Chapter IV: Part 4

He was right. The officer snatched away the skin and thrust it into the long fingers of its indignant owner.

"If you are sso dead," he demanded, not illogically, "why do you drink up our water?"

"Sorry," apologized Taranto. "Where are we?"

"What difference iss it to you?"

"I ... uh ... don't want to make hard feelings or bad luck by dying in one of your burial grounds."

"It will not happen," said the officer grimly. "We have been ssent in another place to guard against that. Look back--you can see the city over that way."

Taranto turned. The outline of the city walls, with lights showing here and there on the watch towers, loomed up about five miles away. A small rise in the rolling ground of the desert hid the base of the walls and the greater part of the rough trail they had evidently followed. It would have been a fine spot for a spaceship to drop briefly to the surface.

"Do you wish to lie down here?" asked the officer politely. "We will wait until it iss over."

Don't be so damn' helpful! thought Taranto.

He looked desperately about, striving to give the impression of seeking a comfortable spot. He felt the situation turning more and more sour by the minute. It would be very difficult to feign death successfully again now that the Syssokan suspicions were so aroused. They might well make sure of him in their own way.

Near him stood half a dozen brown-clad soldiers. Four of them, spears slung on their shoulders by braided straps, had apparently been carrying him while two others acted as relief bearers. Besides the officer, there was a sub-officer, also in brown but wearing a red harness. In the background, a similar group clustered about Meyers.

Taranto saw that he had been tumbled from a sort of flat stretcher of wickerwork. It was of careless craftsmanship, as if meant to be abandoned with the body it served on the last journey. He wondered if it could be assumed to be his property.

"Don't put yourselves out," he said. "I can't hardly take a step even to sit down. It'll be just a coupla minutes now. Good-bye!"

The Syssokan officer made no move to depart. Taranto had not really dared to hope that he would. He was trying to think of some further excuse when Meyers saved him the trouble.

"_Help!_ Taranto!" shrieked the other spacer, bursting suddenly from the group about him. "I told them we're alive, and they want to kill us!"

He ran staggeringly toward Taranto, kicking up spurts of sand. His shirt front was dark with sweat and dribbled water. He looked wild with fright.

"Ah, they do live!" exclaimed the officer. "Seize them!"

He seemed to realize only after about ten seconds that he had, this time, spoken in Terran. Evidently feeling that not all his men might have learned that particular language, he began to repeat the order in Syssokan. Taranto interfered by swinging his fist at the center of the greenish-gray features. The Syssokan, arms flung wide, sailed backward and landed on the nape of his neck in a patch of gravel. Meyers screamed hoarsely as his own bearers caught up to him and dragged him down.

Taranto sprang forward to snatch up the wicker stretcher from the ground. A long-fingered hand clutched at his shoulder, but let go when he kicked backward without looking around. He raised the stretcher and swung it around in a wide arc at the three Syssokans reaching for him.

Two, having left their heads unprotected, went down; but the stretcher frame crumpled. Taranto tripped the other Syssokan, glancing hopefully at the sky. There was no sign of the fire-trail of a descending spaceship in the deepening twilight. Then he had to duck as the other three bearers were upon him.

"Get up, Meyers!" he yelled.

He met the rush with a hard left that dumped the leading Syssokan on his back. The next hesitated, and was brushed aside by the sixth, who had had the wits to unsling his spear.

Taranto sidestepped the crude but large point that thrust straight at his belly. The shaft of the spear slid along his left ribs, and he punched over the outstretched arms of the soldier at the Syssokan's head. He clamped the spear between his elbow and body, retaining it as his attacker staggered back.

Two or three were now advancing from where a knot of figures seemed to be sitting upon Meyers in the gloom. They did not especially hurry. Taranto had begun to reverse the spear to jab at the Syssokan left facing him when he heard a scrabbling behind him.

He whirled away to his right, ducking instinctively as a body hurtled past him. When he faced about, he found that most of those whom he had knocked down were again on their feet and advancing. The officer, the lower part of his face smeared with purplish blood, ran at Taranto full tilt. He screamed an order in his own language.

The spacer cracked the butt of the spear smartly against the Syssokan's head, sending him down on his face. One of the others, however, managed to get a grip on the weapon. Instinct told Taranto that any attempt at a tug of war on his part would lead to a fatal entanglement. He dodged away and sprinted toward the group pinning Meyers.

A Syssokan voice yelled mushily behind him as he concentrated upon driving with the greatest possible force into the writhing group before him. He struck with a crunch that tumbled bodies in all directions. Taranto himself felt sand scrape raspingly against the side of his face as he half-rolled, half-skidded along the ground.

His pursuers now caught up to the new location of hostilities. The first thing Taranto saw as he managed to drag one knee under him was the butt end of a spear plunging at his midsection. The Syssokan behind it had his center of gravity well ahead of his churning feet, obviously intent upon doing great bodily harm. The spacer wondered for a split second why the native did not use his point.

Then he twisted hips and torso to his right, drawing back his left shoulder. As the spear passed him, he slapped down hard on the shaft with his left hand. The butt dug into the sand, and the Syssokan hissed in consternation as he vaulted head over heels before he could release the weapon. The one immediately behind was caught in the center of his harness by a flying foot, whereupon he collapsed with a groan across the prone figure of his comrade. Two more, who had dropped their spears, reached out toward Taranto, urged on by the officer on their heels.

