The Early Asimov. Volume 1

The Callistan Menace

“Damn Jupiter!” growled Ambrose Whitefield viciously, and I nodded agreement.

“I’ve been on the Jovian satellite run,” I said, “for fifteen years and I’ve heard those two words spoken maybe a million times. It’s probably the most sincere curse in the Solar System.”

Our watch at the controls of the scoutship Ceres had just been relieved and we descended the two levels to our room with dragging steps.

“Damn Jupiter-and damn it again,” insisted Whitefield morosely. “It’s too big for the System. It stays out there behind us and pulls and pulls and pulls! We’ve got to keep the Atomos firing all the way. We’ve got to check our course- completely-every hour. No relaxation, no coasting, no taking it easy! nothing but the rottenest kind of work.”

There were tiny beads of perspiration on his forehead and he swabbed at them with the back of his hand. He was a young fellow, scarcely thirty, and you could see in his eyes that he was nervous, and even a little frightened.

And it wasn’t Jupiter that was bothering him, in spite of his profanity. Jupiter was the least of our worries. It was Callisto! It was that little moon which gleamed a pale blue upon our visiplates that made Whitefield sweat and that had spoiled four nights’ sleep for me already. Callisto! Our destination!

Even old Mac Steeden, gray mustachioed veteran who, in his youth, had sailed with the great Peewee Wilson himself, went about his duties with an absent stare. Four days out- and ten days more ahead of us-and panic was reaching out with clammy fingers.

We were all brave enough in the ordinary course of events. The eight of us on the Ceres had faced the purple Lectronics and stabbing Disintos of pirates and rebels and the alien environments of half a dozen worlds. But it takes more than run-of-the-mill bravery to face the unknown; to face Callisto, the “mystery world” of the Solar System.

One fact was known about Callisto-one grim, bare fact. Over a period of twenty-five years, seven ships, progressively better equipped, had landed-and never been heard from again. The Sunday supplements peopled the satellite with anything from super-dinosaurs to invisible ghosts of the fourth dimension, but that did not solve the mystery.

We were the eighth. We had a better ship than any of those preceding. We were the first to sport the newly-developed beryl-tungsten hull, twice as strong as the old steel shells. We possessed super-heavy armaments and the very latest Atomic Drive engines.

Still-we were only the eighth, and every man jack of us knew it.

Whitefield entered our quarters silently and flopped down upon his bunk. His fists were clenched under his chin and showed white at the knuckles. It seemed to me that he wasn’t far from the breaking point. It was a case for careful diplomacy.

“What we need,” said I, “is a good, stiff drink.”

“What we need,” he answered harshly, “is a hell of a lot of good, stiff drinks.”

“Well, what’s stopping us?”

He looked at me suspiciously, “You know there isn’t a drop of liquor aboard ship. It’s against Navy regulations!”

“Sparkling green Jabra water,” I said slowly, letting the words drip from my mouth. “Aged beneath the Martian deserts. Melted emerald juice. Bottles of it! Cases of it!”

“Where?”

“I know where. What do you say? A few drinks-just a few-will cheer us both up.”

For a moment, his eyes sparkled, and then they dulled again, “What if the Captain finds out? He’s a stickler for discipline, and on a trip like this, it’s liable to cost us our rating.”

I winked and grinned, “It’s the Captain’s own cache. He can’t discipline us without cutting his own throat-the old hypocrite. He’s the best damn Captain there ever was, but he likes his emerald water.”

Whitefield stared at me long and hard, “All right. Lead me to it.”

We slipped down to the supply room, which was deserted, of course. The Captain and Steeden were at the controls; Brock and Charney were at the engines; and Harrigan and Tuley were snoring their fool heads off in their own room.

Moving as quietly as I could, through sheer habit, I pushed aside several crates of food tabs and slid open a hidden panel near the floor. I reached in and drew out a dusty bottle, which, in the dim light, sparkled a dull sea-green.

“Sit down,” I said, “and make yourself comfortable.” I produced two tiny cups and filled them.

Whitefield sipped slowly and with every evidence of satisfaction. He downed his second at one gulp.

“How come you volunteered for this trip, anyway, Whitey?” I asked, “You’re a little green for a thing like this.”

He waved his hand, “You know how it is. Things get dull after a while. I went in for zoology after getting out of college-big field since interplanetary travel-and had a nice comfortable position back on Ganymede. It was dull, though;

I was bored blue. So I joined the Navy on an impulse, and on another I volunteered for this trip.” He sighed ruefully, “I’m a little sorry I did.”

“That’s not the way to take it, kid. I’m experienced and I know. When you’re panicky, you’re as good as licked. Why, two months from now, we’ll be back on Ganymede.”

“I’m not scared, if that’s what you’re thinking,” he exclaimed angrily. “It’s-it’s,” there was a long pause in which he frowned at his third cupful. “Well, I’m just worn out trying to imagine what the hell to expect. My imagination is working overtime and my nerves are rubbing raw.”

“Sure, sure,” I soothed, “I’m not blaming you. It’s that way with all of us, I guess. But you have to be careful. Why, I remember once on a Mars-Titan trip, we had-”

Whitefield interrupted what was one of my favorite yarns- and I could spin them as well as anyone in the service-with a jab in the ribs that knocked the breath out of me.

He put down his Jabra gingerly.

“Say, Jenkins,” he stuttered, “I haven’t downed enough liquor to be imagining things, have I?”

“That depends on what you imagined.”

“I could swear I saw something move somewhere in the pile of empty crates in the far corner.”

“That’s a bad sign,” and I took another swig as I said it. “Your nerves are going to your eyes and now they’re going back on you. Ghosts, I suppose, or the Callistan menace looking us over in advance.”

“I saw it, I tell you. There’s something alive there.” He edged towards me-his nerves were plenty shot-and for a moment, in the dim, shadowy light even I felt a bit choked up.

“You’re crazy,” I said in a loud voice, and the echoes calmed me down a bit. I put down my empty cup and got up just a wee bit unsteadily. “Let’s go over and poke through the crates.”

Whitefield followed me and together we started shoving the light aluminum cubicles this way and that. Neither of us was quite one hundred per cent sober and we made a fair amount of noise. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Whitefield trying to move the case nearest the wall.

“This one isn’t empty,” he grunted, as it lifted very slightly off the floor.

Muttering under his breath, he knocked off the cover and looked in. For a half second he just stared and then he backed away slowly. He tripped over something and fell into a sitting position, still gaping at the case.

I watched his actions with raised eyebrows, then glanced hastily at the case in question. The glance froze into a steady glare, and I emitted a hoarse yell that rattled off each of the four walls.

A boy was sticking his head out of the case-a red-haired dirty-faced kid of thirteen or thereabouts.

“Hello,” said the boy as he clambered out into the open. Neither of us found the strength to answer him, so he continued, “I’m glad you found me. I was getting a cramp in my shoulder trying to curl up in there.”

Whitefield gulped audibly, “Good God! A kid stowaway! And on a voyage to Callisto !”

“And we can’t turn back,” I reminded in a stricken voice, “without wrecking ourselves. The Jovian satellite run is poison.”

“Look here,” Whitefield turned on the kid in a sudden belligerence. “Who are you, you young nut, and what are you doing here?”

The kid flinched. “I’m Stanley Fields,” he answered, a bit scared. “I’m from New Chicago on Ganymede. I-I ran away to space, like they do in books.” He paused and then asked brightly, “Do you think we’ll have a fight with pirates on this trip, mister?”

There was no doubt that the kid was filled to the brim with “Dime Spacers.” I used to read them myself as a youngster.

“How about your parents?” asked Whitefield, grimly.

“Oh, all I got’s an uncle. He won’t care much, I guess.” He had gotten over his first uneasiness and stood grinning at us.

“Well, what’s to be done?” said Whitefield, looking at me in complete helplessness.

I shrugged, “Take him to the Captain. Let him worry.”

“And how will he take it?”

“Anyway he wants. It’s not our fault. Besides, there’s absolutely nothing to be done about the mess.”

And grabbing an arm apiece, we walked away, dragging the kid between us.

Captain Bartlett is a capable officer and one of the deadpan type that very rarely displays emotion. Consequently, on those few occasions when he does, it’s like a Mercurian volcano in full eruption-and you haven’t lived until you’ve seen one of those.

