The Crack in Space (1966) Page 11

  ‘I’m glad you see it this way,’ Sal said, ‘because I’m very anxious about this.’ He wondered what material TD had uncovered in the new world; evidently, it was important. And the way Woodbine had talked, he was obviously concerned.

  Hmm, Sal thought. He felt a little worried. Just a little: the first stirrings.

  Frank Woodbine answered the knock on his conapt door, and there on the threshold stood his tall and very dark friend Jim Briskin, looking gloomy as always.

  ‘It’s been a hell of a long time,’ Woodbine said, ushering Jim in. ‘Come over here; I want to show you right away what we’ve turned up on the other side.’ He led Jim to the long table in the living room. ‘Their compressor.’ He pointed to the photograph. ‘There are a hundred better ways to build a compressor than this. Why’d they choose the most cumbersome way possible? You can’t call a culture primitive if it’s got such artifacts in it as piston engines and gas compressors. In fact, their ability to construct a power glider alone puts them out of that class automatically. And yet, something’s obviously wrong. Tomorrow, of course, we’ll know what it is, but I’d like to know tonight, before we establish contact with them.’

  Picking up the photo of the compressor, Jim Briskin studied it. ‘The homeopapes thought you’d found something like this, when you hauled that object back. According to the rumor, you’ve actually …’

  ‘Yes,’ Woodbine said. ‘The rumor’s correct. Here’s a pic of it.’ He showed Jim the photograph of the power glider. ‘It’s in TD’s basement. They’re smart, and yet they’re dumb - the people on the other side, I mean. Come on along with me tomorrow; we’re going to set down exactly here.’ He laid out a sequence of shots taken by the QB satellite. ‘Recognize the terrain? It’s the coast of France. Over here …’ He pointed. ‘… Normandy. A town of theirs. You can’t call it a city, because it’s simply not that large. But it’s the largest one the QB has been able to detect. So we’re going there to confront them in their own bailiwick. By doing so, we get a direct confrontation vis-a-vis their culture, the totality of what they’ve managed to develop. TD is supplying linguistics machines; we’ve got anthropologists, sociologists …’ He broke off. ‘Why are you looking at me like that, Jim?’

  Jim Briskin said, ‘I thought it was a planet in another star system. Then the hints in the media were right, after all. But I’ll come with you; I’m glad to. Thanks for letting me.’

  ‘Don’t take it so hard,’ Woodbine said.

  ‘But it’s inhabited,’ Jim said.

  ‘Not entirely. My god, look on the bright side. This is a tremendous event, an encounter with another civilization entirely, what I’ve been searching for over three star-systems and a time-period of four decades. You’re not going to begrudge us that, are you?’

  After a pause Jim said, ‘You’re right, of course. I’m just having trouble adjusting to this. Give me a little time.’

  ‘Are you sorry now that you made that Chicago speech?’

  ‘No,’ Jim said.

  ‘I hope your attitude doesn’t have to change. There’s one more thing we found: no one at TD has so far been able to make out what it signifies. Look at this pic.’ He placed the glossy print before Jim. ‘It was in the glider, poked down out of sight, obviously deliberately concealed. In a little leather bag.’

  ‘Rocks?’ Jim said, scrutinizing the pic.

  ‘Diamonds. Rough, not cut. Just as they come out of the ground. The inference is that these people prize precious stones but don’t know how to cut or polish them. So, in this one respect at least, they’re some four or five thousand years behind us. What would you say about a culture that can build a power glider, including piston engine and compressor, but hasn’t learned to cut and polish gems?’

  Jim said, ‘I - don’t know.’

  ‘We’re taking some cut stones with us tomorrow. Couple of diamonds, opals, a gold ring set with a nice fat ruby donated by the wife of one of TD’s vice presidents. And we’re also taking this.’ He tossed a sheet of rolled-up paper before Jim. ‘A schematic of a very simple, efficient turbine. And this.’ He bounced another tube of paper onto the table. ‘A schematic of a medium-size steam engine, circa 1880, used as a donkey engine in mine work. But, of course, our main effort will be directed toward ferrying a few of their technological experts, if there are any, over here. Turpin wants to show them around TD, for example. And after that, probably N’York City.’

  ‘Has the government made an effort to get involved in this?’

