The next day was quiet. During the morning Fay pursued the ostensible purpose of their visit by making biographical memoranda concerning the life of the late Son at the Propaganda Office.
Paddy visited Dane, the electrician, and took delivery of the ultra-violet projector.
Dane was proud of his work-an aluminum case eight or nine inches on a side with a handle for carrying. Four lenses opened into the front, a power-pack fitted into clips at the back. In a row along the top were four tuners with vernier settings, four output valves, four switches.
"And is it accurate" Paddy asked skeptically.
"Accurate?" cried Dane. "It's as accurate as the Inter-world Standard that I calibrated it by! Three times I checked each one of the circuits and there's never an offbeat!"
"Good enough and here's your money with a bit of a bonus."
During the afternoon a messenger delivered the prints to the pictures they had made the previous day. None was missing nor were there any deletions.
Evening came with its violent flare of color. Paddy and Fay stacked their equipment on the dilapidated old air-boat, rose over Aevelye, took off for Fumighast Ventrole.
Over the mouth of the hole the guard ship pulled up alongside.
The same corporal saluted them, glancing at their makeshift equipment with contemptuous amusement.
"What is it now? More pictures? It's dark."
"We'd like to get some night shots," said Fay. "To get the effect of the lighting and the fluorescence of the rocks. We've brought along an ultra-violet projector."
"So that's why you had that thing built!" said the corporal. He shrugged. "Go to it."
They dropped away from him into the chasm. " 'So that's why you had that thing built,' " Paddy mimicked in a girlish falsetto. "Strange he didn't ask when our wedding was to be-they seem so interested in all our doings."
They landed on the terrace in front of the house and the darkness, faintly luminescent, was like the fog of dreams.
Fay sighed. "If I weren't so scared and nervous I'd be in love with the place."
"Maybe we'll come here on our honeymoon," said Paddy. She peered at him through the darkness to see whether or not he was serious.
A voice at their elbow said, "Good evening." It was the Shaul major-domo. "More pictures?"
"More pictures is right," said Paddy. "We'd like some shots of you making the beds and maybe dumping the garbage down the chute or maybe putting away the famous silver."
"I'm sorry, I'm afraid that is impossible."
"In that case, with your permission we'll just infest the outer grounds."
"My permission has not been sought," replied the major-domo with a soft silken edge to his voice. "The orders to throw the grounds open to anyone who chose to drop in came from Aevelye."
Paddy grinned. "You and I now-we'd made a good pair on the stage."
The major-domo's cowl vibrated rapidly. He turned and walked off.
For an hour they took pictures of the villa and the silent garden, using a variety of ultra-violet frequencies. At last they worked their way around to the back terrace.
Paddy turned the projector against the back wall. It fluoresced beautifully in striking patterns of red, fiery yellow, gold, lemon-white. He played frequencies at random over the wall while Fay took pictures.
"Now, Paddy," whispered Fay. "The four."
Paddy set the dials. "Got the number of your films?"
"Yes. Three hundred six through three hundred nine, inclusive."
For a flickering instant Paddy pressed all four switches at once and in that instant the random glowings, lines and loops in the significant square coalesced to form lines of legible characters. They even showed the same pattern as had the other data sheets-two preliminary paragraphs and two columns of figures.
"That's it," said Paddy. "Now-one at a time."
Using each frequency separately, they made four photographs.
"We'll make a few more," said Fay, "and then we'll go."
"Wonder of wonders," said Paddy. "I think we've got it."
When at last they rose above Fumighast Ventrole the guardship as before pulled up alongside and the captain requested the camera, the film pack and the ultra-violet projector.
"If the censor finds nothing wrong," he told them, "you'll have everything back tomorrow." Paddy and Fay flew back to their ship.
Again during the morning Fay noted information regarding the dead Shaul Son while Paddy, under the pretext of sealing a leak in the waterline, sought through the ship for spy cells without success.
During the early afternoon a messenger brought them their prints. Fay fanned them out swiftly-306-307-308 309. All there, clean and distinct. When superimposed they would spell out the Shaul fifth of the space-drive engineering.
"I'm off to Room Twelve," said Paddy. Trotting across the field to the Terminal Building he found Room 12 and recovered their power-arm and keys.
They filled watertanks, shipped two new energy cartridges. As Almach was dropping for its bath in the flaming evening vapors they took off. Presently Shaul was half of a bright orange globe below.