Taranto saw Meyers stagger to his feet. Then the two Syssokans were all over him. He skipped away to his left over a pair of limp legs, parried a groping hand, and brought around the long, low left hook that had made him respected in past years.

In the ring, he had floored men with that punch. At the least, he expected a fine, loud _whoosh_ from the Syssokan, but the latter disappointed him. He folded in limp silence.

For a second or two, everything stopped. Taranto stared down at the soldier, slumped on the ground like a loose sack of potatoes. Even the Syssokans who were not at the moment engaged in pulling themselves to their feet also gaped.

Light dawned for the spacer. Those among whom he had gone head-hunting kept getting to their feet as fast as he knocked them down.

"Hit 'em in the gut!" he yelled to Meyers. "That's where their brains are!"

He charged at the nearest Syssokan, lips drawn back in an unconscious snarl. The soldier made a reflexive motion to cross his arms before his thick abdomen. Taranto, unopposed, hit him alongside the head with a light right, then whipped the left hook in again as the arms began to lift. The Syssokan went out like a light.

"Come on!" Taranto shouted at Meyers when he saw that the other had not moved. "Two of us could do it. Those heads are too little to hold a brain. Kick 'em, if you can't do anything else!"

"Are you crazy?" retorted Meyers, his voice hoarse as much with fear as with thirst. "They'll kill us! Give up, and they'll only take us back!"

Taranto sensed someone behind him. He started to run, but two or three recovered Syssokans headed him off. He tried to cut back to his right. He slipped in a patch of sand and saved himself from going flat only by catching his weight on both outstretched hands. One of the Syssokans landed across his back, feeling blindly for a hold.

Taranto surged up, trying to butt with the back of his head. He was promptly wrapped in the long arms of another soldier facing him, as the grip from the rear slid down to his waist. The fellow behind him seemed to think he could hurt him by kneading both knobby fists into the spacer's belly, but there was too much hard muscle there.

The Terran again butted, forward this time, and brought up his knee. This was less effective than it should have been, but it helped him free one arm so that he could drive an elbow backward.

The officer ran up with a reversed spear. From the look in his big black eyes, Taranto realized that the Syssokan had also learned something during the melee. That explained, no doubt, why he was an officer. He swung the spear in a neat arc--at Taranto's head!

It cracked against the Terran's skull. Even though he did his best to ride with it, he felt his knees buckle. He struck out with his right fist, but the punch was smothered by the soldier whom he had kneed.

The spear came down again. The world of Taranto's existence was reduced to a narrow view of a straining, greenish-gray calf showing through a torn leg of a Syssokan uniform. Vaguely, he realized that he was on his hands and knees. A great number of hands seemed to be grabbing at him, and his own were very heavy as he groped out for the leg.

He got some sort of fumbling grip, and started to haul himself up. The slowness of his motions alarmed him, in a foggy way. He tried to tuck his chin behind his left shoulder because he knew that there was something ... something ... coming....

It came. The Syssokan officer's big foot took him behind the ear with a brutal thump.

Taranto, however, sinking into gray nothingness, did not really feel it....

ELEVEN

Smith stood at the corner of the corridor, leaning back every half minute or so to peek around at the stretch leading toward the library and communications room.

Westervelt had propped himself with folded arms against the opposite wall, facing the door to the stairs.

Beryl hovered behind Parrish, who faced Smith impatiently between darting glares at Westervelt.

"All right, I guess I have to tell you, Pete," said Smith in a low tone. "You might say we are temporarily inconvenienced."

"By him?" asked Parrish, jerking a thumb in Westervelt's direction. "That I could understand. The kid's beginning to think he's a comedian. He started out just now playing Charley's Aunt."

"Sssh!" said Smith softly.

Westervelt turned his head toward the main entrance, wondering how far Parrish's voice had carried.

Smith's dapper assistant looked from one to the other. Seeking some evidence of sanity, he turned with raised eyebrows to Beryl. The blonde rounded her blue eyes at him and shrugged.

"Pete, this is no joke," insisted Smith. "I wish it hadn't gotten around so fast, but there it is."

"There _what_ is?" demanded Parrish, in a tone bordering on the querulous.

"Well ... there's been some kind of power failure throughout the business district. There aren't any elevators running, and we don't know how long it will be until the power company copes with the trouble."

"No elevators?" repeated Parrish.

He stared at the sliding doors of the elevator shaft as if unable to comprehend the lack of such service. The idea seemed to sink in.

"_No elevators?_ And ninety-nine stories _up_?"

"Sssh!" said Smith, glancing down the corridor.

"What's the matter with you, Castor?" asked Parrish. "Are you watching for someone ... someone ... oh!"

"See what I'm thinking?" asked Smith.

They faced each other for a moment in silence.

"Well, it ought to be all right, as long as he can get down the stairs if he wants to," said Parrish. "I'm sorry, Beryl. We'll have to make it some other time."

"But how are we going to get home?" asked the blonde.

"Oh, they'll probably have it fixed by the time we're finished here," said Parrish.

"Then what's all the trouble about. Why is Willie looking so sour?"

Westervelt braced himself against the impact of three glances and tried not to sneer. The other two men cleared their throats and looked back at Beryl.

"I'm going to have to ask your co-operation, Beryl," said Smith. "First, Pete, I'd like to point out to you a little gem of modern design. This door here is powered to slide open automatically for a fire or other emergency."

