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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fc652a0 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #63041 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/63041) diff --git a/old/63041-h.zip b/old/63041-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 0304563..0000000 --- a/old/63041-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/63041-h/63041-h.htm b/old/63041-h/63041-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index a61d4f6..0000000 --- a/old/63041-h/63041-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,1071 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=us-ascii" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Morgue Ship, by Ray Bradbury. - </title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - h1,h2 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; -} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: 33.5%; - margin-right: 33.5%; - clear: both; -} - -hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} -hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - -.caption {font-weight: bold;} - -/* Images */ -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -div.titlepage { - text-align: center; - page-break-before: always; - page-break-after: always; -} - -div.titlepage p { - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0em; - font-weight: bold; - line-height: 1.5; - margin-top: 3em; -} - - </style> - </head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Morgue Ship, by Ray Bradbury - -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/license - - -Title: Morgue Ship - -Author: Ray Bradbury - -Release Date: August 25, 2020 [EBook #63041] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MORGUE SHIP *** - - - - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - - -</pre> - - - -<div class="titlepage"> - -<h1>Morgue Ship</h1> - -<h2>By RAY BRADBURY</h2> - -<p>This was Burnett's last trip. Three more<br /> -shelves to fill with space-slain warriors—and<br /> -he would be among the living again.</p> - -<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br /> -Planet Stories Summer 1944.<br /> -Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br /> -the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> - -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>He heard the star-port grind open, and the movement of the metal claws -groping into space, and then the star-port closed.</p> - -<p>There was another dead man aboard the <i>Constellation</i>.</p> - -<p>Sam Burnett shook his long head, trying to think clearly. Pallid and -quiet, three bodies lay on the cold transparent tables around him; -machines stirred, revolved, hummed. He didn't see them. He didn't see -anything but a red haze over his mind. It blotted out the far wall of -the laboratory where the shelves went up and down, numbered in scarlet, -keeping the bodies of soldiers from all further harm.</p> - -<p>Burnett didn't move. He stood there in his rumpled white surgical -gown, staring at his fingers gloved in bone-white rubber; feeling all -tight and wild inside himself. It went on for days. Moving the ship. -Opening the star-port. Extending the retriever claw. Plucking some poor -warrior's body out of the void.</p> - -<p>He didn't like it any more. Ten years is too long to go back and -forth from Earth to nowhere. You came out empty and you went back -full-cargoed with a lot of warriors who didn't laugh or talk or smoke, -who just lay on their shelves, all one hundred of them, waiting for a -decent burial.</p> - -<p>"Number ninety-eight." Coming matter of fact and slow, Rice's voice -from the ceiling radio hit Burnett.</p> - -<p>"Number ninety-eight," Burnett repeated. "Working on ninety-five, -ninety-six and ninety-seven now. Blood-pumps, preservative, slight -surgery." Off a million miles away his voice was talking. It sounded -deep. It didn't belong to him anymore.</p> - -<p>Rice said:</p> - -<p>"Boyohbody! Two more pick-ups and back to New York. Me for a ten-day -drunk!"</p> - -<p>Burnett peeled the gloves off his huge, red, soft hands, slapped them -into a floor incinerator mouth. Back to Earth. Then spin around and -shoot right out again in the trail of the war-rockets that blasted one -another in galactic fury, to sidle up behind gutted wrecks of ships, -salvaging any bodies still intact after the conflict.</p> - -<p>Two men. Rice and himself. Sharing a cozy morgue ship with a hundred -other men who had forgotten, quite suddenly, however, to talk again.</p> - -<p>Ten years of it. Every hour of those ten years eating like maggots -inside, working out to the surface of Burnett's face, working under the -husk of his starved eyes and starved limbs. Starved for life. Starved -for action.</p> - -<p>This would be his last trip, or he'd know the reason why!</p> - -<p>"Sam!"</p> - -<p>Burnett jerked. Rice's voice clipped through the drainage-preservative -lab, bounded against glassite retorts, echoed from the refrigerator -shelves. Burnett stared at the tabled bodies as if they would leap to -life, even while preservative was being pumped into their veins.</p> - -<p>"Sam! On the double! Up the rungs!"</p> - -<p>Burnett closed his eyes and said a couple of words, firmly. Nothing was -worth running for any more. Another body. There had been one hundred -thousand bodies preceding it. Nothing unusual about a body with blood -cooling in it.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Shaking his head, he walked unsteadily toward the rungs that gleamed -up into the air-lock, control-room sector of the rocket. He climbed -without making any noise on the rungs.</p> - -<p>He kept thinking the one thing he couldn't forget.</p> - -<p><i>You never catch up with the war.</i></p> - -<p>All the color is ahead of you. The drive of orange rocket traces across -stars, the whamming of steel-nosed bombs into elusive targets, the -titanic explosions and breathless pursuits, the flags and the excited -glory are always a million miles ahead.</p> - -<p>He bit his teeth together.</p> - -<p><i>You never catch up with the war.