George O. Smith

“ Kingsley looked at the gear speculatively, and from the gear to the screwdriver he held in his hand.
If Kingsley could steer this thing, he could get cigarettes.
He turned the dials carefully, but saw the circle swoop away far too rapidly. It passed bright patches and dark spots with a kaleidoscopic rapidity and poised—somewhere—while Kingsley peered through it hopefully.
Not too far away were a few lonely lights that strove in sheer futility to cast illumination on a dark and sleeping countryside. Town, without a doubt, from a distance. ”

“ Blair shrugged and stood the chair upright roughly.
"Take it easy," he said. Then a thought came to Blair. "Look, Kingsley, can't we make a deal?"
"Deal?" asked Kingsley.
"Yeah. This thing will make us rich quick. Maybe I could do something to make up for the rough way I've handled you, and we could throw in together."
Kingsley shook his head. "It's murder," he said.
"Murder's easy," said Blair callously. "And with this thing they'll never catch us."
"No? You might think differently."
Sally shrugged. "Money makes people think differently," she said. "Why not show him?" ”

“ A ruthless character unlikely to be or become a trusty, and more likely to be carefully watched at all times. How in the devil can a jailed crook do some of the things they get away with?"
"I'll never tell you," agreed Monroe. "But there it is, Walt. Take off and see what you can uncover...."
There was little he could get from the jailbird. Norman Blair's constantly repeated answer was the same:
"I don't know nothing, copper."
"And you've never been in Holland, Illinois?"
"Never heard of it, copper."
"I'm no copper. I'm a Treasury Agent."
"A T-man, huh?" spat Norman Blair roughly. ”

“ He went back to the laboratory and asked more questions, checking on Kingsley's habits. Then, to check upon some of Kingsley's habits in person, Murdoch took to his cab again.
The feeling of frustration welled once more in Murdoch's heart, and he felt glum about missing the scientist. He realized that he had not eaten breakfast, and asked the driver to drop him at a restaurant—and how about a cup of coffee?
"Sure."
"Know Kingsley?"
"Nope. Heard of him, though. Seemed a smart enough feller. Newspaper?"
"I suppose. Any funnies? Nothing of real interest to an out-of-towner, you know." ”

“ But while the game of business-as-normal was going on in official quarters to fool just such a spying operation, the forest rangers were combing the district carefully, and it was only ten o'clock in the evening when one of them found the stolen moving van in a small ravine not more than a mile from Blair's hideaway.
He found it because he was a forest man, and he knew that the trail of broken limbs and crushed twigs meant the passage of some large, hard body. The van was well-concealed, but not well enough concealed to hide it from the sight of a man standing before it with anger in his mind. ”

“ He entered the laboratory and was met with a sharp chop against the side of his head from the edge of Blair's hand. He slumped, senseless, and when he opened his eyes, he was neatly taped with electrician's tape. He looked around and assumed that the tape on Sally's wrists was as tight as that on his own. He glared at Blair.
"What goes on?" he demanded.
"I'm taking over."
"But you—"
"Shut up, chum. I've done it."
Kingsley looked at Sally. The girl shrugged unhappily.
"He met me as I left," she said.
"Anybody who's working this late at night must be doing something good," grunted Blair. ”

“ Kingsley explained, and as he finished, Murdoch got the handcuff keys from the desk sergeant and freed the scientist.
"But how did you accomplish this?" he asked, pointing at the wrecked car.
"Blair messed everything up for everybody," said Kingsley, with a bitter laugh. "We were teleported to the car, which reversed us left to right. I'll have to build another machine to get back to normal again. But Blair," he finished cheerfully, "never did anything right in all his life!" ”

“ Blair continued to oversell Kingsley on the mutual benefits of joining, and Kingsley wanted no part of it.
Kingsley admitted the ease with which Blair had amassed a small fortune and at practically zero chance of being caught and with little effort. It would be so easy merely to live in some pleasant place far from authority and to bring to you all of the things that go toward making life pleasant. ”

“ He shut off the radio and the speech-scrambler, but he had an uncertain, queasy feeling that he could not be certain that Kingsley or Blair was not following his every word from some unseen place right in the jet fighter.
It was an hour and twenty minutes of jet flying from Holland, Illinois, to Little Superior, Wisconsin. And then Murdoch was in the police station talking to the sergeant who was still a bit pop-eyed over the absolutely incredible escape of the scientist. ”

“ She laughed and explained, cranking the dials back as she talked.
"You'd find things hard to read," she told him, and he nodded as he picked up a book.
Sally watched the plate until the laboratory was in the field of view. Then Blair stepped through the teleport and when he came out the far side, he looked back at her—but over the wrong shoulder.
"I'm over here," she said. "You've been reversed back again."
He shook his head. "No more of that for me," he told her fervently. He looked at the gear contemplatively. "But it looks good. Just what goes on?" ”

“ Kingsley paused. He realized that he was treading on thin ground. He wanted no mention of his invention until much later.
"Might be what?" she prompted.
"I have no ideas about your cigarette package," he said a bit abruptly. "It must be false."
"The men who know say 'no'. They claim it is printed on good, authentic paper with the same kind of ink, and in perfect reverse-register to an original."
"I'd hate to go on record as claiming the thing might have passed through some sort of a space warp, or something like that," mused Kingsley. ”

“ Blair laughed ominously. He knew that Kingsley would, ultimately....
Walter Murdoch was waiting for the airplane when it landed on the small field outside of Holland. He said hello to the pilot and climbed into the jet fighter and was borne into the sky with a swoosh. The plane streaked north at six hundred miles per hour while Murdoch called Monroe over the plane's radio.
"Hello, Tony. It begins to jell." ”

