Gateway to Never (John Grimes) Read online

  “And do you think that will be enough?” she asked.

  “That’s the least of my worries,” he said.

  “At times—and this is one of them—I find your attitude towards things in general rather hard to understand.” Her slender face was set in severe lines, her green eyes stared at him in what could have been accusation.

  Grimes squirmed slightly. He said firmly, “I am not, repeat not, a customs officer—and for that I thank all the Odd Gods of the Galaxy. Furthermore, ever since man came down from the trees he has needed an assortment of drugs—tea, coffee, alcohol, tobacco, the juice of sacred mushrooms, the smoke from burning Indian hemp—to take the rough edge off things in general. Most—all, probably—of these things are dangerous if taken in excess. So are plenty of nondrugs. After all, you can kill yourself overeating.”

  “Talking of that,” she said sweetly, “you could stand to lose a pound or three . . . or four . . . or five.”

  He ignored this. “What Billinghurst is doing is interfering with the most sacred freedom of mankind.”

  “Which is?”

  “Freedom to go to hell your own way. The odd part is that in any culture where this freedom is an undeniable right very few people take advantage of it. But once the law, in its wisdom, says, “You must be good,” it’s a different story. You will recall that Atlantia, only a few years ago, tried to ban the consumption of alcohol. As a result nondrinkers became drinkers, moderate drinkers became heavy drinkers, and those who had been heavy drinkers drank themselves into early graves. And the rum runners made their fortunes.”

  “Yes,” she said, “the rum runners made their fortunes. People like Drongo Kane, who has always ranked high on your list of pet dislikes. And now that some genius has discovered that there’s an ideal market for drugs out on the Rim there’ll be more fortunes made, and all by the dregs of humanity. Tell me, John, if you knew that Drongo Kane was among the runners would you be content to do no more than write one of those circulars that nobody ever reads anyhow?”

  He grinned. “I’ll have to toss a coin before I can answer that one. Much as I dislike Drongo Kane I’d hate to be on the same side as Billinghurst!”

  Chapter 3

  WHEN GRIMES ARRIVED at Port Last, on Ultimo, he was not in a good temper. The matter calling him away from Port Forlorn had been too urgent for him to wait for a regular sailing, so he had pressed the deep space tug Rim Malemute into service. She was an enormously powerful little brute, designed to go a long way in a short time. She was an assemblage of highly specialized machinery packed into a tin can, with no waste space whatsoever.

  Williams, her skipper, brought her in as spectacularly as usual, applying the thrust of her inertial drive only when it seemed inevitable that the Malemute and her people would be smeared over the landing apron. Grimes, who was a guest in the control room, remarked coldly, “I almost lost my last meal. Not that it would have been much loss.”

  The tug skipper laughed cheerfully. He and Grimes were old friends and shipmates, and he had often served as the commodore’s second-in-command in Faraway Quest. He said, “You wanted to get here in a hurry, Skipper, and I got you here in a hurry. As for the tucker—this little bitch isn’t an Alpha Class liner.”

  “Isn’t she? You surprise me, Williams.”

  Grimes watched, through the viewport, the ground car that was coming out to the Malemute. Through the transparent canopy he could see two men. One was Giles, the port captain, the other was Dunbar, Rim Runners’ local astronautical superintendent. As the tug was in from another Rim Worlds port there were no customs, health, or immigration officials. He said, “I’d better go to start sorting things out. I’ll let you know where to send my baggage.”

  “Aren’t you living aboard, Skipper?”

  “If I’m a sardine in my next incarnation I’ll think about it—but not until then.”

  Grimes went down to the airlock, the doors of which opened as he reached them, and walked down the ramp while it was still being extruded. As he was doing so the ground car came to a halt and Giles and Dunbar, both tall skinny men, got out. Giles was in uniform and saluted. Dunbar bowed stiffly. Grimes bowed in return.

  “Glad to see you here, Commodore,” said Dunbar.

  “Thank you, Captain.”

  “Perhaps some refreshment before we get down to business. . . .”