"Of course," said Parrish curiously.

"But there isn't any power," Smith pointed out.

Parrish reached out impatiently and tried the door. He wrenched at it two or three times, then bent to peer for the latch.

"No use, Pete," said Smith, glancing down the hall again. "Willie already went through that whole routine. I've been on the phone to the building manager, and there isn't anything he can do except send a party up from the seventy-fifth floor to burn open the door from the stair side."

"Is he doing it?"

"Well, frankly ... I told him it wasn't necessary," said Smith, getting a stubborn look on his long face.

"But you know Bob!" expostulated Parrish. "If he gets the idea that he's penned in here--"

"I know, I know," said Smith. "On the other hand, we can always get something from the lab and break out from this side, provided we take care not to let him know what is going on until later."

Westervelt eyed Beryl sardonically. He had seldom seen an expression so blended of impatience and vague worry. He wondered if anyone would explain to her.

Parrish shook his head.

"I think it might be better to call downstairs again, and have them come up," he said.

"I don't want to do that," said Smith.

"Why not?"

"It would get around. Pretty soon, the story would be all over the D.I.R."

Parrish actually leaned forward slightly to study his chief's face. He found no words, but his very expression was plaintive. Smith sighed.

"We're in the business of springing spacers from jails all over the explored galaxy," he said. "We're supposed to be loaded to the jets with high-potency brainwaves and have a gadget for every purpose! How is it going to look if we're locked in our own office and can't get out without help?"

Parrish threw up his hands. Pivoting, he walked loosely a few feet along the corridor and back, squeezing his chin in the palm of one hand. He clasped his hands behind his back, then, and peered around Smith at the empty wing of the corridor.

"Maybe we could dope him," he suggested, without much feeling.

"I should have thought of that," admitted Smith, "but he's finished eating."

"Can't we find something in the lab to shoot a dart?"

As Smith tried to remember, Westervelt interrupted.

"If you decide on that, I'm not volunteering, thank you. Did you ever see Mr. Lydman move in a hurry? Whoever tries it had better not miss with the first dart!"

Smith said, "Harumph!" and Parrish looked uncomfortable. The assistant glanced momentarily at Beryl, but shook his head immediately.

Westervelt followed his thinking. For one thing, Lydman was known to be devoted to his wife and two children; for another, who knew how badly Beryl might miss?

"Now, if everyone will just keep calm," said Smith, "and we can keep Bob busy, we'll probably get along fine until they restore power. How long can it take, after all? They can't waste any time with a large part of a modern city like this cut off. It's unthinkable."

"I suppose you're right," said Parrish.

Smith turned to Beryl.

"What I meant by asking your co-operation," he said, "is that we'll need to have someone with Mr. Lydman most of the time. Willie has been doing it until now, but we don't want it to look like deliberate surveillance."

"But why?" asked Beryl. "I mean ... I see that it worries all of you that ... that he might find out. But what if he does?"

"Possibly nothing," answered Smith. "On the other hand, Mr. Lydman was once imprisoned, in his space traveling days. He was held for a long time under very trying conditions; and the experience has left him with a problem. It is not _exactly_ claustrophobia...."

He paused, as if to let Beryl recall other remarks about Lydman. Their general air of gravity seemed to impress her.

"I'll be ... glad to help," she said reluctantly.

"Fine!" said Smith. "Probably nothing will be necessary. Now, I think we had better go in and tell Si, so that everyone will be alerted to the situation."

Westervelt caught the glance that passed between Parrish and Beryl. He was almost certain that each of them was mentally counting the people who had known before _they_ had been told.

_That's what you get for being so busy in the dead files_, he thought.

They trouped in behind Smith. Simonetta watched as if they had been a parade. Smith, with an occasional comment from Parrish, told her the story.

"So that is the partial reason for staying late," he concluded, "although, of course, the case of Harris comes first."

Westervelt had wandered over to a window. He adjusted the filter dial for maximum clarity and looked out.

From where he was, he could see a great black carpet across part of the city, spreading out from somewhere beneath his position until it was cut by a sharp line of street lights many blocks away. Beyond that, the city looked normal. To the near side of the invisible boundary and, he supposed, for a like distance in the opposite direction behind his viewpoint, there were only sparse and faint glows of emergency lights. Some were doubtless powered by buildings with the equipment for the purpose, others were the lights of police and emergency vehicles on the ground or cruising low between the taller buildings.

_I wonder what they actually do when something like this happens?_ he thought. _What if they think they have it fixed, turn on the juice again, and it blows a second time?_

His reverie was interrupted by the sound of Simonetta's phone. From where he was, he could see Joe Rosenkrantz's features as the operator asked for Smith.

"Oh, there you are, Mr. Smith," said Joe. "Pauline has been trying all over. Trident is transmitting, and I thought you would want to be here. They say they have a relay set up right to Harris."

Smith let out a whoop and made for the door.

"He'll be right there," Simonetta told the grinning TV man.

Parrish and Westervelt trailed along. When the latter looked back, he saw that Simonetta had replaced Beryl; and he could hardly blame the blonde for seizing the chance to sit down and collect her thoughts. He felt like crawling into a hole somewhere himself.

Passing the library, Parrish cocked an eyebrow at him. Westervelt nodded. He went in and told Lydman about the call. The ex-spacer was interested enough to join the procession.

