The Complete Short Stories: The 1960s. Brian Aldiss

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СКАЧАТЬ we’re very nearly on top of it!’

      ‘Now you’re beginning to frighten me,’ Dominguey said. He looked frightened, dark skin stretched over his cheekbones as he pressed his temples with his fingertips. Behind them, Baron and Malravin were quarrelling. Baron had tripped over the other’s foot as he lay with his head in the drive box, and they were having a swearing match. Neither Dominguey nor Sharn paid them any attention.

      ‘No, there’s one hole in your theory,’ Dominguey finally said.

      ‘Such as?’

      ‘Such as if Erewhon was as close as that to its primary, it could never hold its orbit. It would be drawn into Bertha.’

      Sharn stared at the captain, mulling over his answer. Life was a misery, but there was always some pleasure to be wrung from the misery.

      ‘I got the answer to that when I was outside rolling on the sterile stinking rockface,’ he said. ‘The vapour came pouring over the ground at me. I knew Erewhon was too small to retain any atmosphere for any length of time. In fact it was diffusing into space fast. Therefore, not so long ago, that atmosphere was lying in hollows on the surface, liquid. Follow me?’

      Dominguey swallowed and said, ‘Go on.’

      ‘You made the assumption that Erewhon bore a planetary relationship to Bertha, Dominguey. You were wrong. Erewhon is spinning in from a colder region. The rocks are heating up. We haven’t settled on a planetoid – we’re squatting on a hunk of rock spiralling rapidly into the sun.’

      There came the sound of a blow, and Malravin grunted. He jumped at Baron and the two men clinched, pummelling each other’s backs rather foolishly. Dominguey and Sharn ran up and pulled them apart. Dead or not, Baron was giving a fair account of himself.

      ‘All right,’ Dominguey said angrily. ‘So we’ve run ourselves ragged. We need sleep. You three bunk down, give yourselves sedatives. I’ll get on fixing the cybo, Malravin. Set the alarm signal for nineteen hours fifty, G.M., so that we don’t miss calling Grandon and Brinkdale, and bunk down. We want to get out of here – and we all want to get out of here. Go on, move – you too, Eddy. Your theory has me convinced. We’re leaving as soon as possible, so I’m having peace while I work.’

      In turn they all protested, but Dominguey was not to be over-ruled. He stood with his hands on his hips, his dark face unmoving as they climbed into their bunks. Then he shrugged, set the alarm on the communication panel, and crawled into the drive compartment.

      It was not a matter of simple replacement. Fortunately they had spares for the little sinecells which studded the main spiral of the cyboscope that steered the ship. But the spiral itself had become warped by the extra strains placed on it during their penetration of the nebula. Malravin had drained its oil bath and removed its casing, but the business of setting it back into true was a slow precision job, not made easier by the awkward angle at which it had to be tackled.

      Time passed. Dominguey was listening to the sound of his own heavy breathing when the alarm bell shrilled.

      He crawled out into the cabin. Sharn and Malravin were already rousing and stretching.

      ‘That’s four hours’ hard grind I just put in,’ he said, pushing his words through a yawn. ‘Eddy, see if you can raise the other ships, will you? I must have a drink and get some shut eye. We’re nearly set to blast off.’

      Then he pointed to Baron, his ashen face, the crimson stain over his chest. In two steps he was over to his bunk. Baron lay contorted on his left side, gripping a handful of blanket. He was dead with a knife in his ribs. Dominguey let out a cry that brought the other two down onto their feet.

      ‘He’s been murdered! Jim’s been murdered! One of you two. …’ He turned to Sharn. ‘Sharn, you did this. You’ve killed him with his own explorer’s knife. Why? Why?’

      Sharn had gone as pale as Dominguey.

      ‘You’re lying, I never did it. I was in my bunk asleep! I had no quarrel with Baron. What about Malravin? He’d just had a fight with Jim. He did it, didn’t you, Malravin?’

      The alarm was still shrilling away. They were all shouting. Malravin said, ‘Don’t you call me a murderer. I was fast asleep in my bunk, under sedation as ordered. One of you two did it. It was nothing to do with me.’

      ‘You’ve got a black eye coming on, Malravin,’ Dominguey said. ‘Jim Baron gave you that before you hit the sack. Did you stab him to even up the score?’

      ‘For God’s sake, man, let’s try and raise the other ships while we’ve the chance. You know I’d not do anything like that. You did it yourself, most likely. You were awake, we weren’t.’

      ‘I was stuck with my head in the drive all the time.’

      ‘Were you? How do we know?’

      ‘Yes, he has a point, Dominguey,’ Sharn said. ‘How do we know what you were up to? Didn’t you arrange for us all to get a bit of sleep on purpose, so that you could bring this off?’

      ‘So he did, the filthy murderer,’ Malravin shouted. ‘I wonder you didn’t finish us all while you were about it.’ Putting his hands up, he charged at Dominguey.

      Dominguey ducked. He jumped to one side and hit Malravin as he lumbered past. The blow was a light one. It served merely to make Malravin bellow and come on again. On the table lay a wrench they had used earlier on the cybo casing. Dominguey hit Malravin with it at the base of the neck. The big fellow collided with a chair and sprawled with it to the floor, catching his head sharply against the bulkhead as he went.

      ‘You want any?’ Dominguey asked, facing Sharn with the wrench ready.

      Shaking, Sharn formulated the word ‘No’.

      ‘See to Ike then, while I try to raise a signal.’ Nodding curtly, he went over to the communications panel and cut off the alarm. The sudden silence was as chilling as the racket had been a moment before. He opened up the subradio and began to call.

      Sharn slipped to his knees and pulled Malravin’s head up as gently as he could. The man did not stir. Groaning, Sharn tried to adjust to what had happened. He tried to concentrate his thoughts. He muttered, ‘Humans instigate events; events affect humans. Once a man has started a chain of events, he may find himself the victim of the events. When I entered star service, this was a decisive action, but readers may think that since then I have been at the mercy – the mercy –’

      He began to weep. Malravin was also dead. His neck was broken. Inside his head, still warm, thoughts pouring out into oblivion. …

      After some indefinite period of time, Sharn realised that Dominguey had stopped speaking. Only a meaningless gibber and squeak of static came from the subradio. He looked up. The captain was pointing an iongun at him.

      ‘I know you killed Jim Baron, Sharn,’ he said. His face was distorted by tension.

      ‘I know you killed Malravin. I saw you do it, and there is the murder weapon on the floor.’

      The iongun wavered.

      ‘Ike’s dead?’

      ‘Dead, just as you killed Baron. You’re clever, Dominguey, СКАЧАТЬ