It was a case of the final straw. A satellite run is always wearing. The image of Callisto up ahead was harder on him than on any member of the crew. And now there was this kid stowaway.

It wasn’t to be endured! For half an hour, the Captain shot off salvo after salvo of the very worst sort of profanity. He started with the sun and ran down the list of planets, satellites, asteroids, comets, to the very meteors themselves. He was starting on the nearer fixed stars, when he collapsed from sheer nervous exhaustion. He was so excited that he never thought to ask us what we were doing in the storeroom in the first place, and for that Whitefield and I were duly grateful.

But Captain Bartlett is no fool. Having purged his system of its nervous tension, he saw clearly that that which cannot be cured must be endured.

“Someone take him and wash him up,” he growled wearily, “and keep him out of my sight for a while.” Then, softening a bit, he drew me towards him, “Don’t scare him by telling him where we’re going. He’s in a bad spot, the poor kid.”

When we left, the old soft-hearted fraud was sending through an emergency message to Ganymede trying to get in touch with the kid’s uncle.

Of course, we didn’t know it at the time, but that kid was a Godsend-a genuine stroke of Old Man Luck. He took our minds off Callisto. He gave us something else to think about. The tension, which at the end of four days had almost reached the breaking point, eased completely.

There was something refreshing in the kid’s natural gayety; in his bright ingenuousness. He would meander about the ship asking the silliest kind of questions. He insisted on expecting pirates at any moment. And, most of all, he persisted in regarding each and every one of us as “Dime Spacer” heroes.

That last flattered our egos, of course, and put us on our mettle. We vied with each other in chest-puffing and tale-telling, and old Mac Steeden, who in Stanley’s eyes was a demi-god, broke the all-time record for plain and fancy lying.

I remember, particularly, the talk-fest we had on the seventh day out. We were just past the midpoint of the trip and were set to begin a cautious deceleration. All of us (except Harrigan and Tuley, who were at the engines) were sitting in the control room. Whitefield, with half an eye on the Mathematico, led off, and, as usual, talked zoology.

“It’s a little slug-like thing,” he was saying, “found only on Europa. It’s called the Carolus Europis but we always referred to it as the Magnet Worm. It’s about six inches long and has a sort of a slate-grey color-most disgusting thing you could imagine.

“We spent six months studying that worm, though, and I never saw old Mornikoff so excited about anything before. You see, it killed by some sort of magnetic field. You put the Magnet Worm at one end of the room and a caterpillar, say, at the other. You wait about five minutes and the caterpillar just curls up and dies.

“And the funny thing is this. It won’t touch a frog-too big; but if you take that frog and put some sort of iron band about it, that Magnet Worm kills it just like that. That’s why we know it’s some type of magnetic field that does it-the presence of iron more than quadruples its strength.”

His story made quite an impression on us. Joe Brock’s deep bass voice sounded, “I’m damn glad those things are only four inches long, if what you say is right.”

Mac Steeden stretched and then pulled at his grey mustachios with exaggerated indifference, “You call that worm unusual. It isn’t a patch on some of the things I’ve seen in my day-.” He shook his head slowly and reminiscently, and we knew we were in for a long and gruesome tale. Someone groaned hollowly, but Stanley brightened up the minute he saw the old veteran was in a story-telling mood.

Steeden noticed the kid’s sparkling eyes, and addressed himself to the little fellow, “I was with Peewee Wilson when it happened-you’ve heard of Peewee Wilson, haven’t you?”

“Oh, yes,” Stanley’s eyes fairly exuded hero-worship. “I’ve read books about him. He was the greatest spacer there ever was.”

“You bet all the radium on Titan he was, kid. He wasn’t any taller than you, and didn’t scale much more than a hundred pounds, but he was worth five times his weight in Venusian Devils in any fight. And me and him were just like that. He never went anyplace but what I was with him. When the going was toughest it was always me that he turned to.”

He sighed lugubriously, “I was with him to the very end. It was only a broken leg that kept me from going with him on his last voyage-”

He choked off suddenly and a chilly silence swept over all of us. Whitefield’s face went gray, the Captain’s mouth twisted in a funny sort of way, and I felt my heart skid all the way down to the soles of my feet.

No one spoke, but there was only one thought among the six of us. Peewee Wilson’s last trip had been to Callisto. He had been the second-and had never returned. We were the eighth.

Stanley stared from one to the other of us in astonishment, but we all avoided his eyes.

It was Captain Bartlett that recovered first.

“Say, Steeden, you’ve got an old spacesuit of Peewee Wilson’s, haven’t you?” His voice was calm and steady but I could see that it took a great deal of effort to keep it so.

Steeden brightened and looked up. He had been chewing at the tips of his mustachios (he always did when nervous) and now they hung downwards in a bedraggled fashion.

“Sure thing. Captain. He gave it to me with his own hand, he did. It was back in ‘23 when the new steel suits were just being put out. Peewee didn’t have any more use for his old vitri-rubber contraption, so he let me have it-and I’ve kept it ever since. It’s good luck for me.”

“Well, I was thinking that we might fix up that old suit for the boy here. No other suit’ll fit him, and he needs one bad.”

The veteran’s faded eyes hardened and he shook his head vigorously, “No sir. Captain. No one touches that old suit Peewee gave it to me himself. With his own hand! It’s-it’s sacred, that’s what it is.”

The rest of us chimed in immediately upon the Captain’s side but Steeden’s obstinacy grew and hardened. Again and again he would repeat tonelessly, “That old suit stays where it is.” And he would emphasize the statement with a blow of his gnarled fist.

We were about to give up, when Stanley, hitherto discreetly silent, took a hand.

“Please, Mr. Steeden,” there was just the suspicion of a quaver in his voice. “Please let me have it. I’ll take good care of it. I’ll bet if Peewee Wilson were alive today he’d say I could have it.” His blue eyes misted up and his lower lip trembled a bit. The kid was a perfect actor.

Steeden looked irresolute and took to biting his mustachio again, “Well-oh, hell, you’ve all got it in for me. The kid can have it but don’t expect me to fix it up! The rest of you can lose sleep-I wash my hands of it.”

And so Captain Bartlett killed two birds with one stone. He took our minds off Callisto at a time when the morale of the crew hung in the balance and he gave us something to think about for the remainder of the trip-for renovating that ancient relic of a suit was almost a week’s job.

We worked over that antique with a concentration out of all proportion to the importance of the job. In its pettiness, we forgot the steadily growing orb of Callisto. We soldered every | last crack and blister in that venerable suit. We patched the inside with close-meshed aluminum wire. We refurbished the tiny heating unit and installed new tungsten oxygen-containers.

Even the Captain was not above giving us a hand with the suit, and Steeden, after the first day, in spite of his tirade at the beginning, threw himself into the job with a will.

We finished it the day before the scheduled landing, and Stanley, when he tried it on, glowed with pride, while Steeden stood by, grinning and twirling his mustachio.

And as the days passed, the pale blue circle that was Callisto grew upon the visiplate until it took up most of the sky. The last day was an uneasy one. We went about our tasks abstractedly, and studiously avoided the sight of the hard, emotionless satellite ahead.

We dived-in a long, gradually contracting spiral. By this maneuvre, the Captain had hoped to gain some preliminary knowledge of the nature of the planet and its inhabitants, but the information gained was almost entirely negative. The large percentage of carbon dioxide present in the thin, cold atmosphere was congenial to plant life, so that vegetation was plentiful and diversified. However, the three per cent oxygen content seemed to preclude the possibility of any animal life, other than the simplest and most sluggish species. Nor was there any evidence at all of cities or artificial structures of any kind.

Five times we circled Callisto before sighting a large lake, shaped something like a horse’s head. It was towards that lake that we gently lowered ourselves, for the last message of the second expedition-Peewee Wilson’s expedition-spoke of landing near such a lake.

We were still half a mile in the air, when we located the gleaming metal ovoid that was the Phobos, and when we finally thumped softly on to the green stubble of vegetation, we were scarcely five hundred yards from the unfortunate craft.

“Strange,” muttered the Captain, after we had all congregated in the control room, waiting for further orders, “there seems to be no evidence of any violence at all.”

It was true! The Phobos lay quietly, seemingly unharmed. Its old-fashioned steel hull glistened brightly in the yellow light of a gibbous Jupiter, for the scant oxygen of the atmosphere could make no rusty inroads upon its resistant exterior.