  “Thank you, but no. We adjusted our clocks to your local time for the last week of the voyage and I had breakfast before we landed.” He looked at his watch. “0930 I make it.”

  “That is correct, sir.”

  Grimes got into the front of the car with Dunbar. Giles said that he was going aboard Rim Malemute to see Williams to handle the arrival formalities. Dunbar drove off, wasting no time.

  Grimes looked with interest at the berthed ships as they passed them—Rim Cougar, Rim Panther, the Shakespearean Line’s Othello, the Waverley Royal Mail’s freighter Countess of Ayrshire. It could have been Port Forlorn, but for the weather. The sky overhead was blue, with a very few white clouds, not a dismal gray overcast—mainly natural, but contributed to by the smoke from the towering stacks of Lorn’s heavy industry. Ahead, once they were through the main gates, was the city of Port Last, and beyond the white and red buildings towered the snowcapped pinnacles of the Ultimate Range. The road ran straight as an arrow through fields of wheat, some still green and some already golden. In these latter the harvesters, looking like huge mechanical insects, were busily working.

  Ultimo, thought Grimes. The granary of the Rim Worlds. A planet of farmers. A world where anything, anything at all, is welcome as long as it breaks the deadly monotony. Like Elsinore, another farming world, but dairy products rather than grain, where compulsive gambling is the main social problem. . . .

  He asked Dunbar, “Where have they got young Pleshoff?”

  “In the central jail, Commodore. I could have got him out on bail, but thought that if I did he’d be getting into more trouble.”

  “What are the charges, exactly?”

  “As far as we’re concerned, mutiny. As far as the civil authorities are concerned, drug addiction. I should have liked to have held Captain Gaynes and his chief officer as witnesses—but, as you know, Rim Caribou was already behind schedule and it would have taken too much time to get reliefs for them. But they left affidavits.”

  “Mphm. What do you think, Captain?”

  “What can I think? The young fool was in the control room, testing gear an hour before lift-off, while Gaynes was in my office and the chief officer was seeing the ship buttoned up for space. The engineers had been doing last-minute maintenance on the inertial drive, had made a test run on one-twentieth power and then, with departure time so close, had left it on Stand-By. Pleshoff slammed it into maximum thrust and the old Caribou went up like a rocket. Gaynes and I saw it from my office window. It shook us, I can tell you. Then Pleshoff thought he’d try his hand at a few lateral maneuvers. He wiped the radio mast off the top of the spaceport control tower. He buzzed the market place in Port Last—and it was market day, too, just to improve matters. By this time the chief and second officers had managed to break into the control room. They overpowered him and got the ship back into her berth—just as the entire police force came screaming in through the spaceport gates.”

  “And what does he say?”

  “That it seemed a good idea at the time.”

  “Mphm. I suppose that all of us, as junior officers, have wanted to become instant captains. This drug addiction charge . . . do you think it will stick?”

  “It’ll stick, all right. Pleshoff was running around with a very unsavoury bunch of kids of his own age, bearded boys and shaven-headed girls. The Blossom People, they call themselves.”

  “There are Blossom People on Francisco. I suppose they modeled themselves on these originals.”

  “Probably. The gang that he was mixed up in seem to have a source of supply for—what do they call the muck?—dreamy weed. Ugh!”


  “They smoke it?”

  “Yes. In long, porcelain pipes. They claim that it’s not habit forming. They claim that it’s no worse than alcohol, that its effects are far less injurious. They even have a religion based on it.”

  “Is this . . . this dreamy weed grown locally?”

  Dunbar laughed. “On Ultimo? You must be joking, Commodore. Every square inch of soil on this planet has to nourish the sacred grain. It’s smuggled in, from somewhere. The police and the customs are running around in small circles trying to get their paws onto the runners. But even the pushers are too smart for them.”

  The car had entered the city now, was running through a wide street on either side of which were low, graceful stone houses. The houses gave way to shops, to office buildings, taller and taller as the vehicle approached the centre. And then they were in the great square, with the fountains and the statue of some ancient Greek-looking lady proudly holding a sheaf of wheat. Surrounding the square were the official buildings—town hall, city library, state church, Aero-Space Authority, police headquarters, and prison. The jail was a cylindrical tower, windowless except at ground level. It was well proportioned, graceful even—but it looked grim.

