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diff --git a/23791.txt b/23791.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b840eb2 --- /dev/null +++ b/23791.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1064 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Scrimshaw, by William Fitzgerald Jenkins + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Scrimshaw + +Author: William Fitzgerald Jenkins + +Illustrator: Kelly Freas + +Release Date: December 10, 2007 [EBook #23791] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SCRIMSHAW *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +Transcriber's Note: + + This etext was produced from _Astounding Science Fiction_ September + 1955. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. + copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and + typographical errors have been corrected without note. Subscript + characters are shown within {braces}. + + + + + [Illustration] + + SCRIMSHAW + + _The old man just wanted to get back his + memory--and the methods he used were + gently hellish, from the viewpoint of the + others...._ + + BY MURRAY LEINSTER + + Illustrated by Freas + + +Pop Young was the one known man who could stand life on the surface of +the Moon's far side, and, therefore, he occupied the shack on the Big +Crack's edge, above the mining colony there. Some people said that no +normal man could do it, and mentioned the scar of a ghastly head-wound +to explain his ability. One man partly guessed the secret, but only +partly. His name was Sattell and he had reason not to talk. Pop Young +alone knew the whole truth, and he kept his mouth shut, too. It wasn't +anybody else's business. + +The shack and the job he filled were located in the medieval notion of +the physical appearance of hell. By day the environment was heat and +torment. By night--lunar night, of course, and lunar day--it was +frigidity and horror. Once in two weeks Earth-time a rocketship came +around the horizon from Lunar City with stores for the colony deep +underground. Pop received the stores and took care of them. He handed +over the product of the mine, to be forwarded to Earth. The rocket went +away again. Come nightfall Pop lowered the supplies down the long cable +into the Big Crack to the colony far down inside, and freshened up the +landing field marks with magnesium marking-powder if a rocket-blast had +blurred them. That was fundamentally all he had to do. But without him +the mine down in the Crack would have had to shut down. + +The Crack, of course, was that gaping rocky fault which stretches nine +hundred miles, jaggedly, over the side of the Moon that Earth never +sees. There is one stretch where it is a yawning gulf a full half-mile +wide and unguessably deep. Where Pop Young's shack stood it was only a +hundred yards, but the colony was a full mile down, in one wall. There +is nothing like it on Earth, of course. When it was first found, +scientists descended into it to examine the exposed rock-strata and +learn the history of the Moon before its craters were made. But they +found more than history. They found the reason for the colony and the +rocket landing field and the shack. + +The reason for Pop was something else. + +The shack stood a hundred feet from the Big Crack's edge. It looked like +a dust-heap thirty feet high, and it was. The outside was surface +moondust, piled over a tiny dome to be insulation against the cold of +night and shadow and the furnace heat of day. Pop lived in it all alone, +and in his spare time he worked industriously at recovering some missing +portions of his life that Sattell had managed to take away from him. + +He thought often of Sattell, down in the colony underground. There were +galleries and tunnels and living-quarters down there. There were +air-tight bulkheads for safety, and a hydroponic garden to keep the air +fresh, and all sorts of things to make life possible for men under if +not on the Moon. + +But it wasn't fun, even underground. In the Moon's slight gravity, a man +is really adjusted to existence when he has a well-developed case of +agoraphobia. With such an aid, a man can get into a tiny, coffinlike +cubbyhole, and feel solidity above and below and around him, and happily +tell himself that it feels delicious. Sometimes it does. + +But Sattell couldn't comfort himself so easily. He knew about Pop, up on +the surface. He'd shipped out, whimpering, to the Moon to get far away +from Pop, and Pop was just about a mile overhead and there was no way to +get around him. It was difficult to get away from the mine, anyhow. It +doesn't take too long for the low gravity to tear a man's nerves to +shreds. He has to develop kinks in his head to survive. And those +kinks-- + +The first men to leave the colony had to be knocked cold and shipped +out unconscious. They'd been underground--and in low gravity--long +enough to be utterly unable to face the idea of open spaces. Even now +there were some who had to be carried, but there were some tougher ones +who were able to walk to the rocketship if Pop put a tarpaulin over +their heads so they didn't have to see the sky. In any case Pop was +essential, either for carrying or guidance. + + * * * * * + +Sattell got the shakes when he thought of Pop, and Pop rather probably +knew it. Of course, by the time he took the job tending the shack, he +was pretty certain about Sattell. The facts spoke for themselves. + +Pop had come back to consciousness in a hospital with a great wound in +his head and no memory of anything that had happened before that moment. +It was not that his identity was in question. When he was stronger, the +doctors told him who he was, and as gently as possible what had happened +to his wife and children. They'd been murdered after he was seemingly +killed defending them. But he didn't remember a thing. Not then. It was +something of a blessing. + +But when he was physically recovered he set about trying to pick up the +threads of the life he could no longer remember. He met Sattell quite by +accident. Sattell looked familiar. Pop eagerly tried to ask him +questions. And Sattell turned gray and frantically denied that he'd ever +seen Pop before. + +All of which happened back on Earth and a long time ago. It seemed to +Pop that the sight of Sattell had brought back some vague and cloudy +memories. They were not sharp, though, and he hunted up Sattell again to +find out if he was right. And Sattell went into panic when he returned. + +Nowadays, by the Big Crack, Pop wasn't so insistent on seeing Sattell, +but he was deeply concerned with the recovery of the memories that +Sattell helped bring back. Pop was a highly conscientious man. He took +good care of his job. There was a warning-bell in the shack, and when a +rocketship from Lunar City got above the horizon and could send a tight +beam, the gong clanged loudly, and Pop got into a vacuum-suit and went +out the air lock. He usually reached the moondozer about the time the +ship began to brake for landing, and he watched it come in. + +He saw the silver needle in the sky fighting momentum above a line of +jagged crater-walls. It slowed, and slowed, and curved down as it drew +nearer. The pilot killed all forward motion just above the field and +came steadily and smoothly down to land between the silvery triangles +that marked the landing place. + +Instantly the rockets cut off, drums of fuel and air and food came out +of the cargo-hatch and Pop swept forward with the dozer. It was a +miniature tractor with a gigantic scoop in front. He pushed a great +mound of talc-fine dust before him to cover up the cargo. It was +necessary. With freight costing what it did, fuel and air and food came +frozen solid, in containers barely thicker than foil. While they stayed +at space-shadow temperature, the foil would hold anything. And a cover +of insulating moondust with vacuum between the grains kept even air +frozen solid, though in sunlight. + +At such times Pop hardly thought of Sattell. He knew he had plenty of +time for that. He'd started to follow Sattell knowing what had happened +to his wife and children, but it was hearsay only. He had no memory of +them at all. But Sattell stirred the lost memories. At first Pop +followed absorbedly from city to city, to recover the years that had +been wiped out by an axe-blow. He did recover a good deal. When Sattell +fled to another continent, Pop followed because he had some distinct +memories of his wife--and the way he'd felt about her--and some fugitive +mental images of his children. When Sattell frenziedly tried to deny +knowledge of the murder in Tangier, Pop had come to remember both his +children and some of the happiness of his married life. + +Even when Sattell--whimpering--signed up for Lunar City, Pop tracked +him. By that time he was quite sure that Sattell was the man who'd +killed his family. If so, Sattell had profited by less than two days' +pay for wiping out everything that Pop possessed. But Pop wanted it +back. He couldn't prove Sattell's guilt. There was no evidence. In any +case, he didn't really want Sattell to die. If he did, there'd be no way +to recover more lost memories. + +Sometimes, in the shack on the far side of the Moon, Pop Young had odd +fancies about Sattell. There was the mine, for example. In each two +Earth-weeks of working, the mine-colony nearly filled up a three-gallon +cannister with greasy-seeming white crystals shaped like two pyramids +base to base. The filled cannister would weigh a hundred pounds on +Earth. Here it weighed eighteen. But on Earth its contents would be +computed in carats, and a hundred pounds was worth millions. Yet here on +the Moon Pop kept a waiting cannister on a shelf in his tiny dome, +behind the air-apparatus. It rattled if he shook it, and it was worth no +more than so many pebbles. But sometimes Pop wondered if Sattell ever +thought of the value of the mine's production. If he would kill a woman +and two children and think he'd killed a man for no more than a hundred +dollars, what enormity would