The Early Pohl Page 4

  . . . Well, not really as simple as that. When I got the job so easily I took it as a natural tribute to my talent. It was only a lot later that I realized they would have hired Mothra or Og, Son of Fire, just about as readily right then, because they were very interested in expanding.

  Popular Publications was run by a man named Harry Steeger, an intimidatingly polished Princeton sort of person who skied and owned a yacht and entertained callers who conducted long phone conversations in idiomatic French. He had some fancy Princeton ideas. One of them was that he should pay writers a decent rate—a penny a word, sometimes even more.

  That may not seem like much now. The reason for that is that it wasn't really much even then. But all the same it was more than some other pulp publishers were paying. Steeger was under pressure from the other people involved in his empire to cut his costs by lowering his word rate.

  He didn't like to do this. What he did do was start a mythical other publishing company—it was called Fictioneers, Inc.—which would bring out a whole new line of pulps at a base word rate of half a cent. 205 East 42 happened to be the address of a building that went clear through the block and came out the other side. 210 East 43 was the address of the other entrance, and that became the official address of Fictioneers. The switchboard girl, Ethel Klock (dear, lovely lady who couldn't bowl for sour apples but kept us all company every Friday lunch hour at the alleys), was given a new telephone line, and was instructed under pain of death not to put through any calls to anybody connected with Popular Publications in the Fictioneers number. Well, that drove them all crazy. They tried. But it was tacky to call up an agent as Loren Dowst, editor of Fighting Aces, and buy some stories for Popular Publications at a penny a word, hang up and then call back a minute later as Ray P. Shotwell, editor of Battle Birds, and in a quavering assumed falsetto attempt to buy half-price stories for Fictioneers.

  What Fictioneers obviously needed was at least one or two real, flesh-and-blood, actual people to be editors; and I happened to hit the place at the right time.

  So there I was, nineteen years old from head to feet, and editor of two professional magazines. I had my name on the masthead. I was listed in the writers' market magazines.

  To be sure, Popular didn't pay me very much. It was $10 a week for the first six months or so. That wasn't so bad. They hired another editor at the same time, and he had to work three months for nothing before they raised him to $10 a week.

  The art director was a wonderful man named Alex Portegal, who doubled as a lending agency. You could get five dollars from Alex any time, provided that on payday you gave him back six.* And we needed it. Without Alex, I don't think any of us would have made it through the month, not even the senior editors who were making as much as $35.

  We weren't really expected to live on that kind of money. What we were expected to do was write stories and buy them from ourselves, and somehow piece together enough to survive.

  I did so. The King's Eye, from the February 1941 issue of Astonishing Stories, is one of them. At 5,900 words, at my premium rate of 3/4^f a word, it came to $43.50 that it fetched me . . . equal to a month's editorial pay, just about.

  * It spoils the story, but is true, that at the end of each year Alex took the spoils of his usury, bought drinks for all his clients and gave the rest to charity.

  The King's Eye

  JAMES MacCREIGH

  Chester Wing shoved the cards away from him and rose with a snarl on his lips. "Damn you and your sleight-of-hand, Parrel," he lipped. "Cut it out!"

  "What?" innocently asked Parrel Henderson, Wing's partner in exploration.

  "Dealing from the bottom—that's what. I know we aren't playing for money, but I still don't like the idea of losing every hand."

  "Oh, calm down," suggested Henderson, rising himself. "I was only joking. We'll quit playing if you feel that way." He sauntered over to the quartz viewplate, stared at the fetid swamp that was dimly visible through the steamy fog. The scenery was pretty uninspiring, being nothing better than a steam-shrouded tangle of vegetation, mostly dull greying white. All Venusian landscapes were much alike; all revoltingly wet and unpleasantly hot. "What a place to blow a rocket-tube," he muttered, less than half to Wing.

  Wing nodded vaguely, no longer angry. "Hope to Heaven we get out of here soon," he said fervently.

  "How much longer do you suppose it'll actually be before the tube's ready?" inquired Henderson.

