Part 4

"Within a week we shall have it finished," said Redmond. "Then the stars shall be ours!"

Hanson continued to nod.

"Of course we have not tested the generators as yet. There is no known way of dissipating the energy they develop. Since the realized energy in this real space is sufficient to propel matter faster than the velocity of light, the outpouring of energy must be paradoxically many times the value of infinity."

Hanson continued to nod.

"This statement, of course, makes no sense," said Redmond, "because of one of the definitions of infinity--which is that number which is larger than the number of all numbers. Here we treat infinity as a definite instead of an abstract, and by our equations we are permitted to multiply infinity by integer numbers and come up with a real answer--in a sort of abstract sense," said Redmond with a slight laugh. It was 'Our Equations' now instead of 'Maculay's Equations'.

* * * * *

Hanson continued to nod and Redmond kept watching the spot on the Doctor's glasses.

"However," said Redmond, "the fact is that the power output does not exceed infinity at any time in this space. Not really, and therefore the paradox is answered. It is merely apparent, if you follow me. Actually, the spacecraft is not in real space and therefore it need not have an infinite amount of energy to reach the speed of light. However, there is no way of anchoring the generator on the planet while testing, nor of dissipating the energy. So the only way to test the set-up is to build a spacecraft and take off. If it does not work, we have the standard drivers to get us back."

Hanson kept on nodding. His neck was getting a bit stiff, but he could not stop.

"I've heard the argument that the generators may set up a self-propagating field," said Redmond. "This is so much bosh. The theory that the streak of energy that went through the solar system some weeks ago was the wake of a supervelocity spacecraft seems to be universal among the people who have studied the Equations. Ergo it stands to reason that no destruction of the universe will obtain. We are safe."

Hanson continued to nod.

Redmond smiled quietly.

The doctor said, "You've been working quite hard on this; you must be tired."

Redmond laughed sarcastically. "You've been working harder, Doc. If you've been expecting me to fall under your hypnotic spell with that head-bobbing business, you're getting a stiff neck and no results. You're an old fool with an unfounded horror of anything new. You should view this sensibly; if another race can employ the spacedrive without ruining the universe, so can we. Now why not let busy men alone to work, while you go back to your mental cripples? Good day!"

Hanson fumed but it did no good. He was licked by animosity, disdain, and complete lack of sympathy. There was nothing to do but leave. And the doctor left, half-convinced that Redmond was right in assuming that if one galactic race could use the negative-space drive, another could do the same without fear. But he was only half-convinced; he wanted an opinion from Maculay. There was more here than met the eye.

Some other race knew the secret and were using it. The human race knew the secret and were about to try it. But the man who knew the real answers had gone into a tizzy because of some errata, or factor that was absolutely incompatible with life, liberty, and/or pursuit of happiness.

Hanson grunted. All too often in the case of violent disagreement, all parties were absolutely correct in their own mind, their own honest belief. Maybe this was similar.

One theoretical man feared the results from an abstract analysis of the computations. One mechanically-minded man could not appreciate the possible dangers, but was happy to follow the plans since completion meant fame and fortune for him. Both might be right. But....

* * * * *

Hanson shrugged unhappily; it was a bad spot to be in. Yet in the course of his seventy years many problems had seemed insoluble until some factor entered that changed the whole picture. And life itself must have seen many crises, in which the motion of a hand in the wrong direction would have caused the utter downfall of Humanity--_or_, he thought bitterly, _perhaps we are the result of an ill-moved hand of fate and might truly be great in mind as in work if some prehistoric egomaniac hadn't kicked some unknown prop out from beneath us_.

Perhaps, too, his mind told him, it could have been some half-baked do-gooder trying to help. As he, Jay Hanson, had attempted to help Maculay. The fault was as much his as it was Redmond's. More--Redmond could not help being what he was. Yet, neither could Hanson stand by and see a man go to pieces.

In any case it was not a proposition of fixing the blame; to hell with the blame and the responsibility. Fix it. Fix it. Fix it and forget the fumbling finger that fouled it.

Hanson swore. He was helpless.

Yet for all of his efforts, he believed that something would happen to avert this disaster. It hardly seemed possible that one man's act could destroy the universe. Man's total effort was so puny. Inconsequential. The ignorant savage could not destroy civilization.

But in the back of his mind, Hanson knew that a couple of lumps of plutonium in the hands of an ignorant savage could destroy life beyond the scope of the savage's experience; and mankind's scope was reaching to the stars.

Still fretting, and still hoping for the answer, he headed home.

