They were so engrossed in what was going on that none of them noticed us until we were through the door and had advanced several paces into the room. Then the hobbies, seeing us, reared back upon their rockers and the gnome began to straighten slowly, as if his back might have grown stiff from standing all bent over to go through our things. Still half bent over, he stared up at us through a tangle of unruly hair that hung down across his eyes. He looked like an English sheepdog looking up at us.
All of us stopped and stood together. We didn’t speak, but waited.
The gnome finally, straightened up by degrees, very cautiously and slowly. The hobbies stayed motionless, reared back on their rockers.
The gnome rubbed his gnarled hands together. “We were about, my lord,” he said, “to come after you.”
I motioned with my gun toward the luggage on the floor. He looked at it and shook his head.
“A mere formality,” he said. “An inspection for the customs.”
“With a view to a heavy tax?” I asked. “A very heavy tax.”
“Oh, not at all,” he said. “It is merely that there are certain things which must not be allowed upon the planet. Although, if you should be willing, a small gratuity, perhaps. We have so little opportunity to collect anything of value. And we do render services of which you are much in need. The shelter against the danger and the...”
I looked around the storeroom. It was piled with crates and baskets and other kinds of less conventionalized containers and there were articles of all sorts all heaped and piled together.
“It seems to me,” I said, “that you’ve been doing not too badly. If you ask me, I think you had no thought to get us. We could have stayed in that desert world forever if it had been up to you.”
“I swear,” he said. “We were about to open up the door. But we became so interested in the wonderful items that you carried with you that we quite lost track of time.”
“Why did you put us there to start with?” Sara asked. “In the desert world?” “Why, to protect you from the deadly vibrations,” be explained. “We, ourselves, took cover. Each time a ship lands there are these vibrations. They always come at night, before the dawning of the day that follows the landing of the ship.” “An earthquake?” I asked. “A shaking of the planet.” “Not of the planet,” said the gnome. “A shaking of the senses. It congeals the brain, it bursts the flesh. There can nothing live. That is why we put you in that other world-to save your very lives.”
He was lying to us. He simply had to be. Or at least he was lying about his intention to bring us back from the desert world. The kind of rat he was, there was no reason that he should. He had everything we had; there would have been nothing for him to gain by getting us out of the world he’d thrown us into.
“Buster,” I said, “I don’t buy a word of what you say. Why should the landing of a ship set off vibrations of that kind?”
He laid a crooked finger alongside his bulbous nose. “The world is closed,” he said. “None is welcome here. When visitors do come the world makes certain that they die before they can leave the city. And if they should so manage to escape, the planet seals the ship so they can’t take off again and spread the word of what they found.”
“And yet,” I said, “there is a strong directional beam, a homing beam, reaching well out into space. A beam to lure them in. You lured us in and you got rid of us in the desert world and you had everything we had taken from the ship. You had everything but the ship and maybe you are working on how to get the ship-our ship and all the others that are standing out there, sealed. No wonder the hobbies insisted on bringing all our luggage in. They knew what would happen to the ship. Apparently you haven’t figured out how to beat this sealing business yet.”
He shook his head. “It’s a part of the closed planet routine, sir. There must be a way to get around it, but it’s not been ciphered yet.”
Now that he knew I had him pegged, he’d not bother to deny it. He’d admit everything or almost everything and hope to gain some credit for being frank and forthright. Why was it, I wondered, that so many primates, no matter where you found them, turned out to be such stinkers?
“Another thing that I can’t cipher,” said the gnome, “is how you all got back here. Never before has there been anyone who could come back from one of the other worlds. Not till we let them out.”
“And you claim you were going to let us out?”
“Yes, I swear we were. And you can have all your things. We had no intention of keeping any of them.”
“Now, that is fine,” I said. “You’re becoming reasonable. But there are other things we want.”
He bristled a little. “Like what?” he asked.
“Information,” I told him. “About another man. A humanoid very much like us. He would have had a robot with him.”
He glanced around, trying to make up his mind. I twitched the muzzle of the gun and helped him make it up.
“Long ago,” he said. “Very long ago.”
“He was the only one to come? The only one of us?”
“No. Even longer than him there were others of you. Six or seven of them. They went out beyond the city and that was the last I saw of them.”
“You didn’t put them into another world?”
“Why, yes, of course,” he said. “All who come we put there. It is necessary. Each arrival triggers another killing wave. Once that killing wave is done, we are safe until another ship arrives. We put all who arrive into another world, but we always bring them out.”
Perhaps, I admitted to myself, he was telling us the truth. Although maybe not all the truth. Perhaps he had another angle that he hadn’t sprung on us. Although now, I was fairly certain, even if be had another one he might hesitate to spring it. We had him dead to rights.
