Chapter XV

It so happened that for many long weeks there had been lying in New York space port an urgent shipment for Alsakan. And not only was that urgency a one-way affair. For, with the possible exception of a few packets, whose owners had locked them in vaults and would not part with them at any price, there was not a single Alsakanite cigarette left on Earth!

Luxuries, then as now, soared feverishly in price with scarcity. Only the rich smoked Alsakanite cigarettes, and to those rich the price of anything they really wanted was a matter of almost complete indifference. And plenty of them wanted, and wanted badly, their Alsakanite cigarettes. There was no doubt of that.

The current market report upon them was: "Bid, one thousand credits per packet of ten. Offered, none at any price."

With that ever-climbing figure in mind, a merchant prince named Matthews had been trying to get an Alsakanbound ship into the ether. He knew that one cargo of Alsakanite cigarettes safely landed in any Tellurian space port would yield more profit than could be made by his entire fleet in ten years of normal trading. Therefore, he had for weeks been pulling every wire, and even every string, that he could reach--political, financial, even at times verging altogether too close for comfort upon the criminal--but without results.

For, even if he could find a crew willing to take the risk, to launch the ship without an escort would be out of the question. There would be no profit in a ship that did not return to Earth. The ship was his, to do with as he pleased, but the escorting maulers were assigned solely by the Galactic Patrol, and that patrol would not give his ship an escort.

In answer to his first request, he had been informed that only cargoes classed as necessary were being escorted at all regularly; that seminecessary loads were escorted occasionally, when of a particularly useful or desirable commodity and if opportunity offered; that luxury loads, such as his, were not being escorted at all; that he would be notified if, as, and when the _Prometheus_ could be given escort. Then the merchant prince began his siege.

* * * * *

Politicians of high rank, local and national, sent in "requests" of varying degrees of diplomacy. Financiers first offered inducements, then threatened to "bear down," then put on all the various kinds of pressure known to their pressure-loving ilk. Pleas, demands, threats, and pressures were alike, however, futile. The patrol could not be coaxed or bullied, cajoled, bribed, or cowed; and all further communications upon the subject, from whatever source originating, were ignored.

Having exhausted his every resource of diplomacy, politics, guile, and finance, the merchant prince resigned himself to the inevitable and stopped trying to get his ship off the ground.

Then, like the proverbial bolt from the blue, New York sub-base received from Prime Base an open message, not even coded, which read:

Authorize space ship _Prometheus_ to clear for Alsakan at will,
escorted by patrol ship B 42 TC 838, whose present orders are
hereby canceled. Signed, Haynes.

A demolition bomb dropped into that sub-base would not have caused greater excitement than did that message. Neither the base commander, the captain of the mauler, the captain of the _Prometheus_, nor the highly pleased but equally surprised Matthews could explain it; but all of them did whatever they could to expedite the departure of the freighter. She was, and had been for a long time, practically ready to sail.

As the base commander and Matthews sat in the office, shortly before the scheduled time of departure, Kinnison arrived--or, more correctly, let them know that he was there. He invited them both into the control room of his speedster; and invitations from gray Lensmen were accepted without question or demur.

"I suppose that you are wondering what this is all about," he began. "I'll make it as short as I can. I asked you in here because this is the only convenient place in which I _know_ that what we say will not be overheard. There are lots of spy rays around here, whether you know it or not. The _Prometheus_ is to be allowed to go to Alsakan, because that is where pirates seem to be most numerous, and we do not want to waste time hunting all over space to find one.

"Your vessel was selected, Mr. Matthews, for three reasons, and in spite of the attempts you have been making to obtain special privileges, not because of them: first, because there is no necessary or seminecessary freight waiting for clearance into that region; second, because we do not want your firm to fail. We do not know of any other large shipping line in such a shaky position as yours, nor of any firm anywhere to which one single cargo would make such an immense financial difference."

"You are certainly right there, Lensman!" Matthews agreed, whole-heartedly. "It means bankruptcy on the one hand and a fortune on the other."

* * * * *

"Here's what is to happen. The ship and the mauler blast off on schedule, fourteen minutes from now. They get about to Valeria, when they are both recalled--urgent orders for the mauler to go on rescue work. The mauler comes back, but your captain will, in all probability, keep on going, saying that he started out for Alsakan and that's where he's going----"

"But he wouldn't. He wouldn't _dare_!" gasped the ship owner.