The Captain came out of a brown study and turned to Charney at the radio.

“Ganymede has answered?”

“Yes, sir. They wish us luck.” He said it simply, but a cold shiver ran down my spine.

Not a muscle of the Captain’s face flickered. “Have you tried to communicate with the Phobos?”

“No answer, sir.”

“Three of us will investigate the Phobos. Some of the answers, at least, should be there.”

“Matchstickst” grunted Brock, stolidly.

The Captain nodded gravely.

He palmed eight matches, breaking three in half, and extended his arm towards us, without saying a word.

Charney stepped forward and drew first. It was broken and he stepped quietly towards the space-suit rack. Tuley followed and after him Harrigan and Whitefield. Then I, and I drew the second broken match. I grinned and followed Charney, and in thirty seconds, old Steeden himself joined us.

“The ship will be backing you fellows,” said the Captain quietly, as he shook our hands. “If anything dangerous turns up, run for it No heroics now, for we can’t afford to lose men.”

We inspected our pocket Lectronics and left. We didn’t know exactly what to expect and weren’t sure but that our first steps on Callistan soil might not be our last, but none of us hesitated an instant. In the “Dime Spacers,” courage is a very cheap commodity, but it is rather more expensive in real life. And it is with considerable pride that I recall the firm steps with which we three left the protection of the Ceres .

I looked back only once and caught a glimpse of Stanley’s face pressed white against the thick glass of the porthole. Even from a distance, his excitement was only too apparent. Poor kid! For the last two days he had been convinced we were on our way to clean up a pirate stronghold and was almost dying with impatience for the fighting to begin. Of course, none of us cared to disillusion him.

The outer hull of the Phobos rose before us and overshadowed us with its might. The giant vessel lay in the dark green stubble, silent as death. One of the seven that had attempted and failed. And we were the eighth.

Charney broke the uneasy silence, “What are these white smears on the hull?”

He put up a metal-encased finger and rubbed it along the steel plate. He withdrew it and gazed at the soft white pulp upon it. With an involuntary shudder of disgust, he scraped it off upon the coarse grass beneath.

“What do you think it is?”

The entire ship as far as we could see-except for that portion immediately next the ground-was besmeared by a thin layer of the pulpy substance. It looked like dried foam-like-

I said: “It looks like slime left after a giant slug had come out of the lake and slithered over the ship.”

I wasn’t serious in my statement, of course, but the other two cast hasty looks at the mirror-smooth lake in which Jupiter’s image lay unruffled. Charney drew his hand Lectronic.

“Here!” cried Steeden, suddenly, his voice harsh and metallic as it came over the radio, “that’s no way to be talking. We’ve got to find some way of getting into the ship; there must be some break in its hull somewhere. You go around to the right, Charney, and you, Jenkins, to the left. I’ll see if I can’t get atop of this thing somehow.”

Eyeing the smoothly-round hull carefully, he drew back and jumped. On Callisto; of course, he weighed only twenty pounds or less, suit and all, so he rose upwards some thirty or forty feet. He slammed against the hull lightly, and as he started sliding downwards, he grabbed a rivet-head and scrambled to the top.

Waving a parting to Charney at this point, I left.

“Everything all right?” the Captain’s voice sounded thinly in my ear.

“All O.K.,” I replied gruffly, “so far.” And as I said so, the Ceres disappeared behind the convex bulge of the dead Phobos and I was entirely alone upon the mysterious moon.

I pursued my round silently thereafter. The spaceship’s “skin” was entirely unbroken except for the dark, staring portholes, the lowest of which were still well above my head. Once or twice I thought I could see Steeden scrambling monkey-like on top of the smooth hulk, but perhaps that was only fancy.

I reached the prow at last which was bathed in the full light of Jupiter. There, the lowest row of portholes were low enough to see into and as I passed from one to the other, I felt as if I were gazing into a shipful of spectres, for in the ghostly light all objects appeared only as flickering shadows.

It was the last window in the line that proved to be of sudden, overpowering interest. In the yellow rectangle of Jupiter-light stamped upon the floor, there sprawled what remained of a man. His clothes were draped about him loosely and his shirt was ridged as if the ribs below had moulded it into position. In the space between the open shirt collar and engineer’s cap, there showed a grinning, eyeless skull. The cap, resting askew upon the smooth skullcase, seemed to add the last refinement of horror to the sight.

A shout in my ears caused my heart to leap. It was Steeden, exclaiming profanely somewhere above the ship. Almost at once, I caught sight of his ungainly steel-clad body slipping and sliding down the side of the ship.

We raced towards him in long, floating leaps and he waved us on, running ahead of us, towards the lake. At its very shores, he stopped and bent over some half-buried object Two bounds brought us to him, and we saw that the object was a space-suited human, lying face downward. Over it was a thick layer of the same slimy smear that covered the Phobos.

“I caught sight of it from the heights of the ship,” said Steeden, somewhat breathlessly, as he turned the suited figure over.

What we saw caused all three of us to explode in a simultaneous cry. Through the glassy visor, there appeared a leprous countenance. The features were putrescent, fallen apart, as if decay had set in and ceased because of the limited air supply. Here and there a bit of gray bone showed through. It was the most repulsive sight I have ever witnessed, though I have seen many almost as bad.

“My God!” Charney’s voice was half a sob. ‘They simply die and decay.” I told Steeden of the clothed skeleton I had seen through the porthole.

“Damn it, it’s a puzzle,” growled Steeden, “and the answer must be inside the Phobos.” There was a momentary silence, “I tell you what. One of us can go back and get the Captain to dismount the Disintegrator. It ought to be light enough to handle on Callisto, and at low power, we can draw it fine enough to cut a hole without blowing the entire ship to kingdom come. You go, Jenkins. Charney and I will see if we can’t find any more of the poor devils.”

I set off for the Ceres without further urging, covering the ground in space-devouring leaps. Three-quarters of the distance had been covered when a loud shout, ringing metallically in my ear, brought me to a skidding halt. I wheeled. in dismay and remained petrified at the sight before my eyes.

The surface of the lake was broken into boiling foam, and from it there reared the fore-parts of what appeared to be giant caterpillars. They squirmed out upon land, dirty-grey bodies dripping slime and water. They were some four feet long, about one foot in thickness, and their method of locomotion was the slowest of oxygen-conserving crawls. Except for one stalky growth upon their forward end, the tip of which glowed a faint red, they were absolutely featureless.

Even as I watched, their numbers increased, until the shore became one heaving mass of sickly gray flesh.

Charney and Steeden were running towards the Ceres , but less than half the distance had been covered when they stumbled, their run slowing to a blind stagger. Even that ceased, and almost together they fell to their knees.

Charney’s voice sounded faintly in my ear, “Get help! My head is splitting. I can’t move! I-” Both lay still now.

I started towards them automatically, but a sudden sharp pang just over my temples staggered me, and for a moment I stood confused.

Then I heard a sudden unearthly shout from Whitefield, “Get back to the ship, Jenkins! Get back! Get back!”

I turned to obey, for the pain had increased into a continuous tearing pain. I weaved and reeled as I approached the yawning airlock, and I believe that I was at the point of collapse when I finally fell into it. After that, I can recall only a jumble for quite a period.

My next clear impression was of the control-room of the Ceres . Someone had dragged the suit off me, and I gazed about me in dismay at a scene of the utmost confusion. My brain was still somewhat addled and Captain Bartlett as he leant over me appeared double.

“Do you know what those damnable creatures are?” He pointed outwards at the giant caterpillars.

I shook my head mutely.

“They’re the great grand-daddies of the Magnet Worm Whitefield was telling us of once. Do you remember the Magnet Worm?”

I nodded, “The one that kills by a magnetic field which is strengthened by surrounding iron.”

“Damn it, yes,” cried Whitefield, interrupting suddenly. “I’ll swear to it. If it wasn’t for the lucky chance that our hull is beryl-tungsten and not steel-like the Phobos and the rest-every last one of us would be unconscious by now and dead before long.”

“Then that’s the Callistan menace.” My voice rose in sudden dismay, “But what of Charney and Steeden?”

