Frank Belknap Long

“ Corriston's mental processes were now governed by the most evanescent of impressions: the depth of the shadows on both sides of the corridor; his own shadow lengthening before him; the drone of machinery deep within the Station; the muffled beating of his own heart. Suddenly he was at the end of the corridor and approaching the main control room, his face as grim as death.
Violence he had determined upon, but it would be a very brief, a very effective kind of violence. It takes only a second to rip a mask from a man's face. ”

“ But it was hard to be sure it was really the ship. It was perhaps only one of the many desert mirages which were far more common on Mars than they were on Earth. A man who has once looked at the bright, scarred face of a cliff wall in the Martian sunlight will remember it even in his dreams and no mirages are really necessary. He is certain to see it a second and a third time, like an after-image so indelibly imprinted on the retina of the human eye that its recurrence becomes inevitable.
And yet, the running man could not have been a mirage. ”

“ The killer was coming close again, his shoes making a scraping sound in the darkness, his breathing just barely audible. Corriston edged still further along the girder. Inch by inch he moved parallel to it, fighting off his dizziness, making a desperate effort to keep from falling. The wetness on his shoulder was unnerving, the absence of pain incredible. How seriously could a man be stabbed without feeling any pain at all? ”

“ Almost as if aware of his thoughts, Helen spoke to him for the first time since he had crossed to the viewport.
"It's very strange, darling. I'm calmer now than I have ever been. I guess it can happen if you love a man so very much that you know your life would have no meaning if anything should happen to him. It's like facing up squarely to the fact that you no longer have any existence apart from him. I've done that, darling, and I'm not afraid."
There was silence in the cabin for an instant. Then another shell exploded, and another, and another. Corriston felt light and dangerously dizzy. ”

“ You can never go home because people change and places change with them, and familiar scenes take on an aspect of strangeness as the old, well-loved landmarks fade.
But in space, the landmarks are as wide and deep as the gulfs between the stars, and it is not too difficult for a man to return to a steel-ribbed Gibraltar in space and experience again the emotions he felt when he first sighted it, and hear again the long thunder-roll of the ships berthing and taking off.
The ship which was bringing Corriston back had begun to loom up behind the telemetric aerials with her bow slanting forward. ”

“ Corriston sat up straight. Free to summon the guard. Free to summon a man he had dropped to the floor with two quick, decisive and totally unexpected blows. But if he did summon the guard, what then? Could he be doubled up with cramps—the old prisoners' dodge? "Get me to a doctor. I think I'm dying."
Hell no, not that. It was mildewed even on the face of it. The guard wouldn't be that much of a fool. He'd whip out a gun, and slash downward with it at the first suspicious move on the part of a man he hated. ”

“ There are times when a handcuffed man is at a disadvantage in a furiously waged and uncertain struggle, but Corriston suffered no disadvantage. For ten minutes he had been reminding himself that a blow along the side of the neck, just under the jaw, could paralyze and even kill if it were delivered with sufficient force.
A sharp, flat-of-the-hand blow could do it. But handcuffs were better, and Corriston lashed out now with his manacled wrists upraised, so that the handcuffs grazed Stone's neck twice lightly and then almost splintered his jawbone with a rotor-blade violence. ”

“ But the men who built it had enough pride and confidence in human skill to achieve the impossible."
The girl at Corriston's side looked startled for an instant, as though the ironclad assurance of so young a man was as much of a surprise as his unexpected nearness, and somehow even more disquieting older.
She was certainly somewhat older than he was—about three or four years. She was an exceptionally pretty girl, her fair hair fluffed out from under a blue beret, her ship's lounge jacket a youth-accentuating miracle of casual tailoring that would have looked well on a woman of any age. ”

“ He knew there was a killer loose on the Station, the same one who had been loose on the ship that had taken him to the Station. He knew about a poisoned barb that had killed one man and had barely missed killing Corriston himself.
Dismiss the killer for the moment. There was Helen Ramsey, the wealthiest girl on Earth. Think about Ramsey himself and what his wealth had done to Mars. Think about the colonists on Mars, men who had endured unimaginable hardships and privation to stake out uranium claims which Ramsey did not want them to have. Think about the freighter that had gone out of control. ”