Paddy sighed. "Fay, I've lost ten pounds. I've-"
"Shhh," said Fay. "We'd better check the ship for buttons and spy cells." In an hour, while Paddy encouraged her, she found two audio buttons disguised as rivets and a spy cell on the knob of a high locker.
"Now," she breathed. "Maybe we can talk-though I still feel jumpy."
Paddy rose to his feet. "And maybe there's time for a little kiss or two."
Fay sighed. "Oh, all right… Now stop it," she gasped. "Stop it, Paddy Blackthorne! You'd never marry a fallen woman and I intend to marry you honest and legal and make you squirm the rest of your life, so you behave yourself- until it's legal."
The boat drifted quietly in the great dark emptiness, as remote from the worlds of life as a soul after death. Paddy and Fay sat at the chart table in the observation dome, watching the far stars.
"It's only now," said Paddy, "with four-fifths of it behind us, that I'm getting the jitters."
Fay smiled wanly. She looked tired. Her eyes glowed with an unhealthy brightness, her skin was transparent, her fingers thin, nervous. "That's the way of anything, Paddy. If you're desperate any gain looks good. But now-"
"When I was chained on that little asteroid," said Paddy, "I could think of nothing finer than making off in that beautiful big-domed boat. Sure, I'd take any risk for it. There was nothing for me to lose. Now it's different. I want to live.
I've something to live for." He looked at her with a glance that was like stroking her hair.
For several minutes they sat in silence. The boat drifted through space at an unknown speed. Perhaps it hung motionless. There was no way of knowing.
Padding stirred. "See it out there-Mirach. It's staring back at us, daring us to come closer."
Fay's hand trembled. She laughed uncertainly. "It does have a funny look. Like one of the Koton eyes."
Paddy said, "Of all the Langtry races I hate only the Kotons."
"Probably because they've deviated the most."
Paddy shrugged. "I wonder. The Kotons and the Shauls resemble normal men the most of any. The Shauls have their skin cowls. The Kotons their saucer eyes."
"It's something beyond their mere appearance. It's their psychology. The Shauls are not too far removed from men. Earthers can understand most of their motives. But the Kotons-they're far far away from any Earthers comprehension. It's as if they were stuff of their own twilight world.
"To speak to one you'd say here was the strangest most unique individual possible-a creature that might take to the wilderness to be alone with his own peculiarities. And then when you see them at one of their shoutings-"
"Or at a public torturing, like the time I was oiler on the Christobel Rocket."
Fay winced. "-then they're all the same and you can think of nothing but the rows and rows and rows of big saucer eyes. That's all you see. Acres of eyes as big as clam-shells. And then you know that they're all the same in their oddness."
"Like a race of crazy people. But no," mused Paddy, "I'd hardly call them mad-"
"It would mean little if you did. They have so few sensibilities in common with the root stock."
"Few? There's not any."
"Oh-there are a few. Curiosity-anger-pride."
"Well, that's true," Paddy conceded. "They're a cowardly crew, some of them, and they have those sex festivals."
Fay shook her head. "You're emphasizing the wrong things. Their fear isn't the fear of Earthers. It's closer to what we'd call prudence. There's nothing of panic or fright in it, nothing glandular. And their sex is no more emotional than scratching an itch. Maybe that's their difference-the fact that their glands and hormones play such minor parts in their personalities."
Paddy clenched his fists, shoved out his chin. "I hate the vermin as I hate flies and I feel no more pangs killing Kotons than killing flies."
"I hardly blame you," said Fay. "They're very cruel."
"I've heard that they eat human beings and with relish."
Fay said mournfully, "And why not? Earthers eat pigs and that's about their attitude."
Paddy gritted his teeth. "They invented the nerve-suit. What more can you say to their discredit?" He ran his fingers through his hair. "I hate taking you out there, Fay, and putting you to the risk."
"I'm no better than you are," she said.
Paddy rose to his feet. "In any case there's only nonsense in frightening ourselves. Maybe we'll have it easy."
Fay read from the last little piece of parchment. " 'The Plain of Thish, where Arma-Geth shows the heroes to the wondering stars. Under my mighty right hand.' Do you know anything about Arma-Geth, Paddy?"
