A Matter of Importance Part 2

Willis protested:

"But, sergeant! She only had one set of rockets! She couldn't have taken off again! She didn't have the rockets to do it with!"

"I know she couldn't," growled the sergeant. "But she did."

The _Cerberus_, once landed, should have waited here. It was not only a police regulation; it was common sense. When a s.h.i.+p broke down in s.p.a.ce, the exclusive hope for that s.h.i.+p's company lay in a refuge planet for s.h.i.+ps in that traffic lane. Even lifeboats could ordinarily reach some refuge planet, for picking up later. They couldn't possibly be located otherwise. With three dimensions in which to be missed, and light-years of distance in which to miss them--no s.h.i.+p or boat had ever been found as much as a light-week out in s.p.a.ce. No s.h.i.+p with a crippled drive could possibly be helped unless it got to a specified refuge world where it could be found. No s.h.i.+p which had reached a refuge planet could conceivably want to leave it.

There was also the fact that no s.h.i.+p which had made such a landing would have extra rockets with which to take off for departure.

The _Cerberus_ had landed. Timmy's girl was on it. It had taken off again. It was either an impossible ma.s.s suicide or something worse. It certainly wasn't routine.

Patrolman Willis asked hesitantly:

"D'you think, sergeant, it could be Huks sneaked back--?"

Sergeant Madden did not answer. He went back to the squad s.h.i.+p and armed himself. Patrolman Willis followed suit. The sergeant b.o.o.bied the squad s.h.i.+p so no unauthorized person could make use of it, and so it would disable itself if anyone with expert knowledge tried. Therefore, n.o.body with expert knowledge would try.

The two cops began a painstaking quest for police-type evidence to tell them what had happened, and how and why the _Cerberus_ was missing, after a clumsy but safe landing on Procyron III and when all sanity demanded that it stay there, and when it was starkly impossible for it to leave.

Sergeant Madden and Patrolman Willis were, self-evidently, the only human beings on a planet some nine thousand miles in diameter. It was easy to compute that the nearest other humans would be at least some thousands of thousands of millions of miles away--so far away that distance had no meaning. This planet was something over nine-tenth rolling sea, but there were a few tens of thousands of square miles of solid ground in the one archipelago that broke the ocean's surface. It was such loneliness as very few people ever experience. But they did not notice it. They were busy.

They went over the ground immediately about the landing place. Rocket flame had splashed it, both at the _Cerberus'_ landing and at the impossible take-off. There was nothing within a hundred yards not burned to a crisp. They searched outside that area. Sergeant Madden rumbled to his companion:

"Where'd the other s.h.i.+p land?"

Patrolman Willis blinked at him.

"There had to be another s.h.i.+p!" said Sergeant Madden irritably. "To bring the extra rockets. The other s.h.i.+p had to've brought 'em. And it had to have rockets of its own. There's no s.p.a.ceport here!"

Patrolman Willis blinked again. Then he saw. The _Cerberus_ carried one set of emergency-landing rockets, for use in a descent on a refuge planet if the need arose. The need had arisen and the _Cerberus_ had used them. Then, from somewhere, another set of rockets had been produced for it to use in leaving. Those other rockets must have come on another s.h.i.+p. But it was a trifle more complicated than that. The _Cerberus_ had carried one set of rockets and used them. One. It had been supplied with another set from somewhere. Two. They must have been brought by a s.h.i.+p which also used a set of rockets to land by. That made three. Then the other s.h.i.+p must have had a fourth set for its own take-off, or it would be grounded forever on Procyron III.

Patrolman Willis frowned.

"We looked pretty carefully from aloft," he said uncomfortably. "If there'd been another burned-off landing place, we'd have seen it."

"I know," rumbled Sergeant Madden. "And we didn't. But there must've been another s.h.i.+p aground when the _Cerberus_ came in. Where was it? It prob'ly knew the _Cerberus_ was landing to wait for help. How? If somebody was coming to help the _Cerberus_ it would be bound to spot the other s.h.i.+p, and it didn't want to be spotted. Why? Anyhow, it must've taken the _Cerberus_ and sent it off, and then taken off itself, leaving nothing sensible for us to think. 'Sounds like delinks." Then he growled. "Only it's not. There'd have to be too many men. Delinks don't work together more'n two or three. Too jealous of showin' off. But where was that other s.h.i.+p, and what was it doin' here?"

Patrolman Willis hesitated, and then said:

"There used to be pirates, sergeant."

"Uh-huh," said the sergeant. "You had it right the first time, most likely. Not delinks. Not pirates. You said Huks." He looked around, estimatingly. "The rockets had to be brought here from somewhere else where they'd been landed. I'm betting the tracks were covered pretty careful. But rockets are heavy. Manhandlin' them, whoever was doin' it would take the easiest way. Hm-m-m. There's water close by over yonder.