he commit for a three-gallon quantity of +uncut diamonds? + + * * * * * + +But he did not dwell on such speculation. The sun rose very, very slowly +in what by convention was called the east. It took nearly two hours to +urge its disk above the horizon, and it burned terribly in emptiness for +fourteen times twenty-four hours before sunset. Then there was night, +and for three hundred and thirty-six consecutive hours there were only +stars overhead and the sky was a hole so terrible that a man who looked +up into it--what with the nagging sensation of one-sixth gravity--tended +to lose all confidence in the stability of things. Most men immediately +found it hysterically necessary to seize hold of something solid to keep +from falling upward. But nothing felt solid. Everything fell, too. +Wherefore most men tended to scream. + +But not Pop. He'd come to the Moon in the first place because Sattell +was here. Near Sattell, he found memories of times when he was a young +man with a young wife who loved him extravagantly. Then pictures of his +children came out of emptiness and grew sharp and clear. He found that +he loved them very dearly. And when he was near Sattell he literally +recovered them--in the sense that he came to know new things about them +and had new memories of them every day. He hadn't yet remembered the +crime which lost them to him. Until he did--and the fact possessed a +certain grisly humor--Pop didn't even hate Sattell. He simply wanted to +be near him because it enabled him to recover new and vivid parts of his +youth that had been lost. + +Otherwise, he was wholly matter-of-fact--certainly so for the far side +of the Moon. He was a rather fussy housekeeper. The shack above the Big +Crack's rim was as tidy as any lighthouse or fur-trapper's cabin. He +tended his air-apparatus with a fine precision. It was perfectly simple. +In the shadow of the shack he had an unfailing source of extreme low +temperature. Air from the shack flowed into a shadow-chilled pipe. +Moisture condensed out of it here, and CO{2} froze solidly out of it +there, and on beyond it collected as restless, transparent liquid air. +At the same time, liquid air from another tank evaporated to maintain +the proper air pressure in the shack. Every so often Pop tapped the pipe +where the moisture froze, and lumps of water ice clattered out to be +returned to the humidifier. Less often he took out the CO{2} snow, and +measured it, and dumped an equivalent quantity of pale-blue liquid +oxygen into the liquid air that had been purified by cold. The oxygen +dissolved. Then the apparatus reversed itself and supplied fresh air +from the now-enriched fluid, while the depleted other tank began to fill +up with cold-purified liquid air. + +Outside the shack, jagged stony pinnacles reared in the starlight, and +craters complained of the bombardment from space that had made them. +But, outside, nothing ever happened. Inside, it was quite different. + +Working on his memories, one day Pop made a little sketch. It helped a +great deal. He grew deeply interested. Writing-material was scarce, but +he spent most of the time between two particular rocket-landings getting +down on paper exactly how a child had looked while sleeping, some +fifteen years before. He remembered with astonishment that the child had +really looked exactly like that! Later he began a sketch of his +partly-remembered wife. In time--he had plenty--it became a really +truthful likeness. + +The sun rose, and baked the abomination of desolation which was the +moonscape. Pop Young meticulously touched up the glittering triangles +which were landing guides for the Lunar City ships. They glittered from +the thinnest conceivable layer of magnesium marking-powder. He checked +over the moondozer. He tended the air apparatus. He did everything that +his job and survival required. Ungrudgingly. + +Then he made more sketches. The images to be drawn came back more +clearly when he thought of Sattell, so by keeping Sattell in mind he +recovered the memory of a chair that had been in his forgotten home. +Then he drew his wife sitting in it, reading. It felt very good to see +her again. And he speculated about whether Sattell ever thought of +millions of dollars' worth of new-mined diamonds knocking about +unguarded in the shack, and he suddenly recollected clearly the way one +of his children had looked while playing with her doll. He made a quick +sketch to keep from forgetting that. + +There was no purpose in the sketching, save that he'd lost all his young +manhood through a senseless crime. He wanted his youth back. He was +recovering it bit by bit. The occupation made it absurdly easy to live +on the surface of the far side of the Moon, whether anybody else could +do it or not. + +Sattell had no such device for adjusting to the lunar state of things. +Living on the Moon was bad enough anyhow, then, but living one mile +underground from Pop Young was much worse. Sattell clearly remembered +the crime Pop Young hadn't yet recalled. He