He nodded, turned to stare at the stars ahead. "It's a sort of heroes' memorial in the middle of the plain-'which may not be marred or imprinted on pain of sore death.' "
Fay stared. "And why do you say the last?"
"That's their law. It's a big plain, fifty miles square, I'd say, and as flat as a table. They used a million Armasian and Kudthu and Earther slaves to lay it out level. There's not a hit of gravel the size of a pea to mar the flat. At the center of the plain are the great statues of all the old Sons. And Sam Langtry himself sits at the head of the aisle."
"You sound as if you've been there."
"Oh, not me. There's no one allowed near the plain but the Kotons and few of them. A drunken Shaul woman told me about it once."
Fay said dully, "You make it sound difficult."
"If we had an armed cruiser now," said Paddy, "we might drop smash down beside it, shoot up everything but what we wanted, take off before they could get to us."
Fay shook her head. "Not on Koto. There are five satellite forts covering every square mile on the planet. They'd have your cruiser broken and white-hot before ten seconds had passed."
"Oh, well," said Paddy, "I was just talking-letting my mind loose on wild schemes."
Fay frowned, bit nervously at her lips. "We've got to think of something. With four-fifths of the space-drive in our hands we can't allow ourselves to be captured."
"With or without as far as that goes."
They sat in silence a moment. Then Paddy said, "You'll drop me low and I'll parachute into the very center of Arma-Geth. In the dark I'll get our last sheet and I'll come out on the plain. There you'll drop by and pick me up once more."
"Paddy-are you serious?" Fay asked gently. "Faith and how could I be otherwise? The very thought of the project raises the goose-bumps on my neck."
"Paddy-you're too young to die."
"That I know," Paddy agreed. "That I know." He darted a glance across the gulf toward Mirach. "Especially on the public platforms."
"Just getting near the planet is dangerous," said Fay. "The forts detect anything coming down to Koto that's off the regular lanes. They're not free and easy like the other planets. And if we land at the Montras Field, we'd have to go through that examination again. Except that it probably would be a great deal more thorough."
Paddy pursed his lips. "If luck's with us we could make it past the forts."
"We can't trust to luck," said Fay. "We've got to use our brains."
"It's the old Blackthorn luck," Paddy reminded her. After a moment he added, "Of course it's the Blackthorn brains too, which evens it up."
"Well, use them then!" snapped Fay. "Suppose when I dropped you down you were caught and they tortured everything you knew out of you? All about Delta Trianguli?"
Paddy screwed up his face. "Don't talk so. It takes away my heart for the venture."
"But suppose it happened for a fact? And we lost the four sheets? Then they'd have everything."
Paddy said, "Faith, I believe that if it came to seeing poor Paddy out of the nerve-suit or making sure of the space-drive you'd leave Paddy bellowing there like Bashan's Bull."
She inspected him as if from a distance. "Maybe I would."
Paddy shuddered. "Of all the millions of tender-hearted women in the universe it's you I went and picked out for a shipmate, one like the Hag of Muckish Mountains, who sold her man to the devil for a groat."
Fay said coolly, "Control of space means a great deal to Earth. Right now those sheets are hardly safer than if we had them right here in the cabin. Neither one of us can risk being caught."
Paddy drummed the table with his fingers. "Now if we could only get them safe to the right people on Earth there wouldn't be this conflict and uncertainty and doubt between us."
"There's no conflict and doubt as far as I'm concerned," said Fay with a trace of bravado. "I love my life and I love you- no, now keep away from me, Paddy-but I love Earth and the old continents and oceans and the good Earth people more."
"You're an awful hard woman," said Paddy. "You're one of these fanatics."
She shrugged. "I don't think so at all. You feel the same way if you'd only stop and put it into words."
Paddy was not listening. He rubbed his chin, frowned. "Now I wonder-"
Fay said, "The Langtry ships around Earth are like bees around a honeycomb. Just hoping someone will try to smuggle the sheets to Earth."
"If we could only beam the information in on the space-wave."
"They'd jam us- and if we kept trying too long in one spot they'd triangulate and run us down." She rose and rubbed her hands nervously on the seat of her slacks.
"There's still another chance," said Paddy. "Celestial Express, to Earth Agency."
"Mmmmmmmph. You're out of your mind."
Paddy reached for the Astral Almanac. "Not so fast, not so fast," he muttered. "The Blackthorn brain is a wonderful thing." He licked his finger, turned a page, searched down a column. "Pshaw! No deliveries being made this year."