  Dunbar said, “I’ve warned them that we’re coming. They’ll let us in.”

  “As long as they let us out,” said Grimes.

  Chapter 4

  THE POLICE LIEUTENANT in charge of the ground-floor office eyed Grimes and Dunbar as though they were candidates for admission. “Yes?” he barked.

  “I am Captain Dunbar,” said the local astronautical superintendent. “This gentleman is Commodore Grimes.”

  The policeman’s manner softened very slightly. He asked, “And what can I do for you gentlemen?”

  “We wish to see Mr. Pleshoff. Colonel Warden said that it would be in order.”

  “Oh, yes. Pleshoff.” The swarthy and burly young man leafed through a book on his desk. “We still have him.”

  Pleshoff, thought Grimes. With no “Mister.” But if you get on the wrong side of the law you soon lose your rank and status.

  “Cell 729,” muttered the lieutenant. He raised an imperious hand and a constable obeyed the summons. “Bamberger, take these visitors to see the prisoner Pleshoff.”

  “It is a work period, sir.”

  “I know that. But I think that the sovereign state of Ultimo can afford to dispense with his services for half an hour, or even longer.”

  “Follow me, please, gentlemen,” said the brawny Bamberger. He led the way to a bank of elevator doors. He addressed a grille set in the nearest one, said. “Constable Bamberger, No. 325252, with two visitors, Commodore Grimes and Captain Dunbar.” Then, to his charges, “Stand beside me, please. One on either side of me.” And again to the grille, “Constable Bamberger and party positioned.”

  There was a flash of intense light, lasting for the briefest fraction of a second. Grimes allowed himself to wonder how he would look in the instantaneous photograph. The door slid open to reveal an empty cage. There was no control panel. The door silently shut as soon as they were all inside. Bamberger said, “Level 33.” There was only the slightest tug of acceleration to indicate that they were being slowly carried upwards.

  Grimes said, “I take it that your various robots are programmed to obey only the voices of the prison staff.”

  “I cannot answer that question, sir.”

  “Mphm. And I suppose, too, that the elevators move very slowly unless some key word or phrase is used, so that any prisoner attempting to escape from an upper level in one cage would find that those on the ground floor had been given ample time to prepare for his reception.”

  “I cannot answer that question, sir.”

  “If the machinery running the elevators obeys only the voices of the guards,” said Dunbar, “how could a prisoner persuade it to work for him?”

  “In the history of penology,” said Grimes, “there are many instances of prisoners persuading guards to help them to escape. And not only with a knife or gun in the back.”

  “I’m afraid that I can’t see Pleshoff doing any bribery,” said Dunbar. “Not on Rim Runners’ third officer’s salary. I couldn’t do it on mine.”

  “Mphm,” grunted Grimes, and Bamberger looked relieved at the change of subject.

  “What work do the prisoners do?” asked Grimes.

  “Pleshoff, sir,” said the constable, “is in the workroom where playmaster components are assembled. All the convicts receive full Award rates for whatever work they are doing. In the case of a prisoner not yet tried and convicted, even when undeniably guilty of the offense with which he is charged, he is allowed to keep the money he earns after the cost of his keep has been deducted. After conviction, of course, all his earnings revert to consolidated revenue.”

  “Mphm.” Grimes turned to Dunbar. “I’m surprised that our Mr. Pleshoff hasn’t been up before the Beak yet.”

  “He’s had to take his place in the queue, Commodore.”

  “So they’re keeping you busy,” said Grimes to Bamberger.

  The constable’s wooden face at last betrayed some emotion. “It’s these Blossom People, sir. They get a lungful of dreamy weed and the things they get up to aren’t at all funny. We never have the same trouble with proper criminals.”

  “I suppose not. A proper criminal you just regard as one of the family.”

  Bamberger gave Grimes a very nasty look, then lapsed into sulky silence.

  “But they are becoming a menace,” said Dunbar. “The Blossom People, I mean.”

