The Inheritors Read online

  Grimes, trying to look and to feel fatherly, surveyed his people. He was pleased to note that the real spacemen—with the exception of Hayakawa—looked the part. Ethnic origins and differentiation of skin pigmentation were canceled out, as it were, by the common uniform. With the exception of Maggie Lazenby the scientists looked their part. They were, of course, all in uniform—though it wasn't what they were wearing but how they were wearing it that mattered. To them uniform was just something to cover their nakedness, the more comfortably the better. And to them beards were merely the means whereby the bother of depilation could be avoided. The growths sprouting from the faces of Tallis, Westover and Forsby contrasted shockingly with the neat hirsute adornments sported by Connery and Stein. The only one of the scientists at whom it was a pleasure to look was Doctor Lazenby—slim, auburn-haired and wearing a skirt considerably less than regulation length.

  Grimes looked at her.

  She snapped, "Get on with it, John." (Everybody present knew that she was a privileged person.)

  "Mphm," he grunted as he carefully filled his pipe. "Help yourselves to coffee—or to something stronger from the bar, if you'd rather." He waited until everybody was holding a glass or a cup, then said, "As you all know by this time, this is a Lost Colony expedition . . . ."

  Forsby raised his hand for attention. "Captain, forgive my ignorance, but I've only just joined the Survey Service. And I'm a physicist, not a historian. Just what is a Lost Colony?"

  "Mphm," grunted Grimes again. He shot a dirty look at Maggie Lazenby as he heard her whispered "Keep it short!" He carefully lit his pipe. He said, "The majority of the so-called Lost Colonies date from the days of the Second Expansion, of the gaussjammers. The gaussjammers were interstellar ships that used the Ehrenhaft Drive. Cutting a long and involved story short, the Ehrenhaft generators produced a magnetic current—a current, not a field—and the ship in which they were mounted became, in effect, a huge magnetic particle, proceeding at a speed which could be regulated from a mere crawl to FTL along the 'tramlines,' the lines of magnetic force. This was all very well—but a severe magnetic storm could throw a gaussjammer light-years off course, very often into an unexplored and uncharted sector of the galaxy . . . ."

  "FTL?" demanded Forsby in a pained voice. "FTL?"

  "A matter of semantics," Grimes told him airily. "You know, and I know, that faster-than-light speeds are impossible. With our Mannschenn Drive, for example, we cheat—by going astern in time as we're going ahead in space. The gaussjammers cheated too—by coexisting with themselves all along the lines of magnetic force that they were on. The main thing was—it worked. Anyhow, visualize a gaussjammer after a magnetic storm has tangled the lines of force like so much spaghetti and drained the micro-pile of all energy. The captain doesn't know where he is. But he has got power for his main engines."

  "You said that the micro-pile was dead."

  "Sure. But those ships ran to emergency generators—diesel generators. They churned out the electricity to drive the Ehrenhaft generators. The ship's biochemist knew the techniques for producing diesel fuel from whatever was available—even though it meant that all hands would be on short rations. So, for as long as she could, the ship either tried to make her way back to some known sector or to find a planet capable of being settled . . . ."

  "Analogous," contributed Maggie Lazenby, "to the colonization of many Pacific islands by Polynesians in Earth's remote past. But this colony that we're supposed to be looking for, John . . ."

  "Yes. I was getting around to that. It's supposed to be in the Argo Sector. It was stumbled upon by a Dog Star Line ship that made a deviation to recalibrate her Mannschenn Drive controls. It won't be a Lost Colony for much longer."

  "Why not?" asked Forsby.

  "To begin with, the Dog Star Line people know about it. The Shaara know about it. We know about it. And Drongo Kane knows about it."

  "Drongo Kane?" This was Forsby again, of course. "Who's he?"

  Grimes sighed. He supposed that his physicist knew his own subject, but he seemed to know very little outside it. He turned his regard to his officers, said, "Tell him."

