Look Out For Space (Seven For Space) Page 6

  "By damn!" O'Malley swung back to face me, his jaw working the cigar. He looked like an enraged Martian sandbull. "I can't hold ya, Sam!"

  I grinned at him, getting up from the gripchair. "And, once again, the innocent private eye, harassed by the brutal, insensitive Sergeant of Police, emerges free and clear of the cruel and unjust allegations levied against him."

  O'Malley bit completely through his cigar. He waved to Kelly. "Get him out of here!"

  And he slammed from the room, muttering obscenities.

  Eleven

  I've developed a bad habit: whenever somebody murders a client of mine, then tries to stiff me for the job, I get curious. It costs me time and money, but I can't seem to resist the temptation to find some answers.

  So, after I left O'Malley, I booked a warpflight to Jupiter. Twenty-five billion square miles of planet. The Fat Marble.

  I wanted to talk to Police Inspector McFarlin.

  The first time we'd met, a few years ago, things had been a little sticky. I'd been arrested, questioned by McFarlin, then sent down for a machine brainwash. But, by now, Mac knew I was legit. I'd asked for his help on at least two other capers and for a Jupecop he was plenty okay in my book.

  Don't get me wrong; I have nothing against Jupecops. They do their job and I do mine. It's just that I feel kind of sappy exchanging wisecracks with a three inch mouse, which is how long Police Inspector McFarlin is. But to the planet's mouse folk, he's a national hero. An honest rodent who can't be bought for all the cheese in the galaxy.

  And total honesty is rare in the System.

  I was grateful for one thing: they'd finally developed a neutral gravity inside the domes and I didn't have to strap on a lousy contra-gravbelt to offset my 190 pounds of fighting flab. First time I ever met McFarlin under Jupe gravity, I scaled in at 450. which was disgusting .Out of customs, I grabbed a jumper to Mouse Headquarters and asked to see McFarlin.

  "Do you have an appointment?" queried the officious little reception mouse at the front desk. She had cute whiskers and her tail was pink.

  "Mac'll see me, sweetheart. Just tell him Sam's here. From Bubble City."

  She moused away to find out if he'd talk to me.

  He would.

  "Sam! How fine to see you!" He said this with great warmth.

  We didn't embrace. For one thing you can't embrace a mouse. But I shook his paw, holding it between my thumb and index finger, then sat down in front of his desk. He activated a riser, which brought the desk up to a level with my nose.

  "What brings you to the Marble?" he wanted to know, lacing his brown paws in front of him and looking at me over the edge of his tiny rimless glasses.

  I told him about Brother T. and the events as they'd happened in the case, including the fact that a vanishing redhead had tried to frame me for a homicide.

  " … but mainly I'm here to find out all you can tell me about stolen rocks — small stolen rocks. Seems the asteroid I was chasing isn't the only missing pee wee."

  "Indeed it is not," said the Inspector. "We've had a rash of odd reports from various segments of space, most of them fairly close to the Marble, regarding the theft of any number of extremely small asteroids."

  "And what's your theory?"

  McFarlin spread his paws. "I have none. This is obviously not the work of rustlers or random rock thieves. The pattern is consistent, tying in with another series of odd reports within the same period."

  "What other reports?"

  "A series of kidnappings," he said. "Prominent worm people and certain influential members of various insect groups have been spirited away of late."

  "I see what you mean by consistent," I said. "Very small rocks and very small citizens — worms and insects — have all been grabbed in the same basic period."

  "Exactly," said McFarlin, nodding his furry gray head. "It all seems to tie in with smallness."

  "Any of your mouse people missing?"

  "Not to my knowledge. Just worms, insect folk, and the like."

  "What about blackmail as the motive?"

  "How do you mean, Sam?"

  "You spoke of 'influential' insects and 'prominent' worms. Maybe whoever's behind this is out to pull off a kind of mass blackmail job."

  McFarlin scratched his multi-dyed neck fur, then began firing up a tiny pipe. "Mind if I smoke?" he asked "Nasty addiction I've picked up."

  "It'll stunt your growth," I cracked.

  We both chuckled over this. Then Mac got serious again.

