The Other Side of Here
- Автор: Лейнстер Мюррей
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «The Other Side of Here». Краткое содержание книги:
Newark ... Manhattan ... Baltimore—one by one they went out. A succession of thriving communities suddenly put out like a guttered flame—men, women, children sprawled like grotesque mannikins.
Steve Waldron knew it couldn't be plague. There had to be some connection with the disappearance of the nation's top scientists. And then he plunged to the very center of a dead city and gaped at a truth he could not believe. What could he do against so fearsome a force that threatened to engulf the whole nation?
Here's a spine-tingling science-fiction novel by an old master. It will open up a new dimension of suspense and excitement.
They went away into the distance. A long time later, Waldron stood up stiffly. By the mere chance that the cordon had been formed ever so slightly beyond them, the trio had gone undetected.
Twenty minutes later they were in the garage where they had labored so futilely to contrive the recorders which would tell what the outside world had to know.
There was no reason for them to choose the garage. But they felt that they had to get off the street. This place they knew. The clinging smell of coffee about the office was singularly comforting.
Then Lucy began to shiver. Waldron said desperately: "We've got to do something, Nick! We've got to! But—"
There was a sound of footsteps outside. One man's footsteps. The man walked heavily down the sidewalk outside, and the three in the inner darkness could not imagine who it could be. The man opened the door of the garage office. He came inside. He closed the door behind him.
Then Fran Dutt said in a low, harsh voice: "Lucy? Steve?"
There was no answer. The three of them were motionless.
"Answer me!" whispered Fran fiercely. "I know you're here! I traced you with a short-wave detector. The Leaders haven't thought of that yet. I was in the party that walked past here just now. I was with them and my instrument picked up your set noise. It tells me you're here now. I knew you'd come here when all the world tried to find you to kill you. I didn't tell the others when we walked past just now. I'm your friend, Steve! Lucy—I've got to talk to you!"
Dead silence. Then Waldron's voice, cold and deadly: "I've got a gun on your middle, Fran. Come through the door and talk. But talk quietly!"
Fran came out into the garage proper. He closed the door from the office behind him. Then he turned a flashlight on his own face. It was haggard and worn.
"I've been going crazy," he said bitterly. "Lucy, you're all right?"
He swept the beam around. It touched Lucy and its reflection showed Nick as well as Waldron. "Three of you, eh? You are clever!"
He put the flashlight down on the ground, with its beam still turned on.
"They got an alarm from somewhere," he said jerkily. "They're hunting there. But I came here and my instrument said you were back, whatever you did elsewhere. It's worse than I had imagined, Steve. They're not only looting the city, but they're shipping women back to my homeland for the Leaders. It is horrible! Horrible! If Lucy is caught I will go mad! She must be made more safe."
Waldron sat down. Fran Dutt wrung his hands, in the singular surroundings of the garage lighted only by his flashlight beam. He looked like a man in torment. Waldron pocketed his revolver.
"Well?" he said cynically. "How can Lucy be made more safe? God knows I've tried!"
Fran made a lightning-like movement "This way!"
A flash and an inadequate report came from something in his hand. A blue spark shot out from Nick's high-frequency pack. The tiny, silenced gun spat again. A wire of Waldron's pack parted and a lurid flame spat momentarily.
Then Lucy cried out. Nick toppled slowly forward, every muscle instantaneously stiffened in that ghastly tetany which men had called the "plague." He struck the floor of the garage and careened to one side, unspeakably grotesque because he retained the pose in which he had been standing. And Waldron, seated on a full oil drum next to a car in process of repair, remained utterly motionless. Not a muscle moved. Not an eyelash fluttered.
Lucy cried out hoarsely when she saw Waldron stiff and still. She wrung her hands.
"I almost wish," said Fran Dutt, in exquisite bitterness, "I almost wish that he had killed me when I came in. Because I happen to love you."
EIGHT
Lucy sobbed. Waldron remained utterly motionless. Fran no more than glanced at him. The radiation or the field of force—or whatever it was that had caused the greatest single catastrophe in human history aside from war—the weapon of the invaders had been so utterly effective that merely to see Waldron stiff and still was proof to Fran Dutt that he would stay that way.
He put away his small-caliber pistol and said desperately: "Lucy, I've been a traitor to my homeland, trying to make you safe. I haven't asked anything in return. I've made no bargain. But you must listen to me."
"You've killed my father and Steve, and now—" "Your father isn't dead. I beg you to believe me." His features were contorted. "I cannot let our Leaders take you!" he cried. "You do not know our Leaders! You cannot imagine them! I will not let them take you. Beautiful as you are, they would want you for themselves. I would kill you first, Lucy! I love you, and I will kill you first!"
"Then do it!" cried Lucy as fiercely. "You've killed everybody else—"
"No! Your father is alive. He is in the laboratories of the Leaders. He works, but he is well treated. He is even happy. The Leaders know better than to mistreat scientists. Straussman filled them with such reverence that they will only keep your father prisoner. And Steve is not dead. You know that also. He will go to the laboratories and he will help your father, and they will have work that they love, and good treatment—everything but freedom."
"Then if they're to be prisoners," said Lucy desperately, "let me be a prisoner tool"
Fran Dutt wrung his hands again.
"Listen to me! I hate our Leaders as you do. I hate this invasion as you hate it. I hate our Leaders more than you can imagine, because I have felt their whips. But my father and my mother and my brothers and my sisters—they are hostages for me while I am in your world. If I fail our Leaders, they die by torture. How can I do that? Listen to me! Soon our Leaders will take New York itself. They will take Philadelphia. They will take all the great cities and loot them. They will have such riches and such loot that they will forget this place. Let me hide you, and presently I can come back to this place. We can be happy, perhaps, because I will never let our Leaders see you. I can do no more than that, Lucy. I swear it."
Lucy stared at him in the queer, reflected light that came from the flashlight on the floor. Her face was chalky-white.
Her eyes were wide and dazed.
"I think I believe you," she said through stiff lips. "I used to like you. You're probably trying to be decent, in your way. But it isn't enough. I-I think I prefer dying."
"But I won't let you!" Fran said fiercely. "You will become like Steve and I will hide you carefully. Then I'll come back and waken you and plead with you again. I cannot let you die—and I cannot let our Leaders take you!" His expression was pitiful. "Do not make me do that, Lucy! I beg you—"
There was a sudden, quite impossible movement. Waldron's voice came, icy and even.
"I'll take over now, Fran. And I'll kill you if you move!"
He stood up and went over to Fran. The muzzle of his pistol touched Fran's side as he disarmed him.
"I got one of your gang," he observed, "and put on his armor under my clothes. It works very well, thank you. I pretended to freeze so you could talk frankly to Lucy. I think you did. Lucy, take this unneeded pack off me. I think there's only a wire broken by Fran's bullet. Twist it together and wake Nick up, will you?"
Lucy trembled as she moved to obey.
"You won't kill Fran, will you?"
"Not if I can help it," said Waldron. "He's going to be too useful."
Fran said in the bitterness of absolute despair: "I will not be useful to you, Steve." Waldron said: "We'll see."