  "Drongo Kane . . ." murmured Saul in his deep, rich voice. "Smuggler, gunrunner . . ."

  "Pirate . . ." contributed Timmins.

  "That was never proven," Grimes told him.

  "Perhaps not, sir. But I was on watch—it was when I was a junior in Scorpio—when Bremerhaven's distress call came through."

  "Mphm. As I recall it, Bremerhaven's own activities at the time were somewhat dubious . . . ."

  "Slaver . . ." said Saul.

  "Somebody had to take the people off Ganda before the radiation from their sun fried them. Whatever ships were available had to be employed."

  "But Kane was paid by the Duke of Waldegren for the people he carried in Southerly Buster."

  "Just a fee," said Grimes, "or commission, or whatever, for the delivery of indentured labor."

  "What about this bloody Lost Colony?" demanded Maggie Lazenby.

  "We're supposed to find it." Grimes gestured toward the folder on his desk with the stem of his pipe. "I've had copies made of all the bumf that was given to me. It consists mainly of reports made by agents on quite a few worlds. Our man at Port Llangowan, on Siluria, recorded a conversation between officers of Corgi and Pomeranian in one of the local pubs. Corgi had found this world—which seems to be called Morrowvia—quite by chance. Our man at Port Brrooun, on Drroomoorr, recorded a conversation between the second mate of Corgi and a Shaara drone; once again Morrowvia was mentioned. The same young gentleman—the second mate, not the drone—got into trouble at Port Mackay on Rob Roy. Normally he'd have been emptied out there and then by Corgi's master—but keeping him on board must have been the lesser of two evils."

  "Why?" asked Forsby.

  "Because," Grimes told him patiently, "the master of Corgi didn't want word of a new world that could well be included in the Dog Star Line's economic empire spread all over the galaxy. Where was I? Yes. Our woman at Port Fortinbras, on Elsinore, recorded a conversation between the owner of a repair yard and the owner of a ship chandlery. The repair yard was doing some work on Drongo Kane's ship, Southerly Buster—the mounting of armament, among other things. Kane had told the owner of the yard something—not much, but something—about a Lost Colony found by a Dog Star tramp . . . ."

  "And what are we supposed to do, Captain?" asked Forsby."Plant the Federation's flag, or something?"

  "Or something," said Maggie Lazenby. "You can rest assured of that."

  Or something, thought Grimes.

  4

  As far as Grimes knew there was no real urgency—nonetheless he pushed Seeker along at her maximum safe velocity. This entailed acceleration slightly in excess of 1.5 G, with a temporal precession rate that did not quite, as Maggie Lazenby tartly put it, have all hands and the cook living backward. But Maggie had been born and reared on Arcadia, a relatively low gravity planet and, furthermore, disliked and distrusted the time-twisting Mannschenn Drive even more than the average spaceman or—woman. However, Lieutenant Brian Connery was an extremely competent engineer and well able to maintain the delicate balance between the ship's main drive units without remotely endangering either the vessel or her personnel.

  Even so, Grimes suffered. Seeker had a mixed crew—and a ship, as Grimes was fond of saying, is not a Sunday School outing. On past voyages it had been tacitly assumed that Maggie was the captain's lady. On this voyage it was so assumed too—by everybody except one of the two people most intimately concerned. Grimes tried to play along with the assumption, but it was hopeless.

  "I suppose," he said bitterly, after she had strongly resisted a quite determined pass, "that you're still hankering after that beefy lout, Brasidus or whatever his name was, on Sparta . . . ."

  "No," she told him, not quite truthfully. "No. It's just that I can't possibly join in your fun and games when I feel as though I weigh about fourteen times normal."

 
"Only one and a half times," he corrected her.

  "It feels fourteen times. And it's the psychological effect that inhibits me."

  Grimes slumped back in his chair, extending an arm to his open liquor cabinet.

  "Lay off it!" she told him sharply.