considered that Pop had made +no overt attempt to revenge himself because he planned some retaliation +so horrible and lingering that it was worth waiting for. He came to hate +Pop with an insane ferocity. And fear. In his mind the need to escape +became an obsession on top of the other psychotic states normal to a +Moon-colonist. + +But he was helpless. He couldn't leave. There was Pop. He couldn't kill +Pop. He had no chance--and he was afraid. The one absurd, irrelevant +thing he could do was write letters back to Earth. He did that. He wrote +with the desperate, impassioned, frantic blend of persuasion and +information and genius-like invention of a prisoner in a high-security +prison, trying to induce someone to help him escape. + +He had friends, of a sort, but for a long time his letters produced +nothing. The Moon swung in vast circles about the Earth, and the Earth +swung sedately about the Sun. The other planets danced their saraband. +The rest of humanity went about its own affairs with fascinated +attention. But then an event occurred which bore directly upon Pop Young +and Sattell and Pop Young's missing years. + +Somebody back on Earth promoted a luxury passenger-line of spaceships +to ply between Earth and Moon. It looked like a perfect set-up. Three +spacecraft capable of the journey came into being with attendant reams +of publicity. They promised a thrill and a new distinction for the rich. +Guided tours to Lunar! The most expensive and most thrilling trip in +history! One hundred thousand dollars for a twelve-day cruise through +space, with views of the Moon's far side and trips through Lunar City +and a landing in Aristarchus, plus sound-tapes of the journey and fame +hitherto reserved for honest explorers! + +It didn't seem to have anything to do with Pop or with Sattell. But it +did. + +There were just two passenger tours. The first was fully booked. But the +passengers who paid so highly, expected to be pleasantly thrilled and +shielded from all reasons for alarm. And they couldn't be. Something +happens when a self-centered and complacent individual unsuspectingly +looks out of a spaceship port and sees the cosmos unshielded by mists or +clouds or other aids to blindness against reality. It is shattering. + +A millionaire cut his throat when he saw Earth dwindled to a mere +blue-green ball in vastness. He could not endure his own smallness in +the face of immensity. Not one passenger disembarked even for Lunar +City. Most of them cowered in their chairs, hiding their eyes. They were +the simple cases of hysteria. But the richest girl on Earth, who'd had +five husbands and believed that nothing could move her--she went into +catatonic withdrawal and neither saw nor heard nor moved. Two other +passengers sobbed in improvised strait jackets. The first shipload +started home. Fast. + +The second luxury liner took off with only four passengers and turned +back before reaching the Moon. Space-pilots could take the strain of +space-flight because they had work to do. Workers for the lunar mines +could make the trip under heavy sedation. But it was too early in the +development of space-travel for pleasure-passengers. They weren't +prepared for the more humbling facts of life. + +Pop heard of the quaint commercial enterprise through the micro-tapes +put off at the shack for the men down in the mine. Sattell probably +learned of it the same way. Pop didn't even think of it again. It seemed +to have nothing to do with him. But Sattell undoubtedly dealt with it +fully in his desperate writings back to Earth. + + * * * * * + +Pop matter-of-factly tended the shack and the landing field and the +stores for the Big Crack mine. Between-times he made more drawings in +pursuit of his own private objective. Quite accidentally, he developed a +certain talent professional artists might have approved. But he was not +trying to communicate, but to discover. Drawing--especially with his +mind on Sattell--he found fresh incidents popping up in his +recollection. Times when he was happy. One day he remembered the puppy +his children had owned and loved. He drew it painstakingly--and it was +his again. Thereafter he could remember it any time he chose. He did +actually recover a completely vanished past. + +He envisioned a way to increase that recovery. But there was a marked +shortage of artists' materials on the Moon. All freight had to be hauled +from Earth, on a voyage equal to rather more than a thousand times +around the equator of the Earth. Artists' supplies were not often +included. Pop didn't even ask. + +He began to explore the area outside the shack for possible material no +one would think of sending from Earth. He collected stones of various +sorts, but when warmed up in the shack they were useless. He found no +strictly lunar material which would serve for modeling or carving +portraits in the ground. He found minerals which could be pulverized and +used as pigments, but nothing suitable for this new adventure in the +recovery of lost youth. He even considered