When Westervelt followed him into the communications room, Joe Rosenkrantz was explaining the set-up to Smith.

"Like before, we go through Pluto, Capella VII, and an automatic relay on an outer planet of the Trident system, but you won't see anything of that. It's after we get Johnson that the fun begins."

He leaned back in his swivel chair before the screen and surveyed the group.

"Johnson is gonna _think_ to a fish near his island. This fish thinks to one swimming near Harris. They claim Harris answers."

Smith ran both hands through his hair.

"We try anything," he said. "Let's go!"

Joe got in contact with Johnson, the Terran D.I.R. man, among other things, on Trident. The latter was not quite successful in hiding an I-told-you-so attitude.

"Harris himself confirms that he is being held on the ocean floor," he said. "He seems to be a sort of pet, or curiosity."

"Can you make sense out of the messages?" asked Smith. "I mean, is there any difficulty because of a language barrier? We don't want to make some silly assumption and find out it was based on a misunderstanding."

After the weird pause caused by the mind-numbing distance, Johnson replied.

"There isn't any language barrier in a thought, but you might say there's sometimes an attitude barrier. Usually, we can pick up an equivalent meaning if we assume, for instance, that our time sense is similar to that of these fish."

"Well, try asking Harris how deep he is," suggested Smith.

They watched Johnson look away, although the man did not seem to be going through any marked effort of concentration. Hardly thirty seconds of this had elapsed when they saw him scowl.

"This fish off my beach can't get it through his massive intellect that he can't think directly to another fish at your position. He thinks you must be pretty queer not to have someone to do your thinking for you."

Smith turned a little red. Westervelt admired Joe Rosenkrantz's pokerface. Johnson appeared to be insisting.

"Harris says he is two minutes' swim under the surface," he reported.

"Well, how far from your position, then?" asked Smith.

The distance turned out to be a day-and-a-half swim.

"Does he need anything? Are they keeping him under livable conditions?"

The pause, and Johnson relayed, "They pump him air and feed him. He needs someone to get him out."

"How can we find him?" asked Smith. "Can he work up any way of signaling us?"

"You are signaling him now, he says. He wants you to get him out."

Smith looked around him for questions. Lydman suggested asking how Harris was confined. Smith put it to Johnson, and after the maddening pause, got an answer.

"He says he's in a big glass box like a freight trailer. It's like a cage. Inside, he is free to move around, and he wants to get out."

"Then have him tell us where it is!" snapped Smith.

"He doesn't know," came the reply. "They move about every so often."

"What did I say?" whispered Parrish. "Nomadic."

No one took the time to congratulate him because Smith was asking what the Tridentians were like. Johnson's mental connection seemed to develop static. They saw him shake his head as if to clear it. He turned a puzzled expression to the screen.

"I didn't get that very plainly," he admitted. "A sort of combination of thoughts--they feed him and they don't taste good."

"Well, tell your fishy friend to keep his own opinions out of it," said Smith, surprising Westervelt, who had not quite caught up to the situation.

Johnson, a moment later, grimaced. His expression became apologetic.

"Don't say things like that!" he told Smith, turning again to the screen. "It slipped through my mind as I heard you, and he didn't like it!"

"Who? Harris?"

"No, the fish at his end. I apologized for you."

There was a general restless shifting of feet in the Terran office. Smith seemed, in the dim lighting of the communications room, to flush a deeper shade.

"And what does Harris say?"

Johnson inquired. Harris requested that they get him out.

"Goddammit!" muttered Smith. "He must be punchy!"

"It happens," Lydman reminded him softly.

"Yes," said Smith, after a startled look around, "but some were like that to begin with, and his record suggests it all the way."

He asked Johnson to get a description of the place where Harris found himself. The answer was, in a fashion, conclusive.

"Like any other part of the sea bottom," reported Johnson. "And, furthermore, he's tired of thinking and wants to rest."

"Who does?" demanded Smith.

"They won't tell me," said Johnson, sadly.

Smith choked off a curse, noticing Simonetta standing there. He combed his hair furiously with both hands. No one suggested any other questions, so he thanked Johnson and told Joe to break off.

"At least, we know it's all real," he sighed. "He was actually taken, and he's still alive."

"You put a lot of faith in a couple of fish," said Lydman.

Smith hesitated.

"Well ... now ... they aren't really fish," he said. "Let's not build up a mental misconception, just because we've been kidding about 'swishy the thinking fishy.' Actually, they probably wouldn't even suggest fish to an ichthyologist, and they may be a pretty high form of life."

"They may be as high as this Harris," commented Parrish, and earned a cold stare from Lydman.

"I think I'll look around the lab," said the latter, as the others made motions toward breaking up the gathering.

Westervelt promptly headed for the door. He saw that Lydman was walking around the corner of the wire mesh partition that enclosed the special apparatus of the communications room, doubtless bent upon taking a short-cut into the lab.

_I want to go sit down a while before they pin me on him again_, thought the youth. _I need fifteen minutes, then I'll relieve whoever has him, if Smitty wants me to._

TWELVE

The light, impotent after penetrating fifty fathoms of Tridentian sea, was murky and green-tinted; but Tom Harris had become more or less used to that. It rankled, nevertheless, that the sea-people continued to ignore his demands for a lamp.

