From a hidden point on a balcony overlooking the assembly room, Lesbee listened to a lecture by Hewitt on the difference between a scientific approach and other systems. Among other things, Hewitt said:
'Scientists are an amazing breed. On the one hand, they are conservative. But within the frame of their training, a group of scientists represent truth, integrity, order, sensitivity, and sensibility on the highest level...'
He compared the extreme difficulty of obtaining top scientists at the beginning of the voyage, with the ease he had had in obtaining any number of volunteers on this occasion. The reason: a ship returned from a voyage of over a hundred years represented a clear and immediate problem. Every aspect of that problem had aroused scientific interest and enthusiasm -
Lesbee watched the result of that enthusiasm. Humanitarian laws were codified. There were a police force, judges, a jury system. A captain, yes – Hewitt – but he became the administrator of the law through the system. He had his rights and duties...
Universal equal education was set up, with an administering board and teachers with personal rights and privileges...
Lesbee listened to Hewitt explain in another lecture why only on a ship could such a complete, perfect system be established. Outside force and technology, scientifically altruistic, could move in upon such a limited world as the Hope of Man and in a short time create a model system.
Hewitt explained that among nations on Earth there was no comparable altruistic outside force. Victors in wars, motivated by hatred and the need to control, degrade, despoil, and punish – were virtually the only outside forces human beings had ever known. The defeated knew their fate, held still for the disaster through fear, built up their own hatred, waited their chance -which usually came through the conniving of international politics.
Lesbee's first impulse was to consider Hewitt naive.
Hewitt didn't seem to be aware that, while the ship's inhabitants accepted their rights, there was already muttering against the duties.
And that the men were outraged by the attitude of the newcomers which implied that the women aboard had not been treated right.
Presently, Lesbee found himself wondering if Hewitt's apparent unawareness was not part of a skillful game, another way to power.
While all this was developing, the Molly D cast off.
For Lesbee, when he heard this, all the turmoil aboard the ship became as nothing.
The time had come for his take-over.
38
Lesbee had a strong impulse to go and see Tellier before he did anything.
But he recognized the desire as a weakness. He actually thought, 'Maybe I want him to talk me out of this.' He did not go.
For a few moments before he came down from high to even time, Lesbee stared at the twisted caricature figures of the Gourdy gang. It was an unhappy stare. He disliked this whole group. But unfortunately these were his only possible allies at this stage.
Most of these negative feelings were still strangely heavy on him a little later as he explained the situation to Gourdy. There were so many doubts – 'It's almost,' Lesbee thought, 'as if I consider what I'm about to do an outdated solution. Perhaps I've let all that scientific propaganda affect me.'
He reassured himself that Hewitt was simply another power seeker.
The faraway expression in Lesbee's eyes did not escape Gourdy.
It was the moment of carelessness he had been waiting for all these days. He glanced significantly at Harcourt, who, by instruction, had watched the two men alertly during their discussion.
Lesbee sighed. 'Better start the attack on the ship,' he thought, 'and get it over with.' His intention was to begin by disarming everybody aboard.
At that final instant he caught Harcourt's movement, and his fingers closed convulsively over the control device, squeezed it in a grip of iron.
It was the last thing he ever did.
The blow of energy from Harcourt's blaster caught him in the side of the head and upper shoulder.
Blackout!... death!... instantly.
Pressing the control button knocked him into another time ratio barely short of the ratio related to light-speed, about the same as Hewitt's original 973 to one.
There he lay as dead as any man would ever be.
Gourdy gazed down at the twisted body. In his sharp way, he had observed the one thing Lesbee did consistently in connection with his fantastic disappearing act: the putting of his hand in his pocket. There was no other repeated action.
So – Gourdy had reasoned – Lesbee had some device there by which he was able to become invisible.
He said, 'Roll him over and see what he's got in that pocket.'
The dead body was lifted as if it were made of feathers.
A moment later, Harcourt triumphantly handed Gourdy the control device.
Gourdy pressed the button and turned the switch, one after the other, to the three positions. Nothing happened. Maybe this wasn't it... They searched Lesbee's pockets frantically for some other mechanism, but found nothing.
Again and again, Gourdy manipulated the three-stage switch. Since it was a thought-amplifying device that reacted to certain thoughts only, there was no response.
Baffled, finally, he stared at the almost weightless, fragile body of his dead enemy; and in him were those bitter, hopeless feelings of an untrained man confronted by a scientific complexity.
Not for the first time he realized how much he actually needed Lesbee, or somebody like him.
But he knew also what had driven him. He wanted the captain's wives for himself; it was such a naked desire that had built up in him unbearably during this period when it seemed ' that he had lost everything.
Standing there, he accepted the partial defeat that was here.
'O.K., O.K.!' he said to his henchman in a savage tone, 'we'll take the ship just like we did the first time – except we'll wait for the next sleep period and catch them by surprise. That gives us about ten hours. So let's get some sleep and be ready.
When the ten hours were up, his instructions were: 'Kill only the Space Patrol guys – and Hewitt. We'll need the old ship people.'
The attack on the ship led by Gourdy began as a movement of a straggling line of men traversing one deserted corridor after another. Presently, the first trio of men broke off from the main group and headed for the engine room. Two other segments of three soon turned off, one heading for the alternate control room, the other for the bridge. The main body of men accompanied Gourdy to the upper levels.
It was here in the first officer's apartment – according to Lesbee – that the Space Patrol headquarters had been established. Other patrol men occupied various adjoining cabins.
Two groups of three men were sent into that area with master keys and with instructions to attempt total surprise and show no mercy to any of the new men on the ship.
Gourdy and the remaining two men went cautiously on to the captain's cabin. Using another of the numerous keys Lesbee had made, Gourdy softly unlocked the outer door and tiptoed inside... A minute later, two sleepy, startled women stared up at him from the beds in the master bedroom: his own wife, Marianne, and the woman, Ruth.
One of the other men had gone into the second bedroom. This individual now reported that it was occupied by Ilsa and Ann.
– No Hewitt. Never had been! Why hadn't Lesbee told him-?
Gourdy felt an intense but momentary rage. His emotion yielded to urgency. He left the women and headed for the detector instrument.
All the apartments he scanned were occupied.
After a few minutes of hastily searching for Hewitt, he realized that such a survey would take too long. As a final check, he switched to the dormitory in the lower part of the ship. It was deserted. So they were probably all back with their families.