The Old Man of the Stars Read Online Free PDF Page B

power pile. It’s still running on test. They ought to work.”
    Matthew said huskily: “Anything might go wrong. They haven’t been checked over.”
    â€œNothing much worse can happen than what’s going to happen anyway,” said Clifford. He took a pace forward, down the hill. “Are you coming?”
    â€œOf course I’m coming.”
    Matthew, Clifford, and Bellhouse were running down to the entrance. They were breathless by the time they reached the control cabin, slipping and sliding along the tilted floor. Below, one of the men who had followed them threw a switch, and the great roof rolled back. Now the ship lay on its side beneath the sky to which it belonged. And inside the ship the three men watched and waited, each with fingers poised above the starboard disruptor controls.
    â€œWe shall probably go up along with the ship,” said Bellhouse with a half-hysterical laugh.
    Dazzling across the sky game the three destroyers, the three vicious ships from space. Their noses turned down towards the buildings that waited for there.
    Clifford found time to say, as though it were a theory worth discussing at this very moment: “Maybe they come from that planet that’s swum into view recently. Seems probable.”
    Matthew said: “Could be.” And then the predictor control flickered its warning, the disruptor quivered gently and seemed to reach out as though plucked from its mountings by the approaching ships. Matthew’s finger stabbed down.
    There was a gout of savage, radiant force that scorched away part of the corner of the roof. But at the same time two stabbing fingers leaped out from the two companion disruptors, and caught in their mingled, blinding beam was one of the attacking ships.
    It was knocked upwards as though punched by a mighty hand. The nose dissolved, molten metal falling on the ground below; and the spinning wreckage of what had once been a spaceship made a great spinning arc and came to earth out on the grassy plain below the hills.
    â€œNext one!” shouted Matthews exultantly.
    There was a delay. They waited for the other two ships to come back.
    Then, faintly, they heard the mechanic calling them from below. Clifford opened the nearest port and leaned out.
    â€œThey’ve gone!” came the jubilant message.
    â€œThey’ll only be turning to come back and have another go,” warned Matthew.
    â€œNo. He says they’ve gone well beyond the hills—angled upwards.”
    â€œOff for reinforcements?”
    â€œWe can relax for a little while, anyhow.”
    Bellhouse stayed in the cabin in case of a sudden emergency. Matthew and Clifford lowered themselves to the ground and went out into the air, reeking with smoke that blew over from the stricken town. The woods were burning slowly but steadily.
    The handful of survivors, helped down by the men who had been working here, came down to the shelter of the observatory.
    Matthew said: “I think you’re right, and those murderers did come from that new planet. Now they’re going back to report. After all, from up there this ship of ours must look pretty menacing. It’s four times as big as their things, and they couldn’t know that it wasn’t capable of leaving the ground. A couple of destroyers might be able to knock hell out of a battleship, but it’s safer to go and get the rest of the fleet.”
    â€œI wonder how long that will take?”
    â€œHours, perhaps. Or maybe a day or two. I wouldn’t be surprised to see them back tonight, ready to finish us off.”
    They looked out speculatively across the plain to the hills. It was Clifford who said:
    â€œI’d like to go and have a look at that wreckage.”
    â€œWhat? Good heavens, yes.”
    â€œThere might be somebody—something—still alive. We oughtn’t to dismiss that possibility.”
    â€œAfter seeing that ship come down,” said Matthew