</i></p> - -<p>You come along when space has settled back, when the vacuum has stopped -trembling from unleashed forces between worlds. You come along in the -dark quiet of death to find the wreckage plunging with all the fury of -its original acceleration in no particular direction. You can only see -it; you don't hear anything in space but your own heart kicking your -ribs.</p> - -<p>You see bodies, each in its own terrific orbit, given impetus by -grinding collisions, tossed from mother ships and dancing head over -feet forever and forever with no goal. Bits of flesh in ruptured space -suits, mouths open for air that had never been there in a hundred -billion centuries. And they kept dancing without music until you -extended the retriever-claw and culled them into the air-lock.</p> - -<p>That was all the war-glory he got. Nothing but the stunned, shivering -silence, the memory of rockets long gone, and the shelves filling up -all too quickly with men who had once loved laughing.</p> - -<p>You wondered who all the men were; and who the next ones would be. -After ten years you made yourself blind to them. You went around doing -your job with mechanical hands.</p> - -<p>But even a machine breaks down....</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>"Sam!" Rice turned swiftly as Burnett dragged himself up the ladder. -Red and warm, Rice's face hovered over the body of a sprawled enemy -official. "Take a look at this!"</p> - -<p>Burnett caught his breath. His eyes narrowed. There was something wrong -with the body; his experienced glance knew that. He didn't know what it -was.</p> - -<p>Maybe it was because the body looked a little <i>too</i> dead.</p> - -<p>Burnett didn't say anything, but he climbed the rest of the way, -stood quietly in the grey-metal air-lock. The enemy official was as -delicately made as a fine white spider. Eyelids, closed, were faintly -blue. The hair was thin silken strands of pale gold, waved and pressed -close to a veined skull. Where the thin-lipped mouth fell open a -cluster of needle-tipped teeth glittered. The fragile body was enclosed -completely in milk-pale syntha-silk, a holstered gun at the middle.</p> - -<p>Burnett rubbed his jaw. "Well?"</p> - -<p>Rice exploded. His eyes were hot in his young, sharp-cut face, hot and -black. "Good Lord, Sam, do you know who this is?"</p> - -<p>Burnett scowled uneasily and said no.</p> - -<p>"It's Lethla!" Rice retorted.</p> - -<p>Burnett said, "Lethla?" And then: "Oh, yes! Kriere's majordomo. That -right?"</p> - -<p>"Don't say it calm, Sam. Say it big. Say it big! If Lethla is here in -space, then Kriere's not far away from him!"</p> - -<p>Burnett shrugged. More bodies, more people, more war. What the hell. -What the hell. He was tired. Talk about bodies and rulers to someone -else.</p> - -<p>Rice grabbed him by the shoulders. "Snap out of it, Sam. Think! -Kriere—The All-Mighty—in our territory. His right hand man dead. That -means Kriere was in an accident, too!"</p> - -<p>Sam opened his thin lips and the words fell out all by themselves. -"Look, Rice, you're new at this game. I've been at it ever since the -Venus-Earth mess started. It's been see-sawing back and forth since the -day you played hookey in the tenth grade, and I've been in the thick -of it. When there's nothing left but seared memories, I'll be prowling -through the void picking up warriors and taking them back to the good -green Earth. Grisly, yes, but it's routine.</p> - -<p>"As for Kriere—if he's anywhere around, he's smart. Every precaution -is taken to protect that one."</p> - -<p>"But Lethla! His body must mean something!"</p> - -<p>"And if it does? Have we got guns aboard this morgue-ship? Are we a -battle-cuiser to go against him?"</p> - -<p>"We'll radio for help?"</p> - -<p>"Yeah? If there's a warship within our radio range, seven hundred -thousand miles, we'll get it. Unfortunately, the tide of battle has -swept out past Earth in a new war concerning Io. That's out, Rice."</p> - -<p>Rice stood about three inches below Sam Burnett's six-foot-one. Jaw -hard and determined, he stared at Sam, a funny light in his eyes. His -fingers twitched all by themselves at his sides. His mouth twisted, -"You're one hell of a patriot, Sam Burnett!"</p> - -<p>Burnett reached out with one long finger, tapped it quietly on Rice's -barrel-chest. "Haul a cargo of corpses for three thousand nights and -days and see how patriotic you feel. All those fine muscled lads -bloated and crushed by space pressures and heat-blasts. Fine lads who -start out smiling and get the smile burned off down to the bone—"</p> - -<p>Burnett swallowed and didn't say anything more, but he closed his eyes. -He stood there, smelling the death-odor in the hot air of the ship, -hearing the chug-chug-chug of the blood pumps down below, and his own -heart waiting warm and heavy at the base of his throat.</p> - -<p>"This is my last cargo, Rice. I can't take it any longer. And I don't -care much how I go back to earth. This Venusian here—what's his name? -Lethla. He's number ninety-eight. Shove me into shelf ninety-nine -beside him and get the hell home. That's how I feel!"</p> - -<p>Rice was going to say something, but he didn't have time.</p> - -<p>Lethla was alive.</p> - -<p>He rose from the floor with slow, easy movements, almost like a dream. -He didn't say anything. The heat-blast in his white fingers did all the -necessary talking. It didn't say anything either, but Burnett knew what -language it would use if it had to.</p> - -<p>Burnett swallowed hard. The body had looked funny. Too dead. Now he -knew why. Involuntarily, Burnett moved forward. Lethla moved like a -pale spider, flicking his fragile arm to cover Burnett, the gun in it -like a dead cold star.</p> - -<p>Rice sucked in his breath. Burnett forced himself to take it easy. From -the corners of his eyes he saw Rice's expression go deep and tight, -biting lines into his sharp face.</p> - -<p>Rice got it out, finally. "How'd you do it?" he demanded, bitterly. -"How'd you live in the void? It's impossible!"</p> - -<p>A crazy thought came ramming down and exploded in Burnett's head. <i>You -never catch up with the war!</i></p> - -<p>But what if the war catches up with you?</p> - -<p>What in hell would Lethla be wanting aboard a morgue ship?