“ Luckily for them Kingsley was a methodical man, for the various bits of equipment—the generators, the supplies, the driving components—were all more or less standard, or had been standard bits of electrical gear at one time, and they were equipped with standard input and output plugs which fit standard cables.
Had the gear been built as a unit the initial move would have been impossible. But as it was, each factor in the generation of the space field was produced by some small bit of equipment or a series of small pieces all cable-connected. ”

“ A criminal using a teleport would soon be forced into the constant running that he was in now, for authority could follow and trail him with a similar or even improved model, once the possibility were known.
So Kingsley said "No!" and let it go at that while Blair shrugged, knowing that Kingsley would do as he was told or suffer the consequences.
Periodically during the evening, Blair fired up the equipment and watched the police stations in both small towns nearby. In each things were running as normal. ”

“ I'm sure. A bit more of that double talk and you'll learn how to talk easy," the sergeant threatened.
"But it is."
"Bah! Go on, bright guy."
"The teleport transmits objects through space by bringing two locations side by side in superspace. The trouble is that superspace—or space itself—is twisted as a Mobius Strip is twisted so that everything that goes through it comes out reversed."
"Forget it, chum. Boys, plant this guy in Cell Four. We'll save this for the F. B. I. This guy ain't saying a thing."
"I can tell you where Norman Blair is." ”

“ The new equipment would require cannibalization of the present gear. The salary and the appropriation of a college professor in theoretical and practical physics does not permit grand expenditures for fancy and special equipment.
First sleep. Next rebuilding. Then announcement of his success. And then to reap the profits from a machine that would make him a fortune and bring him undying fame.
Joe Kingsley was wrong. His first move should have been to inspect the package of cigarettes, instead of letting his practised fingers open them without his eyes seeing them. ”

“ The Man Who Could Not Go Right
After Blair and Sally Ransome had finished showing off what they could do with their stolen machine, Kingsley was taken upstairs. There had been a slight argument about the pile of money, Sally insisting that it be re-reversed at once, and Blair telling her that it would have to be shipped somewhere else sooner or later anyway, and that that would automatically re-reverse it and make it valid. ”

“ But Murdoch's belief that there was some connection between Blair and Kingsley was confirmed, as strange as it was. And within the next couple of hours, a general alarm was out for Joseph Kingsley, Sally Ransome, and Norman Blair wanted for suspicion of murder.
Meanwhile, the real criminals were rolling swiftly across the countryside in a stolen moving van with their loot. Another day of luck would see them at their hideout far from any city large enough to have more than the sketchiest of police departments.... ”

“ He fired up the teleport and the lights dimmed.
"What gives?" he demanded of Kingsley.
"That gear takes a lot of power. You haven't got the capacity in that auxiliary."
Blair swore again and tried the teleport, sending the plane of view down the road toward the power distribution system. It entered, and he saw the policeman and the attendant beside the open power switch.
Blair cursed. His hand hit the switch that thickened the connection so that teleportation would be possible—and the lights dimmed while the auxiliary power plant groaned with the unaccustomed load. ”

“ From her handbag he took her keys and opened the door. He carried her in and dropped her on an easy chair, then he looked around.
"Hey!" he exploded.
He raced through the door to the kitchenette and stumbled over the battered easy chair. He swore, but then wasted no time in inspecting the rest of the house.
"He's escaped!" snapped Blair, untaping the girl.
"Escaped?"
"Gone. Come on, Sally. We've got work to do!"
She nodded. The thing to do was to set up the teleport as quickly as possible. How they would search for Joe Kingsley neither of them knew, but it must be done. ”

“ I wouldn't know either. I doubt that any English gun is rifled to the left, and most of the French and German guns are millimeter sizes, neither of which popular sizes fall too well into the thirty-two caliber class. The seven millimeter is about two-seventy-five thousandths of an inch; and the nine millimeter is about three-fifty-four thousandths. I'd have to check the gun expert at the Bureau to state with any positiveness, but I believe that left-hand rifling is comparatively rare."
"Then what in heaven's name—"
Murdoch shrugged. ”

“ According to all of the laws of modern physics, the pencil should have come against the silver plate regardless of its change in color. It was not supposed to stop, yet Kingsley really did not believe that the pencil would do anything else even though he had designed the gear after making the preliminary discoveries. ”

“ The first model of any invention is never the refined version. More than likely it is a rather sorry mess, containing converted parts and hand-whittled members; strewn profusely with regard only to their function, and without a single thought for the esthetic quality of placement or shining panel and meter. ”

“ Gamow. A gentleman with a sense of humor and a definite talent for explaining the more abstract bits of higher mathematics in terms that the man in the street could understand and enjoy reading. It had been Professor Gamow who had hinted that space might be twisted in the Mobius fashion, and that shoes sent across space might turn out to be left shoes, thus simplifying the production problems.
"That's where she heard it before!" muttered Kingsley.
CHAPTER V
The Hijacker
Below in the laboratory, Blair looked at Sally. "What was that?" he asked in a whisper. ”

“ I told Warden Daniels not to do or say anything other than to keep a quiet watch. We'll do our own investigating of this mad thing. The papers are keeping it quiet, too."
Murdoch nodded and dropped the quarter into his pocket.
"This is a start," he said, tapping the file folder. "But that print's rather small."
Monroe nodded. "A mere fragment. Not enough to get a conviction, I'll admit. Just barely enough to get the general classification. About all we can do is to see if there is a connection between the ones that fall into this classification and the real act." ”