“ The killer jabbed the gun more firmly against Corriston's spine and asked in a cold, flat voice: "Do you know who I am, Corriston? Have you any idea?"
Corriston stared out the viewport for a moment without replying, his face deathly pale. "I don't know your name," he said. "Probably that's not too important. I do know that you're a cold-blooded murderer, and that killing gives you pleasure. I am very tired. I wish you wouldn't question me any more."
"Do you think you can pilot this ship to Mars, tired as you are?" ”

“ Corriston stared at him for a long moment in silence. Then he said: "I think perhaps I understand, Freddy. Just suppose we say you succumbed to an impulse to roam. The exploring urge can be overwhelming in a boy of your age. It usually is. If you were on Earth right now you'd be dreaming about exploring the headwaters of the Amazon. You'd be dreaming about birds with bright, tropical plumage and butterflies as big as dinner plates."
Freddy looked up again, not quite so quickly this time. There was wonder and admiration in his stare. ”

“ The second floor landing stretched away into shadows, bisected by a wide corridor dimly lighted by overhead lamps. The second floor had an administrative building aspect and so did the third floor, which seemed in all respects its exact duplicate.
Corriston's excitement grew as he mounted the stairway. He felt like a man poised on the brink of a precipice with no assurance that he would not be hurled to his death; a man aware that tragedy would not strike him like a thunderbolt at any moment ”

“ Chalk up that much to Ramsey's credit. In that respect at least, he was superior to Henley. In that respect at least a man of good will could take sides, all apart from the personal issues involved. Henley was a predatory vulture on all counts, his talons constantly spread, constantly crimson-tipped. Ramsey was a vulture too, but in the depths of his mind he knew it. Part of the agony was shared by him, and in one desperate, despairing part of his personality he had tried to be creative.
Corriston ascended the staircase swiftly, casting one brief glance at some murals and then ignoring them. ”

“ It was perhaps merciful that he couldn't, for the grate was at least ten feet above the floor and had he known beyond the faintest shadow of doubt that it was Helen Ramsey's voice, his inability to reach her would have been fiendish torment.
He hoped only one thing—that he had to reach that voice in time.
First of all he had to stay calm. Even a calm man could not hope to scale a ten-foot wall with his bare hands, but an agitated man would have no chance at all. ”

“ Corriston said. "What will you stand to gain by shooting me and letting him die? You've got his daughter, but a dead man won't be able to ransom her."
For a moment, nothing happened. Henley had made no attempt to draw his gun, and he did not draw it now. He stood very quietly staring at Corriston, breathing heavily, a strange, withdrawn look in his eyes.
Perhaps he was thinking over what Corriston had said. Corriston wondered about that for an instant, and then dismissed it from his mind. You did not take anything for granted when you were standing that close to a killer. ”

“ When the door clanged shut behind the kid, Corriston crossed to his cot, sat down, and cradled his head in his arms. The fact that he was still free to go outside and walk around the Station was no comfort at all. That kind of freedom could be worse than total confinement. He could never hope to escape from observation. The guards were under orders to watch him, and wherever he turned there'd be eyes boring into the back of his neck.
On Earth a man under surveillance could duck quickly into a side street, run and weave about, and emerge on a broad avenue in the midst of a crowd. ”

“ Henley's nearness did not bother Corriston. Death at ten feet could be no more final than death at a hundred yards.
Only one thing bothered him. Events could move fast when you were close to a killer.
He didn't intend to let them move fast. Not for him, at any rate. He let his eyes rest for an instant on the gun in Henley's hand, his thoughts racing. He knew that he'd be as good as dead if he made a single concession.
Don't let him know that the gun worries you. Pretend that the odds are even, even though he's got the drop on you. ”