“They’re sunk,” muttered the Captain grimly. “Unconscious -maybe dead. Those filthy worms are crawling towards them and there’s nothing we can do about it.” He ticked off the points on his fingers. “We can’t go after them in a spacesuit without signing our own death warrant-spacesuits are steel. No one can last there and back without one. We have no weapons with a beam fine enough to blast the Worms without scorching Charney and Steeden as well. I’ve thought of maneuvering the Ceres nearer and making a dash for it, but one can’t handle a spaceship on planetary surfaces like that-not without cracking up. We-”

“In short,” I interrupted hollowly, “we’ve got to stand here and watch them die.” He nodded and I turned away bitterly.

I felt a slight twitch upon my sleeve, and when I turned, it was to find Stanley’s wide blue eyes staring up at me. In the excitement, I had forgotten about him, and now I regarded him bad-temperedly.

“What is it?” I snapped.

“Mr. Jenkins,” his eyes were red, and I think he would have preferred pirates to Magnet Worms by a good deal, “Mr. Jenkins, maybe I could go and get Mr. Charney and Mr. Steeden.”

I sighed, and turned away.

“But, Mr. Jenkins, I could. I heard what Mr. Whitefield said, and my spacesuit isn’t steel. It’s vitri-rubber.”

“The kid’s right,” whispered Whitefield slowly, when Stanley repeated his offer to the assembled men. “The unstrengthened field doesn’t harm us, that’s evident. He’d be safe in a vitri-rubber suit.”

“But it’s a wreck, that suit!” objected the Captain. “I never really intended having the kid use it.” He ended raggedly and his manner was evidently irresolute.

“We can’t leave Neal and Mac out there without trying, Captain,” said Brock stolidly.

The Captain made up his mind suddenly and became a whirlwind of action. He dived into the space-suit rack for the battered relic himself, and helped Stanley into it.

“Get Steeden first,” said the Captain, as he clipped shut the last bolt. “He’s older and has less resistance to the field. -Good luck to you, kid, and if you can’t make it, come back right away. Right away, do you hear me?”

Stanley sprawled at the first step, but life on Ganymede had inured him to below-normal gravities and he recovered quickly. There was no sign of hesitation, as he leaped towards the two prone figures, and we breathed easier. Evidently, the magnetic field was not affecting him yet.

He had one of the suited figures over his shoulders now and was proceeding back to the ship at an only slightly slower pace. As he dropped his burden inside the airlock, he waved an arm to us at the window and we waved back. He had scarcely left, when we had Steeden inside. We ripped the spacesuit off him and laid him out, a gaunt pale figure, on the couch.

The Captain bent an ear to his chest and suddenly laughed aloud in sudden relief, “The old geezer’s still going strong.”

We crowded about happily at hearing that, all eager to place a finger upon his wrist and so assure ourselves of the life within him. His face twitched, and when a low, blurred voice suddenly whispered, “So I said to Peewee, I said-” our last doubts were put to rest.

It was a sudden, sharp cry from Whitefield that drew us back to the window again, “Something’s wrong with the kid.”

Stanley was half way back to the ship with his second burden, but he was staggering now-progressing erratically.

“It can’t be,” whispered Whitefield, hoarsely, “it can’t be. The field can’t be getting him!”

“God!” the Captain tore at his hair wildly, “that damned antique has no radio. He can’t tell us what’s wrong.” He wrenched away suddenly. “I’m going after him. Field or no field, I’m going to get him.”

“Hold on. Captain,” said Tuley, grabbing him by the arm, “he may make it.”

Stanley was running again, but in a curious weaving fashion that made it quite plain, he didn’t see where he was going. Two or three times he slipped and fell but each time he managed to scramble up again. He fell against the hull of the ship, at last, and felt wildly about for the yawning airlock. We shouted and prayed and sweated, but could help in no way.

And then he simply disappeared. He had come up against the lock and fallen inside.

We had them both inside in record time, and divested them of their suits. Charney was alive, we saw that at a glance, and after that we deserted him unceremoniously for Stanley. The blue of his face, his swollen tongue, the line of fresh “blood running from nose to chin told its own story.

“The suit sprung a leak,” said Harrigan.

“Get away from him,” ordered the Captain, “give him air.”

We waited. Finally, a soft moan from the kid betokened returning consciousness and we all grinned in concert.

“Spunky little kid,” said the Captain. “He travelled that last hundred yards on nerve and nothing else.” Then, again. “Spunky little kid. He’s going to get a Naval Medal for this, if I have to give him my own.”

Callisto was a shrinking blue ball on the televisor-an ordinary unmysterious world. Stanley Fields, honorary Captain of the good ship Ceres , thumbed his nose at it, protruding his tongue at the same time. An inelegant gesture, but the symbol of Man’s triumph over a hostile Solar System.

As I reread the story now (it’s the first time I’ve reread it since it was published) I am amused to see that my stowaway youngster’s name is Stanley. That is the name of my younger brother, who was only nine when I wrote the story (the same younger brother who was the subject of my Boys’ High essay, and who is now Assistant Publisher of the Long Island Newsday). Why it is necessary to use “real names” I don’t know, but almost every beginning writer does so, I suspect.

You will notice that there are no girls in the story. This is not really surprising. At eighteen I was busy finishing college and working in my father’s candy store and handling a paper delivery route morning and evening, and I had actually never had time to have a date. I didn’t know anything at all about girls (except for such biology as I got out of books and from other, more knowledgeable, boys).

I eventually had dates and I eventually introduced girls into my stories, but the early imprinting had its effect. To this very day, the romantic element in my stories is minor and the sexual element virtually nil.

On the other hand, I wonder if the above explanation for the lack of sex in my stories is not an oversimplification. After all, I am also a teetotaler and yet I notice that my characters drink Martian Jabra water (whatever that is).

My knowledge of astronomy was quite respectable but I let myself be overinfluenced by the conventions common in the science fiction of that era. All worlds were Earthlike and inhabited in those days, so I gave Callisto an atmosphere containing a small quantity of free oxygen. I also gave it running water, and both plant and animal life. All of this is, of course, unlikely in the extreme, and what evidence we have seems to make of Callisto an airless, waterless world like our Moon (and, of course, I really knew this even back then).

Back to my third story, now-

On July 30, 1938, only eight days after Campbell’s second rejection, I had finished my third story, “Marooned off Vesta.” I did not think it politic to see Campbell oftener than once a month, however, since I suspected that I might easily wear out my welcome if I did. I put “Marooned off Vesta” to one side, therefore, and began to write other stories. By the end of the month I had two more: “This Irrational Planet” and “Ring Around the Sun.”

My first three stories, including “Marooned off Vesta,” had been typed on a very old, but completely serviceable Underwood No. 5 typewriter, which my father had obtained for me in 1936 for ten dollars. After I had submitted my second story to Campbell, however, my father decided that I was in earnest about a writing career, and feeling that my failure to sell was irrelevant and, in any case, temporary, he set about getting me a brand-new typewriter.

On August 10, 1938, a Smith-Corona portable entered the house and it was on the new typewriter that my fourth and fifth stories were written.

Of the three, I felt “This Irrational Planet” to be the weakest, so I did not submit it to Campbell. I submitted it directly to Thrilling Wonder Stories on August 26, and it was not rejected till September 24. Campbell had spoiled me, and the four-week interval between submission and rejection appalled me. I even called during that interval to make an indignant inquiry-not knowing that a mere four-week wait was brief indeed for anyone but Campbell.

But at least the rejection, when it came, was typewritten ‘ and was not a printed form. What’s more, it contained the sentence, “Try us again, won’t you?” That encouraged me. Perhaps I underestimated the story. Buoyantly, I tried Campbell, and he rejected it in six days. Five other magazines rejected it afterward. I never did sell it, and “This Irrational Planet” is also nonexistent now. I don’t even remember the plot, except that I’m pretty certain that the planet of the title was Earth itself. (The only other information I have about it is that it was quite short, only three thousand words long. Actually, most of the stories of those early years that I never sold, and no longer exist, were short. The longest was the first, “Cosmic Corkscrew.”)

The other two stories written in the same month were reserved for a better fate, but it didn’t seem so at first On August 30, 1938, I visited Campbell for the third time and submitted both “Marooned off Vesta” and “Ring Around the Sun”-and both were returned to me on September 8.

