Iceworld

pursue the matter. Instead, he turned back to his work, and gradually the vivarium took shape under his* skilled tentacles. Both the refrigerator and the pump were remarkably tiny devices, each solidly attached to a side of the box-like affair. Their controls were simple; an off-on toggle for the pump, and a thermostat dial for the refrigerator.

“I haven’t calibrated that,” Feth said, referring to the latter. “I’m mounting a thermometer inside where it can be seen through the lid, and you’ll just have to fiddle with the knob until it’s right.”

“That’s all right — for supposedly haywire apparatus, you certainly turn out a factory job. There’s nothing to apologize for that I can see.”

There were several hours yet to go before they were actually due at the meeting place on Planet Three. They loafed and talked for a while, Ken’s plan coming gradually into more definite shape as they did so. They discussed the peculiarities of the Planet of Ice. Feth looked through his stock cabinets and reported that there was nothing he could turn into a portable control set so that Ken could handle his own torpedo. It was his turn to kick himself when the scientist suggested that he wire contacts to the controls — he (Ken) did not insist on sending the impulses by radio. Thirty minutes later a torpedo was sitting in the shop with a long cable extending from a tiny opening in its hull, and ending in a small box with half a dozen knobs studding its surface. Ken, manipulating the knobs, found no difficulty in making the projectile do whatever he wanted.

“I guess we’re even in the matter of overlooking the obvious,” he said at last. “Had we better be getting ready to go?”

“I suppose so. By the way, since you can’t read the torpedo’s instruments, maybe you’d better let me navigate you to the ground. Then you can do what you please.”

“That would be best. I certainly could not judge either distance or speed at three thousand miles from the surface.”

They donned space suits, and carried their apparatus out to the Karella. The vivarium they left in the air lock, since it was going to have to be fastened to the torpedo anyway; but Lee found it there a little later and delivered a vitriolic comment on people who obstructed the exits from a space ship. Ken humbly carted the box inside by himself, Feth having gone up to the control room to direct the newly modified torpedo to its cradle.

They were ready to go, except for one thing, and neither of them realized the omission. It was brought home to them only a minute before the planned take-off time, when another space-suited figure glided from the air lock of the station to that of the ship. Lee waited, apparently unsurprised; and a moment later Laj Drai entered the control room.

“We may as well go, if all your apparatus is on board,” he said.

Without comment, Ken nodded to the pilot.

16

Ken paused halfway into his armor to wave all four tentacles in expostulation.

“If you don’t think I know what I’m talking about, why did you hire me?” he asked. “I’ll get and grow plants for you as fast as I can. Our tank is only so big — there are growths down there that wouldn’t fit in this ship, whether you believe it or not. I don’t know any better than you what tofacco looks like when it’s growing — I’m not even as sure as you seem to be that it’s a plant. Just get out of your head the idea that I’m going to pack plants into this case until they have no room to breathe, and try to develop a little patience. It took two thousand years to explore Sarr, and the exploring was a darn sight easier than this!” He resumed the task of sliding into his metal shell.

“You’ll do what you’re told, Mr. Ken. I don’t care how you do it, as I said before; but if we’re not growing tofacco in a reasonable time, someone’s going to be awfully sorry.”

Ken’s response was slightly muffled, as only his head was now protruding from the suit. “That, of course, you can do; I can’t stop you. However, if you’ll let me do this my own way, I honestly think things will go faster. Use your head, after all — who does know this planet?” He paused too briefly for the question to have any but rhetorical significance, and went on: “The natives, of course. They not only know the planet, they presumably know where the tofacco can be obtained, since they sell it to you. You’ll have to work hard to convince me that there’s any better way of learning what we want to know than getting the information from the natives.”

“But it takes so long to learn a language!”

“True. It also takes quite a while to explore two hundred million square miles of territory, even if you count out the three quarters of it that seems to be flatland — and you can’t really do that; these natives may be on good enough terms with the flatlanders to get the tofacco from them by trade. How about that? I understand you had your fill of exploring the flatlands quite a while ago— what was it, nineteen out of nineteen torpedoes lost, or twenty out of twenty? The percentage was embarrassing in either case.”

“But suppose they don’t want us to learn where it can be obtained? They might be afraid we’d get it ourselves, instead of paying them for it”

“That would not be too stupid of them. Sure, they may suspect just that. I never denied that a certain amount of tact would be needed. If you don’t think I can exercise it, I repeat — do it yourself. We have more suits. I want to go down anyway, to study the place, but come right along — the torpedo will carry you and me and the tank easily enough!”

“I may not be a genius, but I’m not completely insane. I’ll be there by proxy. If I don’t like your tact, you needn’t bother to come back.”

“Don’t you want the suit? I thought they were expensive,” Ken said sweetly, and pulled the massive helmet into place with a clang.

Feth, who had been listening in, dogged the piece in place. He was just a trifle worried; he himself had not talked to Drai like that for years, and still retained unpleasant memories of the last time he had done so. He knew, of course, the purpose behind Ken’s attitude; the scientist wanted to annoy Drai sufficiently so that he would not suspect more than one thing at a time. That one thing was to be exactly what Ken wanted. Feth admitted to himself that that part of the conversation had been well handled. Nevertheless, he was not too sure he liked the expression of Laj Drai’s face as that individual draped himself within easy earshot of the radio.

His attention was shifted from the matter as Ken called in from the air lock, reporting that he was attached.

“Let me get out of here with my own controls, and move around a bit while I’m close enough to judge results,” he finished. “I’d better get the feel of this thing while I have just inertia for trouble, and before there’s weight as well.”

“Sound enough,” Feth approved, and took his tentacles from his own controls. One eye remained on the indicators, while the other sought the nearest port. In a few seconds the cigar-shaped bit of metal came into view, darting this way and that, swinging the clumsy figure of the armored scientist from a point near its bow and the rectangular box of the vivarium a few feet farther aft — it, too, was too large to go into the cargo compartment. Ken seemed to be having no trouble in controlling the sloppy-looking assembly, and presently signified that he was ready for the dive.

“All right,” Feth replied, “I have it. Be sure all your own controls are neutral — they’re not cross-connected, and impulses will add algebraically. By the way, all the stuff is in the cargo compartment.”

The other torpedo with the first batch of samples had been salvaged from its lonely perch on Mercury, and Laj Drai knew that; so Feth hoped he would not notice the slight accent on the “all.” The mechanic had placed the extra radio in with the other objects, but had done so at the last moment and had had no time to tell Ken about it. He hoped the fellow knew how to operate the set.

Ken, as a matter of fact, had not realized what Feth was implying. He was much too occupied in bracing his nerves for the descent that had been so hard on them the previous time. He succeeded better on this occasion, largely because he was able to keep most of his mind on the problems that would be facing him after he was down. They were numerous enough.