  Wing cocked a thoughtful ear at the faint humming sound that told of the automatic repair-machines at work, extracting isotopic beryllium from the constant flow of swamp-water that passed through its pipes, plating it in layers on the steel core that was the mold for their new rocket-tube. "Maybe two days," he pronounced finally, "At least, the tube ought to be ready then. Whether or not our fine-feathered friends will do something to keep us here is something else again. I don't feel very happy about that—though there isn't really much that they could do, once we get the new tube in place."

  It had been a bad day for the Earthmen when they'd been forced to land in this particular section of Venus. The local tribe of natives had developed a positive allergy to Earthmen, the result of a fracas that had occurred years before, when planetary pioneering had been newer. Wing had never got all the details from the reticent tribesmen, but it had had something to do with the great Venustone that was now on exhibition in the Hall of the Planets, back in Washington on Earth. The Stone was really a huge red diamond, but its great size and unusual coloring had made it highly valuable. Wing couldn't blame the chief for regretting its loss to the tribe. Probably the Earthman who had taken it had "paid" for it with trumpery beads or colored cloth—at gun's point. That sort of trade dealings was all right, of course, for the more ignorant Venusians, but the chief hereabout—he was really a king, and "Ch'mack" was as close as Terrestrial lips could come to reproducing the verbal click and splash that was his name—was no less intelligent than the average Earthman.

  "Hey!" Henderson's cry broke in on Wing's absorbed reverie. "Who's pounding on the lock?"

  Certain enough, there was someone scratching on the airlock, obviously desirous of attracting attention. Wing refocused his gaze, saw, just visible at an angle through the quartz port, a hideously furred, troll-like creature, manlike in face, resembling most nearly a web-winged caricature of a kangaroo in body.

  "It's one of Ch'mack's boys," said Wing. "Suppose we're in trouble again?"

  "You don't mean again," Henderson shrugged expressively. "You mean yet. Ch'mack is about the touchiest living thing I've seen. I don't know why—we never did him nothing. Let's find out what he wants anyway. Go talk to the messenger."

  "Me? Why me? Go yourself!"

  "All right," Henderson sighed, contemplating the mucky terrain. "Let's both go. Here!" He tossed a wire-coiled sort of helmet at Wing, who caught it deftly and slipped it over his head. Henderson donned one also, and stepped into the airlock. The wire helmets were preceptors—what you might call telepathy-radios, allowing the explorers to converse mentally with the Venusians. No human could have spoken the Venusians' native tongue.

  A touch on a button closed the inner door, sealing off the ship; as soon as that was closed, the outer door of the lock opened automatically. Henderson and Wing grabbed at their nostrils, and stepped out on to Venusian soil.

  Humans could breathe Venus' air indefinitely, providing they didn't overexert themselves. The CO2-rich atmosphere contained enough oxygen for life, though not as much as did Earth's. But it also contained a variety of rank, hot odors, most of which resembled decaying fish.

  Wing marvelled at the fact that so disgusting a smell wasn't actually poisonous, and turned to the Venusian waiting. "What do you want?" he inquired, ungraciously but without attempting to give deliberate offense.

  "Ch'mack wishes to see you," the Venusian thought back, hostility in his tones. "Come with us." The Earthmen might have refused, but they suddenly discovered that there were more Venusians than one present.
And all of them were armed.

  They went.

  "Why will you not admit your purpose here?" bellowed Ch'mack suspiciously. The Earthmen shrugged and didn't answer. They had been asked that question, or a variant, a dozen times since that quiz began. And Ch'mack had refused to tell them just of what they were suspected. Nor had their perceptors been able to penetrate his will-shielded mind. "I know what you want," he went on vindictively. "Don't think that I do not. I know almost everything. But admit it to me!"

  "Modest cuss," thought Wing "below the threshold"—i.e., without sufficient intensity for the thought to be telepathed. Aloud he said, "I don't know what you mean."

  "Fool! Do you think you can hide things from me? I know what you are after," repeated the king. "And you won't get it!" With a furtive movement he stuck his hand into his pouch, the only article of clothing he wore. He seemed reassured at what he found. "No, you won't steal it," he continued. "I won't let you! But you must be punished for wanting to steal it. I will see that you are punished."