</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Lethla half-crouched in the midst of the smell of death and the -chugging of blood-pumps below. In the silence he reached up with quick -fingers, tapped a tiny crystal stud upon the back of his head, and the -halves of a microscopically thin chrysalis parted transparently off -of his face. He shucked it off, trailing air-tendrils that had been -inserted, hidden in the uniform, ending in thin globules of oxygen.</p> - -<p>He spoke. Triumph warmed his crystal-thin voice. "That's how I did it, -Earthman."</p> - -<p>"Glassite!" said Rice. "A face-moulded mask of glassite!"</p> - -<p>Lethla nodded. His milk-blue eyes dilated. "Very marvelously pared to -an unbreakable thickness of one-thirtieth of an inch; worn only on the -head. You have to look quickly to notice it, and, unfortunately, viewed -as you saw it, outside the ship, floating in the void, not discernible -at all."</p> - -<p>Prickles of sweat appeared on Rice's face. He swore at the Venusian and -the Venusian laughed like some sort of stringed instrument, high and -quick.</p> - -<p>Burnett laughed, too. Ironically. "First time in years a man ever came -aboard the Constellation alive. It's a welcome change."</p> - -<p>Lethla showed his needle-like teeth. "I thought it might be. Where's -your radio?"</p> - -<p>"Go find it!" snapped Rice, hotly.</p> - -<p>"I will." One hand, blue-veined, on the ladder-rungs, Lethla paused. -"I know you're weaponless; Purple Cross regulations. And this air-lock -is safe. Don't move." Whispering, his naked feet padded white up the -ladder. Two long breaths later something crashed; metal and glass and -coils. The radio.</p> - -<p>Burnett put his shoulder blades against the wall-metal, looking at his -feet. When he glanced up, Rice's fresh, animated face was spoiled by -the new bitterness in it.</p> - -<p>Lethla came down. Like a breath of air on the rungs.</p> - -<p>He smiled. "That's better. Now. We can talk—"</p> - -<p>Rice said it, slow:</p> - -<p>"Interplanetary law declares it straight, Lethla! Get out! Only dead -men belong here."</p> - -<p>Lethla's gun grip tightened. "More talk of that nature, and only dead -men there will be." He blinked. "But first—we must rescue Kriere...."</p> - -<p>"Kriere!" Rice acted as if he had been hit in the jaw.</p> - -<p>Burnett moved his tongue back and forth on his lips silently, his eyes -lidded, listening to the two of them as if they were a radio drama. -Lethla's voice came next:</p> - -<p>"Rather unfortunately, yes. He's still alive, heading toward Venus -at an orbital velocity of two thousand m.p.h., wearing one of these -air-chrysali. Enough air for two more hours. Our flag ship was attacked -unexpectedly yesterday near Mars. We were forced to take to the -life-boats, scattering, Kriere and I in one, the others sacrificing -their lives to cover our escape. We were lucky. We got through the -Earth cordon unseen. But luck can't last forever.</p> - -<p>"We saw your morgue ship an hour ago. It's a long, long way to Venus. -We were running out of fuel, food, water. Radio was broken. Capture -was certain. You were coming our way; we took the chance. We set a -small time-bomb to destroy the life-rocket, and cast off, wearing our -chrysali-helmets. It was the first time we had ever tried using them to -trick anyone. We knew you wouldn't know we were alive until it was too -late and we controlled your ship. We knew you picked up all bodies for -brief exams, returning alien corpses to space later."</p> - -<p>Rice's voice was sullen. "A set-up for you, huh? Traveling under the -protection of the Purple Cross you can get your damned All-Mighty safe -to Venus."</p> - -<p>Lethla bowed slightly. "Who would suspect a Morgue Rocket of providing -safe hiding for precious Venusian cargo?"</p> - -<p>"Precious is the word for you, brother!" said Rice.</p> - -<p>"Enough!" Lethla moved his gun several inches.</p> - -<p>"Accelerate toward Venus, mote-detectors wide open. Kriere must be -picked up—<i>now!</i>"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Rice didn't move. Burnett moved first, feeling alive for the first time -in years. "Sure," said Sam, smiling. "We'll pick him up."</p> - -<p>"No tricks," said Lethla.</p> - -<p>Burnett scowled and smiled together. "No tricks. You'll have Kriere on -board the <i>Constellation</i> in half an hour or I'm no coroner."</p> - -<p>"Follow me up the ladder."</p> - -<p>Lethla danced up, turned, waved his gun. "Come on."</p> - -<p>Burnett went up, quick. Almost as if he enjoyed doing Lethla a favor. -Rice grumbled and cursed after him.</p> - -<p>On the way up, Burnett thought about it. About Lethla poised like -a white feather at the top, holding death in his hand. You never -knew whose body would come in through the star-port next. Number -ninety-eight was Lethla. Number ninety-nine would be Kriere.</p> - -<p>There were two shelves numbered and empty. They should be filled. And -what more proper than that Kriere and Lethla should fill them? But, he -chewed his lip, that would need a bit of doing. And even then the cargo -wouldn't be full. Still one more body to get; one hundred. And you -never knew who it would be.</p> - -<p>He came out of the quick thoughts when he looped his long leg over -the hole-rim, stepped up, faced Lethla in a cramped control room that -was one glittering swirl of silver levers, audio-plates and visuals. -Chronometers, clicking, told of the steady dropping toward the sun at a -slow pace.</p> - -<p>Burnett set his teeth together, bone against bone. Help Kriere escape? -See him safely to Venus, and then be freed? Sounded easy, wouldn't be -hard. Venusians weren't blind with malice. Rice and he could come out -alive; if they cooperated.</p> - -<p>But there were a lot of warriors sleeping on a lot of numbered shelves -in the dim corridors of the long years. And their dead lips were -stirring to life in Burnett's ears. Not so easily could they be ignored.</p> - -<p><i>You may never catch up with the war again.</i></p> - -<p>The last trip!</p> - -<p>Yes, this could be it. Capture Kriere and end the war. But what -ridiculous fantasy was it made him believe he could actually do it?</p> - -<p>Two muscles moved on Burnett, one in each long cheek. The sag in his -body vanished as he tautened his spine, flexed his lean-sinewed arms, -wet thin lips.</p> - -<p>"Now, where do you want this crate?" he asked Lethla easily.