Copper looked toward Garry. “There isn’t any biology building. I don’t know where we can isolate him.”
“How about East Cache?” Garry said after a moment’s thought. “Will Blair be able to look after himself—or need attention?”
“He’ll be capable enough. We’ll be the ones to watch out,” Copper assured him grimly. “Take a stove, a couple bags of coal—necessary supplies and a few tools to fix it up. Nobody’s been out there since last fall, have they?”
Garry shook his head. “If he gets noisy—I thought that might be a good idea.”
Barclay hefted the tools he was carrying and looked up at Garry. “If the muttering he’s doing now is any sign, he’s going to sing away the night hours. And we won’t like his song.”
“What’s he saying?” Copper asked.
Barclay shook his head. “I didn’t care to listen much. You can if you want to. But I gather the blasted idiot had all the dreams McReady had, plus a few more. He slept beside the Thing when we stopped on the trail coming in from Secondary Magnetic, remember. He dreamt the Thing was alive, and dreamt more details. And—damn his soul—he knew it wasn’t all dream, or had reason to. He knew it had telepathic powers that were stirring vaguely, and that it could not only read minds, but project thoughts. They weren’t dreams, you see, they were stray thoughts that Thing was broadcasting, the way Blair’s broadcasting his thoughts now; a sort of telepathic muttering in its sleep. That’s why he knew so much about its powers. I guess you and I, Doc, weren’t so sensitive—if you want to believe in telepathy.”
“I have to.” Copper sighed. “Dr. Rhine of Duke University has shown that it exists, shown that some are much more sensitive than others.”
“Well, if you want to learn a lot of details, go listen in on Blair’s broadcast. He’s driven most of the boys out of the Ad Building. Kinner’s rattling pans like coal going down a shoot. When he can’t rattle a pan, he shakes ashes.
“By the way, Commander, what are we going to do in the spring, now the planes are out of it?”
Garry sighed. “I’m afraid our expedition is going to be a loss. We cannot divide our strength now.”
“It won’t be a loss—if we continue to live and come out of this,” Copper promised him. “The find we’ve made, if we can get it under control, is important enough. The cosmic ray data, magnetic work, and atmospheric work won’t be greatly hindered.”
Garry laughed mirthlessly. “I was just thinking of the radio broadcasts. Telling half the world about the wonderful results of our exploration flights, trying to fool men like Byrd and Ellsworth back home there that we’re doing something.”
Copper nodded gravely. “They’ll know something’s wrong. But men like that have judgment enough to know we wouldn’t do tricks without some sort of reason, and they will wait for our return to judge us. I think it comes to this; men who know enough to recognize our deception will wait for our return. Men who haven’t discretion and faith enough to wait will not have the experience to detect any fraud. We know enough of the conditions here to put through a good bluff.”
“Just so they don’t send ‘rescue’ expeditions,” Garry prayed. “When—if—we’re ever ready to come out, we’ll have to send word to Captain Forsythe to bring a stock of magnetos with him when he comes down. But—never mind that.”
“You mean if we don’t come out?” asked Barclay. “I was wondering if a nice running account of an eruption or an earthquake via radio—with a swell windup by using a stick of decanite under the microphone would help. Nothing, of course, will entirely keep people out. One of those swell, melodramatic ‘last-man-alive scenes’ might make ’em go easy though.”
Garry smiled with genuine humor. “Is everybody in camp trying to figure that out, too?”
Copper laughed. “What do you think, Garry? We’re confident we can win out—but not too easy about it, I guess.”
Clark grinned up from the dog he was petting into calmness. “Confident, did you say, Doc?ˮ
Blair moved restlessly around the small shack. His eyes jerked and quivered in vague, fleeting glances at the four men with him; Barclay, six feet tall and weighing over 190 pounds, McReady, as tall, but slightly leaner, Dr. Copper, short, squatly powerful, and Benning, 5-foot-10 of wiry strength.
Blair was huddled up against the far wall of the East Cache cabin, his gear piled in the middle of the floor beside the heating stove forming an island between him and the four men.
“I don’t want anybody coming here,” he snapped nervously. “Kinner may be human now, but I don’t believe it. I’ll cook my own food. I’m going to get out of here, but I’m not going to eat any food you send me. I want cans. Sealed cans.”
“O.K. Blair, we’ll bring ’em tonight,” Barclay promised.
“You’ve got coal, and the fire’s started. I’ll make a last—” Barclay started forward.
Blair instantly scurried to the farthest corner. “Get out! Keep away from me, you monster!” the little biologist shrieked, and tried to claw his way through the wall of the shack. “Keep away from me—keep away—I won’t be absorbed—I won’t be—”
Barclay relaxed and moved back. Dr. Copper shook his head.
“Leave him alone, Bar. It’s easier for him to cook the food himself. We’ll have to fix the door, I think—”
The four men let themselves out. Efficiently, Benning and Barclay fell to work. There were no locks in Antarctica; there wasn’t enough privacy to make them needed. But powerful screws had been driven in each side of the door frame, and the spare aviation control cable, immensely strong woven-steel wire, was rapidly caught between them and drawn taut. Barclay went to work with a drill and a keyhole saw. Presently he had a trap cut in the door through which goods could be passed without unlashing the entrance. Three powerful hinges from a stock-crate, two hasps, and a pair of three-inch cotter-pins made it impossible to open from the other side.
Blair moved about restlessly inside. He was dragging something over to the door with panting gasps and muttered, frantic curses. Barclay cracked the hatch and glanced in, Dr. Copper peering over his shoulder. Blair had moved the heavy bunk against the door. It could not be opened without his cooperation now.
“Don’t know but what the poor guy’s right at that,” McReady said with a sigh. “If he gets loose, it is his avowed intention to kill each and all of us as quickly as possible; which is something we donʼt agree with. But we’ve got something on our side of that door that maybe is worse than a homicidal maniac. If one or the other has to get loose, I think I’ll come up and undo the lashings here.”
Barclay grinned. “You let me know, and I’ll show you how to get them off fast. Let’s get back.”
The sun was painting the northern horizon in multicolored rainbows still, though it was two hours below the horizon. The field of drift swept off to the north, sparkling under its flaming colors in a million million reflected glories. Low mounds of rounded white on the northern horizon, the Magnet Range, was barely awash above the sweeping drift. Little eddies of wind-lifted snow swirled away from their skis as they set out toward the main encampment two miles away. The spidery finger of the broadcast radiator lifted a gaunt black needle against the white of the antarctic continent. The snow under their skis was like fine sand, hard and gritty in the -40° cold.
“Spring,” said Benning bitterly, “is come. Ain’t we got fun. And I’ve been looking forward to getting away from this blasted hole in the ice.”
“I wouldn’t try it now, if I were you.” Barclay grunted. “Guys that set out from here in the next few days are going to be marvelously unpopular.”