  "Steal what?" inquired Wing, annoyed.

  "Steal what! As if you didn't know. My Eye, of course!"

  Wing and Henderson exchanged puzzled glances. The king had two perfectly good eyes, that was true enough, but certainly neither of them had any intention of stealing one. The king glared at them heatedly. For a second it seemed he would actually walk over to them, violating the tribe's eon-old custom and actually setting his feet to the ground, to strike them. Then he looked away, a cunning smile spreading over his face, seemingly plunged into deep thought.

  "Ah," he said finally. "I have been trying to think of a punishment for them, but I cannot. My mind is too subtle, too delicate, to think of a fitting doom. Besides, we must make absolutely sure that they are guilty, must make them confess. I shall refer the matter to the Tribune!"

  The Tribune! The hapless two knew what that meant. The Tribune was an old institution in all Venusian tribes, apparently a relic of the laws that had governed Venus when it was a unified, planetwide democracy. It was a group of a dozen or so of the leaders of each tribe, the most powerful men in them and generally the oldest and bitterest as well. To appear before a Tribune was akin to appearing before a highly refined and super-deadly Spanish Inquisition. It was a rule of the Tribune that confession must precede punishment. But any kind of a confession would do, and the Tribune was perfectly willing to use torture to obtain it. Often the "questioning" was worse and more to be feared than the punishment itself—for the worst punishment was merely death, and death is always too abstract a concept to be feared with the heart, only with the mind.

  Henderson felt his companion nudging him. He looked—Wing had flicked the switch that turned off his perceptor, was motioning to him to do likewise. "Listen," spoke Wing tensely as soon as Henderson had prevented the transmission of the words, "we'd better give in to them. Time works for us; it'll be a while before they can summon the Tribune. Maybe we can stall them off until the tube's ready. If we make a break for it now we can probably get away all right—but what'll we do then?"

  Henderson comprehended. "Okay," he said. "But we better hang onto our guns—Hey!" His surprise was justified; before his very eyes, Wing stiffened and fell heavily to the ground. Then he felt a sharp sting in his own thigh and realized, as he collapsed in his turn, that they had both been shot with paralysis darts.

  And as he lay there rigid, he cursed himself. For a smirking Venusian face bent over him and took away the gun he'd just determined to retain at all costs.

  Wing had no clear idea of how long it was before he felt the first muscle-twinges that indicated that the effect of the dart had begun to work off.

  The first thing he did was to move his eyes. The particular sector of the wall on which they had been permanently focused had become boring.

  He discovered that he and his companion were in a sort of cage; bars of Venus fern-wood, floor of some rocky, cement-like material. It had a door, and the door was standing invitingly open. But Wing could only look longingly at the door, and not pass through it, for he and his partner were very securely tied with rope twisted from the "veins" of the fern-wood leaves, as strong as cobalt-steel, and tougher.

  They were alone in a large room, their cage only one of a dozen or more, but all the others empty. Beside the cages the room held a good many seats and benches, and a lot of equipment at which Wing looked only briefly. Its purpose was too plain for his nerves. It was torture tools, and all ready for use.

  Wing kicked and rolled over, touching his companion, who was also back to normal. "What do we do now?" asked Henderson, carefully keeping fear from his voice.

  "Wait. That's all we can do."

  That was true enough. Wing knew their bonds were amply secure; there was no chance of immediate escape. To make plans now would be stupid, for they had no idea of what chances the future might offer.

  So they waited, passing the time in desultory conversation. In twenty minutes or so one of the Venusians peered in the door at them, widened his eyes when he saw they'd regained the power of movement, and went away again. "This is it," said Wing, and Henderson nodded in agreement.

  It was it. In a moment the door was flung open wide and in solemn procession, entered the Tribune.

  Wing thought they were the toughest-looking representatives of their kind he'd ever seen. They were every one members of the nebulously defined aristocracy of their tribe.