  ‘Schwarz, I understand, has asked Turpin if a mixed bag of specialists from various bureaus can accompany us tomorrow. I don’t know what the old man has decided; it’s up to him. After all, TD can shut down the nexus any time it so desires. Schwarz knows that.’

  Jim said, ‘Would you hazard any kind of estimate as to the level of their culture in terms of chronology relative to ours?’

  ‘Sure,’ Frank Woodbine said. ‘Somewhere between 3000 B.C. and A.D. 1920. Does that answer your question?’

  ‘So it can’t be graded on a time-scale which compares it to us.’

  ‘We’ll know tomorrow,’ Frank said. ‘Or rather - and I fully expect this, Jim - we’ll know that they’re so damn different from us that they might as well live on a planet in some other star system, as you’d like them to be. A non-terrestrial race entirely.’

  ‘With six legs and an exoskeleton,’ Jim murmured.

  ‘If not worse. Something that would make George Walt look perfectly ordinary. You know, that’s what we ought to do: take George Walt over with us tomorrow. Tell these people on the other side that George Walt is our god, that we worship him and they’d better, too, or he’ll make the bad atoms rain down on them and cause them to die of leukemia.’

  ‘Probably,’ Jim said, ‘they’ve not reached the level of developing atomic power. Either for industry or warfare.’

  ‘For all I know,’ Frank said quietly, ‘they’ve got an atomic tactical bomb made out of wood.’

  ‘That’s impossible. It’s a joke. You’re kidding.’

  ‘I’m not kidding - I’m just terribly upset. Nobody in our world ever knew that you could build complex modern machinery out of wood, as these people have. If they can manage to do that, although God knows how long it took them to do it, they can do anything. At least, that’s the way it strikes me. I’m going to set the jet-hopper down in Normandy tomorrow with my heart in my mouth, and I’ve been to more star-systems than any other human being; don’t forget that. I’ve seen a lot of alien worlds.’

  Somberly, Jim Briskin picked up the photo of the wooden engine and once more studied it.

  ‘Of course,’ Frank added, ‘I keep saying to myself, “Look what we can learn.” And look what they can learn from us.’

  ‘Yes,’ Jim agreed, ‘we have to look on this as an opportunity.’ His tone, however, was grave.

  ‘You know, just as I know, that something is awfully wrong.’

  Jim Briskin nodded.

  In the middle of the night Don Stanley, administrative assistant to Leon Turpin, was awakened by the ringing of his vidphone.

  Sitting up groggily, he managed to locate the receiver in the dark. ‘Yes?’ he said, switching on the light. In the bed, his wife slept on.

  On the vidscreen the physiognomy of a top-level TD researcher came into view. ‘Mr Stanley, we’re calling you instead of Mr Turpin. Somebody at policy has to know this.’ The researcher’s voice was jumpy with tension. ‘The QB is down.’

  ‘Down what?’ Stanley could not focus his faculties.

  ‘They shot it down. God knows how. Just now, not ten minutes ago. We don’t know whether we should try to put up another one to replace it or just wait.’

  Stanley said, ‘Maybe the QB merely malfunctioned. Maybe it’s up there coasting around dead.’

  ‘It’s not up there at all; we’ve got a number of instruments capable of registering that. You know, bringing down an orbiting satellite requires a pretty exact science of weapons devel
opment; it’s not easy to do.’

  Still half-asleep, Don Stanley had a momentary hypnogogic vision of an enormous crossbow with a cord capable of being stretched back a mile. He shook the vision off and said, ‘Maybe we shouldn’t send Woodbine over there tomorrow. We don’t want to lose him.’

  ‘Whatever you and Mr Turpin decide,’ the researcher said. ‘But sooner or later we have to make formal contact with them, don’t we? So why not right away? It seems to me that, in view of their maneuver against the QB, we can’t afford to wait. We’ve got to know what they possess.’

  ‘We’ll go ahead,’ Stanley decided, ‘but we’ll see that Woodbine is accompanied by company police. And we’ll keep in constant radio contact with him all the time he’s there.’

  ”’Company police,” ‘ the researcher said in disgust. ‘What Woodbine needs is the United States Army.’