Sort of a sound in there--too narrow to be a bay. Let's have a look. And the slopes are easiest that way, too."

He led off to the eastward. He thought of Timmy's girl. He'd never seen her, but Timmy was going to marry her. She was on the _Cerberus_. It was the job of the cops to take care of whatever dilemma that s.h.i.+p might be in. As of here and now, it was Sergeant Madden's job. But besides that, he thought of the way Timmy would feel if anything happened to the girl he meant to marry. As Timmy's father, the sergeant had to do something.

He wanted to do it fast. But it had to be done the right way.

The route he chose was rocky, but it was nearly the only practicable route away from the burned-dead landing place. He climbed toward what on this planet was the east. There were pinnacles and small precipices.

There were small, fleshy-leaved bushes growing out of such tiny collections of soil as had formed in cracks and crevices in the rock.

Sergeant Madden noted that one such bush was wilted. He stopped. He bent over and carefully felt of the stones about it. A small rock came out.

The bush had been out of the ground before. It had carefully been replaced. By someone.

"The rockets came this way," said the sergeant, with finality. "Hauled over this pa.s.s to the _Cerberus_. Somebody must've knocked this bush loose while workin' at getting 'em along. So he replanted it. Only not good enough. It wilted."

"Who did it?" demanded Patrolman Willis.

"Who we want to know about," growled Sergeant Madden. "Maybe Huks. Come on!"

He scrambled ahead. He wheezed as he climbed and descended. After half a mile, Patrolman Willis said abruptly:

"You figure they all left, before anybody tried to find 'em?"

The sergeant grunted affirmatively. A quarter mile still farther, the rocky ground fell away. There was the gleam of water below them. Rocky cliffs enclosed an arm of the sea that came deep into the land, here. In the cliffs rock-strata tilted insanely. There were red and yellow and black layers--mostly yellow and black. They showed in startlingly clear contrast.

"Right!" said Sergeant Madden in morose satisfaction. "I thought there might've been a boat. But this's it!"

He went down a steep descent to the very edge of the sound--it was even more like a fjord--where the waters of the ocean came in among the island's hills. On the far side, a little cascade leaped and bubbled down to join the sea.

"You go that way," commanded Sergeant Madden, "and I'll go this. We've got two things to look for--a shallow place in the water coming right up to sh.o.r.e. And look for signs of traffic from the cliffs to the water. By the color of those rocks, we'd ought to find both."

He lumbered away along the water's edge. There were no creatures which sang or chirped. The only sounds were wind and the lapping of waves against the sh.o.r.e. It was very, very lonely.

Half a mile from the point of his first descent, the sergeant found a shoal. It was a flat s.p.a.ce of shallow water--discoverable by the color of the bottom. The water was not over four feet deep. It was a remarkably level shoal place.

He whistled on his fingers. When Patrolman Willis reached him, he pointed to the cliffs directly across the beach from the shallow water.

Lurid yellow tints stained the cliff walls. Odd ma.s.ses of fallen stone dotted the cliff foot. At one place they were piled high. That pile looked quite natural--except that it was at the very center of the sh.o.r.e line next the shoal.

"This rock's yellow," said Sergeant Madden, rumbling a little. "It's mineral. If we had a Geiger, it'd be raising h.e.l.l, here. There's a mine in there. Uranium. If a s.h.i.+p came down on rockets, an' landed in that shoal place yonder ... why ... it wouldn't leave a burned spot comin'

down or takin' off, either. Y'see?"

Patrolman Willis said: "Look here, sergeant--"

"I'm in command here," growled Sergeant Madden. "Huks didn't b.o.o.by trap.

Proud as h.e.l.l, and touchy as all get-out, but not killers. Not crazy killers, anyhow. You go get up yonder. Up where we started down. Then go on away. Back to the squad s.h.i.+p. If I don't come along, anyhow you'll know what's what when the _Aldeb_ comes."

Patrolman Willis expostulated. Sergeant Madden was firm. In the end, Patrolman Willis went away. And Sergeant Madden sat at ease and rested until he had time enough to get back to the squad s.h.i.+p. It was true that the Huks didn't b.o.o.by trap. They hadn't had the practice, anyhow, eighty years ago. But this was a very important matter. Maybe they considered it so important that they'd changed their policy concerning this.

Wheezing a little, Sergeant Madden pulled away large stones and small ones. An opening appeared behind them. He grunted and continued his labor. Nothing happened. The mouth of a mine shaft appeared, going horizontally into the cliff.

Puffing from his exertions, Sergeant Madden went in. It was necessary if he were to make a routine examination.