"Sure he would," Kinnison insisted, cheerfully enough. "That is the third good reason your vessel is being allowed to set out: because it certainly will be attacked. You didn't know it until now, but your captain and over half of your crew are pirates themselves, and----"

"What? Pirates!" Matthews bellowed. "I'll go down there and----"

"You'll do nothing whatever, Mr. Matthews, except watch things, and you will do that from here. The situation is entirely under control."

"But my ship! My cargo!" the shipper wailed. "We'll be ruined if----"

"Let me finish, please," the Lensman interrupted. "As soon as the mauler turns back it is practically certain that your captain will send out a message, letting the pirates know that he is easy prey. Within a minute after sending that message, he dies. So does every other pirate aboard. Your ship lands on Valeria and takes on a crew of space-fighting wildcats, headed by Peter VanBuskirk. Then it goes on toward Alsakan. When the pirates board that ship, after its prearranged, half-hearted resistance and easy surrender, they are going to think that all hell's out for noon. Especially since the mauler, back from her 'rescue work,' will be tagging along, not too far away."

"Then my ship will really go to Alsakan, and back, safely?" Matthews was almost dazed. Matters were entirely out of his hands, and things had moved so rapidly that he hardly knew what to think. "But if my own crews are pirates, some of them may----But I can, of course, get police protection if necessary."

"Unless something entirely unforseen happens, the _Prometheus_ will make the round trip in safety, cargoes and all--under mauler escort all the way. You will, of course, have to take the other matter up with your local police."

"When is the attack to take place, sir?" asked the base commander.

"That's what the mauler skipper wanted to know when I told him what was ahead of him." Kinnison grinned. "He wanted to sneak up a little closer about that time. I'd like to know, myself, but unfortunately that will have to be decided by the pirates after they get the signal. It will be on the way out, though, because the cargo she has aboard now is a lot more valuable to Boskone than a load of Alsakanite cigarettes would be."

"But do you think you can take the pirate ship that way?" asked the commander, dubiously.

"No. But he will cut down his personnel to such an extent that he will have to head back for base."

"And that's what you want--the base. I see."

He did not see--quite--but the Lensman did not enlighten him further.

* * * * *

There was a brilliant double flare as freighter and mauler lifted into the air. Kinnison showed the ship owner out.

"Hadn't I better be going, too?" asked the commander. "Those orders, you know."

"A couple of minutes yet. I have another message for you--official. Matthews won't need a police escort long--if any. When that ship is attacked it is to be the signal for cleaning out every pirate in Greater New York--the worst pirate hotbed on Tellus. Neither you nor your force will be in on it directly, but you might pass the word around, so that our own men will be informed ahead of the Telenews outfits."

"Good! That has needed doing for a long time."

"Yes. But you know it takes a long time to line up every man in such a big organization. They want to get them all, without getting any innocent by-standers."

"Who's doing it? Prime Base?"

"Yes. Enough men will be thrown in here to do the whole job in an hour."

"That _is_ good news. Clear ether, Lensman!" And the base commander went back to his post.

As the air-lock toggles rammed home, sealing the exit behind the departing visitor, Kinnison eased his speedster into the air and headed for Valeria. Since the two vessels ahead of him had left atmosphere inertialess, as would he, and since several hundred seconds had elapsed since their take-off, he was, of course, some ten thousand miles off their line as well as being uncounted millions of miles behind them. But the larger distance meant no more than the smaller, and neither of them meant anything at all to the patrol's finest speedster. Kinnison, on easy touring blast, caught up with them in minutes. Closing up to less than one light year, he slowed his pace to match theirs and held his distance.

Any ordinary ship would have been detected instantly--long since, in fact--but Kinnison rode no ordinary ship. His speedster was immune to all detection save electromagnetic or visual, and, therefore, even at that close range--the travel of half a minute for even a slow space ship in open space--he was safe. For electromagnetics are useless at that distance; and visual apparatus, even with subether converters, is reliable only up to a few mere thousands of miles, unless the observer knows exactly what to look for and where to look for it.