  ‘We don’t want the government meddling into this,’ Stanley said sharply. ‘If TD can’t handle this, we’ll shut down the ‘scuttler and abolish the nexus. Forget the entire matter.’ He felt irritable. This puts an entirely new light on everything, this about the QB, he realized. In no way - or at least in no important way - are these people lagging behind us. We’re not going to be able to get away with trading them a basketful of glass beads in exchange for North America. He recalled the leather bag of uncut diamonds found in the glider. They may not be able to finish up stones, he thought, but at least they know what’s really valuable. There’s a crucial difference between carrying around a bagful of rough diamonds and, say, a bagful of seashells.

  ‘You’ve still got a team on the other side, don’t you?’ Stanley said. ‘You didn’t pull them back over here.’

  ‘They’re there,’ the researcher said, ‘but they’re just standing by, waiting for dawn and the party of university professors and the linguistics machines, all that stuff that’s been promised.

  ‘We don’t want to get into a brawl with these people,’ Stanley said, ‘even if they did get to our satellite. TD wants industrial techniques from them, wants their know-how hardwarewise. Let’s not spoil that. Okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ the researcher agreed, ‘and lots of luck.’

  Don Stanley hung up, sat for a time, then rose and walked to the kitchen of his conapt to fix himself something to eat.

  Tomorrow’s going to be quite a day, he said to himself. I wish I was going along, but, in view of this, I think I ll stay on this side. After all, I’m a desk man, not a leg man; let somebody else do it. Somebody like Woodbine who’s paid to take risks. This is exactly why we hired him.

  He did not envy Woodbine.

  And then all at once it occurred to him that old Leon Turpin might order him to go along. In which case he would have to - or lose his job. And losing one’s job, these days, was no joke.

  His appetite was gone. Leaving the kitchen, Don Stanley returned to his bed, gloomily aware that with such thoughts on his mind he would probably be unable to get back to sleep.

  It turned out that he was right.

  TEN

  Because the defective Jiffi-scuttler technically belonged to him, Darius Pethel could not effectively be denied permission to cross over, along with the group of top scientific and linguistic experts leaving in the morning. Wearing a carefully ironed and starched white shirt and new tie, he arrived at TD’s central administrative offices in Washington, D.C., at exactly eight a.m. He felt confident. TD employees had treated him with deference ever since he had turned the defective ‘scuttler over to them. After all, he could take it back… or, at least, so Pethel reasoned.

  Two officials of the company, both of them tense, accompanied him to Mr Turpin’s office on the twentieth floor, depositing him there, and at once hurrying off. Now he was on his own.

  The board chairman of TD did not awe Darius Pethel. ‘Morning, Mr Turpin,’ he said in greeting. ‘I hope I’m not late.’ He was not sure where the group was assembling. Probably down in the subsurface labs near the ‘scuttler.

  ‘Ump,’ the old man said, glancing at him sideways, the wrinkled neck twisting like a turkey’s. ‘Oh, yes. Pedal.’

  ‘Pethel.’

  ‘So you want to be in on things, do you?’ Leon Turpin studied him, smiling a thin, gleeful smile.

  ‘I want to keep in touch,’ Pethel said. He pointed out, ‘After all, it is my, property.’

  ‘Oh, yes, we’re very conscious of that, Pethel. You’re a highly important figure in all that’s going on. Being a businessman, you’ll no doubt be useful on this mission; you can establish trade relations with these people. In fact, we expect you to start selling them ‘scuttlers.’ Leon Turpin laughed. ‘All right, Mr Pethel. You go ahead downstairs to the labs and join the group; make yourself at home here at TD. Do whatever you feel like. I myself - I’m staying here. One trip across is enough for a man of my age; I’m sure you can appreciate that.’

  Conscious that he had been made fun of, Darius Pethel left Mr Turpin’s office and took the elevator down. Smouldering, he said to himself, I can be important in this. The people on this alternative Earth or whatever it is can probably use an improved method of transportation even better than we can. After all, from what the TV newsman said, they seem to be backward, compared to us. There was something about a primitive ship or airplane. Something obsolete in our world several centuries ago.

  The elevator let him off at the guarded lower floors of the building, and he made his way down the corridor, following the instructions painted on the walls, to the main lab proper.

  When he opened the lab door he found himself facing a man whom he had seen many times on TV. It was the Republican-Liberal candidate for president, James Briskin, and Pethel halted in awe and surprise.

  ‘Let’s get a shot of you standing at the entrance hoop,’ a photographer was saying to Briskin. ‘Could you move over there, please?’