</p> - -<p>Lethla exhaled softly. "Cooperation. I like it. You're wise, Earthman."</p> - -<p>"Very," said Burnett.</p> - -<p>He was thinking about three thousand eternal nights of young bodies -being ripped, slaughtered, flung to the vacuum tides. Ten years of -hating a job and hoping that some day there would be a last trip and it -would all be over.</p> - -<p>Burnett laughed through his nose. Controls moved under his fingers like -fluid; loved, caressed, tended by his familiar touching. Looking ahead, -he squinted.</p> - -<p>"There's your Ruler now, Lethla. Doing somersaults. Looks dead. A good -trick."</p> - -<p>"Cut power! We don't want to burn him!"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Burnett cut. Kriere's milky face floated dreamily into a visual-screen, -eyes sealed, lips gaping, hands sagging, clutching emptily at the stars.</p> - -<p>"We're about fifty miles from him, catching up." Burnett turned to -Lethla with an intent scowl. Funny. This was the first and the last -time anybody would ever board the <i>Constellation</i> alive. His stomach -went flat, tautened with sudden weakening fear.</p> - -<p>If Kriere could be captured, that meant the end of the war, the end -of shelves stacked with sleeping warriors, the end of this blind -searching. Kriere, then, had to be taken aboard. After that—</p> - -<p>Kriere, the All-Mighty. At whose behest all space had quivered like -a smitten gong for part of a century. Kriere, revolving in his neat, -water-blue uniform, emblems shining gold, heat-gun tucked in glossy -jet holster. With Kriere aboard, chances of overcoming him would be -eliminated. Now: Rice and Burnett against Lethla. Lethla favored -because of his gun.</p> - -<p>Kriere would make odds impossible.</p> - -<p>Something had to be done before Kriere came in.</p> - -<p>Lethla had to be yanked off guard. Shocked, bewildered, -fooled—somehow. But—how?</p> - -<p>Burnett's jaw froze tight. He could feel a spot on his shoulder-blade -where Lethla would send a bullet crashing into rib, sinew, -artery—heart.</p> - -<p>There was a way. And there was a weapon. And the war would be over and -this would be the last trip.</p> - -<p>Sweat covered his palms in a nervous smear.</p> - -<p>"Steady, Rice," he said, matter of factly. With the rockets cut, there -was too much silence, and his voice sounded guilty standing up alone in -the center of that silence. "Take controls, Rice. I'll manipulate the -star-port."</p> - -<p>Burnett slipped from the control console. Rice replaced him grimly. -Burnett strode to the next console of levers. That spot on his back -kept aching like it was sear-branded X. For the place where the bullet -sings and rips. And if you turn quick, catching it in the arm first, -why—</p> - -<p>Kriere loomed bigger, a white spider delicately dancing on a web of -stars. His eyes flicked open behind the glassite sheath, and saw the -<i>Constellation</i>. Kriere smiled. His hands came up. He knew he was about -to be rescued.</p> - -<p>Burnett smiled right back at him. What Kriere didn't know was that he -was about to end a ten-years' war.</p> - -<p>There was only <i>one</i> way of drawing Lethla off guard, and it had to be -fast.</p> - -<p>Burnett jabbed a purple-topped stud. The star-port clashed open as -it had done a thousand times before; but for the first time it was a -good sound. And out of the star-port, at Sam Burnett's easily fingered -directions, slid the long claw-like mechanism that picked up bodies -from space.</p> - -<p>Lethla watched, intent and cold and quiet. The gun was cold and quiet, -too.</p> - -<p>The claw glided toward Kriere without a sound, now, dream-like in its -slowness.</p> - -<p>It reached Kriere.</p> - -<p>Burnett inhaled a deep breath.</p> - -<p>The metal claw cuddled Kriere in its shiny palm.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus.jpg" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>Lethla watched.</p> - -<p>He watched while Burnett exhaled, touched another lever and said: "You -know, Lethla, there's an old saying that only dead men come aboard the -<i>Constellation</i>. I believe it."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>And the claw closed as Burnett spoke, closed slowly and certainly, all -around Kriere, crushing him into a ridiculous posture of silence. There -was blood running on the claw, and the only recognizable part was the -head, which was carefully preserved for identification.</p> - -<p>That was the only way to draw Lethla off guard.</p> - -<p>Burnett spun about and leaped.</p> - -<p>The horror on Lethla's face didn't go away as he fired his gun.</p> - -<p>Rice came in fighting, too, but not before something like a red-hot -ramrod stabbed Sam Burnett, catching him in the ribs, spinning him back -like a drunken idiot to fall in a corner.</p> - -<p>Fists made blunt flesh noises. Lethla went down, weaponless and -screaming. Rice kicked. After awhile Lethla quit screaming, and the -room swam around in Burnett's eyes, and he closed them tight and -started laughing.</p> - -<p>He didn't finish laughing for maybe ten minutes. He heard the retriever -claws come inside, and the star-port grind shut.</p> - -<p>Out of the red darkness, Rice's voice came and then he could see Rice's -young face over him. Burnett groaned.</p> - -<p>Rice said, "Sam, you shouldn't have done it. You shouldn't have, Sam."</p> - -<p>"To hell with it." Burnett winced, and fought to keep his eyes open. -Something wet and sticky covered his chest. "I said this was my last -trip and I meant it. One way or the other, I'd have quit!"</p> - -<p>"This is the hard way—"</p> - -<p>"Maybe. I dunno. Kind of nice to think of all those kids who'll never -have to come aboard the <i>Constellation</i>, though, Rice." His voice -trailed off. "You watch the shelves fill up and you never know who'll -be next. Who'd have thought, four days ago—"</p> - -<p>Something happened to his tongue so it felt like hard ice blocking his -mouth. He had a lot more words to say, but only time to get a few of -them out:</p> - -<p>"Rice?"</p> - -<p>"Yeah, Sam?"</p> - -<p>"We haven't got a full cargo, boy."</p> - -<p>"Full enough for me, sir."