  “I suppose they are,” said Grimes. Performing aerobatics in a 3,000-ton spaceship certainly could be classed as being a menace.

  “Floor 33,” announced Bamberger. He led the way out through the opening door.

  Most of Floor 33 was occupied by the workroom. Through the space ran long, slow-moving conveyor belts. Industriously engaged at these were about a hundred men, each of whom was dressed in drab gray coveralls, each of whom had his number stenciled on to the chest and back of his garment. Blue-and-silver-uniformed guards strolled watchfully along the lines, and other guards stood behind mounted guns of some kind in inward-facing balconies. Those screwdrivers, thought Grimes with a twinge of apprehension, could be used as weapons. And the soldering irons . . . But how long would a prisoner who tried to attack a guard last? Not long. He transferred his attention to an almost-completed playmaster that was sliding past him. He wondered if the machine in his own home had been assembled in a place like this.

  One of the guards who had more silver braid on his sleeves than the others came to meet them. He said, “Commodore Grimes? Captain Dunbar? You wish to see Pleshoff, Number 729. You may use the refreshment room. It will not be required for general use until the next smoke, forty-five minutes from now. Take these gentlemen there, Bamberger.”

  “Yes, Sergeant.”

  The refreshment room was grim, gray, cheerless. It contained an ice-water dispenser and dispensers for tea and coffee. Bamberger asked if they wanted a drink. Dunbar refused one. The constable drew paper cups of coffee for Grimes and himself. The fluid was lukewarm, black, and bitter and could have been an infusion of anything at all but what it was called.

  Escorted by two guards Pleshoff came in. Grimes remembered the young man, had interviewed him when he applied for a position in Rim Runners. He had been a junior officer in Trans-Galactic Clippers and had met a girl from Faraway when his ship had carried a number of Rim Worlds’ passengers on a cruise. He seemed to remember that Pleshoff had married the girl—yes, he had applied for an extension of leave during his honeymoon. And hadn’t Pleshoff’s captain mentioned to him, not so long ago, that the marriage had broken up?

  There are some men who look like spacemen, like officers, no matter what they are wearing. Pleshoff was not one of them. Out of uniform—or in the wrong uniform—he looked like a very ordinary, very frightened young man. At least he didn’t look like a criminal, thought Grimes.

  The commodore said to
the guards, “Do you think that you could leave us alone with the . . . er . . . prisoner?”

  Bamberger said, “These gentlemen were vouched for by Colonel Warden.”

  One of the other men asked, “Aren’t you Commodore Grimes, sir? The Commodore Grimes?”

  “There’s only one of me as far as I know,” said Grimes. “On this Continuum.”

  Bamberger was puzzled by this remark and said doubtfully, “We have to ask the sergeant.”

  But the sergeant was agreeable, and after a few minutes Grimes, Dunbar, and Pleshoff had the refreshment room to themselves, the two superintendents seated on a hard wooden bench and the young officer facing them, perched on a chair that looked even harder than their own seat.

  Chapter 5

  “AND NOW, MR. PLESHOFF,” said Grimes sternly, “what have you to say for yourself?”

  “I suppose it’s no good my saying that I’m sorry, sir.”

  “It’s not,” Grimes told him. But, he thought, I’m sorry. I’m sorry to see a youngster ruin his career.

  “I suppose, sir, that I’m finished with Rim Runners.”

  “I’m afraid, Mr. Pleshoff, that you’re finished in space. After what you did, your Certificate of Competency will have to be dealt with. There’s no way out of it. But I don’t think that we shall be pressing the mutiny charge.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “You haven’t much to thank me for, Mr. Pleshoff. You’re on the beach. You still have to face the drug charges. But I shall instruct our legal people to do what they can for you.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “And you might do something for me.”

  “Anything I can, sir.” Pleshoff was pitifully eager.

  “I’ll be frank with you. Until now I’ve never taken this drug business seriously. I’ve thought, if people want to blow their minds, let ’em. It just never occurred to me that anybody in a position of trust, of responsibility, would get . . . hooked? Is that the right word?”