Ross Rocklynne

“ Unterzuyder took off his glasses. There were red marks around his eyes where the glasses had taken hold. He had inherited the famous thin nose and receding chin of the Unterzuyders. His pale thin lips worked nervously.
"I work alone, Mr. Bailes," he said haughtily. "And I work best when such as you try to set your pitiful little traps! Threaten me as you will, nothing can keep me from my purpose. And now good-day."
Bigger's voice was filled with disgust. "Your purpose being, of course, to find asteroid X and free your ancestors so they can go to work on the Solar System again!" ”

“ Unterzuyder brushed Foshag aside.
"I warn you, Mr. Bailes," he said thickly, "if you have any ulterior motive, such as looting this ship, we will put up a fight! Our settlers were chosen for their intrepid qualities. We have guns. We have bombs. We have a flare-cannon. You will not find us easy prey!"
Bailes leaned back easily. "Relax, Unterzuyder. As far as guns go, we've got our share. And we have got a brace of flare-cannons embrasured into the bulkheads of the Space-Queen ourselves, if you want to get tough." ”

“ If the man says he's got a galloping heart, that's what he's got. Think of the courage, the idealism, the sheer fortitude of this man, who has gathered together a group of settlers to brave the dangers of a jungle-world like Titan—a planet no one has ever attempted to colonize! ”

“ He believed in the future of the human race. He wanted to spread mankind's dominion even beyond the Moons of Jupiter. Titan had been viewed by only two men, both of whom stated it was livable. It had soil. It had vegetation. Also, it had dangerous animal life.
"That's for us!" said Fayette stoutly. She accidentally pointed the neutron gun at Unterzuyder. She was squirming around on her chair with repressed vitality. Her eyes melted on him. He wished he could get over the feeling that she was laying it on too thick. That perfume. He must not allow himself to be affected. ”

“ She was on her feet, laughing half hysterically. "You're trying to say the Unterzuyders invented a time-machine? That they aren't hibernating at all? After all the trouble we've gone to—" She giggled. "That's rich, Ralph—"
Female instability. He held her tightly. A lie, a good solid lie. His heart raced. Bigger Bailes. "Of course not, dear. The whole idea of a time-machine is fantasy—"
Is it?
"—and it'll make you feel better to know the map is purely contemporary. ”

“ He drew himself up arrogantly. "Put down that gun, Fayette."
If anything, she held the gun more firmly, and moved it three inches toward him.
"Don't mistake me, Ralph," she said, her eyes cold. "This is a yes and no game. No maybes or ifs. If you say yes when the gun says no, that's too bad. If you say no when the gun wants yes, that's too bad. You see how straightforward the three of us are?
"But I and my pet neutron gun will give you time to think.
"Tell me how you found X."
He slumped weakly against the bulkhead, wiping at his forehead with the back of a shaking hand. ”

“ The mind works that way.
"Sometimes people are made to feel they're unhealthy, only they aren't really. Or they're told their eyes are bad. Or that they're superior to other people.
"It's just as if—" she frowned hard as if looking for an example "—as if your parents were sitting inside that smart blonde head of yours, Ralph, and telling you to free the Unterzuyders from their sleep. It's something you feel you have to do. ”

“ But perhaps one of your caliber is well acquainted with the advantages of using an alias!"
"There are advantages," Bigger nodded. "Your advantage lies in heading a group of settlers who don't know you're using them to help you find the asteroid where your ancestors have been sleeping for the past eighty-odd years."
Unterzuyder's cane whipped around nervously. "I know nothing about a map!"
Bigger's jowls quivered with mirth. "Seven weeks ago," he pointed out, "your father died. He told you the map was hidden in an old book called Tertium Organum, A Key To The Enigmas Of The World. ”

“ Beecher stowed the check in his wallet with satisfaction. "Now we'll get busy. Of course, we'll have to have a drawing account. We'll have to discuss details, such as the number of settlers to be transported so I can buy or charter the proper type of space ship. There's the matter of building supplies to be bought—grain seeds—food—a thousand details which you can leave entirely in our hands, Mr. Straley!
"And while we're at it, I'd like to shake your hand! It's very few people who'd endanger their own lives to further the progress of mankind!" ”

“ Bigger would loot the ship when he learned the map was a practical joke. Taking a ship this far beyond Jupiter would have to pay off. And there was nobody to stop him.
What was it his father told him about Unterzuyder techniques? Sell short at the top, buy long at the bottom. All events, good or bad, could be used to build a firmer superstructure!
Well, face it! Ship's course had been changed. The settlers by this time had demanded to know why. Beecher would tell them Carruthers Straley was Ralph Unterzuyder, hunting for a hibernaculum! ”