</p> - -<p>"But still not full. If we went back to Center Base without filling -the shelves, it wouldn't be right. Look there—number ninety-eight is -Lethla—number ninety-nine is Kriere. Three thousand days of rolling -this rocket, and not once come back without a bunch of the kids who -want to sleep easy on the good green earth. Not right to be going back -any way—but—the way—we used to—"</p> - -<p>His voice got all full of fog. As thick as the fists of a dozen -warriors. Rice was going away from him. Rice was standing still, and -Burnett was lying down, not moving, but somehow Rice was going away a -million miles.</p> - -<p>"Ain't I one hell of a patriot, Rice?"</p> - -<p>Then everything got dark except Rice's face. And that was starting to -dissolve.</p> - -<p>Ninety-eight: Lethla. Ninety-nine: Kriere.</p> - -<p>He could still see Rice standing over him for a long time, breathing -out and in. Down under the tables the blood-pumps pulsed and pulsed, -thick and slow. Rice looked down at Burnett and then at the empty shelf -at the far end of the room, and then back at Burnett again.</p> - -<p>And then he said softly:</p> - -<p>"<i>One hundred.</i>"</p> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Morgue Ship, by Ray Bradbury - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MORGUE SHIP *** - -***** This file should be named 63041-h.htm or 63041-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/0/4/63041/ - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan 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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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/license - - -Title: Morgue Ship - -Author: Ray Bradbury - -Release Date: August 25, 2020 [EBook #63041] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ASCII - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MORGUE SHIP *** - - - - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - - - - - - - - - - Morgue Ship - - By RAY BRADBURY - - This was Burnett's last trip. Three more - shelves to fill with space-slain warriors--and - he would be among the living again. - - [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from - Planet Stories Summer 1944. - Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that - the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] - - -He heard the star-port grind open, and the movement of the metal claws -groping into space, and then the star-port closed. - -There was another dead man aboard the _Constellation_. - -Sam Burnett shook his long head, trying to think clearly. Pallid and -quiet, three bodies lay on the cold transparent tables around him; -machines stirred, revolved, hummed. He didn't see them. He didn't see -anything but a red haze over his mind. It blotted out the far wall of -the laboratory where the shelves went up and down, numbered in scarlet, -keeping the bodies of soldiers from all further harm. - -Burnett didn't move. He stood there in his rumpled white surgical -gown, staring at his fingers gloved in bone-white rubber; feeling all -tight and wild inside himself. It went on for days. Moving the ship. -Opening the star-port. Extending the retriever claw. Plucking some poor -warrior's body out of the void. - -He didn't like it any more. Ten years is too long to go back and -forth from Earth to nowhere. You came out empty and you went back -full-cargoed with a lot of warriors who didn't laugh or talk or smoke, -who just lay on their shelves, all one hundred of them, waiting for a -decent burial. - -"Number ninety-eight." Coming matter of fact and slow, Rice's voice -from the ceiling radio hit Burnett. - -"Number ninety-eight," Burnett repeated. "Working on ninety-five, -ninety-six and ninety-seven now. Blood-pumps, preservative, slight -surgery." Off a million miles away his voice was talking. It sounded -deep. It didn't belong to him anymore. - -Rice said: - -"Boyohbody! Two more pick-ups and back to New York. Me for a ten-day -drunk!" - -Burnett peeled the gloves off his huge, red, soft hands, slapped them -into a floor incinerator mouth. Back to Earth. Then spin around and -shoot right out again in the trail of the war-rockets that blasted one -another in galactic fury, to sidle up behind gutted wrecks of ships, -salvaging any bodies still intact after the conflict. - -Two men. Rice and himself. Sharing a cozy morgue ship with a hundred -other men who had forgotten, quite suddenly, however, to talk again. - -Ten years of it. Every hour of those ten years eating like maggots -inside, working out to the surface of Burnett's face, working under the -husk of his starved eyes and starved limbs. Starved for life. Starved -for action. - -This would be his last trip, or he'd know the reason why! - -"Sam!" - -Burnett jerked. Rice's voice clipped through the drainage-preservative -lab, bounded against glassite retorts, echoed from the refrigerator -shelves. Burnett stared at the tabled bodies as if they would leap to -life, even while preservative was being pumped into their veins. - -"Sam! On the double! Up the rungs!" - -Burnett closed his eyes and said a couple of words, firmly. Nothing was -worth running for any more. Another body. There had been one hundred -thousand bodies preceding it. Nothing unusual about a body with blood -cooling in it. - - * * * * * - -Shaking his head, he walked unsteadily toward the rungs that gleamed -up into the air-lock, control-room sector of the rocket. He climbed -without making any noise on the rungs. - -He kept thinking the one thing he couldn't forget. - -_You never catch up with the war._ - -All the color is ahead of you. The drive of orange rocket traces across -stars, the whamming of steel-nosed bombs into elusive targets, the -titanic explosions and breathless pursuits, the flags and the excited -glory are always a million miles ahead. - -He bit his teeth together. - -_You never catch up with the war._ - -You come along when space has settled back, when the vacuum has stopped -trembling from unleashed forces between worlds. You come along in the -dark quiet of death to find the wreckage plunging with all the fury of -its original acceleration in no particular direction. You can only see -it; you don't hear anything in space but your own heart kicking your -ribs. - -You see bodies, each in its own terrific orbit, given impetus by -grinding collisions, tossed from