He knew that they used such devices. Through the clear walls of his tank, he had seen night parties swimming out to hunt small varieties of fish. The water craft they piloted on longer trips and up to the surface were also equipped with lights powered by some sort of battery. It infuriated Harris to be forced arbitrarily to exist isolated in the dimness of the ocean bottom day or the complete blackness of night.

He rose from the spot where he had been squatting on his heels. So smooth was the glassy footing that he slipped and almost fell headlong. He regained his balance and looked about.

The tank was about ten by ten feet and twice as long, with metal angles which he assumed to be aluminum securing all edges. These formed the outer corners, so that he could see the gaskets inside them that made the tank water-tight. The sea-people, he had to admit, were quite capable of coping with their environment and understanding his.

The end of the tank distant from Harris was opaque. He thought that there were connections to a towing vehicle as well as to the plant that pumped air for him. The big fish had not made that quite clear to him. All other sides of the tank were quite clear. Whenever he walked about, he could look through the floor and find groups of shells and other remnants of deceased marine life in the white sand. Occasionally, he considered the pressure that would implode upon him should anything happen to rupture the walls, but he had become habitually successful in forcing that idea to the back of his mind.

Along each of the side walls were four little airlocks. The use of these was at the moment being demonstrated by one of the sea-people to what Harris was beginning to think of as a child.

The parent was slightly smaller than Harris, who stood five-feet-five and weighed a hundred and thirty pounds Terran. It also had four limbs, but that was about the last point they had in common. The Tridentian's limbs all joined his armored body near the head. Two of them ended in powerful pincers; the others forked into several delicate tentacles. The body was somewhat flexible despite the weight of rugged shell segments, and tapered to a spread tail upon which the crustacean balanced himself easily.

Harris felt at a distinct disadvantage in the vision department: each of the Tridentians had four eyes protruding from his chitinous head. The adult had grown one pair of eye-stalks to a length of nearly a foot. The second pair, like both of the youngster's, extended only a few inches.

The Terran could not be sure whether the undersea currency consisted of metal or shell, but the Tridentian deposited some sort of coin in a slot machine outside one of the little airlocks. It caused a grinding noise. Directly afterward, a small lump of compressed fish, boned, was ejected from an opening on the inside.

"Goddam' blue lobsters!" swore Harris. "Think they're doing me a favor!"

He let them wait a good five minutes before he decided that the prudent course was to accept the offering. Sneering, he walked over and picked up the food. There was usually little else provided. On days he had been too angry or too disgusted to accept the favors of sightseers, his keepers assumed that he was not hungry.

In the beginning, he had also had a most difficult time getting through to them his need for fresh water. That was when he had come to believe in the large, fish-like swimmer who had transmitted his thoughts to the sea-people. The fact that the latter could and did produce fresh water for him aroused his grudging respect, even though the taste was nothing to take lightly.

He juggled the lump of fish in one hand, causing the little Tridentian to twirl his eye-stalks in glee and swim up off the ocean bottom to look down through the top of the tank. The parent also wiggled his eye-stalks, more sedately. Harris suspected them of laughing, and turned his back.

Looking through the other side of his tank, he could see--to such distance as the murky light permitted--the parked vehicles of the Tridentians. Like a collection of small boats, they were of sundry sizes and shapes, depending perhaps upon each owner's fancy, perhaps on his skill. Harris did not know whether the Tridentians' craftsmanship extended to the level of having professional builders. At any rate, they were spread out like a small city. Among them were tent-like arrangements of nets to keep out swimming vermin. Other than that, the sea-people used no shelters.

_They were smart enough to build a cage for me!_ he thought bitterly. _What the hell is the matter with the Terran government, anyway? That Department of Interstellar Relations, or whatever they call it. Why can't they get me out of here? And where did Big Fish go now?_

He saw several of the crustacean people approaching from the camping area. Shortly, no doubt, he would again be a center of mass attention, with cubes of compressed and stinking fish shooting at him from all the little airlocks. He snarled wordlessly.

The groups seemed to come at certain periods which he had been unable to define. He could only guess that they had choice times for hunting besides other work that had to be done to maintain the campsite and their jet-propelled craft.

_I'd like to get one of them in here and boil him!_ thought Harris. _Big Fish claims they don't taste good. I wonder. Anyway, it would shake them up!_

He had long since given up thinking about what the sea-people could do to him if they chose. Their flushing the tank eighteen inches deep with sea water twice a day had soon given him an idea, especially as he had nowhere to go during the process. He no longer permitted himself to fall asleep anywhere near the inlet pipe.

He noticed that the dozen or so sightseers were edging around the end of the tank to join the first individual and his offspring. Looking up, Harris saw the reason. A long, dark shadow was curving down in an insolently deliberate dive. It was streamlined as a Terran shark and as long as the tank in which Harris lived. The flat line of its leading edge split into something very like a yawn, displaying astonishing upper and lower carpets of conical teeth. This was possible because the eyes, about eight Harris thought, were spaced in a ring about the head end of the long body.

_They know I don't like to eat them, but I like to scare them a little._ Big Fish thought to Harris. _Look at them trying to smile at me!_

Harris watched the Tridentians wiggling and waving their eye-stalks as the monster passed lazily over them and turned to come slowly back.

"I'd like to scare them a lot," said Harris, who had learned some time ago that he got through better just by forgetting telepathy and verbalizing. "Is the D.I.R. man still there?"

