Lord of a Thousand Sun: Space Stories of Poul Anderson (Illustrated). Poul Anderson

      V

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      The eighty-six hour day of Ganymede drew to a close. Jupiter was at the half now, a banded amber giant in a sky of thronging wintry stars. Ray wiped his grimy hands and sighed.

      "Done," he said, looking fondly at the haywired mess filling half the lab and reaching back toward the engines. "We've done it—we've conquered the stars."

      "My little Earthlin is so clever," simpered Dyann.

      "I am horribly afraid," said Urushkidan, "tat tis minor achievement of mine will eclipse my true accomplishments in te popular mind. Oh, well." He shrugged. "I can always use te money."

      "Umm, yeah, I never thought of that," said Ray. "I'm safe enough from Vanbrugh now—you don't arrest the man who's given Earth the Galaxy—but by gosh, there's a fortune in this little gadget too."

      "For me, of course, when I have patented it," said Urushkidan.

      "What?" yelped Ray. "You—"

      "Certainly. I inbented it, didn't I? I shall patent it too. Tell me, should I charge an exorbitant royalty or would tere be more money in mass sales at small price?"

      "Look here," snarled Ray, "I happen to know how this thing is put together too."

      "Do you?" grinned Urushkidan nastily.

      "Uh—" Ray looked at the jungle of apparatus and gulped. He had only a few fragmentary drawings. By Einstein, he had no idea how the damned thing worked.

      "But we helped you," he protested feebly.

      "When you pay your mules and cows, I may consider gibing you a small percentage," said Urushkidan loftily.

      "You've already got more money than you know what to do with, you bloated capitalist. I happen to know you invested your Nobel Prize in mortgages and then foreclosed."

      "And why not? When te royalties on tis engine start coming in, and I get my second Nobel Prise, maybe ten I can afford an occasional cigar. You Earthlings neber reward genius. All tese years I'be had to smoke tat foul pipe—And tat reminds me, we habe to test tis machine. Where is te nearest tobaco store?"

      Ray sighed and gave up. Martians had replaced Scotchmen in the lexicon of thrift, but Urushkidan set some kind of new record.

      He sat down in the pilot chair and started the atomic generator on high level conversion. "I hope it works," he muttered nervously. His fingers moved over the improvised control panel for the star drive. "Hang on, folks, here goes nothing."

      "Nothin," said Dyann after a long silence, "is correct."

      "Oh, lord! What's the matter now?" Ray went back to the new engine. Its circuits were alive, tubes glowed and indicators blinked, but the boat sat stolidly where it was.

      "I told you not to use tose approximations," said Urushkidan.

      Ray fiddled with the main-drive settings. "It's like any other gadget," he complained. "You sweat yourself dry designing it from theory, and then you have to tinker till it works."

      He began changing the positions of resistors and condensers, cutting sections out of the circuit to work on them. Urushkidan shredded a piece of paper, wetted it, and tried to smoke it.

      "Ray!" Dyann's voice came sharp and urgent from the forward cabin. "I saw a rocket flare."

      "Oh, no!" He sprang back to her and peered into the night sky. A long trail of flame arced across it. And another, and another—

      "The Jovians," he groaned. "They've found us."

      "They may not see us," said Dyann hopefully.

      "They have metal detectors. We're done for."

      "Vell, ve can only die vunce. Kiss me, sveetheart." Dyann folded Ray in one arm while the other reached for her sword.

      The patrol rockets went over the horizon, braking, and swam back. Blast-flames spattered off the valley floor and frozen-gas vapors boiled furiously up toward mighty Jupiter.

      The boat telescreen blinked its indicator light. Numbly, Ray tuned it in. The lean hard face of Colonel Roshevsky-Feldkamp sprang into its frame.

      "Ah, there you are," said the Jovian.

      "If we surrender," said Ray, "will you give us safe conduct back to Earth?"

      "Certainly not. But you may be allowed to live."

      Urushkidan spoke from the lab. "Ballantyne, I tink te trouble lies in tis square-wave generator. If we doubled te boltage—"

      * * * * *

      The first patrol ship sizzled to a landing. Roshevsky-Feldkamp leaned forward till his face seemed to project from the screen and Ray had a wild desire to punch its nose. "So you've been working on our project." He said, "Well, so much the more labor spared us."

      Dyann cut loose with a short-range blaster she had located somewhere on the lab ship.