The Mammoth Book of Golden Age SF Read Online Free PDF Page B

years ago.” He laughed harshly, unsteadily.
    Tony said without emotion, “Cut it out. Hasn’t this ship got auxiliary rocket blasts?”
    “Naturally. But this is a one and a half gravity planet. Anyway, the auxiliary jets won’t be in such good condition after a fifty-foot drop.”
    “Then we’ll fix ’em,” said Tony sharply. He added, “What makes you so sure it’s millions of years ago, Masters?”
    Masters leaned back against the door jamb, face as cold and hard as stone.
    “Don’t make me bow to you any more than I have to, lieutenant,” he said ominously. “I didn’t believe your story before, but I do now. You predicted this crack-up – it had to happen. So I’m ready to concede it’s millions of years ago; mainly because there wasn’t any one and a half gravity planet within hundreds of millions of miles of the asteroid belt. But there
used
to be one.”
    Tony said, lips barely moving, “Yes?”
    “There used to be one –
before the asteroids
.”
    Tony smiled twistedly. “I’m glad you realize that.”
    He turned and went for the air lock, but, since the entire system of electric transmission had gone wrong somewhere, he abandoned it and followed a draft of wet air. He jerked open the door of a small storage bin, and crawled through. There was a hole here, that had thrust boxes of canned goods haphazardly to one side. Beyond was the open night.
    Tony crawled out, stood in the lee of the ship, occasional stinging drops of rain lashing at their faces. Wind soughed across a rocky plain. A low roar heralded a nearby, swollen stream. A low
kutakikchkut
monotonously beat against the night, night-brooding bird, Tony guessed, nested in the heavy growth flanking a cliff that cut a triangular section from a heavily clouded sky. Light from a probably moon broke dimly through clouds on the leftward horizon.
    Masters’ teeth chattered in the cold.
    Tony edged his way around the ship, looking the damage over. He was gratified to discover that although the auxiliary rocket jets were twisted and broken, the only hole was in the storage bin bulkheads. That could be repaired, and so, in time, could the jets.
    They started to enter the ship when Masters grasped his arm. He pointed up into the sky, where a rift in the clouds showed.
    Tony nodded slowly. Offsetting murkily twinkling stars, there was another celestial body, visible as a tiny crescent.
    “A planet?” muttered Tony.
    “Must be.” Masters’ voice was low.
    They stared at it for a moment, caught up in the ominous, baleful glow. Then Tony shook himself out of it, went for the storage bin.
    Walking down the corridor with Masters, Tony came upon Braker and Yates.
    Braker grinned at him, but his eyes were ominous.
    “What’s this I hear about about a skeleton?”
    Tony bit his lip. “Where’d you hear it?”
    “From the girl and her old man. We stopped outside their room a bit. Well, it didn’t make sense, the things they were saying. Something about an emerald ring and a skeleton and a cave.” He took one step forward, an ugly light in his smoky eyes. “Come clean, Crow. How does this ring I’ve got on my finger tie with a skeleton?”
    Tony said coldly, “You’re out of your head. Get back to the lounge.”
    Braker sneered. “Why? You can’t make us stay there with the door broken down.”
    Masters made an impatient sound. “Oh, let them go, lieutenant. We can’t bother ourselves about something as unimportant as this. Anyway, we’re going to need these men for fixing up the ship.”
    Tony said to Yates, “You know anything about electricity? Seems to me you had an E.E. once.”
    Yates’ thin face lighted, before he remembered his sullen pose. “O.K., you’re right,’ he muttered. He looked at Braker interrogatively.
    Braker said “Sorry. We’re not obligated to work for you. As prisoners, you’re responsible for us and our welfare. We’ll help you or whoever’s bossing the job
if
we’re not prisoners.”
    Tony nodded.