The very next day I shipped off “Marooned off Vesta,” which I felt to be the better of the two, to Amazing Stories . It took a month and a half to hear from them, but this time the wait was worth it. On October 21, 1938, there came a letter of acceptance from Raymond A. Palmer, who was then editor of Amazing and who has since achieved his greatest fame as a leading figure in the flying saucers craze and in other forms of occultism. To this day I have never met Mr. Palmer personally.

It was my first acceptance, four months to the day after my first visit to John Campbell. By that time I had written six stories and had collected nine rejections from Various magazines. The check, for $64 (one cent a word), followed on October 31, and that was the first money I ever earned as a professional writer. [In this book, I am going to pay considerable attention to the money I received for my stories. This is not because I write primarily for money or regarded money as particularly important either then or now (my publishers will gladly bear witness to this). The money I received, however, was crucial in determining my career. It paid enough to put me through school and not so much as to lure me out of it. You’ll see as we go along.]

For a number of years I kept that first acceptance letter, from Palmer, framed on my bedroom wall. But in the vicissitudes of life, it, too, has disappeared and, yes, I’m sorry.

The story appeared in the March 1939 issue of Amazing Stories , which reached the newsstands on January 10, 1939, just eight days after my nineteenth birthday. It was the first occasion on which I ever appeared professionally, and I still have an intact copy of that issue of the magazine. I did not save one at the time (my sense of historical importance, as I have already explained, is deficient) but eventually removed my story for binding and discarded the rest. Ordinarily, I don’t mind doing this and have done it ruthlessly through all the years (space is limited even in the best of apartments when one is as prolific as I have been), but the time came when I was sorry I hadn’t saved that first one intact. The well-known science fiction fan Forrest J Ackerman heard me express regret and kindly sent me a copy in excellent condition.

That copy, by the way, contains a little autobiographical squib in the rear, written by my teen-age self. On rereading, years later, it turned out to be exquisitely embarrassing.

“Marooned off Vesta” is not included here, since it appeared in Asimov’s Mysteries . (This doesn’t mean it was a mystery. The reason for its inclusion in that particular collection is explained there. -Well, go ahead, buy the book and satisfy your curiosity.)

As for “Ring Around the Sun,” it was rejected by Thrilling Wonder Stories , but then, on February 5, 1939, it was accepted by Future Fiction , one of the new science fiction magazines that were springing up.

It appeared in the second issue of that magazine, which did not, however, reach the stands until nearly a year after the sale. The payment (theoretically on publication, rather than on acceptance as was Campbell’s more civilized procedure) was even more delayed. What’s more, it was at the rate of only half a cent a word, so the check came to a mere twenty-five dollars. Astonishing Stories also paid only half a cent a word at that time, but “The Callistan Menace” was the longer story-6,500 words-so it netted me $32.50.

I didn’t feel put upon, however. I well knew by that time that in the still earlier history of science fiction magazines, payment of a quarter of a cent a word was common, and that not on publication but (the saying went) on lawsuit. Besides, those were lean times, and twenty-five dollars represented something like five months’ pocket money to me (no kidding).

The editor of Future Fiction was, at that time, Charles D. Hornig. I occasionally visited his office to inquire when a story might appear, or when a check might, but I don’t recall ever having found him in. In fact, to this day I have never, to my knowledge, met him.

Ring Around the Sun

Jimmy Turner was humming merrily, if a bit raucously, when he entered the reception room.

“Is Old Sourpuss in?” he asked, accompanying the question with a wink at which the pretty secretary blushed gratefully.

“He is; and waiting for you.” She motioned him towards the door on which was written in fat, black letters, “Frank McCutcheon, General Manager, United Space Mail.”

Jim entered. “Hello, Skipper, what now?”

“Oh, it’s you, is it?” McCutcheon looked up from his desk, champing a foul-smelling stogie. “Sit down.”

McCutcheon stared at him from under bushy gray eyebrows. “Old Sourpuss,” as he was euphoniously known to all members of United Space Mail, had never been known to laugh within the memory of the oldest inmate, though rumor did have it that when a child he had smiled at the sight of his father falling out of an apple-tree. Right now his expression made the rumor appear exaggerated.

“Now, listen. Turner,” he barked, “United Space Mail is inaugurating a new service and you’re elected to blaze the trail.” Disregarding Jimmy’s grimace, he continued, “From now on the Venerian mail is on an all-year-round basis.”

“What! I’ve always thought that it was ruinous from a financial standpoint to deliver the Venerian. mail except when it was this side of the Sun.”

“Sure,” admitted McCutcheon, “if we follow the ordinary routes. But we might cut straight across the system if we could only get near enough to the sun. That’s where you come in! They’ve put out a new ship equipped to approach within twenty million miles of the sun and which will be able to remain at that distance indefinitely.”

Jimmy interrupted nervously, “Wait a while, S-Mr. McCutcheon, I don’t quite follow. What kind of a ship is this?”

“How do you expect me to know? I’m no fugitive from a laboratory. From what they tell me, it emits some kind of a field that bends the radiations of the sun around the ship. Get it? It’s all deflected. No heat reaches you. You can stay there forever and be cooler than in New York.”

“Oh, is that so?” Jimmy was skeptical. “Has it been tested, or is that a little detail that has been left for me?”

“It’s been tested, of course, but not under actual solar conditions.”

“Then it’s out. I’ve done plenty for United, but this is the limit. I’m not crazy, yet.”

McCutcheon stiffened. “Must I recall the oath you took upon entering the service. Turner? ‘Our flight through space-’ “

“‘-must ne’er be stopped by anything save death,’“ finished Jimmy. “I know that as well as you do and I also notice that it’s very easy to quote that from a comfortable armchair. If you’re that idealistic, you can do it yourself. It’s still out, as far as I’m concerned. And if you want, you can kick me out. I can get other jobs just like that,” he snapped his fingers airily.

McCutcheon’s voice dropped to a silky whisper. “Now, now. Turner, don’t be hasty. You haven’t heard all I have to say yet. Roy Snead is to be your mate.”

“Huh! Snead! Why, that four-flusher wouldn’t have the guts to take a job like this in a million years. Tell me some other fairy tale.”

“Well, as a matter of fact, he has already accepted. I thought you might accompany him, but I guess he was right. He insisted you’d back down. I thought at first you wouldn’t.”

McCutcheon waved him away and bent his eyes unconcernedly on the report he had been scrutinizing at the time of Jimmy’s entrance. Jimmy wheeled, hesitated, then returned.

“Wait a while, Mr. McCutcheon; do you mean to say that Roy is actually going?” McCutcheon nodded, still apparently absorbed in other matters, and Jimmy exploded, “Why, that low-down, spindle-shanked, dish-faced mug! So he thinks I’m too yellow to go! Well, I’ll show him. I’ll take the job and I’ll put up ten dollars to a Venerian nickel that he gets sick at the last minute.”

“Good!” McCutcheon rose and shook hands, “I thought you’d see reason. Major Wade has all the details. I think you leave in about six weeks and as I’m leaving for Venus tomorrow, you’ll probably meet me there.”

Jimmy left, still boiling, and McCutcheon buzzed for the secretary. “Oh, Miss Wilson, get Roy Snead on the ‘visor.”

A few minutes’ pause and then the red signal-light shone. The ‘visor was clicked on and the dark-haired, dapper Snead appeared on the visi-plate.

“Hello, Snead,” McCutcheon growled. “You lose that bet, Turner accepted that job. I thought he’d laugh himself sick when I told him you said he wouldn’t go. Send over the twenty dollars, please.”

“Wait a while, Mr. McCutcheon,” Snead’s face was dark with fury, “what’s the idea of telling that punch-drunk imbecile I’m not going? You must have, you double-crosser. I’ll be there all right, but you can put up another twenty and I’ll bet he changes his mind yet. But /’// be there.” Roy Snead was still spluttering when McCutcheon clicked off.

The General Manager leaned back, threw away his mangled cigar, and lit a fresh one. His face remained sour, but there was a definite note of satisfaction in his tone when he said, “Ha! I thought that would get them.”

It was a tired and sweaty pair that blasted the good ship Helios across Mercury’s orbit. In spite of the perfunctory friendship enforced upon them by the weeks alone in space, Jimmy Turner and Roy Snead were scarcely on speaking terms. Add to this hidden hostility, the heat of the bloated sun and the torturing uncertainty of the final outcome of the trip and you have a miserable pair indeed.