blasting, to aid his search. +He could. Down in the mine, blasting was done by soaking carbon +black--from CO{2}--in liquid oxygen, and then firing it with a spark. It +exploded splendidly. And its fumes were merely more CO{2} which an +air-apparatus handled easily. + +He didn't do any blasting. He didn't find any signs of the sort of +mineral he required. Marble would have been perfect, but there is no +marble on the Moon. Naturally! Yet Pop continued to search absorbedly +for material with which to capture memory. Sattell still seemed +necessary, but-- + +Early one lunar morning he was a good two miles from his shack when he +saw rocket-fumes in the sky. It was most unlikely. He wasn't looking for +anything of the sort, but out of the corner of his eye he observed that +something moved. Which was impossible. He turned his head, and there +were rocket-fumes coming over the horizon, not in the direction of Lunar +City. Which was more impossible still. + +He stared. A tiny silver rocket to the westward poured out monstrous +masses of vapor. It decelerated swiftly. It curved downward. The rockets +checked for an instant, and flamed again more violently, and checked +once more. This was not an expert approach. It was a faulty one. Curving +surface-ward in a sharply changing parabola, the pilot over-corrected +and had to wait to gather down-speed, and then over-corrected again. It +was an altogether clumsy landing. The ship was not even perfectly +vertical when it settled not quite in the landing-area marked by silvery +triangles. One of its tail-fins crumpled slightly. It tilted a little +when fully landed. + +Then nothing happened. + +Pop made his way toward it in the skittering, skating gait one uses in +one-sixth gravity. When he was within half a mile, an air-lock door +opened in the ship's side. But nothing came out of the lock. No +space-suited figure. No cargo came drifting down with the singular +deliberation of falling objects on the Moon. + +[Illustration] + +It was just barely past lunar sunrise on the far side of the Moon. +Incredibly long and utterly black shadows stretched across the plain, +and half the rocketship was dazzling white and half was blacker than +blackness itself. The sun still hung low indeed in the black, +star-speckled sky. Pop waded through moondust, raising a trail of slowly +settling powder. He knew only that the ship didn't come from Lunar City, +but from Earth. He couldn't imagine why. He did not even wildly connect +it with what--say--Sattell might have written with desperate +plausibility about greasy-seeming white crystals out of the mine, +knocking about Pop Young's shack in cannisters containing a hundred +Earth-pounds weight of richness. + + * * * * * + +Pop reached the rocketship. He approached the big tail-fins. On one of +them there were welded ladder-rungs going up to the opened air-lock +door. + +He climbed. + +The air-lock was perfectly normal when he reached it. There was a glass +port in the inner door, and he saw eyes looking through it at him. He +pulled the outer door shut and felt the whining vibration of admitted +air. His vacuum suit went slack about him. The inner door began to open, +and Pop reached up and gave his helmet the practiced twisting jerk +which removed it. + +Then he blinked. There was a red-headed man in the opened door. He +grinned savagely at Pop. He held a very nasty hand-weapon trained on +Pop's middle. + +"Don't come in!" he said mockingly. "And I don't give a damn about how +you are. This isn't social. It's business!" + +Pop simply gaped. He couldn't quite take it in. + +"This," snapped the red-headed man abruptly, "is a stickup!" + +Pop's eyes went through the inner lock-door. He saw that the interior of +the ship was stripped and bare. But a spiral stairway descended from +some upper compartment. It had a handrail of pure, transparent, +water-clear plastic. The walls were bare insulation, but that trace of +luxury remained. Pop gazed at the plastic, fascinated. + +The red-headed man leaned forward, snarling. He slashed Pop across the +face with the barrel of his weapon. It drew blood. It was wanton, savage +brutality. + +"Pay attention!" snarled the red-headed man. "A stickup, I said! Get it? +You go get that can of stuff from the mine! The diamonds! Bring them +here! Understand?" + +Pop said numbly: "What the hell?" + +The red-headed man hit him again. He was nerve-racked, and, therefore, +he wanted to hurt. + +"Move!" he rasped. "I want the diamonds you've got for the ship from +Lunar City! Bring 'em!" Pop licked blood from his lips and the man with +the weapon raged at him. "Then phone down to the mine! Tell Sattell I'm +here and he can come on up! Tell him to bring any more diamonds they've +dug up since the stuff you've got!" + +He leaned forward. His face was only inches from Pop Young's. It was +seamed and hard-bitten and nerve-racked. But any man would be quivering +if he wasn't used to space or the feel of one-sixth gravity on the Moon. +He panted: + +"And get it straight! You