"Will you stop being cryptic long enough to tell me what you're looking for?"
"Oh," said Paddy, "I thought there might be a comet cutting in from outer space close to Earth. Then we could include the sheets as part of the baggage. But there's nothing listed, nothing for another eight months."
Fay narrowed her eyes thoughtfully, said nothing. Paddy shrugged. "I guess we take our chances. There's still that old Blackthorn luck."
Oyster-white Koto hung below, Koto the twilight-planet.
"It's a frightening place," murmured Fay. "So dim and dark."
Paddy essayed a confident laugh and was surprised at the shrill sound which left his mouth. "Now then, Fay, it'll go fast. One, two, three-down, up, off again, like old Finnigan at Bantry Station."
"I hope so, Paddy."
"Now we'll wait till those forts are spaced just enough to chance dropping our boat through."
Fay pointed. "There's a big hole out there over the Cai-Lur Quadrant."
"Down we go," said Paddy. "Now pray to Saint Anthony if you be a good Catholic-"
"I'm not," snapped Fay, "and if you'll give more mind to the boat and less to religion we'll gain by it."
Paddy shook his head reproachfully. "If old Father O'Toole would hear you, how he'd tut-tut-tut. Turn off the lights then and douse the field on the cowcatcher if we want to help our chances."
Koto bulged across their vision. "Now!" said Paddy. "Off with all power and we fall like a dead rock and hope they're not too vigilant in the forts."
Ten minutes, twenty minutes passed. Silent and tense they sat in the dark cabin, their pale faces lit by the reflected glow of Koto.
The horizons spread, they felt the cushioning crush of air below them.
"We're past," breathed Fay. "We're down. Turn on the power, Paddy."
"Not yet. We'll get clear down into the traffic lanes."
The twilight surface of Cai-Lur Steppe rushed close. "The power, Paddy! Do you want to crash?"
"Not yet."
"Paddy! Those trees!"
A quick gust of power, a wrench of the rudder-the boat swooped belly-down, only yards from the surface, and charged hedge-hopping across the plain.
"Now then," said Paddy cheerfully, "and where's Arma-Geth from here?"
Fay pulled herself up into the seat. "You reckless idiot!"
"The lower we go, the safer," Paddy told her. "And Arma-Geth?"
She looked at the chart. "Magnetic compass one hundred fifty-three. About a thousand kilometers. There's a rather large city-Dhad-in our way. The traffic regulations for Koto-let's see." She flipped pages in Traffic Regulations of All Worlds. "Fourth level for us. Speed, two thousand KPH. If I were you I'd swing around Dhad."
Paddy shrugged. "On the fourth level we're just as safe over the town as over the country. Maybe safer if anyone has reported a strange space-boat."
Dhad swung below, a low city of flat wide roofs, glowing pearl-colored in the darkness, and presently was left astern. They crossed a range of mountains, rose to dodge Mt. Zacauh, a perfect cone eight miles high, slanted down across the Plain of Thish.
They dropped low, hovered, strained their eyes through the darkness. Paddy muttered, "It must be close."
Fay rose, "I'll try infra-red." A moment later, "I see it- about ten miles to the left. It looks quiet. You can drop down a little-there's nothing below us."
With the skids almost dragging Paddy edge the boat toward Arma-Geth.
"About three miles," said Fay. "That's close enough. We don't know how well it's guarded or even it it's guarded at all."
Paddy set the ship down and the solid vibrationless ground felt curiously still, dead, silent, after the dynamic flight-motion of the boat. Throwing open the port they put out their heads, listened. No sound, except for a soft distant chirring of insects. Three miles ahead, black on the gray luminescence of Koto's sky, rose a confused group of silhouettes.
"Now," said Paddy thickly, "my tools, my gun, my light. I'll be out there and back in less time than you'll know." She watched him strap on his equipment. "Paddy-"
"What now?"
"I should be coming with you."
"Perhaps you should," Paddy agreed easily. "And if so I'll come back for you. But right now it's only a reconnaissance I'm making and you're the rear guard. Unless of course the stuff is there for the taking, so ridiculously easy that I can't resist it."
"Be careful, Paddy."
"Indeed I will, you can count on it. And you mind for your own safety. Be ready to jump if it gets dangerous. If there's any shooting or disturbance-don't wait for me."