  "There is no indication whatever that the kidnappings are connected to blackmail." He had the pipe going and his black-bead eyes were lost in a swirl of smoke. "No communications of this nature have reached us — or any worm or insect family within our jurisdiction. Blackmail, therefore, can be discounted in this case."

  "Well, Inspector …" I stood up, almost knocking over his desk with my left ear. "Guess I'll do a bit of hunting on my own. Try to find out who's behind all this."

  McFarlin also stood up, putting aside his pipe to offer a farewell paw. "Stop by any time, Sam. Always glad to see you."

  "Thanks, Mac," I said. "Feeling's mutual."

  And I carefully shook his paw.

  * * *

  I was about to flag a jumper outside Mouse HQ when I felt a light tug at my left ankle sock. I looked down.

  "Mr. Space … might I speak with you, sir?"

  Another mouse. Also a cop — which he proved by holding up a stamped idencard. I could see that he wore a teeny gold badge on the inside flap of his bizsuit.

  "I'm in no hurry," I said. And I wasn't — since I had no leads and nowhere to go. Maybe he knew something I didn't.

  We sat down together on a rock. Meaning I sat on the rock and the copmouse perched on my knee.

  I'm Lieutenant Pennington," he told me. "Sylvester Reems Pennington, Jr."

  "Seems you already know who I am."

  "You are notorious, sir."

  "Is that good or bad?"

  He chuckled, rippling his neck fur. "In your case, Mr. Space, it simply means 'well known'. I meant to imply no slur on your character."

  "Thanks," I said.

  "I understand, from Inspector McFarlin, that you are personally motivated in tracking down the person or persons responsible for the current mysterious rash of worm-insect-asteroid kidnappings."

  "I didn't know you could kidnap an asteroid."

  "Ah, the quick tongue of the typical private detective!" Pennington chuckled. "I was, of course, lumping the varied disappearances into a single, inadequate phrase."

  "Sure," I said, wishing he'd get to the point.

  "At any rate," said Pennington, wiping a dust mote from his right eye with a minuscule white paper tissue. "I, too, am interested — in a professional capacity — in finding out just who is behind these crimes."

  "You been assigned to the case?"

  He nodded. "For the past Jupemonth I have pursued nothing else. My every waking moment is devoted to the vital accumulation of facts and evidence."

  "And what have you accumulated?"

  He shrugged, looping his tail around my knees to stabilize his balance. "Very little, I'm afraid. But the one lead I seem to have uncovered I am unable to pursue."

  "Oh?"

  "Unlike yourself, I am not free to travel from one planetary body to another through our System in pursuit of villainy. My position as a local police lieutenant here on Jupiter makes such circumnavigation quite impossible."

  "Where would you like to circumnavigate to?"

  "The Moon," he said. "Which, for you, sir, is but a mere hop skip and a jump — to place it in vulgarized terminology."

  "And why should I hop to the Moon?" I gave him a hard look. "That is what you are getting at, isn't it?"

  "Indeed, sir, it is," he said, chuckling and rubbing his stomach fur.

  "Well?"

  "You are an impatient man, Mr. Space."

  "I like to keep things moving along, Lieutenant."

  "Since we are
going to be working as a team, you may call me Sylvester," he told me.

  "I don't work with mice," I said.

  His whiskers flicked. "And why not, sir?"

  "No offense," I said, seeing he was upset. "It's just that I don't work with anybody, on any team. I'm a lone wolf. Always have been. I'm nobody's puppet."

  "Let me assure you, Mr. Space, it is not my intention to attach any strings to your person, either actually or symbolically."

  "If you've got a lead that makes sense, I'll follow it out. But on my terms," I said.

  "Of course," nodded the copmouse. "You'll find me affable and entirely cooperative in this venture."

  "Okay, what's your lead?"

  "Have you heard of a Moonking named Pendorf Wrenhurst?"

  "Maybe."

  "He's a very wealthy sportsman. Races sandboats for a hobby. Has a huge mansion on Dark Side."

  "So?"

  The mouse scrubbed at his other eye with the tissue. "You should also know, Mr. Space, that this man — an Earthling like yourself — engages in the unsavory and despicable sideline of worm slavery."

  "Never heard of it."

