"Why here?" asked Lucky. "I mean, why on Mercury?"
"Because there's no other planetary surface in the Solar System where there is such a concentration of light over so large an area. The effects Mindes is looking for can be detected most easily here. It would be a hundred tunes as expensive to set up the project on Earth, and results would be a hundred times as uncertain. So Mindes tells me."
"Only now we're having these accidents."
Dr. Gardoma snorted. "They're no accidents. And, Mr. Starr, they have to be stopped. Do you know what the success of Project Light would mean?" He drove on, caught up in the vision. "Earth would no longer be the slave of the Sun. Space stations circling Earth could intercept sunlight, push it through hyperspace, and spread it evenly over the Earth. The desert heat and the polar cold would vanish. The seasons would be rearranged to our liking. We could control the weather by controlling the distribution of sunlight. We could have eternal sunlight where we wanted it; night of any length where we wanted it. Earth would be an ak-conditioned paradise."
"It would take time, I imagine."
"A great deal of it, but this is the beginning… Look, I may be out of order here, but aren't you the David Starr who cleared up the matter of the food poisonings on Mars?"
There was an edge to Lucky's voice as he answered, and his brows contracted slightly. "What makes you think so?"
Dr. Gardoma said, "I am a physician, after all. The poisonings seemed at first to be a disease epidemic, and I was much interested in it at the tune. There were rumors about a young Councilman's having played the chief role in straightening the mystery, and names were mentioned."
Lucky said, "Suppose we let it go at that." He was displeased, as always, at any intimation that he was becoming well known. First Mindes, now Gardoma.
Dr. Gardoma said, "But if you are that Starr, you're here, I hope, to stop these so-called accidents."
Lucky did not seem to hear. He said, "When will I be able to talk to Scott Mindes, Dr. Gardoma?"
"Not for at least twelve hours."
"And will he be rational?"
''I'm certain of that."
A new guttural baritone voice broke in. "Are you, Gardoma? Is that because you know our boy Mindes was never irrational?"
Dr. Gardoma whirled at the sound and made no effort to hide the look of acute dislike on his face. "What are you doing here, Urteil?"
"Keeping my eyes and ears open, though I suppose you'd rather I kept them closed," the newcomer said.
Both Lucky and Bigman were staring at him curiously. He was a large man; not tall, but broad of shoulder and thick-muscled. His cheeks were blue with stubble, and there was a rather unpleasant air of self-assurance about him.
Dr. Gardoma said, "I don't care what you do with your eyes and ears, but not in my office, if you don't mind."
"Why not in your office?" demanded Urteil. "You're a doctor. Patients have a right to come in. Maybe I'm a patient."
"What's your complaint?"
"How about these two? What are their complaints? Hormone deficiency, for one thing, I suppose." His eyes fell lazily on Bigman Jones as he said that.
There was a breathless interlude in which Bigman turned a deathly white and then seemed to swell. Slowly he rose from his seat, his eyes round and staring. His lips moved as though forming the words "hormone deficiency," as though he were trying to convince himself that he had actually heard the words and that it was no illusion.
Then, with the speed of a cobra striking, Bigman's five foot two of cord-whip muscle launched itself at the broad, sneering figure before him.
But Lucky moved faster. His hands shot downward, catching Bigman at each shoulder. "Easy, Bigman."
The small Martian struggled desperately. "You heard him, Lucky. You heard him."
"Not now, Bigman."
Urteil's laugh was a series of sharp barks. "Let him go, fella. I'll smear the little boy over the floor with my finger."
Bigman howled and writhed in Lucky's grip.
Lucky said, "I wouldn't say anything else, Urteil, or you may be in a kind of trouble your senator friend won't be able to get you out of."
His eyes had become brown ice as he spoke and his voice was smooth steel.
Urteil's glance locked with Lucky's for a moment, then fell away. He mumbled something about joking. Bigman's harsh breathing calmed somewhat, and as Lucky slowly released his grip the Martian took his seat, still trembling with almost unbearable fury.
Dr. Gardoma, who had watched the bit of byplay tensely, said, "You know Urteil, Mr. Starr?"
"By reputation. He's Jonathan Urteil, Senator Swen-son's roving investigator."
"Well, call it that," muttered the physician.
"And I know you too, David Starr, Lucky Starr, whatever you call yourself," said Urteil. "You're the roving wonder-boy for the Council of Science. Mars poisonings. Asteroid pkates. Venusian telepathy. Do 1 have the list correct?"
"You have," said Lucky tonelessly.
Urteil grinned triumphantly. "There isn't much the senator's office doesn't know about the Council of Science. And there isn't much I don't know about things happening here. For instance, I know about the attempt on your life, and I've come here to see you about it."
"Why?"
"To give you a little warning. Just a friendly little warning. I suppose the medic here has been telling you what a nice guy Mindes is. Just a momentary splash of unbearable strain, he's been telling you, I suppose. They're great friends, Mindes and he."
"I just said-- " began Dr. Gardoma.
"Let me say," said Urteil. "Let me say this, Scott Mindes is about as harmless as a two-ton asteroid heading for a space-ship. He wasn't temporarily insane when he pointed a blaster at you. He knew what he was doing. He tried to kill you in cold blood, Starr, and if you don't watch out, he'll succeed next time. Because you can bet your small friend's Martian hip boots he'll try again."
3. Death Waits in a Room
Then Lucky said, "Why? What's his motive?"
Urteil said calmly, "Because he's afraid. He's out here with millions of cash invested, cash that's been given him by a lax Council of Science, and he can't make his experiments work. He's calling his incompetence bad breaks. Eventually he'll go back to Earth and cry about Mercury's jinx. Then he'll get more money out of the Council, or, rather, out of the taxpayers, for some other fool scheme. Now you're coming to Mercury to investigate, and he's afraid that the Council, in
spite of itself, may learn a little of the truth… You
take it from there."
Lucky said, "If this is the truth, you know it already."
"Yes, and I hope to prove it."
"But you're the danger to Mindes, then. By your reasoning, it is you he should try to kill."
Urteil grinned and his plump cheeks broadened until his jowly face looked wider than it was long. He said, "He has tried to kill me. True enough. But I've been through many tough sieges working for the senator. I can handle myself."
"Scott Mindes never tried to kill you or anybody," said Dr. Gardoma, his face pinched and white. "You know it, too."
Urteil made no direct answer. He spoke instead to Lucky. "And keep an eye on the good doctor too. As I said, he's great friends with Mindes. If I were you, I wouldn't let him treat me for as much as a headache. Pills and injections can-- " He snapped Ms fingers with a sharp cracking noise.
Dr. Gardoma, words coming thickly, said, "Some day, someone will kill you for-- "
Urteil said carelessly, "Yes? Are you planning on being the one?" He turned to go, then said over his shoulder, "Oh, I forgot. I hear that old man Peverale wants to see you. He's very disturbed at there being no official welcome. He's upset. So go see him and pat his poor old head for him… And, Starr, another hint.
After this, don't use any protective suits of any kind without checking them for leaks. Know what I mean?" With that, finally, he left.
Long moments passed before Gardoma was near normality again, before he could talk without choking. Then he said, "He riles me more every time I see him. He's a mean-mouthed, lying-"