He finished, "Remember that I have already been in your mind. Remember, also, that according to your own logic, in a few hours I will be blotted out forever in a blaze of electric projectors."
"Of course," she said quickly, "that is true. You will be dead, won't you? Very well, I'll answer your questions."
Joanna Hillory's mind was like a book whose thickness could not be measured, with almost an infinity of pages to examine, an incredibly rich, incredibly complex structure embroidered with a billion billion impressions garnered through the years by an acutely observant intellect. Jommy Cross caught swift, tantalizing glimpses of her recent experiences. There was, briefly, the picture of an unutterably bleak planet, low-mountained, sandy, frozen, everything frozen – Mars! There were pictures of a gorgeous, glass-enclosed city, of great machines digging under a blazing battery of lights. Somewhere it was snowing with a bitter, unearthly fury – and a black spaceship, glittering like a dark jewel in the sun, was briefly visible through a thick plate-glass window.
The confusion of thoughts cleared as she began to talk. She spoke slowly, and he made no attempt to hurry her, in spite of his conviction that every second counted, that at any minute now death would blast from the sky at his defenseless ship. Her words and the thoughts that verified them were as bright-cut as so many gems, and as fascinating.
The tendrilless slans had known from the moment he started to climb the wall that an interloper was coming. Interested primarily in his purpose, they made no effort to stop him when he could have been destroyed without difficulty. They left several ways open for him to get to the ship, and he had used one of them, although – and here was an unknown, unexpected factor – the particular alarms of that way had not gone off.
The reason the warships were slow in destroying him was that they hesitated to use their searchlights over a continent so densely inhabited. If he should climb high enough or go out to sea, the ship' would be quickly destroyed. On the other hand, if he chose to circle around on the continent, his fuel would waste away in a dozen hours or so, and before that, dawn would come and enable the electric projectors to be used with brief, deadly effect.
"Suppose," said Jommy Cross, "I should land in the downtown section of a great city. I could very possibly escape among so many houses, buildings, and people."
Joanna Hillory shook her head. "If this ship's speed falls below two hundred miles per hour, it will be destroyed, regardless of the risk involved, regardless of the fact that they hope to save my life by capturing the ship intact. You can see I'm being very frank with you."
Jommy Cross was silent. He was convinced, overwhelmed by the totality of the danger. There was nothing clever about the plan. Here was simply a crude reliance on big guns and plenty of them. "All this." he marveled at last, "for one poor slan, one ship. How mighty the fear must be that prompts so much effort, so much expense, for so little return!"
"We have put the snake outside our law,"' came the cool reply. Her gray eyes glowed with a quiet fire. Her mind concentrated on the single track of her words. "Human courts do not release prisoners because it will cost more to convict them than the amount of the theft. Besides, what you have stolen is so precious that it would be the greatest disaster in our history if you escaped."
He felt abruptly impatient "You assume far too readily that the true slans are not already in possession of the antigravity secret My purpose during the coming years is to analyze the true slans to their hiding place; and I can tell you now that practically everything you have told me I shall not use as evidence. The very fact that they are so completely hidden is an indication of their immense resourcefulness."
Joanna Hillory said, "Our logic is very simple. We have not seen them in rocketships – so they have no rocketships. Even yesterday, in that ridiculous flight to the palace, their craft, while very pretty, was powered by multiple-pulse jet motors, a type of engine we discarded a hundred years ago. Logic, like science, is deduction on the basis of observation, so – "
Jommy Cross frowned unhappily. Everything about the slans was wrong. They were fools and murderers. They had started a stupid, ruthless, fratricidal war against the tendrilless slans. They sneaked around the country, using their diabolical mutation machines on human mothers – and the monstrosities that resulted were destroyed by medical authorities. Mad, purposeless destruction! And it simply didn't fit!
It didn't fit with the noble character of his father and his mother. It didn't fit with his father's genius, or with the fact that for six years he himself had lived under the influence of Granny's squalid mind and remained untouched, un-soiled. And, finally, it didn't fit with the fact that he, a half-grown true slan, had braved a trap he did not even suspect and because of one loophole in their net, one unknown factor, had so far escaped their vengeance.
His atomic gun! The one factor that they still didn't suspect. It would be useless, of course, against the battle cruisers coasting along in the blackness behind him. It would take a year or more to build a projector with a beam big enough to reach out and tear those ships to pieces. But one thing it could do. What it could touch, its shattering fire would disintegrate into component atoms. And, by God! he had the answer, given time and a little luck.
The glare of a searchlight splashed against his visiplates. Simultaneously, the ship jumped like some toy that had been struck an intolerable blow. Metal squeaked, walls shook, tights blinked, and then, as the sounds of violence died into little menacing whispers, he bounded from the deeps of the chair into which he had been flung and snatched at the rocket activator.
The machine leaped forward in dizzy acceleration. Against the pressure of plunging fury, he reached forward and clicked on the radio.
The battle was on, and unless he could persuade them to desist, the chance to put his one lone plan into action would never come. The rich, vibrant voice of Joanna Hillory echoed the thought that beat in his mind.
"What are you going to do – talk them out of what they plan to do? Don't be so silly. If they finally decided to sacrifice me, you don't think they'd give your welfare any consideration, do you?"
Chapter Eleven
Outside, the night sky was dark. A sprinkling of stars glittered coldly in the moonless night. There was no sign of an enemy ship, not a shadow, not a movement against the immensity of turgid, deep, deep blue ceiling.
Inside, the tense silence was shattered by a hoarse choking cry from the next room. An angry barrage of vituperation followed. Granny was awake.
"What's the matter? What's happened?"
Brief silence, and then abrupt end of anger and mad beginning of fear. Instantly, her terrified thought poured out in frantic flood. Obscene curses, born of fear, assailed the air. Granny didn't want to die. Kill all slans, but not Granny. Granny had money to – She was drunk. The sleep had allowed the liquor to take control of her again. Jommy Cross shut her thoughts and her voice out of his mind. Urgently he spoke into the radio.
"Calling the commander of the warships! Calling the commander! Joanna Hillory is alive. I am willing to release her at dawn, the only condition being that I be allowed to get up into the air again."
There was silence, then a woman's quiet voice entered the room. "Joanna, are you there?"
"Yes, Marian."
"Very well," the calm voice of the other went on, "we accept on the following conditions: You will inform us an hour before the actual landing where it will be. The point of landing must be at least thirty miles – that is, five minutes allowing for acceleration and deceleration – from the nearest large city. We assume, of course, that you believe you can escape. Very well. You will have two hours more of opportunity. We shall have Joanna Hillory. A fair exchange!"