  "Worms, as you may know, are hardy little souls," said the cop-mouse. "They are prized as below-ground workers on certain backwater planets. Mr. Wrenhurst traffics in the worm trade. Which is to say, he provides alien worms for illegal sale outside the System."

  "I gotcha. You think Wrenhurst might be the character behind the rash of kidnappings."

  "Possibly, sir … very possibly."

  "But you have no proof?"

  "None whatever," admitted Pennington.

  "And how do you tie in the insect and asteroid end of things if he just wants worms?"

  "I don't, Mr. Space. That's all part of the mystery. But it seems to me that a good place to start unraveling it might be in the private domain of Mr. Wrenhurst."

  "Sam Space as spy?"

  "Precisely, sir!"

  I shrugged, almost dislodging the copmouse from my knee. "What the hell, Sylvester, a lead's a lead. I didn't have one when I met you, but I've got one now. I guess that's all any dick can ask for."

  His whiskers were quivering. "Then … you'll go to the Moon?"

  "Eventually," I said. "With one prior stop enroute."

  Twelve

  In order to make a stop you have to find the thing you're stopping for — and finding Joe Hopper wasn't easy.

  I tried his pad, then his cabstand, then his garage.

  "Gone," mumbled the grizzled slugbelly who worked for him. He was tinkering with one of Joe's pre-Z spacers, an older model Hopper kept for classic display purposes.

  "Gone where?"

  "Dunno." He waved a lazy tentacle. "Just gone. Answered a call. Took off."

  We were at Hopper's Deluxe Spacekab Emporium, which was the name Joe gave to this seedy garage and repair shack on the edge of a gorfswamp outside Gimp City in the Cuthbert Cluster.

  "What do you want with him, anyhow?" asked the slugbelly. His snugsuit was grimed with space oil and his upper tentacles were tobacco stained.

  "Got a job for him," I said.

  "You gonna wait?"

  "Depends," I said. "Did he say when he'd be back?"

  "It's like I told ya," whined the slugbelly. "He just hot-assed off. Joe never tells me nothin' … and I don't ask him nothin'."

  The noise in the sky proved I wouldn't have to wait: a crackling howl of after-jets, damped and power-reversed for a flamedown.

  It was Joe — in his Twin-X thrustfin.

  I met him on the field and told him I needed his help.

  "Sure, Sammy," he grunted, stripping his flyhat. "If you can name it, I can do it."

  "You don't lack confidence, Joe," I grinned.

  "Modest I ain't; talented I am! What's the pitch?"

  "I want to go sand racing," I said. "And I want to win."

  We walked inside his Emporium.

  * * *

  What I needed from Joe was simply and totally illegal by MSA standards. At least years back, the Moon Sports Association had outlawed all atomic powered sandboats for Moonlake events under their "pilot safety" bylaws. The things were just too damned fast.

  But I wanted speed, not safety, and I didn't give a damn about the rules.

  "Can you rig a detachable atompac for a racing sander?" I asked Joe.

  "Sure, but if you try to run it, they'll disqualify you."

  "Not the way I've got it planned," I told him. "I want the boat to meet full pre-race specs, meaning a standard jato unit, conventional hull and steering gear. But I also want you to provide space for me to install an atompac once I've passed tech inspection."

  Joe looked doubtful. "No good, Sam. They'll still disqualify you. The winning boats are impounded for total teardown after the race."

  "I just want to win," I told him. "Let me worry about what happens afterwards."

  "Okay," he said. "I can do the job for you if you're sure that's the way you want it."

  "I'm sure," I said.

  "And, if I dare pose the question, who the hell pays for all this?"

  "I do," I said.

  Actually, I wouldn't be paying. A down-at-the-dishkas private op with holes in both socks doesn't buy souped-up Moon boats. Before I'd left the Fat Marble, I'd worked out a little under-the-counter arrangement with Sylvester. The costs for all this were coming out of a fund for retired mice set up by the cops at Mouse HQ. Pennington assured me I'd have enough solarcreds to pay off Hopper, plus a spillover for my Moon jaunt. And who was I to argue with a cop?

  Syl kept his end of the deal.

  On the day the boat was ready I got a package delivered to my crummy office. Plain brown Jupe-wrap. No return address. Inside: 18,000 solarcredits. A tidy bundle. If Pennington's little scheme was ever uncovered, there'd be some pissed off senior mice on Jupiter.