* * * * *

Kinnison, then, closed up and followed the _Prometheus_ and her mauler escort; and as they approached the Valerian solar system, sure enough, the recall messages came booming in. Also, as had been expected, the renegade captain of the freighter sent back, first his defiant answer, and then his message to the pirate high command. The mauler turned back; the merchantman kept on. Suddenly, however, she stopped, inert, and from her ports were ejected discrete bits of matter--probably the bodies of the Boskonian members of her crew. Then the _Prometheus_, again inertialess, flashed directly toward the planet Valeria.

An inertialess landing is, of course, highly irregular, and is made only when the ship is to take off again immediately. It saves all the time ordinarily lost in spiraling and deceleration, and saves the computation of a landing orbit, which is no task for an amateur computer. It is, however, dangerous.

It takes power, plenty of it, to maintain the force which neutralizes the inertia of mass, and if that force fails, even for an instant, while a ship is upon a planet's surface, the consequences are usually highly disastrous. For in the neutralization of inertia there is no magic, no getting of something for nothing, no violation of Nature's law of the conservation of matter and energy. The instant that force becomes inoperative the ship possesses exactly the same velocity, momentum, and inertia that it possessed at the instant the force took effect.

Thus, if a space ship takes off from Earth, with its orbital velocity of about eighteen and one half miles per second relative to the Sun, goes free, dashes to Mars, lands free, and then goes inert, its original velocity, both in speed and in direction, is instantly restored, with consequences better imagined than described. Such a velocity, of course, _might_ take the ship harmlessly into the air; but it probably would not.

But the _Prometheus_ landed free, and so did Kinnison. He stepped out, fully armored against Valeria's extremely heavy atmosphere and laboring a trifle under its terrific gravitation, to be greeted cordially by _Lieutenant_ VanBuskirk, whose fighting men were already streaming aboard the freighter.

"Hi, chief!" the Dutchman called, gayly. "Everything went off like clockwork. Won't hold you up long--be blasting off in ten minutes."

"Ho, Lefty!" the Lensman acknowledged, as cordially, but saluting the newly commissioned officer with an exaggerated formality. "Say, Bus, I've been doing some thinking. Why wouldn't it be a good idea to----"

"Uh-uh, it would _not_," denied the fighter, positively. "I know what you're going to say--that you want in on this party--but don't say it."

"But I----" Kinnison began to argue.

"Nix," the Valerian declared flatly. "You've got to stay with your speedster. No room for her inside, as she's full to the last meter with cargo and with my men. You can't clamp on outside, as that would give the whole thing away. And besides, for the first and last time in my life I've got a chance to give a gray Lensman orders. Those orders are to stay out of and away from this ship--and I'll see to it that you do, too, you little Tellurian wart! Boy, what a kick I get out of that!"

"You would, you big, dumb Valerian ape. You always were a small-souled type!" Kinnison retorted. "Piggy-piggy----Haynes, huh?"

"Uh-huh." VanBuskirk nodded. "How else could I talk so rough to _you_ and get away with it? However, don't feel too bad. You aren't missing a thing, really. This thing is in the cans already, and your fun is up ahead somewhere. And by the way, Kim, congratulations. You had it coming. We're all behind you, from here to the next universe and back."

"Thanks. And the same to you, Bus, and many of 'em. Well, if you won't let me stow away, I'll tag along behind, I guess. Clear ether--or rather, I hope it's full of pirates by to-morrow morning. Won't be, though, probably; don't imagine they'll move until we're almost there."

* * * * *

And tag along Kinnison did, through thousands and thousands of parsecs of uneventful voyage.

Part of the time he spent in the speedster, dashing hither and yon. Most of it, however, he spent in the vastly more comfortable mauler; to the armored side of which his tiny vessel clung with its magnetic clamps while he slept and ate, gossiped and read, exercised and played with the mauler's officers and crew, in deep-space comradery. It so happened, however, that when the long-waited attack developed he was out in his speedster, and thus saw and heard everything from the beginning.

Space was filled with the old, familiar interference. The raider flashed up, locked on with magnets, and began to beam. Not heavily--scarcely enough to warm up the defensive screens--and Kinnison probed into the pirate with his spy ray.