_Which ... what you thought?_ inquired Big Fish.

"The other Terran, the one on the island."

_The other air-breathing one is gone, the other Big Fish is feeding, as I have done just now, and it is not clear about the far Terran who lacks a Big Fish._

"All the bastards on both worlds are out to lunch," growled Harris, "and here I sit!"

_You are in to lunch_, agreed the monster.

The three eyes that bore upon the imprisoned man as the thinker swept past the tank had an intelligent alertness. Harris had come to imagine that he could detect expressions on Big Fish's limited features.

"You're the only friend I've got!" he exclaimed, slipping suddenly into self-pity. "I wish I could go with you."

_Once you could, when you had your own tank._

"It was what we call a submarine," said Harris. "I was looking to see what was on the ocean floor. Tell me, is it all like this?"

_Is it all like what? With blue lobsters?_

Harris still retained enough sanity to realize that the Tridentians did not suggest Terran lobsters to this being who probably could not even imagine them. That was an automatic translation of thought furnished out of his own memory and name-calling.

"No," he said. "I mean is it all sand and mud with a few chasms here and there? Where do these crabs get their metals?"

_There are different kinds of holes and hills. It is all mostly the same. You cannot swim in it anywhere, although there are little things that dig under the soft sand. Some of them are good to eat but you have to spit out a lot of sand. The crabs dig with machines sometimes, in big holes, but what they catch I do not know._

"Isn't there anything that catches _them_?" asked Harris bitterly.

_No. They are big enough to catch other things, except a few. Things that are bigger than I am are not smart._

The monster made a pass along the ocean bed near the Tridentians, stirring up a cloud of sand and causing Harris's captor to shrink against the side of his tank. The Terran laughed heartily. He clapped the backs of his fists against his forehead above the eyes and wiggled his forefingers at the Tridentians on the other side of the clear barrier.

Even after the sand had settled, he ran back and forth along the side of his tank, making sure that every sightseer had opportunity to note his gesture. He had an idea that they did not like it much.

_They do not like it at all_, thought Big Fish. _Some of them are asking for the man who lets the sea into your tank._

"Don't call it a man!" objected Harris, giving up his posturing. "I am a man."

_What else can I call these men except men?_ asked the other. _I do not understand why you want to be called a man. You are different._

"Forget it," said Harris. "It was just a figure of thought."

He felt like sitting down again, but decided against it in case the onlookers should succeed in obtaining the services of the tank attendant. He walked to the end of the tank, where he could stare into the greenish distance without looking at the Tridentian camp.

"I wish I were dead," he muttered. "They'll never get me out of here."

Behind him, he heard the plop-plop of food tidbits landing on the floor of the tank as the onlookers sought to regain his attention. They must have come out of their moment of pique if they were trying to coax him to amuse them further.

"If I could find a bone in those hunks of fish, I'd kill myself," said Harris.

The dark shape of Big Fish settled over the tank, cutting off what little light there was like a cloud. Harris looked up resentfully.

_I do not understand you_, thought the monster. _That would be very foolish._

"What--trying to commit suicide with a fish bone?"

_No matter how, it would be extremely foolish, for then you would be dead._

Harris could not think of anything to say. He could not even think of anything to think, obviously, since none of his chaotic, half-formed thoughts brought a response.

_It would be as if you had been eaten_, insisted his friend.

"All right, all right! I won't do it then, if that'll make you happy," exclaimed Harris.

_It has no effect on how well I feed_, Big Fish informed him.

It took Harris a minute, but he figured it out.

"So that's your philosophy!" he muttered to himself. "Now I know what it takes to make you happy. Something to eat!"

_Where?_ inquired the monster. _I do not see anyone I want to eat._

"Never mind!" said Harris. "Tell me more about the ocean bottom. Where there are big holes or cliffs, can you see ... uh ... stripes in the sides, layers of rock?"

_Sometimes. Where it is deep enough. Other places there are things growing to the bottom. Only little fish that are not even good to eat do their feeding there. Sometimes the sea-people take away the growing things or dig holes._

"I'll bet there are plenty of things to get out of this ocean," mused Harris. "Who knows how the climate may have changed in thousands of years. Maybe if there was an ice age the seas would have shrunk. Maybe there was a volcanic age. Maybe you could drill underwater and find oil--if you knew where to look. Maybe there are deposits of diamonds under the ooze."

He stopped when he sensed a vague irritation. He realized that his thoughts had been going out and scoring the cleanest of misses.

"It doesn't matter," he said. "Just tell me what you do know about the sea."

_I can tell you where to find tribes of the sea-people. I can tell you where to find all sorts of good eating-fish. I know where to think to other Big Fish but that I cannot tell you, for you cannot feel it._

The monster rose slowly through the water. He had seen something up there that interested him, Harris knew, and would return when it occurred to him.

He considered the possibilities. Perhaps there was something in the idea of building up a food industry. If you had inside tips on where the fish were, how could you miss? Then, the Tridentians must have some knowledge of where to find metals, since they used them. He suspected that they had factories somewhere.

"Come to think of it," he asked himself, "how do I know it isn't some savage tribe that picked me up? One of these days, I may wind up with a more advanced bunch. I'll have to ask Big Fish when he comes back."