try any tricks and we take off! We swing over +your shack! The rocket-blast smashes it! We burn you down! Then we swing +over the cable down to the mine and the rocket-flame melts it! You die +and everybody in the mine besides! No tricks! We didn't come here for +nothing!" + +He twitched all over. Then he struck cruelly again at Pop Young's face. +He seemed filled with fury, at least partly hysterical. It was the +tension that space-travel--then, at its beginning--produced. It was +meaningless savagery due to terror. But, of course, Pop was helpless to +resent it. There were no weapons on the Moon and the mention of +Sattell's name showed the uselessness of bluff. He'd pictured the +complete set-up by the edge of the Big Crack. Pop could do nothing. + +The red-headed man checked himself, panting. He drew back and slammed +the inner lock-door. There was the sound of pumping. + +Pop put his helmet back on and sealed it. The outer door opened. +Outrushing air tugged at Pop. After a second or two he went out and +climbed down the welded-on ladder-bars to the ground. + +He headed back toward his shack. Somehow, the mention of Sattell had +made his mind work better. It always did. He began painstakingly to put +things together. The red-headed man knew the routine here in every +detail. He knew Sattell. That part was simple. Sattell had planned this +multi-million-dollar coup, as a man in prison might plan his break. The +stripped interior of the ship identified it. + +It was one of the unsuccessful luxury-liners sold for scrap. Or perhaps +it was stolen for the journey here. Sattell's associates had had to +steal or somehow get the fuel, and somehow find a pilot. But there were +diamonds worth at least five million dollars waiting for them, and the +whole job might not have called for more than two men--with Sattell as a +third. According to the economics of crime, it was feasible. Anyhow it +was being done. + +Pop reached the dust-heap which was his shack and went in the air lock. +Inside, he went to the vision-phone and called the mine-colony down in +the Crack. He gave the message he'd been told to pass on. Sattell to +come up, with what diamonds had been dug since the regular cannister was +sent up for the Lunar City ship that would be due presently. Otherwise +the ship on the landing strip would destroy shack and Pop and the colony +together. + +"I'd guess," said Pop painstakingly, "that Sattell figured it out. He's +probably got some sort of gun to keep you from holding him down there. +But he won't know his friends are here--not right this minute he won't." + +A shaking voice asked questions from the vision-phone. + +"No," said Pop, "they'll do it anyhow. If we were able to tell about +'em, they'd be chased. But if I'm dead and the shacks smashed and the +cable burnt through, they'll be back on Earth long before a new cable's +been got and let down to you. So they'll do all they can no matter what +I do." He added, "I wouldn't tell Sattell a thing about it, if I were +you. It'll save trouble. Just let him keep on waiting for this to +happen. It'll save you trouble." + +Another shaky question. + +"Me?" asked Pop. "Oh, I'm going to raise what hell I can. There's some +stuff in that ship I want." + +He switched off the phone. He went over to his air apparatus. He took +down the cannister of diamonds which were worth five millions or more +back on Earth. He found a bucket. He dumped the diamonds casually into +it. They floated downward with great deliberation and surged from side +to side like a liquid when they stopped. One-sixth gravity. + +Pop regarded his drawings meditatively. A sketch of his wife as he now +remembered her. It was very good to remember. A drawing of his two +children, playing together. He looked forward to remembering much more +about them. He grinned. + +"That stair-rail," he said in deep satisfaction. "That'll do it!" + +He tore bed linen from his bunk and worked on the emptied cannister. It +was a double container with a thermware interior lining. Even on Earth +newly-mined diamonds sometimes fly to pieces from internal stress. On +the Moon, it was not desirable that diamonds be exposed to repeated +violent changes of temperature. So a thermware-lined cannister kept them +at mine-temperature once they were warmed to touchability. + +Pop packed the cotton cloth in the container. He hurried a little, +because the men in the rocket were shaky and might not practice +patience. He took a small emergency-lamp from his spare spacesuit. He +carefully cracked its bulb, exposing the filament within. He put the +lamp on top of the cotton and sprinkled magnesium marking-powder over +everything. Then he went to the air-apparatus and took out a flask of +the liquid oxygen used to keep his breathing-air in balance. He poured +the frigid, pale-blue stuff into the cotton. He saturated it. + +All the inside of the shack was foggy when he finished. Then he pushed +the cannister-top down. He breathed a sigh of relief when it was in +place. He'd arranged for it to