  "So I can't drink now."

  "You will not drink now." Her manner softened. "Don't forget, John, that you're responsible for the ship and everybody aboard her . . . ."

  "Nothing can happen in deep space."

  "Can't it?" Her fine eyebrows lifted slightly. "Can't it? After some of the stories I've heard, and after some of the stories you've told me yourself . . .

  "Mphm." He reached out again, but it was a half-hearted attempt.

  "Things will work out, John," she said earnestly. "They always do, one way or the other . . . ."

  "Suppose it's the wrong way?"

  "You'll survive. I'll survive. We'll survive." She quoted, half seriously, " 'Men have died, and worms have eaten 'em—but not for love . . .' "

  "Where's that from?" he asked, interested.

  "Shakespeare. You trade school boys—you're quite impossible. You know nothing—nothing—outside your own field."

  "I resent that," said Grimes. "At the Academy we had to do a course in Twentieth Century fiction . . .

  Again the eyebrows lifted. "You surprise me." And then she demanded incredulously, "What sort of fiction?"

  "It was rather specialized. Science fiction, as a matter of fact. Some of those old buggers made very good guesses. Most of them, though, were way off the beam. Even so, it was fascinating."

  "And still trade-school-oriented."

  He shrugged. "Have it your way, Maggie. We're just Yahoos. But we do get our ships around." He paused, then delivered his own quotation. " 'Transportation is civilization.' "

  "All right," she said at last. "Who wrote that?"

  "Kipling."

  "Kipling—and science fiction?"

  "You should catch up on your own reading some time . . . ." The telephone buzzed sharply. He got up and went rapidly to the handset.

  She remarked sweetly, "Nothing can happen in deep space . . . ."

  "Captain here," said Grimes sharply.

  Lieutenant Hayakawa's reedy voice drifted into the day cabin. "Hayakawa, Captain sir . . . ."

  "Yes, Mr. Hayakawa?"

  "I . . . am not certain. But I think I have detected psionic radiation—not close, but not too far distant.

  "It is extremely unlikely," Grimes said, "that we are the only ship in this sector of space."

  "I . . . I know, Captain. But—it is all vague, and the other telepath is maintaining a block . . .I . . . I tried at first to push through, and he knew that I was trying . . . . Then, suddenly, I relaxed . . . ."

  Psionic judo . . . thought Grimes.

  "Yes . . . You could call it that . . . But there is somebody aboard that ship who is thinking all the time about . . . Morrowvia . . . ."

  "Drongo Kane," said Grimes.

  "No, Captain. Not Drongo Kane. This is a . . . young mind. Immature . . . ."

  "Mphm. Anything else?"

  "Yes . . . . He is thinking, too, of somebody called Tabitha . . . ."

  "And who's she when she's up and dressed?"

  "She is not dressed . . . not as he remembers her."

  "This," stated Maggie Lazenby, "is disgusting. I thought, in my innocence, that the Rhine Institute took a very dim view of any prying by its graduates into private thoughts. I was under the impression that telepathy was to be used only for instantaneous communications over astronomical distances."

  "If every Rhine Institute graduate who broke the Institute's rules dropped dead right now," Grimes told her, "there'd be one helluva shortage of trained telepaths. In any case, the Institute allows some latitude to those of its people who're in the employ of a recognized law enforcement agency. The Federation's Survey Service is one such. Conversely, the Institute recognizes the right of any telepath, no matter by whom employed, to put up a telepathic block."

  "I still don't like it. Any of it."

  "Mr. Hayakawa," said Grimes into the telephone, "you heard all that?"

  "Yes, Captain."

  "And what are your views?"

  In reply came a thin chuckle, then, "I try to be loyal, sir. To the Institute, to the Service, to my shipmates, to my captain. Sometimes it is hard to be loyal to everybody at once. But, also, I try to be loyal to myself."