Jimmy peered tiredly at the maze of dials confronting him, and, brushing a damp lock of hair from his eyes, grunted, “What’s the thermometer reading now, Roy?”

“One hundred twenty-five degrees Fahrenheit and still climbing,” was the growled response.

Jimmy cursed fluently, “The cooling system is on at maximum, the ship’s hull reflects 95% of the solar radiation, and it’s still in the hundred twenties.” He paused. “The gravometer indicates that we’re still some thirty-five million miles from the Sun. Fifteen millions miles to go before the Deflection Field becomes effective. The temperature will probably scale 150 yet. That’s a sweet prospect! Check the desiccators. If the air isn’t kept absolutely dry, we’re not going to last long.”

“Within Mercury’s orbit, think of it!” Snead’s voice was husky. “No one has ever been this close to the sun before. And we’re going closer yet.”

“There have been many this close and closer,” reminded Jimmy, “but they were out of control and landed in the sun. Friedlander, Debuc, Anton-” His voice trailed into a brooding silence,

Roy stirred uneasily. “How effective is this Deflection Field anyway, Jimmy? Your cheerful thoughts aren’t very soothing, you know.”

“Well, it’s been tested under the harshest conditions laboratory technicians could devise. I’ve watched them. It’s been bathed in radiation approximating the sun’s at a distance of twenty million. The Field worked like a charm. The light was bent about it so that the ship became invisible. The men inside the ship claimed that everything outside became invisible and that no heat reached them. A funny thing, though, the Field will work only under certain radiation strengths.”

“Well, I wish it were over one way or the other,” Roy glowered. “If Old Sourpuss is thinking of making this my regular run-, well, he’ll lose his ace pilot.”

“He’ll lose his two ace pilots,” Jimmy corrected.

The two lapsed into silence and the Helios blasted on.

The temperature climbed: 130, 135, 140. Then, three days later, with the mercury quivering at 148, Roy announced that they were approaching the critical belt, the belt where the solar radiation reached sufficient intensity to energize the Field.

The two waited, minds at feverish concentration, pulses pounding.

“Will it happen suddenly?”

“I don’t know. We’ll have to wait.”

From the portholes, only the stars were visible. The sun, three times the size as seen from Earth, poured its blinding rays upon opaque metal, for on this specially designed ship, portholes closed automatically when struck by powerful radiation.

And then the stars began disappearing. Slowly, at first, the dimmest faded-then the brighter ones: Polaris, Regulus, Arcturus, Sirius. Space was uniformly black.

“It’s working,” breathed Jimmy. The words were scarcely out of his mouth, when the sunward portholes clicked open. The sun was gone!

“Ha! I feel cooler already,” Jimmy Turner was jubilant. “Boy, it worked like a charm. You know, if they could adjust this Deflection field to all radiation strengths, we would have perfected invisibility. It would make a convenient war weapon.” He lit a cigarette and leaned back luxuriously.

“But meanwhile we’re flying blind,” Roy insisted.

Jimmy grinned patronizingly, “You needn’t worry about that, Dishface. I’ve taken care of everything. We’re in an orbit about the sun. In two weeks, we’ll be on the opposite side and then I’ll let the rockets blast and out of this band we go, zooming towards Venus.” He was very self-satisfied indeed.

“Just leave it to Jimmy ‘Brains’ Turner. I’ll have us through in two months, instead of the regulation six. You’re with United’s ace pilot, now.”

Roy laughed nastily. “To listen to you, you’d think you did all the work. All you’re doing is to run the ship on the course I’ve plotted. You’re the mechanic; I’m the brains.”

“Oh, is that so? Any damn pilot-school rookie can plot a course. It takes a man to navigate one.”

“Well, that’s your opinion. Who’s paid more, though, the navigator or the course-plotter?”

Jimmy gulped on that one and Roy stalked triumphantly out of the pilot room. Unmindful of all this, the Helios blasted on.

For two days, all was serene; then, on the third day. Jimmy inspected the thermometer, scratched his head and looked worried. Roy entered, watched the proceedings and raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“Is anything wrong?” He bent over and read the height of the thin, red column. “Just 100 degrees. That’s nothing to look like a sick goat over. From your expression, I thought something had gone wrong with the Deflection Field and that it was rising again,” he turned away with an ostentatious yawn.

“Oh, shut up, you senseless ape,” Jimmy’s foot lifted in a half-hearted attempt at a kick. “I’d feel a lot better if the temperature were rising. This Deflection Field is working a lot too good for my liking.”

“Huh! What do you mean?”

“I’ll explain, and if you listen carefully you may understand me. This ship is built like a vacuum bottle. It gains heat only with the greatest of difficulty and loses it likewise.” He paused and let his words sink in. “At ordinary temperatures this ship is not supposed to lose more than two degrees a day if no outside sources of heat are supplied. Perhaps at the temperature at which we were, the loss might amount to five degrees a day. Do you get me?”

Roy’s mouth was open wide and Jimmy continued. “Now this blasted ship has lost fifty degrees in less than three days.”

“But that’s impossible.”

“There it is.” Jimmy pointed ironically. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong. It’s that damn Field. It acts as a repulsive agent towards electromagnetic radiations and somehow is hastening the loss of heat of our ship.”

Roy sank into thought and did some rapid mental calculations. “If what you say is true,” he said at length, “we’ll hit freezing point in five days and then spend a week in what amounts to winter weather.”

“That’s right. Even allowing for the decrease in heat-loss as the temperature is lowered, we’ll probably end up with the mercury anywhere between thirty and forty below.”

Roy gulped unhappily. “And at twenty million miles away from the sun!”

“That isn’t the worst,” Jimmy pointed out. “This ship, like all others used for travel within the orbit of Mars, has no heating system. With the sun shining like fury and no way to lose heat except by ineffectual radiation, Mars and Venus space-ships have always specialized in cooling systems. We, for instance, have a very efficient refrigeration device.”

“We’re in a devil of a fix, then. The same applies to our space suits.”

In spite of the still roasting temperature, the two were beginning to experience a few anticipatory chills.

“Say, I’m not going to stand this,” Roy burst out. “I vote we get out of here right now and head for Earth. They can’t expect more of us.”

“Go ahead! You’re the pilot. Can you plot a course at this distance from the sun and guarantee that we won’t fall into the sun?”

“Hell! I hadn’t thought of that.”

The two were at their wits’ end. Communication via radio had been impossible ever since they had passed Mercury’s orbit. The sun was at sunspot maximum and static had drowned out all attempts.

So they settled down to wait.

The next few days were taken up entirely with thermometer watching, with a few minutes taken out here and there when one of the two happened to think of an unused malediction to hurl at the head of Mr. Frank McCutcheon. Eating and sleeping were indulged in, but not enjoyed.

And meanwhile, the Helios , entirely unconcerned in the plight of its occupants, blasted on.

As Roy had predicted, the temperature passed the red line marked “Freezing” towards the end of their seventh day in the Deflection Belt. The two were remarkably unhappy when this happened even though they had expected it.

Jimmy had drawn off about a hundred gallons of water from the tank. With this he had filled almost every vessel on board.

“It might,” he pointed out, “save the pipes from bursting when the water freezes. And if they do, as is probable, it is just as well that we supply ourselves with plenty of available water. We have to stay here another week, you know.”

And on the next day, the eighth, the water froze. There were the buckets, overflowing with ice, standing chill and bluecold. The two gazed at them forlornly. Jimmy broke one open.

“Frozen solid,” he said bleakly and wrapped another sheet about himself.

It was hard to think of anything but the increasing cold now. Roy and Jimmy had requisitioned every sheet and blanket on the ship, after having put on three or four shirts and a like number of pairs of pants.

They kept in bed for as long as they were able, and when forced to move out, they huddled near the small oil-burner for warmth. Even this doubtful pleasure was soon denied them, for, as Jimmy remarked, “the oil supply is extremely limited and we will need the burner to thaw out the water and food.”

Tempers were short and clashes frequent, but the common misery kept them from actually jumping on each other’s throats. It was on the tenth day, however, that the two, united by a common hatred, suddenly became friends.