mother ships and dancing head over -feet forever and forever with no goal. Bits of flesh in ruptured space -suits, mouths open for air that had never been there in a hundred -billion centuries. And they kept dancing without music until you -extended the retriever-claw and culled them into the air-lock. - -That was all the war-glory he got. Nothing but the stunned, shivering -silence, the memory of rockets long gone, and the shelves filling up -all too quickly with men who had once loved laughing. - -You wondered who all the men were; and who the next ones would be. -After ten years you made yourself blind to them. You went around doing -your job with mechanical hands. - -But even a machine breaks down.... - - * * * * * - -"Sam!" Rice turned swiftly as Burnett dragged himself up the ladder. -Red and warm, Rice's face hovered over the body of a sprawled enemy -official. "Take a look at this!" - -Burnett caught his breath. His eyes narrowed. There was something wrong -with the body; his experienced glance knew that. He didn't know what it -was. - -Maybe it was because the body looked a little _too_ dead. - -Burnett didn't say anything, but he climbed the rest of the way, -stood quietly in the grey-metal air-lock. The enemy official was as -delicately made as a fine white spider. Eyelids, closed, were faintly -blue. The hair was thin silken strands of pale gold, waved and pressed -close to a veined skull. Where the thin-lipped mouth fell open a -cluster of needle-tipped teeth glittered. The fragile body was enclosed -completely in milk-pale syntha-silk, a holstered gun at the middle. - -Burnett rubbed his jaw. "Well?" - -Rice exploded. His eyes were hot in his young, sharp-cut face, hot and -black. "Good Lord, Sam, do you know who this is?" - -Burnett scowled uneasily and said no. - -"It's Lethla!" Rice retorted. - -Burnett said, "Lethla?" And then: "Oh, yes! Kriere's majordomo. That -right?" - -"Don't say it calm, Sam. Say it big. Say it big! If Lethla is here in -space, then Kriere's not far away from him!" - -Burnett shrugged. More bodies, more people, more war. What the hell. -What the hell. He was tired. Talk about bodies and rulers to someone -else. - -Rice grabbed him by the shoulders. "Snap out of it, Sam. Think! -Kriere--The All-Mighty--in our territory. His right hand man dead. That -means Kriere was in an accident, too!" - -Sam opened his thin lips and the words fell out all by themselves. -"Look, Rice, you're new at this game. I've been at it ever since the -Venus-Earth mess started. It's been see-sawing back and forth since the -day you played hookey in the tenth grade, and I've been in the thick -of it. When there's nothing left but seared memories, I'll be prowling -through the void picking up warriors and taking them back to the good -green Earth. Grisly, yes, but it's routine. - -"As for Kriere--if he's anywhere around, he's smart. Every precaution -is taken to protect that one." - -"But Lethla! His body must mean something!" - -"And if it does? Have we got guns aboard this morgue-ship? Are we a -battle-cuiser to go against him?" - -"We'll radio for help?" - -"Yeah? If there's a warship within our radio range, seven hundred -thousand miles, we'll get it. Unfortunately, the tide of battle has -swept out past Earth in a new war concerning Io. That's out, Rice." - -Rice stood about three inches below Sam Burnett's six-foot-one. Jaw -hard and determined, he stared at Sam, a funny light in his eyes. His -fingers twitched all by themselves at his sides. His mouth twisted, -"You're one hell of a patriot, Sam Burnett!" - -Burnett reached out with one long finger, tapped it quietly on Rice's -barrel-chest. "Haul a cargo of corpses for three thousand nights and -days and see how patriotic you feel. All those fine muscled lads -bloated and crushed by space pressures and heat-blasts. Fine lads who -start out smiling and get the smile burned off down to the bone--" - -Burnett swallowed and didn't say anything more, but he closed his eyes. -He stood there, smelling the death-odor in the hot air of the ship, -hearing the chug-chug-chug of the blood pumps down below, and his own -heart waiting warm and heavy at the base of his throat. - -"This is my last cargo, Rice. I can't take it any longer. And I don't -care much how I go back to earth. This Venusian here--what's his name? -Lethla. He's number ninety-eight. Shove me into shelf ninety-nine -beside him and get the hell home. That's how I feel!" - -Rice was going to say something, but he didn't have time. - -Lethla was alive. - -He rose from the floor with slow, easy movements, almost like a dream. -He didn't say anything. The heat-blast in his white fingers did all the -necessary talking. It didn't say anything either, but Burnett knew what -language it would use if it had to. - -Burnett swallowed hard. The body had looked funny. Too dead. Now he -knew why. Involuntarily, Burnett moved forward. Lethla moved like a -pale spider, flicking his fragile arm to cover Burnett, the gun in it -like a dead cold star. - -Rice sucked in his breath. Burnett forced himself to take it easy. From -the corners of his eyes he saw Rice's expression go deep and tight, -biting lines into his sharp face. - -Rice got it out, finally. "How'd you do it?" he demanded, bitterly. -"How'd you live in the void? It's impossible!" - -A crazy thought came ramming down and exploded in Burnett's head. _You -never catch up with the war!