He dropped to the ground, stood listening. Chirr, chirr, chirr-a sound like a billion tiny bells.
Paddy started briskly for the silhouettes, treading the smooth swept surface of the plain. The silhouettes grew, towered past the gray afterglow, loomed up to the stars. There was no sound, no hint of movement, no lights. More slowly he advanced, ears and eyes like funnels.
He came to a stone wall, cold and moist, high as his head. He felt along the top, grasped the edge, hauled himself up. He was on a great stone pavilion. To either side rose dark statues-the Koton Sons of Langtry, row after rigid row, conventionalized, sitting in low chairs, staring with wide mother-of-pearl eyes across the sacred Plain of Thish.
Paddy sat a moment quietly, listening, every nerve in his body alive, groping for sensation. He rose to his feet, moved across the stone to the nearest statue. Where was the latest?
Logically it should be the last statue of the series at the end of a row.
He felt along the base of the statue nearest him, looked along the sides, saw in faintly luminescent letters-Lajory, 17th Son of Langry; Following it was a series of dates and ceremonial phrases.
He must be close, thought Paddy. The late Son was the nineteenth of the line. To his ears came the shuffle of footsteps on the stone. He clapped his hand to his gun, froze.
A pair of dark figures passed thirty feet away. There was the milky flash of great night-seeing eyes and they were gone. Had they seen him? Paddy pondered. They had seemed neither surprised nor startled. Perhaps they had mistaken him for a devotee. Best to make haste in any event.
He moved to the next statue. Golgach, 18th Son of Langtry," read the plaque.
To the next. Ladha-Kudh, 19th Son of Langtry. Here was his goal with the fifth sheet under the right hand. The hand lay on the knee, palm downward. Paddy looked up. Twenty feet. He took a last look around. No sight, no sound, no one to watch for thieving intruders.
He set his toe in a cleft, heaved himself up on the pedestal. The shuffle of steps-Paddy flattened against a pillar of the great chair. The sound passed.
Heart thumping Paddy hauled himself up the side of the chair into Ladha-Kudh's lap. Above loomed the stern dish-eyed face of the man he had killed and to Paddy's excited brain, the mother-of-pearl plates that were the eyes seemed to stare down accusingly.
Paddy grimaced. "Now's the time for the banshee to howl if ever he's going to. Ah, bless the Lord, may the creature's ghost still prowl the asteroid where he was killed."
Paddy crawled out the right leg to the hand, felt the Stone fingers. "Now how will this be?" thought Paddy. "Will they raise up easy-like or will I want a charge of jovian-powder to lift the hand away? First we'll try my bar."
He unhooked the pry-bar from his belt, pushed it under the hand, applied force. Snap! The ball of the thumb broke off, fell clattering to the pavement.
Paddy crouched, tingling all over. No sound-he felt at the fractured part, sensed the beginnings of a cavity. Bringing up his flash-lamp, he directed the tiniest whisper of light possible at the broken spot. A cavity it was and Paddy eagerly plied the bar.
A stem voice came from below. "What are you doing up there? Come down or I'll pick you off with a beam."
Paddy said, "Right away. I'm coming." He reached into the cavity, pulled out a metal box, shoved it into his pouch.
"Come down!" said the voice. "By the justice of Koto come down!"
Paddy slowly crawled back to Ladha-Kudh's lap. Trapped, caught red-handed-how many of them were there? He peered toward the pavement but could see only darkness. But they could doubtless see him well with their big twilight eyes.
He let himself down the leg of the chair. If he could only see. He snatched out his light, flashed it along the ground. Three Kotons-uniformed, guns at ready-and they were dazzled. Paddy shot them-one, two, three-left them thrashing on the stone. He jumped down, hit with a jar, rose, raced to the edge, dropped over to the Plain of Thish.
He paused an instant, listened. He heard his own panting. The darkness bulked heavy with menace but he dared not use his flash. Above him he heard movement, staccato voices, sounds of anger.
Crouching he scuttled off across the plain. At his back came a shrill whistle and over his head he heard a throb, a hum.
Paddy dodged, ran with mouth open, eyes staring into the gloom. Oh, to be in the ship! Fay, Fay, have the port wide!
A thud ahead of him, a swarm of figures. Paddy shot wildly, kicked, punched. Then his gun was wrenched away and his arms seized.