Chapter V

Back on Earth I was still trancing around feeling the air with my fingers and pinching myself here and there just to make sure I had really got out of that inferno all in one piece, when they hauled me out to the airport to present me with my ship. They even made a ceremony of it and gave me a medal for distinguished service to Mankind. And who do you think presented the medal?

I looked at the dapper little figure waltzing over all togged out in the S.S.C. uniform, and then I did a double take. It was no other than my old pal of the Iron College, perfume-manufacturer for hopper-scorps, Pard Hoskins. He came over and clapped me on the back, but I didn't feel a thing. I was paralyzed.

So I'd been taken for a ride right from the start. So they'd outsmarted me all the way: out-fought and out-figured me, and even planted a stoolie on me and made me like it.

I didn't hear a word they said, nor even notice when they pinned the medal on. When they got through with me, I just crawled into my beautiful new ship like it was an old tin can and headed out. I didn't even care right then if I landed back in Akroida's bony lap. I'd have stuck my head in her mandibles and told her, "Chew it up, Ak. It's just a cabbage, anyway."

But a funny thing happened. Out there, mooning along all alone in the dark with not a soul in a million miles, I heard Akroida laughing. It was a horrible sound, a kind of metallic neighing and snorting, but pretty soon I began laughing, too. I didn't know what the joke was, but all of a sudden I knew I'd find out some day. It did me a lot of good. I braced up and went on to Venus, where I made some real good trades. I didn't try any more capers, though. I was all capered out.

It wasn't until a year later, in a joint on Mars, that I ran into Pard Hoskins again. I gave him the old frost, but he only grinned sort of sad and touched me for some of that filthy Martian beer. He looked real seedy.

"What's the matter?" I asked, as sarcastic as I could manage. "They sending you over the road again to nab another sucker?"

He shook his head, and sighed into his beer. "I got fired, Casey," he confessed. "Over that there Killicut caper. Those plans--I might of known." He shook his head again like a tired old man.

A shiver ran over me. "Here it comes," I thought.

"What about those plans?" I asked. "Weren't they all O.K.?"

He sighed again. "Nope. Oh, the plans was O.K. They was strictly bona fide. Only they won't work on Earth. I told 'em about that anti-grav in the first place. Then I almost caused an inter-world incident stealin' the Killicut Emeralds. And now the damn thing won't work on Earth!" He set to chewing his lip and staring into his beer.

I took him by his scrawny shoulder and shook. "Why won't it work?" I yelled. "I knew there was something, the way she laughed! Why won't it work?"

He stared dully at me. "Laugh, did she? Well, she sure had the last laugh. It won't work in our atmosphere; just on a chlorine or methane planet. It works like the poles of a battery. That Great Red Spot is just the negative pole. All those there plants change the atmosphere just enough to make it a strong negative field. Then all they have to do is counter-balance that with enough positive, and there they are. It works like anti-gravity, only it ain't. Only we ain't got an atmosphere we can work that way. Cripes! So she laughed!" His hoarse voice stopped and he stared bitterly at the wall. Then he cussed for two minutes without stopping. He took a big swig of that rotten beer. "I'll bet she's laughing herself fat, the old rip!"

Well, I hope she is. In the dead of night sometimes I can hear her; and pretty soon I'm laughing, too....