  The two Earthmen were unceremoniously unbound and yanked from their cage. Dragged to a brace of high-backed fern-wood chairs, they were bound again, to the chairs. That was no pleasure, for these chairs had been designed for the different Venusian anatomy—and, being for the exclusive use of the Tribune's prisoners, hadn't been intended for comfort anyhow.

  The Tribune took seats, all but one. This one, apparently the Chairman, advanced threateningly toward the Terrestrials. He reached out to touch Wing's head. Wing feared the beginning of the torture and strained desperately against the ropes, but the Venusian merely wanted to turn on Wing's perceptor. When he had done the same to Henderson, he lanced a thought at them, menace implicit in his manner.

  "Earthmen," he thought, even his mind-vibrations coming ponderous and slow, "confess to us and save yourselves pain!"

  "Confess what?" Henderson flashed. "We told you—we came here only because our ship was wrecked. We had no intention of harming you, or of stealing your king's 'Eye,' whatever that may be. As soon as our ship is repaired, we will go away."

  The Venusian's next thought conveyed an impression of sardonic laughter. "Go away! Earthmen, you will never go away from here. Not alive." His demeanor had been hostile; now it became aggressively menacing. Like a scourge the thought came: "Confess! We know that you came here to steal the Eye. We know that your pretended ignorance of the nature of the Eye is a bluff. Let us end all bluffs and lies. The Eye—I shall say it to keep you from using this line of evasion anymore—is a great, red, sacred gem, the twin of the one that was foully stolen from us forty years ago. Now that I have broken down that veil of lying—confess!"

  The Venusian stepped back, panting with the vigor of his thoughts. He eyed his two prisoners intently. Seeing that they had resolved not to answer, he angrily motioned toward a pair of guards stationed near the door. Together they lugged up a heavy, squat metal basin, in which burned a fiercely hot flame.

  The two Terrestrials realized that the torture had come, and braced themselves for it.

  But they weren't to be tortured just then anyhow, it seemed, for, before the torture could commence, there was a disturbance at the door and a new Venusian burst in. "The King is dead!" he screamed, the thought beating on the brains of the Earthmen while the gibberish of his voice resounded in their ears. "His body has been found on the throne. He was murdered!"

  Wing and Henderson had suddenly become secondary matters. The Tribune left the room in a flurry—though not so fast but what the guards returned the pair of Earthmen to their cages, retying them. In a moment the ha
ll was empty again.

  "This is not going to help us at all, Parrel," Wing said with dark foreboding. "Of all the things I didn't want to happen. . . . I don't care who killed the king. I know who's going to pay for it. Us."

  "Shut up," growled Henderson, who knew that. His eyes were fastened on his own wrist, where he was fighting the ropes with his fingers. "Let's think about getting out of this place. The monkey that tied me up was in a hurry, and I know a couple of things about ropes, anyhow. He didn't notice the way I kept my arm poked a little away from my side. I've got a little slack here. If I can find something long and narrow, I think I can pry that knot open."

  Wing flopped painfully to his side. "In my pocket," he grunted, contorting himself so that Henderson could get at it. "It's a fountain pen. Will it do?"

  "No," said Henderson, extracting it. "But I'll make it do!" Holding it in his teeth, he slipped it into the precious inch of slackness he'd created, pried, and stretched the inch to two. A moment later his arm was free; he shed his own bonds and quickly got to those of his companion.

  "Let's get from here," muttered Wing when they were both standing, trying to massage the pain from their hurt limbs. "If we use our perceptors occasionally, just flip them on and off, we'll be able to catch thoughts and see if anyone is looking for us."

  They moved quietly to the door and stood in attitudes of intense concentration as they "listened" for sentries. Their questing minds could find no trace of anyone watching, so they slipped out the door and broke for the surrounding jungle at a quick, space-consuming walk. Their perceptors they continued to use at intervals. For their purposes, the things had a great defect; they broadcast thoughts quite as well and as far as they received them. . . .

  The uniformly grey Venusian jungle, with its toadstool plants and fern-like trees, offered no pleasing prospect to the two explorers as they slogged their way along as quietly as possible. They had to take immense care that the apparently dry spots they stepped on were really what they seemed. Bogs and swampholes freckled the Venusian terrain.