  "Putting it briefly," said Maggie Lazenby, "you know on which side your bread is buttered."

  "Butter is an animal-derived food, Miss Commander, which I never touch."

  "Mr. Hayakawa," asked Grimes, "do you hear anything further from the strange ship?"

  "No, Captain. The block has been reestablished."

  "Let me know when you do hear anything more." He punched buttons, then spoke again into the instrument. "Captain here, Mr. Timmins. Mr. Hayakawa has reported a vessel in our vicinity, apparently heading for Morrowvia. Have you picked anything up?"

  "Just the normal commercial traffic, sir. A Shaara freighter, Mmoorroomm, Rob Roy to ZZrreemm. Empress of Scotia, Dunedin to Darnstadt. Cutty Sark, Carinthia to Lorn. Schnauzer, Siluria toMacbeth. And, according to Sector Plot, the following ships not fitted with Carlotti equipment: Sundowner, Aquarius to Faraway, Rim Eland, Elsinore to Ultimo . . . ."

  "Thank you." Then, speaking more to himself than to anybody else, "Schnauzer . . . Dog Star Line . . . cleared for Macbeth . . . . She might finish up there eventually . . . ."

  He ignored Maggie's questioning look and went to his playmaster. As its name implied, the device provided entertainment, visual and audio—but this one, a standard fitting in the captain's quarters in all FSS ships, was also hooked up to the vessel's encyclopedia bank. "Get me Lloyd's Register," he ordered. "I want details on Schnauzer. Sirian ownership. Dog Star Line . . . ."

  The screen lit up, displaying the facsimile of a printed page.

  Schnauzer—a new ship, small, exceptionally fast for a merchantman, defensively armed. (The Dog Star Line had long insisted that its vessels were capable of conducting their own defense on some of the trade routes where piracy still persisted.)

  "Mphm," he grunted. Back at the telephone he ordered Timmins to send a coded message to the FSS agent at Port Llangowan, on Siluria, to ask the names of Schnauzer's personnel when she cleared outward.

  He strongly suspected that the master would be Captain Danzellan.

  5

  "Master, Roger Danzellan," the Federation's man on Siluria replied eventually. "First mate, Oscar Eklund. Second mate, Francis Delamere. Third mate, Kathryn Daley. Chief engineer, Mannschenn Drive, Evan Jones. Chief engineer Interplanetary Drives, Ian Mackay. Juniors, H. Smith, B. Ostrog, H. Singh. Purser/catering officer, Glynis Trent . . ." The message went on to say that Captain Danzellan and Mr. Delamere had both been among Corgi's complement when she had last been at Port Llangowan. The last piece of information that it contained was that Francis Delamere was the nephew of the Dog Star Line's general manager.

  So—obviously, the Dog Star people were interested in Morrowvia. On receiving the report from Corgi's master they had acted, and fast. A suitable ship had been shunted off her doubtlessly well-worn tramlines, and Danzellan had been transferred to her command. Probably he had not wished to have Delamere as one of his Officers—but Delamere had pull. Nepotism, as Grimes well knew, existed in the Survey Service. In a privately owned shipping company the climate would be even more suitable to its flourishing.

  There was only one thing for Grimes to do—to pile on the Gs and the lumes, to get to Morrowvia before Danzellan. Fortunately, the merchant vessel was not fitted with a Mass Proximity Indicator—the Dog Star Line viewed new navigational aids with suspicion and never fitted them to its ships until their value was well proven. Sooner or later—sooner, Grimes hoped—Seeker would pick up Schnauzer in her screen and, shortly thereafter, would be able accurately to extrapolate her trajectory. Schnauzer would know no
thing of Seeker's whereabouts or presence.

  And Drongo Kane in his Southerly Buster? A coded request for information to the Bug Queen brought the news that he had lifted from Port Fortinbras, his refit completed, with a General Clearance. Such clearances were rarely issued. This one must have cost Kane plenty.