“Sorry. I didn’t realise.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Martine gave him a twinkly, penetrating glance. “Go on, Mr Tarrant—I believe you were going to try convincing me that telepathy is an established fact.”
Tarrant nodded. “It may not be an established fact, but we might be able to establish it to your satisfaction in a few minutes.”
“What would be the point?”
“Well, if I can get you to accept direct transference of data, it’s only a short step to believing in a mental transmitter so powerful that it swamps out everything else in the receiver’s brain.”
“A short step for you perhaps, but a great leap for a scientist.” Martine looked over his glasses. “How would you do it, anyway?”
“You’ve still got that tissue you pumped out of my lungs?”
“It doesn’t prove anything—new marine life forms are still being found every year.”
“Yes, but if you divide it in two, and put the two parts in separate rooms, you’ve only to do something to one part. …”
“And see if the other part reacts!” Martine went to the locker and poured some brandy for himself, once again playing the part of the jaunty amateur sailor. “You propose doing something fairly drastic to the first half?”
“For the purpose of the experiment,” Tarrant said, “there’s no point in tickling it.”
Fifteen minutes later he was standing in a small chemical laboratory on a lower deck of the ship. He had almost conquered his first blind reaction to the sight of the Ka tissue, but his stomach heaved intermittently as he watched the movements of the egg-sized gob of black jelly. The entire organism had been poured out of the bucket and divided in two by pressing down on it with a metal sheet. Both halves had then been scooped into glass jars. One of them was in Martine’s quarters on the upper deck and the other had been taken to the laboratory by Tarrant. Wet highlights glistened on its surface as it furled and flattened, restlessly exploring its surroundings with pseudopods which sometimes extended right across the container. When it managed to rise a short distance up the side of the jar its undersurface was seen to have the dark redness of clotted blood.
“Pleasant little fellow,” Tarrant’s companion said. He was a bearded young research assistant who had been introduced to Tarrant as Les Anvers.
“A real charmer.” Tarrant tried to sound emotionless as he took the stopper off the bottle of concentrated hydrochloric acid which had been provided by Martine. “Give the word at any time.”
Anvers glanced reluctantly at his stopwatch and then at Tarrant. “I don’t like doing this to anything that’s alive.”
“I’m the one that’s doing it,” Tarrant told him. “Say when.”
Anvers shrugged, waited a short time, then stopped the watch, “Now!”
Tarrant immediately poured the acid into the jar and watched, his mouth twitching uncontrollably, as the black jelly writhed in the swiftly darkening fluid. In a matter of seconds there was nothing left but a foul-smelling organic slurry on the surface of which bubbles clustered like a swarming of blood-red beetles. Appalled though he was, Tarrant felt a deep pang of satisfaction. I hope that got home to you, Ka, he thought. I hope you felt that. He became aware that Anvers was staring at him.
“It’s all in a good cause,” he said, realising the futility of trying to explain what had been happening, that he was trying to save the lives of men and women.
Anvers nodded without speaking and placed a square of glass on the jar to contain the fumes which were rising from it. A minute later Martine came into the laboratory carrying his own stopwatch. He took the other watch from Anders and waited until the assistant had gone out before comparing the two readings. They were the same to within a fraction of a second.
“There was a marked reaction,” he said. “The control specimen seemed to go mad.”
Tarrant nodded peacefully. “I’m glad about that.”
Martine looked away from him. “This place stinks.”
“If you want to be squeamish,” Tarrant said, angered, “be squeamish about those people who are carrying that stuff around inside them. You don’t like this experiment? All right—I’ll suggest a better one. Take that other piece of tissue and put it on your tongue and see what happens. Why don’t we go up there right now?”
“You’ve made your point,” Martine said. “Don’t overdo it.”
Tarrant bunched his fists in exasperation. “I’m sorry, but nobody understands—and there’s so little time. How long do you think it will take them to find Somerville’s boat?”
“Three or four days if he’s lucky.”
“That long? I don’t get it.”
“It appears,” Martine said drily, “that all our long-range, all-weather, day-and-night reconnaissance aircraft are grounded because the engines have started to fall off them. Perhaps you encountered similar problems in your flying days?”
“All the time—but what about the Navy?”
“They’ve got two destroyers in operational condition, and both are going straight to Harpoon Island. The idea must be to wait there until your friend shows up. I’m told that one of them is equipped with fairly reliable homing missiles, so. …”
Tarrant understood how Martine had arrived at his estimate of the time until Somerville would be intercepted—that was how long it would take The Rose of York to reach the vicinity of Harpoon Island. Even in the 20th century it had been common for complex warships to spend half their lifetimes in dock, and the South Newzealand Admiralty was grandiosely trying to operate a similar type of vessel—with the result that as many as eight out of ten vessels would be laid up for scheduled and unscheduled repairs at any given time. This loss of technical competence was giving Somerville a brief respite, but it was nothing more than a stay of execution. Commanders who were armed with weapons they could not fully trust would employ the tactics of instantaneous overkill.
“Look,” Tarrant said desperately, “why don’t we go after Somerville in this ship?”
“That’s out of the question.”
“I don’t see why. If we start from the area where you picked me up, we can calculate Somerville’s course and. …” Tarrant broke off as he saw that the geniality had faded from Martine’s face.
“You don’t seem to appreciate your position in this affair,” Martine said. “It’s serious enough that you’re a deserter from the Air Force, but being an accomplice in the theft of a nudear device makes you an international criminal.” He held up one hand to forestall Tarrant’s protest.
“It doesn’t matter that I personally am beginning to believe you had no control over your actions—I have to obey the orders I received from Christchurch. And that means I have to place you under arrest and take you to the authorities.”
“You wouldn’t do that,” Tarrant challenged unthinkingly.
Martine looked surprised, then opened the door and nodded to someone outside. Two men with the brown, vein-corded forearms of deckhands moved into view. They were of medium size and build, but something in the half-expectant way they looked at Tarrant told him they had been selected for their ability to deal with trouble.
“I’m supposed to lock you in a store room, but I don’t want to do that,” Martine said. “Instead I’m putting you in an ordinary cabin on this deck. The door won’t be locked, but there’ll be a guard on it at all times and you’ll be doing yourself a favour if you don’t try to get away. If you cooperate in this arrangement I’m sure you’ll be very comfortable.”
“Thanks a lot.” Tarrant tried to gather enough strength to state his case over again with greater force, but the physical reactions to his near-drowning were becoming more insistent and he knew he would have to lie down or risk keeling over. The futility of attempting to do anything more to help Somerville, Myrah and the others bore down on him like a massive weight. He stared dumbly at Martine for a moment, then turned and left the laboratory on legs which buckled gently with every step.