Planetary Agent X

He started to protest, but the senior of the two grinned at him and whipped the gun from his belt.

“Sonny,” he said, “in spite of all you’ve heard about adventure in space, it’s not like that at all. Sorry. Captain’s orders. No weapons among the passengers so long as we’re spaceborne. You’ll get this oversized cannon back when you land.” He looked at it and grunted. “Where’d you get this thing, anyway?”

“It usta belong to my old man,” Billy said sourly. “He usta be a gun crank, like.”

“He must have been,” the other chuckled. “Hey, Bob, look at this. Front sight filed away, and all.”

But his companion had taken on the next colonist in the line.

Billy shuffled on toward the ship. He had carried the last hurdle.

There had been some crucial moments during the past twelve hours, but he had cleared every obstacle. He had crossed Greater Washington in another cab, using Horace Barrymore’s credit card. He had got through the press of people at the shuttle-spaceport, without exposure, hiding his face in a handkerchief and sneezing time after time, just as he’d passed the ticket gate. He had sat in the back of the shuttle rocket, hiding his head in his arm and pretending sleep every time someone had come near.

Once outside Greater Washington, he felt some relief. He assumed they had circulated the inadequate drawing of him throughout the globe. Most likely. He didn’t know. But at least people weren’t expecting to run into him out here.

His papers had been cleared without difficulty. He had, on the rocket shuttle, practiced Horace Barrymore’s shaky signature a few times. It wasn’t difficult. A scribble.

It had carried him past, easily enough.

And now he was actually entering the ship.

At the entry level stood another ship’s officer, sheaf of papers in hand.

“Name?”

“Horace Barrymore.”

“Horace Barrymore. Here it is. Berth 33, Compartment Twelve. Down that way, son.”

Billy Antrim went as indicated. He had no baggage, but on the other hand, neither did most of the others. The baggage had been checked earlier. Billy, of course, had none to check. After they were spaceborne he would put up a big howl, to cover. He could claim that they’d lost his things. It shouldn’t be difficult. He might even get some sort of reimbursement.

Compartment Twelve was but a hundred feet or so down the corridor along which he walked. The door was closed. He opened it and stepped in.

Billy Antrim scowled. It didn’t look to be the type of compartment devoted to passengers. On the far side of the room was a desk at which was seated an easy-going looking young man, his face tired and his clothing rumpled and dirty—like Billy himself.

He looked up quizzically. “Hello, Billy,” he said, his hand reaching for the automatic which lay on the desk.

Billy Antrim blurred into motion. He crouched, his right hand flicked and the knife was there magically. He threw the hand back for the cast.

Ronny Bronston’s eyes blinked in surprised alarm—his fingers were still inches from the gun.

Then there was something in the wild blue eyes of Billy Antrim. He threw the knife—

His throw was not quite true. It missed Ronny Bronston’s head by scant millimeters and broke its point in a clang on the steel bulkhead beyond.

The gun was trained on Billy’s stomach.

The Section G agent took a deep breath, swallowed, then managed to say, “You missed, Billy. I didn’t expect you to miss.”

Billy Antrim sneered. “It’s all luck,” he said. “Everything’s luck, I had one chance in a million, and didn’t make it.”

The gun was steady.

“Sit down over there, Billy. I set this whole thing up only minutes ago. I didn’t expect you quite yet. But shortly there’ll be some local agents of my department showing up. Then we’ll get about our business.”

Billy sat, his strained juvenile face still in sneer. “You ain’t got a jug could hold me, yoke.”

Ronny Bronston looked at him meditatively. Evidently the other didn’t know that there were no prisons for such as him on presentday Earth. Criminals of Billy Antrim’s ilk were turned over to medical science for rehabilitation.

Ronny said, “It’s been a long trek, Billy. I don’t mind admitting you almost made it. You know what your big mistake was?”

“Yes.”

“Oh?” Bronston raised eyebrows.

“I didn’t slit that drunken bum’s throat last night. I should’ve. But instead I just poured more liquor down his gullet. I thought he’d stay under long enough for me to make it. He musta woke up right after I left.”

Ronny Bronston looked at him in puzzlement.

“It doesn’t sound like a man with your background. Why couldn’t you kill him? You’d already finished off eight others.”

“Seven,” Billy muttered.

“Eight. One of those two women bystanders you wounded in Scranton died in the hospital.”

Billy winced.

“With a record like that,” Bronston pursued, “you should have been capable of finishing Barrymore off to make sure your back trail was clean.”

Billy said sourly, “What difference does it make? Maybe I was gettin’ tired of all the killin’. Ever since I knew Big Luigi give it to me, I been thinking about it all. About my old lady, and how she always said I was gonna go to school and all. But after I knifed one of Big Luigi’s goons he sent her off the planet, and I never seen her again.”

For a long moment, Ronny Bronston looked at the other. Billy Antrim, defeated now and at bay, still looked like nothing so much as a defiant school youngster, caught in some misdemeanor and hauled before the principal. There was even somewhat of a wistful quality in the juvenile killer’s face, as though of a child grown almost to adulthood who had been allowed down through the years to press his face against the windowpane and look in at the others, celebrating their Christmases and birthdays—but never allowed to enter and participate.

Ronny shook his head, as though to clear away a trend of thought he couldn’t afford.

He said, “I’m afraid not. I’ve been looking further into your dossier, Billy. Section G has been checking you on every planet you’ve ever set down on. And we’ve been checking that of Luigi Agrigento, too.”

Billy was scowling at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, ya stupid yoke. I know what happened to my old lady.”

“That’s not Luigi Agrigento’s way. His henchman molested your mother and as a result you killed him. Somebody, given Maffeo outlook, had to pay. And since it was your mother who was the original…”

Billy Antrim was on his feet, shaking. “You lie!”

Bronston, his eyes wary, shook his head. “Sit down, Billy. You know better. I have no reason to lie.”

Billy slumped back into the chair, his once poker face twitching. “You he,” he muttered.

Bronston shrugged, as though he couldn’t care less. “Agrigento evidently turned her over to his goon’s relatives. And they… I didn’t understand this part of it. What does capontina mean?”

“No,” Billy Antrim whispered, his head in his hands, his body swaying. “No.”

Bronston said, an element of contempt in his voice. “You fizzled out, in the real clutch, Billy. You should have finished off Barrymore. And just a few minutes ago. You missed me with that knife on purpose, didn’t you?”

Billy Antrim didn’t answer.

“You haven’t got the guts to kill any more, Billy,” Bronston told him.

Irene Kasansky looked up from her screens and order boxes, her switches and buttons, and said with as near to a smile as Irene Kasansky ever came to a smile, “Hello, Ronny. How’d you make out in New Albuquerque?”

Ronny said, exhaustion in his voice, “Not now, Irene. Is the Old Man available?”

Irene snorted and said, “Sid Jakes is with him. But it’s nothing more important than your report. Where’ve you been?”