The World of Null-A

She frowned at that, but did not answer directly. “Who are you?” she said instead. “What do you want?”

The questions reminded Gosseyn unpleasantly that he didn’t know anything more about himself basically than she did. He knelt beside her husband. As he untied the gag, he studied Prescott’s face. It was a stronger countenance, seen so closely, than he expected. Only positive beliefs could put that look on a man’s face. The problem was, were his convictions rooted in null-A? Or did his strength derive from the certainties that a leader must cultivate?

He expected Prescott’s comment on his predicament to furnish a clue to his character. He was disappointed. The man lay staring up at him, more thoughtfully now. But he said nothing at all.

Gosseyn faced the woman again. “If I should call Roboplane Service,” he said, “what should I say to them to get a plane?”

She shrugged. “That you want a plane, of course.” She looked at him, an odd expression on her face. “I’m begi

Gosseyn hesitated. “Something like that,” he admitted finally. He returned to his problem. “I don’t have to quote a registry number or anything like that?”

“No.”

“I dial their number and say I want a plane? Do I tell them where to send it?”

“No. All public roboplanes are co

“There’s absolutely nothing else to do?”

She shook her head. “No, nothing.”

It seemed to Gosseyn that her replies were too frankly given. There was a way to settle that. A lie detector. He remembered having seen one in an adjoining room. He got it and set it up beside her. The lie detector said, “She’s telling the truth.”

To the woman, Gosseyn said, “Thanks!” He added, “How long will it take a plane to get here?”

“About an hour.”

There was a video extension on the table near the window. Gosseyn sank into a chair beside it, looked up the number, and dialed it. The video plate on the earphone did not even flicker. Gosseyn stared at it, startled. He dialed again, hurriedly, and this time listened intently at the receiver. Dead silence.

He got up, and ran downstairs to the main instrument in the living room. Still no answer. He clicked open the door at the back and peered into the heart of the machine. It was normally warm. All the transparent tubes were glowing. The fault must be outside the building.

Slowly, Gosseyn climbed back to the second floor. There was a picture in his mind, a picture of himself cut off here on this mountain. Cut off physically and by the mystery of himself. It was a dark inward world at which he gazed. He felt depressed and tense. The idyl was over.

His belief that he was in control of the situation was meaningless in the face of what had happened to the videophone.

Somewhere out there the forces that had put him here were waiting. For what?

VIII

Gosseyn climbed slowly up the stairs. At the top he stopped to collect his thoughts. His plan for an easy departure had failed. He visualized the potentialities. He would get some information and then leave on foot as quickly as possible.

The decision braced him. He turned to go into the bedroom, but paused as the voice of Prescott came.

“What I don’t understand is what happened to the video.”

His wife sounded thoughtful. “It can only be one of two things. An interference screen has been set up between here and”—Gosseyn did not catch the name—“or else there’s a fault in the machine itself.”

“But isn’t there supposed to be automatic warning long before anything is worn out, whereupon a repairman comes along and fixes it up?”

Gosseyn waited for the woman’s reply to that. It was hard for him to believe they knew nothing about it.

“That’s the way it’s always been,” said Amelia Prescott. “It seems very strange.”

Gosseyn forced himself to wait for further comment. When none was made, he tiptoed hurriedly down the stairs, then came up again, noisily this time. The delay strained his patience, and, since he wasn’t sure that the pretense would serve a useful purpose, he made up for lost time the moment he entered the room.

“Where,” he asked, “do you keep your maps of Venus?”

Prescott did not reply, but his wife shrugged and said, “They’re in a cupboard in the laboratory.” She described the location of the cupboard.

Gosseyn remembered having looked into it. He hurried down into the basement and dug out three maps. Upstairs again, he spread them out on the floor and knelt beside them. He had seen maps of Venus before, but it was different being there. Besides, these were more detailed. Gosseyn looked up.

“Will you show me where you are on one of these things?”

The woman said, “We’re on the one marked ‘Three,’ on that central mountain range. I once put a little mark showing our approximate location. It’s probably still there.”

Gosseyn found it about four hundred miles north of the city of New Chicago.

“Oh, there’s ample fruit,” she said in answer to his next query. “Purple berries an inch in diameter by the billion, a large yellow fruit, a bananalike juicy fruit, reddish in color. I could name a dozen others, but those are available the year round. They’ll see you through any trip that you can possibly make.”

Gosseyn studied the woman’s face thoughtfully. Finally, he reached over and touched the lie detector. It said, “That’s the way it is.”

He turned back to Amelia Prescott. “You’re convinced I’ll be captured?” he asked. Briefly, he was intent. “Is that it?”

“Of course you’ll be captured.” She was calm. “We have no police system on Venus, and no ordinary crimes. But the cases requiring detective work that come up are always solved with extraordinary speed. You’ll be interested in meeting a null-A detective, but you’ll be shocked by the swiftness which you are captured.”

Gosseyn, whose main purpose was to contact Venusian authorities, was silent. He felt torn. His impulse now was to leave immediately. The sooner the concealing vastness of the mighty forest closed around him, the safer he would be. But Amelia Prescott’s complete misunderstanding of the situation drew her character into sharper focus.

She was i

Conversely, her husband’s silence was abnormal. Thinking about it, Gosseyn felt himself change color. Until this moment he had taken it for granted that he was not recognized. Prescott had not been one of those present at the palace of the Machine on earth. But suppose the man had been shown photographs.

It changed things. He had decided earlier to give no explanations. But if Prescott knew him, then silence might make the man suspect that he himself was known.

On the other hand, it would be folly to identify himself as Gilbert Gosseyn if he didn’t have to. He stood up. And then once more he hesitated. Abruptly he knew he couldn’t depart without telling the woman. If anything happened to him, then she at least would know.

Through her the whole of Venus might be warned of the hideous danger that threatened. Telling her would be risky for her too, but Gosseyn had a plan for that. He would leave the decision about her husband up to her.

Gosseyn sat down on the edge of the bed. Now that he had made up his mind, he felt cool and unshakable. His nerves were steady as lead, that stable element. Ostensibly, then, he addressed himself to both the man and the woman. Actually, only the woman interested him. After a little more than a minute, Prescott rolled over and studied his face. Gosseyn pretended not to notice.

Twenty minutes later he let his voice lapse into silence. In the bright light that glared in through the wall window, he saw that Prescott’s eyes were fixed on him.