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mien of the bentlam eater. But Kinnison's mind was not an ordinary one; the
dose which would have rendered any bona-fide 'miner's brain as helpless as his
body did not affect the Lensman's new equipment at all. Alcohol and bentlam
together were bad, but the Lensman was sober. Therefore, if anything, the
drugging of his body only made it easier to dissociate his new mind from it.
Furthermore, he need not waste any thought in making it act. There was only
one way it could act, now, and Kinnison let his new senses roam abroad without
even thinking of the body he was leaving behind him.
In view of the rigorous orders from higher up the conference room was
heavily guarded by screened men; no one except old and trusted employees were
allowed to enter it, and they were also protected. Nevertheless, Kinnison got
in, by proxy.
A clever pick-pocket brushed against a screened waiter who was about to
enter the sacred precincts, lightning fingers flicking a switch. The waiter
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began to protestûthen forgot what he was going to say, even as the pick-pocket
forgot completely the deed he had just done. The waiter in turn was a trifle
clumsy in serving a certain Big Shot, but earned no rebuke thereby; for the
latter forgot the offense almost instantly. Under Kinnison's control the
director fumbled at his screen-generator for a moment, loosening slightly a
small but important resistor. That done, the Lensman withdrew delicately and
the meeting was an open book.
"Before we do anything," the director began, "Show me that all your screens
are on." He bared his ownûit would have taken an expert service man an hour to
find that it was not functioning perfectly.
"Poppycock!" snorted the zwilnik. "Who in all the hells of space thinks that
a Lensman wouldûor couldûcome to Euphrosyne?"
"Nobody can tell what this particular Lensman can or can't do, and nobody
knows what he's doing until just before he dies. Hence the strictness. You've
searched everybody here, of course?"
"Everybody," Strongheart averred, "even the drunks and the dopes. The whole
building is screened, besides the screens we're wearing."
"The dopes don't count, of course, provided they're really doped." No one
except the Gray Lensman himself could possibly conceive of a Lensman beingûnot
seeming to be, but actually beingûa drunken sot, to say nothing of being a
confirmed addict of any drug. "By the way, who is this Wild Bill Williams
we've been hearing about?"
Strongheart and his friend looked at each other and laughed. "I checked up
on him early," the zwilnik chuckled. "He isn't the Lensman, of course, but I
thought at first he might be an agent. We frisked him and his ship
thoroughlyûno diceûand checked back on him as a miner, four solar systems
back. He's clean, anyway; this is his second bender here. He's been guzzling
everything in stock for a week, getting more pie-eyed every day, and
Strongheart and I just put him to bed with twenty four units of benny. You
know what that means, don't you?"
"Your own benny or his?" the director asked. "My own. That's why I know he's
clean. All the other dopes are too. The drunks we gave the bum's rush, like
you told us to."
"QX. I don't think there's any danger, myselfûI think the hot-shot Lensman
they're afraid of is still working Bronsecaûbut these orders not to take any
chances at all come from 'way, 'way up."
"How about this new system they're working on, that nobody knows his boss
any more? Hooey, I call it."
"Not ready yet. They haven't been able to invent an absolutely safe one
that'll handle the work. In the meantime, we're using these books. Cumbersome,
but absolutely safe, they say, unless and until the enemy gets onto the idea.
Then one group will go into the lethal chambers of the Patrol and the rest of
us will use something else. Some say this code can't be cracked; others say
any code can be read in time. Anyway here's your orders. Pass them along. Give
me your stuff and we'll have supper and a few drinks."
They ate. They drank. They enjoyed an evening and a night of high revelry
and low dissipation, each to his taste; each secure in the knowledge that his
thought-screen was one hundred percent effective against the one enemy he
really feared. Indeed, the screens were that effectiveûthenûsince the Lensman,
having learned from the director all he knew, had restored the generator to
full efficiency in the instant of his relinquishment of control.
Although the heads of the zwilniks, and therefore their minds, were secure
against Kinnison's prying, the books of record were not. And, though his body
was lying helpless, inert upon a drug-fiend's cot, his sense of perception
read those books; if not as readily as though they were in his hands and open,
yet readily enough. And, far off in space, a power-brained Lensman yclept
Worsel recorded upon imperishable metal a detailed account, including names,
dates, facts, and figures, of all the doings of all the zwilniks of a solar
system!
The information was coded, it is true; but, since Kinnison knew the key, it
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might just as well have been printed in English. To the later consternation of
Narcotics, however, that tape was sent in under Lensman's Sealûit could not be
read until the Gray Lensman gave the word.
In twenty four hours Kinnison recovered from the effects of his debauch. He
got his keys from Strongheart. He left the asteroid. He knew the mighty
intellect with whom he had next to deal, he knew where that entity was to be
found; but, sad to say, he had positively no idea at all as to what he was
going to do or how he was going to do it.
Wherefore it was that a sense of relief tempered the natural apprehension he
felt upon receiving, a few days later, an insistent call from Haynes. Truly
this must be something really extraordinary, for while during the long months
of his service Kinnison had called the Port Admiral several times, Haynes had
never before Lensed him.
"Kinnison! Haynes calling!" the message beat into his consciousness.
"Kinnison acknowledging, sir!" the Gray Lensman thought back.
"Am I interrupting anything important?" "Not at all. I'm just doing a little
flit."
"A situation has come up which we feel you should study, not only in person,
but also without advance information or pre-conceived ideas. Can you come in
to Prime Base immediately?"
"Yes, sir. In fact, a little time right now might do me good in two waysûlet
me mull a job over, and let a nut mellow down to a point where maybe I can
crack it At your orders, sir!"
"Not orders, Kinnison!" the old man reprimanded him sharply. "No one gives
Unattached Lensmen orders. We request or suggest, but you are the sole judge
as to where your greatest usefulness lies."
"Please believe, sir, that your requests are orders, to me," Kinnison
replied in all seriousness. Then, more lightly, "Your calling me in suggests
an emergency, and travelling in this miner's scow of mine is just a trifle
faster than going afoot. How about sending out something with some legs to
pick me up?"
"The Dauntless, for instance?"
"Ohûyou've got her rebuilt already?"
"Yes."
"I'll bet she's a sweet clipper! She was a mighty slick stepper before; now
she must have more legs than a centipede!"
And so it came about that in a region of space entirely empty of all other [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]