“ We're going to need you to help pilot this ship to Mars."
14
The silence in the chart room was like the hush that comes over a desert when hurricane winds have died down, or like the stillness of a rocky coast when waves have ceased to pound, and dangerous rocks stand out with all of their saw-edged teeth exposed.
It was extraordinary how, at the point of a gun, a man could think and act almost automatically, and postpone making any decision at all. It wasn't cowardice; Corriston was quite sure of that. He felt only anger, deep, relentless, all-consuming. ”

“ A passenger saw him and screamed. His knees had given way and his huge frame seemed to be coming apart at the joints. He straightened out on the deck, jerking his head spasmodically, propelling himself backwards by his elbows. Almost as if with conscious intent, his body arched itself, sank level with the floor, then arched itself again.
It was as though all of his muscles and nerves were protesting the violence that had been done to him, and were seeking by muscular contractions alone to dislodge the stiff, thorned horror protruding from his flesh. ”

“ You won't stand a chance. Henley will be coming back in a few hours now. You'd better get out while you're still in one piece."
Corriston was tempted to hurl Stone back against the wall and shout at him: "It doesn't matter whether I go out of here in one piece or dead on a stretcher. She's the only thing I care about."
But he caught himself just in time. Stone thought in the most primitive imaginable terms. You couldn't go to a Stone Age man and say: "My own skin doesn't mean a goddam thing to me. I'm in love. If she dies I die. Can't you understand that? If she dies, my life will be over." ”

“ The captain had faithfully kept his word. The captain hadn't let him down. But any man can end up a prisoner when everyone disbelieves him and he has no way of proving that he is telling the truth.
It was hard to believe that a day and a night had passed, and that the Captain had kept his word and gone ahead with the roll call. It was even harder to believe that he, Corriston, was no longer on the ship, but in a sanity cell on the Space Station, and that the ship was traveling back toward Earth. ”

“ Corriston looked up at the massive gate swinging shut behind him. For good or ill, he was completely trapped, completely at the mercy of the armed guards inside the citadel.
They hadn't taken his gun away from him, but, nevertheless, he was trapped. What chance would one armed man have against seventy-five or a hundred guards? They were keeping out of sight, all but the two at the gate. ”

“ They might not even be watching the cell door because he had behaved himself so well up to now. Psycho-cases were permitted to roam, but if they stayed in their cells precautions would naturally be relaxed in their favor.
Corriston now was about to develop a sudden, unanticipated impulse to roam. The fact that he was completely sane gave him an edge over the space-shocked recruits. There is nothing quite so terrifying to a man who doubts his own sanity than the thought that unseen eyes are keeping tabs on him. He feels guilty and acts guilty and almost invariably his caution deserts him. ”

“ Corriston left the tractor a hundred and seventy yards from the gate, well hidden behind a hundred foot dune. The other tractors had come to a halt a much greater distance from the Citadel, and were spread out across the desert in a slightly uneven, double line.
He walked slowly forward across the rust-red sand, with a feeling in his bones that he was going to be lucky. Yet he knew that he'd have to be convincing, or he wouldn't stand a chance. If there was more than one guard at the gate he might never get inside. ”

“ For the second time the guard's features began to come apart. The entire upper portion of his face seemed to sink inward and broaden out, and the flowing began, the incredible refusal of his forehead and nose to remain in close proximity to his mouth.
One eye closed completely; the other remained open in a wide and almost pupilless stare. The chin receded and the lips became a puckered gray orifice that looked like some monstrous fungus growth sprouting from the middle of a gargoyle face. ”

“ It was exactly like the barb which had sealed the lips of that blabbermouth Clakey.
Corriston went back to his cot and sat down. He told himself it would be highly dangerous to leave the cell and give the killer another chance. He had saved himself by refusing to slap a non-existent mosquito. But in the shadows of the Station there would be no mosquitoes—non-existent or otherwise. The killer would simply crouch in shadows, await his chance, and take careful aim.
What he had to do was find Miss Ramsey, and prove his sanity. ”