_ - -But what if the war catches up with you? - -What in hell would Lethla be wanting aboard a morgue ship? - - * * * * * - -Lethla half-crouched in the midst of the smell of death and the -chugging of blood-pumps below. In the silence he reached up with quick -fingers, tapped a tiny crystal stud upon the back of his head, and the -halves of a microscopically thin chrysalis parted transparently off -of his face. He shucked it off, trailing air-tendrils that had been -inserted, hidden in the uniform, ending in thin globules of oxygen. - -He spoke. Triumph warmed his crystal-thin voice. "That's how I did it, -Earthman." - -"Glassite!" said Rice. "A face-moulded mask of glassite!" - -Lethla nodded. His milk-blue eyes dilated. "Very marvelously pared to -an unbreakable thickness of one-thirtieth of an inch; worn only on the -head. You have to look quickly to notice it, and, unfortunately, viewed -as you saw it, outside the ship, floating in the void, not discernible -at all." - -Prickles of sweat appeared on Rice's face. He swore at the Venusian and -the Venusian laughed like some sort of stringed instrument, high and -quick. - -Burnett laughed, too. Ironically. "First time in years a man ever came -aboard the Constellation alive. It's a welcome change." - -Lethla showed his needle-like teeth. "I thought it might be. Where's -your radio?" - -"Go find it!" snapped Rice, hotly. - -"I will." One hand, blue-veined, on the ladder-rungs, Lethla paused. -"I know you're weaponless; Purple Cross regulations. And this air-lock -is safe. Don't move." Whispering, his naked feet padded white up the -ladder. Two long breaths later something crashed; metal and glass and -coils. The radio. - -Burnett put his shoulder blades against the wall-metal, looking at his -feet. When he glanced up, Rice's fresh, animated face was spoiled by -the new bitterness in it. - -Lethla came down. Like a breath of air on the rungs. - -He smiled. "That's better. Now. We can talk--" - -Rice said it, slow: - -"Interplanetary law declares it straight, Lethla! Get out! Only dead -men belong here." - -Lethla's gun grip tightened. "More talk of that nature, and only dead -men there will be." He blinked. "But first--we must rescue Kriere...." - -"Kriere!" Rice acted as if he had been hit in the jaw. - -Burnett moved his tongue back and forth on his lips silently, his eyes -lidded, listening to the two of them as if they were a radio drama. -Lethla's voice came next: - -"Rather unfortunately, yes. He's still alive, heading toward Venus -at an orbital velocity of two thousand m.p.h., wearing one of these -air-chrysali. Enough air for two more hours. Our flag ship was attacked -unexpectedly yesterday near Mars. We were forced to take to the -life-boats, scattering, Kriere and I in one, the others sacrificing -their lives to cover our escape. We were lucky. We got through the -Earth cordon unseen. But luck can't last forever. - -"We saw your morgue ship an hour ago. It's a long, long way to Venus. -We were running out of fuel, food, water. Radio was broken. Capture -was certain. You were coming our way; we took the chance. We set a -small time-bomb to destroy the life-rocket, and cast off, wearing our -chrysali-helmets. It was the first time we had ever tried using them to -trick anyone. We knew you wouldn't know we were alive until it was too -late and we controlled your ship. We knew you picked up all bodies for -brief exams, returning alien corpses to space later." - -Rice's voice was sullen. "A set-up for you, huh? Traveling under the -protection of the Purple Cross you can get your damned All-Mighty safe -to Venus." - -Lethla bowed slightly. "Who would suspect a Morgue Rocket of providing -safe hiding for precious Venusian cargo?" - -"Precious is the word for you, brother!" said Rice. - -"Enough!" Lethla moved his gun several inches. - -"Accelerate toward Venus, mote-detectors wide open. Kriere must be -picked up--_now!_" - - * * * * * - -Rice didn't move. Burnett moved first, feeling alive for the first time -in years. "Sure," said Sam, smiling. "We'll pick him up." - -"No tricks," said Lethla. - -Burnett scowled and smiled together. "No tricks. You'll have Kriere on -board the _Constellation_ in half an hour or I'm no coroner." - -"Follow me up the ladder." - -Lethla danced up, turned, waved his gun. "Come on." - -Burnett went up, quick. Almost as if he enjoyed doing Lethla a favor. -Rice grumbled and cursed after him. - -On the way up, Burnett thought about it. About Lethla poised like -a white feather at the top, holding death in his hand. You never -knew whose body would come in through the star-port next. Number -ninety-eight was Lethla. Number ninety-nine would be Kriere. - -There were two shelves numbered and empty. They should be filled. And -what more proper than that Kriere and Lethla should fill them? But, he -chewed his lip, that would need a bit of doing. And even then the cargo -wouldn't be full. Still one more body to get; one hundred. And you -never knew who it would be. - -He came out of the quick thoughts when he looped his long leg over -the hole-rim, stepped up, faced Lethla in a cramped control room that -was one glittering swirl of silver levers, audio-plates and visuals. -Chronometers, clicking, told of the steady dropping toward the sun at a -slow pace. - -Burnett set his teeth together, bone against bone. Help Kriere escape? -See him safely to Venus, and then be freed? Sounded easy, wouldn't be -hard. Venusians weren't blind with malice. Rice and he could come out -alive; if they cooperated. - -But there were a lot of warriors sleeping on a lot of numbered shelves -in the dim corridors of the long years. And their dead lips were -stirring to life in Burnett's ears. Not so easily could they be ignored. - -_You may never catch up with the war again._ - -The last trip! - -Yes, this could be it. Capture Kriere and end the war. But what -ridiculous fantasy was it made him believe he could actually do it? - -Two muscles moved on Burnett, one in each long cheek. The sag in his -body vanished as he tautened his spine, flexed his lean-sinewed arms, -wet thin lips. - -"Now, where do you want this crate?" he asked Lethla easily. - -Lethla exhaled softly. "Cooperation. I like it. You're wise, Earthman." - -"Very," said Burnett. - -He was thinking about three thousand eternal nights of young bodies -being ripped, slaughtered, flung to the vacuum tides. Ten years of -hating a job and hoping that some day there would be a last trip and it -would all be over. - -Burnett laughed through his nose. Controls moved under his fingers like -fluid; loved, caressed, tended by his familiar touching. Looking ahead, -he squinted. - -"There's your Ruler now, Lethla. Doing somersaults. Looks dead. A good -trick." - -"Cut power! We don't want to burn him!" - - * * * * * - -Burnett cut. Kriere's milky face floated dreamily into a visual-screen, -eyes sealed, lips gaping, hands sagging, clutching emptily at the stars. - -"We're about fifty miles from him, catching up." Burnett turned to -Lethla with an intent scowl. Funny. This was the first and the last -time anybody would