  * * *

  "How's she look to you?" Joe asked me.

  I walked around her. Whistled through my pivot tooth. "She's a zooch!" I said. "A real zooch!"

  Long, low-bodied, wind sculptured, with a flared podcock and raked tweeters, she was a dreamboat. On her tucked hull, in gold paint, the name I'd asked for: Irmaline.

  In honor of my latest light o' love. Susan Sunbright's middle name.

  "This panel snaps off," said Joe, as he popped loose a side section near the jato unit. "You can attach your atompac, line it in, and you'll get an extra thousand thrustpower on the straights."

  "Terrif," I said.

  "But you won't have a chance to take off the pac once you've crossed the starting line. They'll be watching you all through the race. They use geepers. Got the best eyes in the System."

  "Like I said, let me worry about that end of it."

  Joe stepped back, proudly. He dusted his big hands. "She's all yours, pard. Go break your bones!"

  Thirteen

  The Moon was always a bore.

  Sterile, lacking color, full of unsightly craters. On Luna you eat sand and spit rocks. A dead wasteland of chill peaks and raw valleys. No wonder they'd abandoned the Moon colony.

  Still, Rim City was hanging in there, with its sleazo dendives and cut rate sexhuts, catering to Loonies and gungoons, driftbums and retired spacers. The dregs.

  Richos lived on Dark Side, away from the floaters in the Rim — and all the sandlake races were run under laser lights. The Loonies stayed out. Dark Side was reserved for wealthy eccentrics and biz-moguls. And for daring sportsmen such as Tyrus Steadman, the devil take the hindmost racing fanatic.

  * * *

  Who was Steadman? Well, before he got to Dark Side he used to be a private dick out of Bubble City. Name: Sam Space.

  Call me Ty.

  I'd raced before. Swamp cabs mostly, in tanktown events on Venus. Jungle runs. Strictly for laughs. No rules. No limits. Just bash your way to a win. I'd won a couple; I'd also gone on my nog more than once in those souped up clunks, and I knew how it felt to kiss the wall at full revs. The V-shaped scar on my back, running f
rom shoulder to butt-bone, came from racing swampers.

  I could bash with the best of them.

  But I'd never sandraced. I'd faked out enough ID to convince the richos that I was worthy of their sport, but there was no use pretending I knew anything about running a Moonlake.

  "Nothing to it, boyo," the tech inspector told me as he point-checked my boat. " Just stay clear of the fantails."

  We were in the pits, a large rocked-off area just beyond the marked lake course. The laser lights made it bright as day.

  "What about fantails?" I asked the tech.

  "These lakes are more fine grain dust than sand," he said. "And Moondust is rough if you ride the tweeters. Fantail thrown up by the boat ahead can blind you for sure. Next thing you know, you're off the course with a rock up your cod. Kaput!"

  "If I don't hang in close, how do I pass?"

  "Most of that is done on the long back straight. You cut left to miss the fantail. Power can get you by on the straight. Passing on a turn can wipe you out."

  "I'll remember that," I told him.

  He made a final note in his foilpad, snapped it closed. He punch-stamped my hull. "You're A-Okay for the race, Mr. Steadman. And, I might say, she's a nice little sander."

  "Thanks," I said.

  "Give you a bit of advice?"

  "Sure."

  "Since this is your first lake run, don't try for a top slot. Stay back and watch how the fast boys operate. Learn the ropes. Then, next time out, you can maybe open up and go for the gravy."

  I told him I was sure that was good advice. And it was. Only I wasn't out to learn; I was out to win. And with Joe's atompac on board, I knew I could take any other rig on the lake.

  "Good luck, Mr. Steadman."

  "Call me Ty," I said, and threw him a smile.

  * * *

  The course was laid out on the floor of a dead crater (that's the only kind they've got on Luna) with plenty of sharp turns and a mile-long straight just before you come into start-finish. Each turn was banked with high walls of packed Moonrock, which meant you made damn sure not to lose it on one. You could afford to spin on the straights without any major problems, but the lane past start-finish was narrow, with high metaloid watchstands flanking it on both sides.