The temperature was hovering down near the zero point, making up its mind to descend into the minus regions. Jimmy was huddled in a corner thinking of the times back in New York when he had complained of the August heat and wondered how he could have done so. Roy, meanwhile, had manipulated numb fingers long enough to calculate that they would have to endure the coldness for exactly 6354 minutes more.

He regarded the figures with distaste and read them off to Jimmy. The latter Scowled and grunted, ”The way I feel, I’m not going to last 54 minutes, let alone 6354.” Then, impatiently, “I wish you could manage to think of some way of getting us out of this.”

“If we weren’t so near the sun,” suggested Roy, “we might start the rear blasts and hurry us up.”

“Yes, and if we landed in the sun, we’d be nice and warm. You’re a big help!”

“Well, you’re the one that calls himself ‘Brains’ Turner. You think of something. The way you talk, you’d think all this was my fault.”

“It certainly is, you donkey in human clothing! My better judgment told me all along not to go on this fool trip. When McCutcheon proposed it, I refused pointblank. I know better.” Jimmy was very bitter. “So what happened? Like the fool you are, you accept and rush in where sensible men fear to tread. And then, of course. I naturally had to tag along.

“Why, do you know what I should have done,” Jimmy’s voice ascended the scale, “I should have let you go alone and freeze and then sat down by a roaring fire all by myself and gloated. That is, if I had known what was going to happen.”

A hurt and surprised look appeared on Roy’s face. “Is that so? So that’s how it is! Well, all I can say is that you certainly have a genius for twisting facts, if for nothing else. The fact of the matter is that you were unutterably stupid enough to accept and I the poor fellow raked in by the force of circumstances.”

Jimmy’s expression was one of the utmost disdain. “Evidently the cold has driven you batty, though I admit it wouldn’t take much to knock the little sense you possess out of you.”

“Listen,” Roy answered hotly. “On October 10th, McCutcheon called me up on the ‘visor and told me you had accepted and laughed at me for a yellow-belly for refusing to go. Do you deny that?”

“Yes, I do, and unconditionally. On October 10, Sourpass told me that you had decided to go and had bet him that-”

Jimmy’s voice faded away very suddenly and a shocked look spread over his face. “Say-, are you sure McCutcheon told you I had agreed to go?”

A chill, clammy feeling clutched at Roy’s heart when he caught Jimmy’s drift, a feeling that drowned out the numbness of the cold.

“Absolutely,” he answered. “I’ll swear to that. That’s why I went.”

“But he told me you had accepted and that’s why / went.” Jimmy felt very stupid all at once.

The two fell into a protracted and ominous silence which was broken at length by Roy, who spoke in a voice that quivered with emotion.

“Jimmy, we’ve been the victims of a contemptible, dirty, lowdown, doublecrossing trick.” His eyes dilated with fury. “We’ve been cheated, robbed-,” words failed him but he kept on uttering meaningless sounds, indicative mainly of devouring rage.

Jimmy was cooler, but none the less vindictive, “You’re right, Roy; McCutcheon has done us dirty. He has plumbed the depths of human iniquity. But we’ll get even. When we get through in 6300 odd minutes, we will have a score to settle with Mr. McCutcheon.”

“What are we going to do?” Roy’s eyes were filled with a bloodthirsty joy.

“On the spur of the moment, I suggest that we simply tear into him and rend him into tiny, little pieces.”

“Not gruesome enough. How about boiling him in oil?”

“That’s reasonable, yes; but it might take too long. Let’s give him a good old-fashioned beating-with brass knuckles.”

Roy rubbed his hands. “We’ll have lots of time to think up some really adequate measures. The dirty. God-forsaken, yellow-livered, leprous-” The rest verged fluently into the unprintable.

And for four more days, the temperature dove. It was on the fourteenth and last day that the mercury froze, the solid red shaft pointed its congealed finger at forty below.

On this terrible last day, they had lit the oil-burner, using their entire scanty supply of oil. Shivering and more than half frozen, they crouched close, attempting to extract every last drop of heat.

Jimmy had found a pair of ear-muffs several days before in some obscure corner, and it now changed hands at the end of every hour. Both sat buried under a small mountain of blankets, chafing chilled hands and feet. With every passing minute, their conversation, concerning McCutcheon almost exclusively, grew more vitriolic.

“Always quoting that triply-damned slogan of the Space Mail: ‘Our flight through sp-’ “ Jimmy choked with impotent fury.

“Yes, and always rubbing holes in chairs instead of coming out here and doing something like a man’s work, the rotten so-and-so,” agreed Roy.

“Well, we’re due to pass out of the deflection zone in two hours. Then three weeks and we’ll be on Venus,” said Jimmy, sneezing.

“That can’t be too soon for me,” answered Sneed, who had been sniffling for the last two days. “I’m never taking another space trip except maybe the one that takes me back to Earth. After this, I make my living growing bananas in Central America. A fellow can be decently warm out there at least.”

“We might not get off Venus, after what we’re going to do to McCutcheon.”

“No, you’re right there. But that’s all right. Venus is even warmer than Central America and that’s all I care about.”

“We have no legal worries either,” Jimmy sneezed again. “On Venus, life imprisonment’s the limit for first-degree murder. A nice,-warm dry cell for the rest of my life. What could be sweeter?”

The second hand on the chronometer whirled at its even pace; the minutes ticked off. Roy’s hands hovered lovingly over the lever that would set off the right rear blasts which would drive the Helios out away from the sun and from that terrible Deflection Zone.

And at last, “Go!” shouted Jimmy eagerly. “Let her blast!”

With a deep reverberating roar, the rockets fired. The Helios trembled from stem to stern. The pilots felt the acceleration press them back into their seats and were happy. In a matter of minutes, the sun would shine again and they would be warm, feel the blessed heat once more.

It happened before they were aware of it. There was a momentary flash of light and then a grinding and a click, as the sunward portholes closed.

“Look,” cried Roy, “the stars! We’re out of it!” He cast an ecstatically happy glance at the thermometer. “Well, old boy, from now on we go up again.” He pulled the blankets about him closer, for the cold still lingered.

There were two men in Frank McCutcheon’s office at the Venus branch of the United Space Mail: McCutcheon himself and the elderly, white-haired Zebulon Smith, inventor of the Deflection Field. Smith was talking.

“But Mr. McCutcheon, it is really of great importance that I learn exactly how my Deflection Field worked. Surely they have transmitted all possible information to you.”

McCutcheon’s face was a study in dourness as he bit the edge off one of his two-for-five cigars and lit it.

“That, my dear Mr. Smith,” he said, “is exactly what they did not do. Ever since they have receded far enough from the sun to render communication possible, I have been sending requests for information regarding the practicability of the Field. They just refuse to answer. They say it worked and that they’re alive and that they’ll give the details when they reach Venus. That’s all!”

Zebulon Smith sighed in disappointment. “Isn’t that a bit unusual; insubordination, so to speak? I thought they were required to be complete in their reports and to give any requested details.”

“So they are. But these are my ace pilots and rather temperamental. We have to extend some leeway. Besides, I tricked them into going on this trip, a very hazardous one, as you know, and so am inclined to be lenient.”

“Well, then, I suppose I must wait.”

“Oh, it won’t be for long,” McCutcheon assured him. “They’re due today, and I assure you that as soon as I get in touch with them, I shall send you the full details. After all, they survived for two weeks at a distance of twenty million miles from the sun, so your invention is a success. That should satisfy you.”

Smith had scarcely left when McCutcheon’s secretary entered with a puzzled frown on her face.

“Something is wrong with the two pilots of the Helios , Mr. McCutcheon,” she informed him. “I have just received a bulletin from Major Wade at Pallas City, where they landed. They have refused to attend the celebration prepared for them, but instead immediately chartered a rocket to come here, refusing to state the reason. When Major Wade tried to stop them, they became violent, he says.” She laid the communication down on his desk.

McCutcheon glanced at it perfunctorily. “Hmm! they do seem confoundedly temperamental. Well, send them to me when they come. I’ll snap them out of it.”

It was perhaps three hours later that the problem of the two misbehaving pilots again forced itself upon his mind, this time by a sudden commotion that had arisen in the reception room. He heard the deep angry tones of two men and then the shrill remonstrances of his secretary. Suddenly the door burst open and Jim Turner and Roy Snead strode in.

Roy coolly closed the door and planted his back against it.