ever board the _Constellation_ alive. His stomach -went flat, tautened with sudden weakening fear. - -If Kriere could be captured, that meant the end of the war, the end -of shelves stacked with sleeping warriors, the end of this blind -searching. Kriere, then, had to be taken aboard. After that-- - -Kriere, the All-Mighty. At whose behest all space had quivered like -a smitten gong for part of a century. Kriere, revolving in his neat, -water-blue uniform, emblems shining gold, heat-gun tucked in glossy -jet holster. With Kriere aboard, chances of overcoming him would be -eliminated. Now: Rice and Burnett against Lethla. Lethla favored -because of his gun. - -Kriere would make odds impossible. - -Something had to be done before Kriere came in. - -Lethla had to be yanked off guard. Shocked, bewildered, -fooled--somehow. But--how? - -Burnett's jaw froze tight. He could feel a spot on his shoulder-blade -where Lethla would send a bullet crashing into rib, sinew, -artery--heart. - -There was a way. And there was a weapon. And the war would be over and -this would be the last trip. - -Sweat covered his palms in a nervous smear. - -"Steady, Rice," he said, matter of factly. With the rockets cut, there -was too much silence, and his voice sounded guilty standing up alone in -the center of that silence. "Take controls, Rice. I'll manipulate the -star-port." - -Burnett slipped from the control console. Rice replaced him grimly. -Burnett strode to the next console of levers. That spot on his back -kept aching like it was sear-branded X. For the place where the bullet -sings and rips. And if you turn quick, catching it in the arm first, -why-- - -Kriere loomed bigger, a white spider delicately dancing on a web of -stars. His eyes flicked open behind the glassite sheath, and saw the -_Constellation_. Kriere smiled. His hands came up. He knew he was about -to be rescued. - -Burnett smiled right back at him. What Kriere didn't know was that he -was about to end a ten-years' war. - -There was only _one_ way of drawing Lethla off guard, and it had to be -fast. - -Burnett jabbed a purple-topped stud. The star-port clashed open as -it had done a thousand times before; but for the first time it was a -good sound. And out of the star-port, at Sam Burnett's easily fingered -directions, slid the long claw-like mechanism that picked up bodies -from space. - -Lethla watched, intent and cold and quiet. The gun was cold and quiet, -too. - -The claw glided toward Kriere without a sound, now, dream-like in its -slowness. - -It reached Kriere. - -Burnett inhaled a deep breath. - -The metal claw cuddled Kriere in its shiny palm. - -Lethla watched. - -He watched while Burnett exhaled, touched another lever and said: "You -know, Lethla, there's an old saying that only dead men come aboard the -_Constellation_. I believe it." - - * * * * * - -And the claw closed as Burnett spoke, closed slowly and certainly, all -around Kriere, crushing him into a ridiculous posture of silence. There -was blood running on the claw, and the only recognizable part was the -head, which was carefully preserved for identification. - -That was the only way to draw Lethla off guard. - -Burnett spun about and leaped. - -The horror on Lethla's face didn't go away as he fired his gun. - -Rice came in fighting, too, but not before something like a red-hot -ramrod stabbed Sam Burnett, catching him in the ribs, spinning him back -like a drunken idiot to fall in a corner. - -Fists made blunt flesh noises. Lethla went down, weaponless and -screaming. Rice kicked. After awhile Lethla quit screaming, and the -room swam around in Burnett's eyes, and he closed them tight and -started laughing. - -He didn't finish laughing for maybe ten minutes. He heard the retriever -claws come inside, and the star-port grind shut. - -Out of the red darkness, Rice's voice came and then he could see Rice's -young face over him. Burnett groaned. - -Rice said, "Sam, you shouldn't have done it. You shouldn't have, Sam." - -"To hell with it." Burnett winced, and fought to keep his eyes open. -Something wet and sticky covered his chest. "I said this was my last -trip and I meant it. One way or the other, I'd have quit!" - -"This is the hard way--" - -"Maybe. I dunno. Kind of nice to think of all those kids who'll never -have to come aboard the _Constellation_, though, Rice." His voice -trailed off. "You watch the shelves fill up and you never know who'll -be next. Who'd have thought, four days ago--" - -Something happened to his tongue so it felt like hard ice blocking his -mouth. He had a lot more words to say, but only time to get a few of -them out: - -"Rice?" - -"Yeah, Sam?" - -"We haven't got a full cargo, boy." - -"Full enough for me, sir." - -"But still not full. If we went back to Center Base without filling -the shelves, it wouldn't be right. Look there--number ninety-eight is -Lethla--number ninety-nine is Kriere. Three thousand days of rolling -this rocket, and not once come back without a bunch of the kids who -want to sleep easy on the good green earth. Not right to be going back -any way--but--the way--we used to--" - -His voice got all full of fog. As thick as the fists of a dozen -warriors. Rice was going away from him. Rice was standing still, and -Burnett was lying down, not moving, but somehow Rice was going away a -million miles. - -"Ain't I one hell of a patriot, Rice?" - -Then everything got dark except Rice's face. And that was starting to -dissolve. - -Ninety-eight: Lethla. Ninety-nine: Kriere. - -He could still see Rice standing over him for a long time, breathing -out and in. Down under the tables the blood-pumps pulsed and pulsed, -thick and slow. Rice looked down at Burnett and then at the empty shelf -at the far end of the room, and then back at Burnett again. - -And then he said softly: - -"_One hundred._" - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Morgue Ship, by Ray Bradbury - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MORGUE SHIP *** - -***** This file should be named 63041.txt or 63041.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/0/4/63041/ - -Produced by Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan 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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