break a frozen-brittle switch as it +descended. When it came off, the switch would light the lamp with its +bare filament. There was powdered magnesium in contact with it and +liquid oxygen all about. + +He went out of the shack by the air lock. On the way, thinking about +Sattell, he suddenly recovered a completely new memory. On their first +wedding anniversary, so long ago, he and his wife had gone out to dinner +to celebrate. He remembered how she looked: the almost-smug joy they +shared that they would be together for always, with one complete year +for proof. + +Pop reflected hungrily that it was something else to be made permanent +and inspected from time to time. But he wanted more than a drawing of +this! He wanted to make the memory permanent and to extend it-- + +If it had not been for his vacuum suit and the cannister he carried, Pop +would have rubbed his hands. + + * * * * * + +Tall, jagged crater-walls rose from the lunar plain. Monstrous, extended +inky shadows stretched enormous distances, utterly black. The sun, like +a glowing octopod, floated low at the edge of things and seemed to hate +all creation. + +Pop reached the rocket. He climbed the welded ladder-rungs to the air +lock. He closed the door. Air whined. His suit sagged against his body. +He took off his helmet. + +When the red-headed man opened the inner door, the hand-weapon shook and +trembled. Pop said calmly: + +"Now I've got to go handle the hoist, if Sattell's coming up from the +mine. If I don't do it, he don't come up." + +The red-headed man snarled. But his eyes were on the cannister whose +contents should weigh a hundred pounds on Earth. + +"Any tricks," he rasped, "and you know what happens!" + +"Yeah," said Pop. + +He stolidly put his helmet back on. But his eyes went past the +red-headed man to the stair that wound down, inside the ship, from some +compartment above. The stair-rail was pure, clear, water-white plastic, +not less than three inches thick. There was a lot of it! + +The inner door closed. Pop opened the outer. Air rushed out. He climbed +painstakingly down to the ground. He started back toward the shack. + +There was the most luridly bright of all possible flashes. There was no +sound, of course. But something flamed very brightly, and the ground +thumped under Pop Young's vacuum boots. He turned. + +The rocketship was still in the act of flying apart. It had been a +splendid explosion. Of course cotton sheeting in liquid oxygen is not +quite as good an explosive as carbon-black, which they used down in +the mine. Even with magnesium powder to start the flame when a bare +light-filament ignited it, the cannister-bomb hadn't equaled--say--T.N.T. +But the ship had fuel on board for the trip back to Earth. And it blew, +too. It would be minutes before all the fragments of the ship returned +to the Moon's surface. On the Moon, things fall slowly. + +Pop didn't wait. He searched hopefully. Once a mass of steel plating +fell only yards from him, but it did not interrupt his search. + +When he went into the shack, he grinned to himself. The call-light of +the vision-phone flickered wildly. When he took off his helmet the bell +clanged incessantly. He answered. A shaking voice from the mining-colony +panted: + +"We felt a shock! What happened? What do we do?" + +"Don't do a thing," advised Pop. "It's all right. I blew up the ship and +everything's all right. I wouldn't even mention it to Sattell if I were +you." + +He grinned happily down at a section of plastic stair-rail he'd found +not too far from where the ship exploded. When the man down in the mine +cut off, Pop got out of his vacuum suit in a hurry. He placed the +plastic zestfully on the table where he'd been restricted to drawing +pictures of his wife and children in order to recover memories of them. + +He began to plan, gloatingly, the thing he would carve out of a +four-inch section of the plastic. When it was carved, he'd paint it. +While he worked, he'd think of Sattell, because that was the way to get +back the missing portions of his life--the parts Sattell had managed to +get away from him. He'd get back more than ever, now! + +He didn't wonder what he'd do if he ever remembered the crime Sattell +had committed. He felt, somehow, that he wouldn't get that back until +he'd recovered all the rest. + +Gloating, it was amusing to remember what people used to call such +art-works as he planned, when carved by other lonely men in other +faraway places. They called those sculptures scrimshaw. + +But they were a lot more than that! + + +THE END + +[Illustration] + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Scrimshaw, by William Fitzgerald Jenkins + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SCRIMSHAW *** + +***** This file should be named 23791.txt or 23791.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/7/9/23791/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Stephen Blundell and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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