“ His mother had always assured him the Unterzuyders were prone to heart trouble. Just as she'd got around to making him wear glasses. Terrible uncertainties were crowding him. He was surrounded by treachery. Had Foshag been shadowing him?
Foshag's great frame rocked judicially on its toes.
"If you truly have a bad heart," he said measuredly, "you'd have taken the long trail when the Ares hit heaven. We humans often are plagued with strange influences. Words spoken to the unguarded mind of the child sometimes become fact to the grownup. I'd not worry about the heart. ”

“ Unterzuyder snapped. "I still work alone—unless forced to recruit help. That condition may occur. In the meantime, use some of those qualities of leadership an explorer should have. Inform these people what's up. Tell them Bailes will probably attempt to loot the ship. Line the men up at the arsenal and load them down with weapons. Make arrangements so the women and children will keep to the cabins. Can you handle that?"
Beecher flushed until his face was bright red.
Leaving him properly insulted, Unterzuyder went to the control turret where he cornered Foshag, drew him to the Solar Chart. ”

“ Something that would competently accomplish the task of fooling the Beechers, Bigger Bailes, and possibly Foshag!
As he started out of the dining room, Beecher lunged after him, trailing a rocket-stream of cigar smoke.
"A minute, Straley!" Beecher held him from the door, his close-set eyes full of dislike. "Foshag told me Bigger Bailes is back there." He jerked a shoulder. "You're a man with many small tricks, Straley," he went on slowly. "Probably you're the most dangerous man I've ever encountered. ”

“ Quickly he unfolded the chart in the back of the book. The map should be there.
It wasn't.
He slapped the drawer shut, sank feebly back to his seat. The Beechers were gone an inordinately long time. He thought he heard them whispering in the kitchen. Then Beecher lunged back into the room bearing a jigger of no doubt cheap rye. Unterzuyder gulped it down and put the glass to one side.
Fayette was admiring. "For a man in poor health," she exclaimed, "you take it without a whimper—or a chaser!" ”

“ The Solar System could not be drawn to scale unless the inner planets were crowded in fractionally close to the Sun.
Here, the positions of the planets were indicated by dots whose map-distance from the Sun receded inward in logarithmic ratio to actual distance.
Pluto, for instance, being one hundred times farther from the Sun than Mercury in real distance, appeared by the map to be only, roughly, twenty times as far.
The position of the dot-planets on the map of course indicated the exact date of the day when the map was drawn. ”

“ Change your ways, and you may indeed live a long life!"
The door burst open and Beecher lunged in. His shrewd eyes rested on Unterzuyder.
"Sorry I had to bop you, Unterzuyder," he said in clipped accents. "But it was the best way to get you out of the picture and keep you from talking to Bigger Bailes. You might have messed up the works. As it was, we told him the truth."
"The truth?"
"Certainly. You admitted it to Fayette. That you'd figured out the orbit and present position of X. He got the course from Foshag and made us turn around toward Titan again. ”

“ Fayette's expression alone showed sympathy. He knew his own face was fiery red.
Nonetheless, he told the settlers everything he thought necessary. (They knew it anyway.) He apologized. He pointed out deviously that, after all, they were on the way to a new world. That much he had done for them.
"What you do not realize is that it was I, your leader, who diverted Bigger Bailes from looting the ship.
"Quite deliberately, I built up the feeling that the new course was the course to X, the hibernaculum of my criminal ancestors. All of you were convinced. ”

“ He whipped out a check book. He adjusted his glasses. Primly, he wrote a check and extended it with a jabbing motion, holding it for perhaps thirty seconds before Beecher's crestfallen face turned toward his daughter. Fayette was looking with intense interest at the check.
"Why not? Mr. Straley, like you, we're idealists. Money means hardly anything. ”

“ Like all Unterzuyders, he's clever and he's dangerous and he's shifty. He'll travel the crookedest course you ever saw. At the moment, he's got his identity pretty well covered up under the name of Carruthers Straley. In the last three weeks he's organized a band of settlers from Satterfield City who call themselves Titan Settlers, Ltd. ”

“ That arrogant Bigger Bailes, no doubt! So what? Add one more menace to those he was collecting. In fact, mess up the mess a little more.
"Captain Foshag," he said, "you are a well-read man. Ever read Ouspensky?"
Foshag nodded his square bearded chin. "A man of vast creative mental power, Mr. Straley. A man who seemed able to step off our three dimensions and look at the universe from a new viewpoint." Tentatively: "You have an interest in the classical philosophers, perhaps?" ”

“ EXPLORERS RETURN FROM
GANYMEDE ICE TUNDRA
Father and daughter
make unique team
"It says quite a bit about the expeditions you two have headed. Needless to say, I'm impressed! I am here, of course, to make you a proposition." ”