“Don’t let anyone disturb me until I’m through,” Jimmy told him.

“No one’s getting through this door for a while,” Roy answered grimly, “but remember, you promised to leave some for me.”

McCutcheon said nothing during all this, but when he saw Turner casually draw a pair of brass knuckles from his pocket and put them on with a determined air, he decided that it was time to call a halt to the comedy.

“Hello, boys,” he said, with a heartiness unusual in him. “Glad to see you again. Take a seat.”

Jimmy ignored the offer. “Have you anything to say, any last request, before I start operations?” He gritted his teeth with an unpleasant scraping noise.

“Well, if you put it that way,” said McCutcheon, “I might ask exactly what this is all about-if I’m not being too unreasonable. Perhaps the Deflector was inefficient and you had a hot trip.”

The only answer to that was a loud snort from Roy and a cold stare on the part of Jimmy.

“First,” said the latter, “what was the idea of that filthy, disgusting cheat you pulled on us?”

McCutcheon’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “Do you mean the little white lies I told you in order to get you to go? Why, that was nothing. Common business practice, that’s all. Why, I pull worse things than that every day and people consider it just routine. Besides, what harm did it do you?”

“Tell him about our ‘pleasant trip,’ Jimmy,” urged Roy.

“That’s exactly what I’m going to do,” was the response. He turned to McCutcheon and assumed a martyr-like air. “First, on this blasted trip, we fried in a temperature that reached 150 but that was to be expected and we’re not complaining; we were half Mercury’s distance from the sun.

“But after that, we entered this zone where the light bends around us; incoming radiation sank to zero and we started losing heat and not just a degree a day the way we learned it in pilot school.” He paused to breathe a few novel curses he had just thought of, then continued.

““In three days, we were down to a hundred and in a week down to freezing. Then for one entire week, seven long days, we drove through our course at sub-freezing temperature. It was so cold the last day that the mercury froze.” Turner’s voice rose till it cracked, and at the door, a fit of self-pity caused Roy to catch his breath with an audible gulp. McCutcheon remained inscrutable.

Jimmy continued. “There we were without a heating system, in fact, no heat of any kind, not even any warm clothing. We froze, damn it; we had to thaw out our food and melt our water. We were stiff, couldn’t move. It was hell, I tell you, in reverse temperature.” He paused, at a loss for words.

Roy Snead took up the burden. “We were twenty million miles away from the sun and I had a case of frost-bitten ears. Frost-bitten, I say.” He shook his fist viciously under McCutcheon’s nose. “And it was your fault. You tricked us into it! While we were freezing, we promised ourselves that we’d come back and get you and we’re going to keep that promise.” He turned to Jimmy. “Go ahead, start it, will you? We’ve wasted enough time.”

“Hold it, hoys,” McCutcheon spoke at last. “Let me get this straight. You mean to say that the Deflection Field worked so well that it kept all the radiation away and sucked out what heat there was in the ship in the first place?” Jimmy grunted a curt assent.

“And you froze for a week because of that?” McCutcheon continued.

Again the grunt.

And then a very strange and unusual thing happened. McCutcheon, “Old, Sourpuss,” the man without the “risus” muscle, smiled. He actually bared his teeth in a grin. And what’s more, the grin grew wider and wider until finally a rusty, long-unused chuckle was heard louder and louder, until it developed into a full-fledged laugh, and the laugh into a bellow. In one stentorian burst, McCutcheon made up for a lifetime of sour gloom.

The walls reverberated, the windowpanes rattled, and still the Homeric laughter continued. Roy and Jimmy stood openmouthed, entirely non-plussed. A puzzled bookkeeper thrust his head inside the door in a fit of temerity and remained frozen in his tracks. Others crowded about the door, conversing in awed whispers. McCutcheon had laughed!

Gradually, the risibilities of the old General Manager subsided. He ended in a fit of choking and finally turned a purple face towards his ace pilots, whose surprise had long since given way to indignation.

“Boys,” he told them, “that was the best joke I ever heard. You can consider your pay doubled, both of you.” He was still grinning away like clockwork and had developed a beautiful case of hiccoughs.

The two pilots were left cold at the handsome proposal. “What’s so killingly funny?” Jimmy wanted to know, “I don’t see anything to laugh at, myself.”

McClutcheon’s voice dripped honey, “Now, fellows, before I left I gave each of you several mimeographed sheets containing special instructions. What happened to them?”

There was sudden embarrassment in the air.

“I don’t know. I must have mislaid mine,” gulped Roy.

“I never looked at mine; I forgot about it.” Jimmy was genuinely dismayed.

“You see,” exclaimed McCutcheon triumphantly, “it was all the fault of your own stupidity.”

“How do you figure that out?” Jimmy wanted to know. “Major Wade told us all we had to know about the ship, and besides, I guess there’s nothing you could tell us about running one.”

“Oh, isn’t there? Wade evidently forgot to inform you of one minor point which you would have found on my instructions. The strength of the Deflection Field was adjustable. It happened to be set at maximum strength when you started, that’s all.” He was now beginning to chuckle faintly once more. “Now, if you had taken the trouble to read the sheets, you would have known that a simple movement of a small lever,” he made the appropriate gesture with his thumb, “would have weakened the Field any desired amount and allowed as much radiation to leak through as was wanted.”

And now the chuckle was becoming louder. “And you froze for a week because you didn’t have the brains to pull a lever. And then you ace pilots come here and blame me. What a laugh!” and off he went again while a pair of very sheepish young men glanced askance at each other.

When McCutcheon came around to normal, Jimmy and Roy were gone.

Down in an alley adjoining the building, a little ten-year-old boy watched, with open mouth and intense absorption, two young men who were engaged in the strange and rather startling occupation of kicking each other alternately. They were vicious kicks, too.

When I wrote “Ring Around the Sun” I was much taken by the two protagonists. Turner and Snead. It was in my mind, I recall, to write other stories about the pair. This was a natural thought, for in the late 1930s there were a number of “series” of stories about a given character or characters. Campbell himself had written some delightful stories featuring two men named Penton and Blake, and I longed to do a Penton-Blake imitation.

There was a practical value to writing a “series.” For one thing, you had a definite background that was carried on from story to story, so that half your work was done for you. Secondly, if the “series” became popular, it would be difficult to reject new stories that fit into it.

I didn’t make it with Turner and Snead. In fact, I never tried. The time was to come, two years later, when I was to have a pair of very similar characters, Powell and Donovan, who were to be in four stories and who were to be part of a very successful “series” indeed.

By the end of August 1938, then, I had written five stories, of which three were eventually published. Not bad!

However, there followed a dry spell. I was finishing my third year of college and was trying, without success, to get admission into medical school. The situation in Europe was disturbing. It was the time of the surrender at Munich, and for a Jewish teen-ager there was something unsettling about the rapid, sure-fire victories of Hitler.

The next three stories took not one month, as had the previous three, but three months. And all were clearly well below the limits of salability even in the most permissive market. They were “The Weapon,” “Paths of Destiny,” and “Knossos in Its Glory.” Campbell rejected each one in very short order, and all made the rounds without luck. There came a time, nearly three years later, when Astonishing seemed interested in “The Weapon,” but that fell through and the other two didn’t even come that close.

All three stories are now gone forever. I remember nothing at all about two of them, but “Knossos in Its Glory” was an ambitious attempt to retell the Theseus myth in science fiction terms. The minotaur was an extraterrestrial who landed in ancient Crete with only the kindliest of intentions, and I remember writing terribly stilted prose in an attempt to make my Cretans sound as I imagined characters in Homer ought to sound. Campbell, always kind, said in rejecting it that my work “was definitely improving, especially where I was not straining for effect.”

By the time I was writing “Knossos in Its Glory” I had just received my check for “Marooned off Vesta” and I was a professional. My spirits rose accordingly, and toward the end of November I wrote “Ammonium,” which was another attempt (like “Ring Around the Sun”) at humor.

I had a pretty good notion that Campbell wouldn’t like it, however, and I never showed it to him. I sent it to Thrilling Wonder Stories instead. When they rejected it, I lost heart and retired it. It was only after Future Fiction had taken “Ring Around the Sun” that I thought I would chance this other one, too.

On August 23, 1939, I sent it in to Future Fiction , which took it, altering its name to “The Magnificent Possession.”