put your feet well away from it. Put your palms flat against the wall!”
They looked for help from Melahat. She was sprawled across the door in a dead faint.
The two boys did as they were told, even though they were shaking and crying and one of them had developed hiccups.
I frisked them, keeping a foot ready to pull their feet from under them if they tried anything rough. They were clean. This wasn’t odd as they were wearing only pants.
I breathed a sigh of relief. So far so good.
I looked around the room. Utanc had laid rugs on top of rugs decoratively. Musical instruments were on racks. She had a bunch of framed pictures.
Keeping one eye on the little boys, I walked over to the pictures. They weren’t real photographs. They were magazine cutouts she had framed in golden frames. Movie stars! Male movie stars! Actors from all down the years.
Some books. I had often seen her bringing in books. Watchful that the boys didn’t pull anything, I pawed over the volumes. Odds and ends. But a whole series of hardcover volumes called The Illustrated Lives of Famous Stars.
Suddenly my plans got even better.
I turned on the boys. They were shivering and shaking. Both of them had hiccups now. Good. They’d cooperate. I brandished the Colt .44 Magnum. Then I cocked it.
“Which one of these movie stars does she like best?”
The one who wasn’t vomiting stopped his hiccups long enough to say, in a thin scream, “Those two on the end!” He pointed, lost his balance and hit his head on the wall.
I went over and looked. Sure enough, the two on the end were smeared with th
e lipstick of kisses!
Rudolph Valentino and James Cagney!
I went over and grabbed their well-thumbed copies of Illustrated Lives.
Out of my pocket, I took a roll of two-inch-wide adhesive tape. I grabbed the wrists of the first boy and taped them together. I kicked his ankles together and taped them. I slapped adhesive tape across his mouth.
I grabbed the second boy and did the same.
I kicked Melahat to her feet. “Get me two blankets!”
She tottered off and came back with them. I spread them on the floor. I dumped one boy per blanket. I picked up the corners and threw them over my shoulder, two bundles, not even squirming.
“Melahat, you camel’s dung,” I said in a deadly voice. “You will clean up this room. When Utanc returns you will tell her the two boys’ grandmothers are ill and calling for them and that they’ll be gone for many days.”
She kept opening and closing her mouth, possibly trying to speak.
“If you don’t and if Utanc suspects or hears one word that I took the boys, I’ll slaughter the whole staff!”
She collapsed to the floor and started bumping her head against it. Aha, I didn’t need hypnohelmets. All I needed was an elephant rifle!
I stuck the Colt in my belt. I went out to the station wagon and dumped my bundles in the back.
It had to work!
PART TWENTY-FIVE
Chapter 6
I drove to the hospital. I threw the bundles over my shoulder. I went in by the secret entrance that led into the basement.
On the intercom, I summoned Prahd.
He came running down in some alarm. There was nobody housed in the basement yet.
I had dumped the bundles on a table. “I’ve brought the first two criminals,” I said.
“Oh, wait!” said Prahd. “I’m not set up! Not down here. I’ve been working on a microorganism that uses the trachoma organism to spawn in. It then eats up the trachoma and becomes benign and furnishes the victim with vitamins. It’s also contagious. When I’ve finished that, I am going to get to work on TB.”
“This is more important!” I said sternly.
“Oh. Well, there’s my whole project on infant mortality. I think I can reduce it to zero!”