He began to plan what he would do if he reached some higher civilization under the sea. Anyone with the knowledge to mine metals, or maybe to extract them from sea water, would be interested in contacting Terrans from another world. There would be a little trouble, probably, in getting them to comprehend space, but some of them could be sent up to the surface in tanks. Then there would be a need for some Terran who knew both worlds.

"I could wind up an ambassador!" Harris told himself. "I wonder ... maybe I could even work it with this bunch. If I could only get out of here! Come back in another submarine, maybe."

He began to pace the length of his tank and back, stopping once to gather up the fish that had been bought for him by some of the crowd outside. He noted that the latter was constantly changing without varying much in total number. He took to walking around the sides of the tank, staring into each set of eyes.

In the end, this had such a hypnotic effect that he imagined himself swimming through the dim, greenish light. The sea-people outside began to appear as individuals. He grew into the feeling that he could recognize one from the other.

He found himself running for the corner where he had collected his fish. The sound that had triggered the reaction originated at the opaque end of the tank. It was followed within seconds by several jets of water, white and forceful, which entered near the floor of the structure.

Harris snatched up his supply of food to keep it from being washed away. With one hand, he tried to roll up the legs of his pants. He never seemed to be prepared when the time came, but he was constantly too chilled to go around with the trousers rolled up all the time.

The water swished about the calves of his legs. After a few minutes, it began to recede as the Tridentian machinery pumped it out. Soon, the tank was clean of everything but Harris, his fish, and the thick smell of sea water.

_He was good_, came a thought. _I see you are eating too._

A large shadow passed overhead. Most of the Tridentians wiggled their eye-stalks in an effort to look amiable. Harris dropped his fish to the damp floor.

"No, I'm not eating," he said. "I'm all wet."

_So am I_, answered Big Fish.

"But I'm not usually," said Harris.

_I know. It is unkind, they way they let you dry out. Would you like me to knock in the end of the tank? You could have all the water you want._

"Not right now," said Harris calmly. He sat down, crossing his legs. "I'll have to grow some gills first. It may not take much longer, at that."

He looked at the Tridentians, who looked in at him. Again, he felt the sensation of being able to recognize individuals. Perhaps he should talk to them more often through Big Fish.

"Maybe some of them are really nice fellows," he muttered, "if I just get to know them better."

_No_, his friend told him, _they are not very good to eat._

THIRTEEN

Time had dragged its slow way past six-thirty. The excuse of a flying start on the Harris case had worn thin to the point of delicacy--to all but one man. The rest of them hoped sincerely that _he_ was keeping himself interested.

Westervelt sat at his desk, perusing an article in _Spaceman's_ World about the exploration of a newly discovered planetary system. It might come up in a conference someday, he reflected, and it might be as well to know a few facts on the subject. No life had been discovered on any of the dozen planets, but that did not necessarily preclude the establishment of a Terran colony in the future. The department also had problems with colonies, as witness Greenhaven.

He put down the magazine for a moment to review the personnel situation.

Parrish, he remembered, had expressed his intention of retreating to his office and putting in an hour or two of desk-heeling. Under the circumstances, he had declared, there was little point in digging further into the files for an idea since that was not at all their primary purpose in staying late. Rosenkrantz, of course, was on watch in the communications room. Smith wandered in and out. Simonetta had taken a portable taper down to Lydman's office to help organize a preliminary report the chief had requested from him. After she had returned, and fallen to low-voiced gossip through the window with Pauline, Beryl had been sent back with a number of scribbled objections for Lydman to answer.

Smith had spent all of five minutes thinking them up--before Simonetta brought the original report. Westervelt wondered how soon Beryl would return with the answers, because it would then probably be his turn to ride herd.

He did not regard the idea with relish.

Smith strolled out of his office. He halted to survey the nearly empty office with an air of vague surprise, then saw Simonetta outside Pauline's cubicle. He went over to join the conversation.

_I should have walked out somewhere_, thought Westervelt. _Now the door is completely blockaded._

The magazine article turned dull immediately.

Sure enough, in a few minutes Smith approached Westervelt's corner.

"Who's on watch, Willie?" he asked, attempting a jovial wink.

"Beryl, I think," answered the youth. "Must be--she hasn't been around."

"She's been there quite a while," commented Smith. "I have a feeling that it's time for a shift. How about wandering down there and edging in?"

"What would I say?" objected Westervelt. "He's probably dictating his remarks and wouldn't like me hanging around."

Smith chewed on his lower lip.

"For the questions I sent him," he muttered thoughtfully, "five minutes should have been enough. Goldilocks has been with him over half an hour."

"But he must be tired of my face," said Westervelt.

"I don't have anyone else to send, unless you want me to think up an excuse for Pauline. Asking him to help with her homework would be pretty thin."

Westervelt thought it over. Parrish, in his present mood, was not likely to be of any help. Simonetta had just done her stint, and Joe was needed on the space set. It would have been nice if there were a message for Lydman to listen to, but that was wishful dreaming.

"All right, Mr. Smith," he surrendered. "Maybe I can take along this article and ask if he's seen it yet. If he's taking an inventory or trying out something in the lab, I'll take my life in my hands and volunteer to help!"

Smith laughed.

"It can't be that bad, Willie," he said, slapping the other on the shoulder.

Westervelt was not so sure, but he folded the magazine open to the beginning of his article and went out. Pauline peered at him as he passed.

"Don't look like that!" he said. "You'll see me again, I hope!"