  Obligingly, Briskin walked to the ‘scuttler.

  This is the big time, Pethel realized. Our next president is here along with me. I wonder what would happen if I said hello to him, he wondered. Would he answer back? Probably would because he’s campaigning; after he gets into office, he won’t have to.

  To Jim Briskin, Pethel said humbly, ‘Hello, Mr Briskin. You don’t know me, but I’m going to vote for you.’ He had just made up his mind; seeing Briskin in real life had decided him. ‘I’m Darius Pethel.’

  Glancing at him, Briskin said, ‘Hello, Mr Pethel.’

  ‘This Jiffi-scuttler belongs to me,’ Pethel explained. ‘I discovered the rent in it, the doorway to the other universe. Or rather, my repairman Rick Erickson did. But he’s dead now.’ He added, ‘Very tragic; I was there when it happened.’

  A TD official, appearing beside Jim Briskin, said, ‘We’re ready to get started, Mr Briskin.’

  A small, rather handsome man strolled up, and Darius, with a start, recognized him, too. This was Frank Woodbine, the famous deep-space explorer. Good lord, Pethel said to himself, and I’m going with them!

  ‘Jim,’ Woodbine said to Jim Briskin, ‘we’re all carrying laser pistols except you. Don’t you think you’re making a mistake?’

  ‘Hey,’ Pethel said tremulously, ‘nobody gave me a pistol.’

  A TD employee passed a pistol, in its holster, over to him. ‘Sorry, Mr Pethel.’

  ‘That’s more like it,’ Dar Pethel said, wondering if he was supposed to hold the thing in his hands or strap it on somehow.

  ‘I don’t need a gun,’ Jim Briskin said.

  ‘Of course you do,’ Woodbine said. ‘You want to come back, don’t you?’ To Pethel, Woodbine said, ‘Tell him he needs a gun.’

  ‘You ought to have one, Mr Briskin,’ Pethel said eagerly. ‘No one knows what we’ll run into over there.’

  At last, with massive reluctance, Briskin accepted a gun. ‘This is not the way,’ he said, to no one in particular. ‘We shouldn’t be doing this, going to meet them armed like this.’ He looked melancholy.

  ‘What choice have we got?’
Woodbine said and disappeared through the entrance hoop of the Jiffi-scuttler.

  ‘I’ll go in with you, Mr Briskin,’ Pethel said. ‘Instead of with those scientists.’ He indicated the group which had formed behind them. ‘I can’t talk their language; I’ve got nothing in common with them.’

  A man whom he recognized as Briskin’s campaign manger, Salisbury Heim, hurried up to join Briskin. ‘Sorry I’m late.’ Quickly, he made note of the news photographers, TV cameras, the gang of media people. ‘You fellows get every step of this,’ he called to them. ‘You understand?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Heim,’ they murmured, moving forward.

  ‘The time is now,’ Salisbury Heim said, and gave Jim Briskin a small push in the direction of the entrance hoop. ‘Let’s go, Jim.’

  ‘Are you ready, Mr Pethel?’ Jim Briskin asked.

  ‘Oh, thanks; I am, yes,’ Pethel answered hurriedly. ‘This is certainly a fascinating journey, isn’t it?’

  ‘Momentous,’ Salisbury Heim said.

  ‘In fact even historical,’ Briskin said, with a faint smile.

  ‘Entering the Jiffi-scuttler now,’ a TV newsman was saying into his lapel mike, ‘the possible future president of the United States reveals no indication of concern for his personal safety. Solicitous of the welfare of the others surrounding him, he makes certain that they understand the gravity or - as James Briskin himself just now put it - the historical significance of this body of persons passing across into a situation fraught with possible peril. But the stakes in this are vast, and no one has forgotten that, least of all James Briskin. Another world, another civilization … what will this come to mean in future centuries to mankind? Undoubtedly, James Briskin is asking himself that at this very instant as he crosses the threshold of the rather plain, almost ordinary-appearing Jiffi-scuttler.’

  Jim Briskin winked at Darius Pethel.

  Startled, Pethel attempted to wink back, but he was too tense.

  ‘Hey, just a moment, Mr Briskin!’ a homeopape photographer called. ‘We want to be sure we catch you going through the rent. Could you kindly retrace your steps back to the hoop, please? Those last four steps?’