"Terrestrials--and Americans!" he exclaimed, half aloud, startled for an instant. "But naturally they would be, since this is a put-up job and over half the crew were New York gangsters."

"The blighter's got his spy-ray screens up," the pilot was grumbling to his captain. The fact that he spoke in English was immaterial to the Lensman; he would have understood equally well any other possible form of communication or of thought exchange. "That wasn't part of the plan, was it?"

If Helmuth, or one of the able minds at his base, had been directing that attack it would have stopped right there. The pilot had shown a flash of feeling that, with a little encouragement, might have grown into a suspicion.

But the captain was not an imaginative man. Therefore: "Nothing was said about it, either way," he replied. "Probably the mate's on duty. He is not one of us, you know. All the better if he is. The captain will open up. If he doesn't do it pretty quick, I'll open her up myself. There, the port's opening. Slide a little forward.... Hold it! Go get 'em, men!"

Then men, hundreds of them, armed and armored, swarmed through the freighter's locks. But as the last man of the boarding party passed the portal something happened that was most decidedly not on the program: the outer port slammed shut and its toggles drove home!

"Blast those screens! Knock them down! Get in there with a spy ray!" barked the pirate captain. He was not one of those hardy and valiant souls who, like Gildersleeve, led, in person, the attacks of his cutthroats. He emulated, instead, the higher Boskonian officials and directed his raids from the safety of his control room; but, as has been intimated, he was unlike those officials in that he lacked directorial ability. Thus it was only after it was too late that he became suspicious. "I wonder if somebody could have double-crossed us? Hi-jackers?"

"We'll soon know," the pilot growled, and even as he spoke the spy ray got through, revealing a very shambles.

For VanBuskirk and his Valerians had not been caught napping, nor were they a crew--unarmored, partially armed, and rendered even more impotent by internal mutiny, strife, and slaughter--such as the pirates had expected to find.

* * * * *

Instead of such a crew the boarders met a force that was overwhelmingly superior to their own--not only in point of numbers, but even more markedly in the strength and agility of its units. Also, the defenders were more capably armed than were the attackers, since, in addition to the efficient armor of the patrol and its ultra-deadly portable weapons, at least one of those terrific semiportable projectors commanded every corridor of the freighter. In the blasts of those projectors most of the pirates died instantly, not knowing what struck them, not even knowing that they died.

They were the fortunate ones. The others knew what was coming and saw it as it came, for the Valerians did not even draw their DeLameters. They knew that the pirates' armor could withstand for many minutes any hand weapon's beams, and they disdained to remount the heavy semiportables. They came in with their space axes, and at the sight the pirates broke and ran screaming in panic fear. But they could not escape. The toggles of the exit port were not only in their sockets, but they were also locked in them.

Therefore, the storming party died to the last man; and, as VanBuskirk had foretold, it was scarcely even a struggle. For any ordinary space armor is just so much tin against a Valerian swinging a space ax.

The spy ray of the pirate captain got through just in time to see the ghastly finale of the massacre, and his face turned first purple, then white.

"The patrol!" he gasped. "Valerians--a whole company of them! I'll say we've been double-crossed!"

"Right-o--we've jolly well been," the pilot agreed. "You don't know the half of it yet, either. Somebody's coming, and it isn't a boy scout. If a mauler should suck us in, we'd be very much a spent force, what?"

"Cut out the conversation!" snapped the captain. "Is it a mauler, or not?"

"A bit too far away yet to say, but it probably is. They wouldn't have sent those jaspers out without cover, old bean. They knew that we can burn that freighter's screens down in an hour. Better cut the beams and get ready to run, what?"

The commander did so, wild thoughts racing through his mind. If a mauler got close enough to him to use magnets, he was done. Cutting arcs would burn through his armor like cheese, and he had no fighting men left. And even if he had--even a full crew of the most savage fighters known would have to be inescapably cornered before they would mix it with what that mauler had aboard. He would have to go back to base, anyway----

"Tally ho, old fruit!" The pilot slammed his levers over to maximum blast. "It's a mauler and we've been bloody well jobbed. Back to base?"

"Yes." And the discomfited captain energized his communicator, to report to his immediate superior the humiliating outcome of the supposedly carefully planned coup.