"You might try looking a little more confident of that yourself," Simonetta called after him.

Westervelt turned the corner and walked slowly down the hall, trying out more confident expressions as he went. None of them felt exactly right.

Passing the spare office where the dead files were kept, he heard a sound.

_They must have come up here for something_, he thought. _That's why it seemed so long to Smitty._

He had opened the door and taken one step inside before he realized that the room was dark. Without thinking, he reached out to flip the light switch.

Beryl Austin leaped to her feet with a flash of thigh that hardly registered on Westervelt in the split-second of his astonishment. Then he saw that she had not been alone on the settee that stood beside the door. Parrish rose beside her.

The suddenness of their movements and the ferocity of their combined stares had the impact of a stunning blow upon Westervelt. The implications of the blonde's slightly disheveled appearance, however, were obvious.

He could not, for a moment, think at all. Then he began to have a feeling that he ought to say something to cover his escape. Beneath that, somewhere, surged the conviction that he had nothing to apologize for. In the face of such hostility and tension, it called for a lot of courage.

"You little sneak!" spat Beryl.

Westervelt noted with a certain detachment that her voice had turned shrill. Not knowing of anything else to do, he stared as she tugged her dress into place. This seemed to outrage her more than anything he could have said. He also saw the gleam of Parrish's teeth, and the grimace was not even remotely a smile. The man took a step to place himself before Beryl.

"What do you think you're doing?" demanded Parrish, with a good deal more feeling than originality.

Westervelt had been wondering what to say to that when it came, as was inevitable. A dozen half-expressed answers flitted through his mind.

_How do you get out of a thing like this?_ he asked himself desperately. _You'd think it was me that did it!_

Before he could explore the implications of his choosing the words "did it," Beryl found her voice again.

"Get out of here!" she shrilled. "Who told you to come poking in?"

"I heard a noise," said Westervelt, conscious that his voice sounded odd. "I thought it was Mr. Lydman."

"Do I look like Lydman?" demanded Parrish, not raising his voice as much as Beryl had. "There wasn't any light, was there? Did you think he'd be sitting in here in the dark?"

The possibility charged the atmosphere like static electricity. Actually, mere mention of it made Westervelt feel better because it sounded so much like what he might have found.

"How did I know?" he retorted. "I thought Beryl was with him. Why should I expect _you_? You said you weren't going to dig any further in here."

Beryl had been smoothing her still-perfect coiffure. Now she stiffened as much as Parrish. Westervelt sensed that his choice of words might have been unfortunate.

"Well, who is with him?" he demanded, before they could say anything.

The question galvanized Parrish into action. He stepped forward to meet Westervelt face to face.

"If you're so worried about that, why don't you go find him?" he sneered. "For my money, you two make a good match."

"Maybe I will," said Westervelt hotly. "_You_ two don't seem to care about what's going on. If you'll just excuse me, I'll turn out the light and--"

"Oh, cut out the speech-making!" requested Beryl. "Get out of the door, Willie, and let me out of here. I'm tired of the whole incident."

"Now, wait a minute, Beryl!" protested Parrish.

"Yeah," said Westervelt, "you'd better check. Your lipstick is really smudged this time."

"Shut up, you!" Parrish snapped.

He took Beryl by the shoulders and pulled her back. She pulled herself free peevishly. Westervelt leaned against the wall and curled a lip.

"Enough is enough!" she said. "Let me out of here!"

"You forgot to smile," Westervelt told Parrish.

The man turned on him and reached out to seize a handful of his shirtfront. Westervelt straightened up, alarmed but willing to consider changing the smooth mask of Parrish's face. Beryl was shrilling something about not being damned fools, when she stopped in the middle of a word.

Parrish also grew still. The forearm Westervelt had crossed over the hand grabbing at his shirt fell as Parrish let him go. The man was staring over Westervelt's shoulder. He looked almost frightened.

Westervelt looked around--and a thrill shot through him, like the shock of diving into icy water.

Lydman was standing there, staring through him.

When he looked again, as he shrank instinctively away from the doorway, he realized that the ex-spacer was staring through all of them. After a moment, he seemed to focus on Beryl.

"They'll let you out, I think," he said in his quiet voice.

Parrish stepped back nervously, and Westervelt edged further inside the doorway to make room. Beryl did not seem to have heard. She gaped, hypnotized by the beautiful eyes set in the strong, tanned face.

Lydman put the palm of one hand against Westervelt's chest and shoved slowly. It was as well that the file cabinet behind the youth was nearly empty, because it slid a foot along the floor as his back flattened against it. Lydman reached out his other hand and took Beryl gently by the elbow.

She stepped forward, turning her head from side to side as if to seek reassurance from either Parrish or Westervelt, but without completely meeting their eyes. Lydman led her into the hall and released her elbow.

She started uncertainly up the corridor toward the main office. Lydman fell in a pace or two behind her.

Westervelt heard a gasp. He looked at Parrish and realized that he had been holding his breath too. Then, by mutual consent, they followed the others out into the hall.

"Listen, Willie," whispered Parrish, watching the twenty-foot gap between them and Lydman's broad shoulders, "we have to see that she doesn't forget and try to leave. If he won't let me talk to her, you'll have to get her attention."

"Okay, I'll try," murmured Westervelt. "Look--I was really looking for him I never meant to--"

"I never meant to either," said Parrish. "Forget it!"