5

He was sitting in his office when the telephone rang on the following morning. Hanson answered it slowly, prepared to stall any patient off until he could regain some of his composure and his self-confidence.

"Hanson? Doc, this is Larimore."

"Larimore? Hi. What's up?"

"Doc, this job ain't good."

"What job?"

"_The Black Slash._"

"The what?"

Larimore chuckled. "If that yarn had turned up in the slush-pile, it would have been bounced with a rejection slip. It's not good, Doc. You've got no reason to write that bad, even though you've not written me anything for a couple of years; you don't forget how. But this job sounds like the half-baked efforts of a man convinced that he could write but who lacks the basic fundamentals of story construction. Now--"

"What in the devil are you talking about?" demanded Hanson.

"Didn't you send me a yarn called _The Black Slash_?"

"I--" Hanson paused. Cautiously, he said: "By Edward Lomax?"

"Naturally. That's your pen name. It--"

"Wasn't the job timely?"

"Doc, you ought to know by now that every time something new and frightening comes up, my desk is bombarded with a million stories about it. The best get taken up. That streak of energy a couple of weeks ago has brought fourteen stories so far, and some of them were damned good. But yours--Say, Doc, how come you went to Venus? I thought that you weren't allowed space-flight?"

Hanson paused and shook his head. Edward Lomax was his pen name. It was the pen name supplied to Maculay in the explanation as to why Cliff was in disfavor in the eyes of his fictitious uncle. And it was sort of natural, too, that Maculay would try to write about this thing. But Maculay, either as the renowned Clifford Maculay, or young Cliff Maculay the black sheep, had never written a single line of fiction. Maculay's pedantic papers were full of equations, qualifications, cumbersome sentences, and inverted phrases--complete with the everlasting 'However' enclosed between commas.

Hanson laughed shortly.

People do not expect a man to step up to his first piano, sit himself down, and run through a faultless repertoire from Bach to Bebop. But these same people nod their heads at a new author's writing and think it is the first time he ever sat down to a typewriter--and then swear that they will do likewise as soon as they get a couple of free hours. Maculay was no exception, plus the fact that Hanson had given his mind the false experience of writing to cover up many irregularities in Maculay's past. Maculay believed he could write and had been writing; actually he knew nothing of the techniques involved. It takes more than a burning desire to see your words in print; it takes at the very least some judgment as to which of your words you select for print plus the ability to produce them in logical sequence. Maculay had tried.

But above all, Maculay had offered a lead--provided unwittingly by Hanson himself. The doctor glowed inwardly, happily. He would now--

"You still there, Doc?"

"You bet. Where did that story come from, Larry?"

Larimore paused a moment. "A small town in the midlands of Venus a couple of hundred miles from Melaxis." Then he exploded. "Hey. Weren't you there? Why didn't you bring it back with you? What the hell goes on--?"

Hanson said, "Larimore, this is a long story and probably a better one than Maculay wrote. But it's important."

"I'm listening. Take off."

The doctor outlined the entire business over the telephone.

"My God," said Larimore. "Now what?"

"Now? It's easy. Send Maculay a special radiogram, addressed to Lomax, stating that Modern Pictures wants the script for a full-length moving picture at some fabulous price providing they can hire the author to rewrite the thing into novel length. You have an option check for five thousand dollars which will expire within ten days if the author is not present in person at your office before that time."

"I get it. 'Twill be done."

Hanson sat back, relieved; this was the answer he was hoping for. It had come and now all he had to do was to husband his strength until Maculay could get home. Because when Maculay arrived, there would be a big job to do.

* * * * *

He spent his time working slowly, resting often. He went to Larimore's office and fitted it with his equipment, on the off-chance that Maculay might be hard to handle. Hanson did not think Maculay would be difficult to re-convert since the true personality was submerged by the false character by mere hypnotic suggestion. It should be remarkably easy. But the doctor wanted to take no chances.

He read Maculay's sorry attempt at fiction. It was not good fiction but it interested Hanson because there was so much fact concealed in its descriptive passages. Maculay, unable to think too deeply about the negative space concept, or real and unreal space, and variable-matrix wave mechanics, had treated the whole scientific formulation with a touch of the ridiculous. Just as Cliff, upon hearing of the streak of energy, had laughingly included it in a 'story' because he was hypnotically unfitted to treat his opinion as anything but fiction-fantasy, he was again concealing the truth behind a thin disguise. It was all there.

All there, Hanson saw with a sour finality, but the solution. Maculay had pulled the old gag of having the fabulous machine totally destroyed, complete with its secret. A poor gag, and unfitted for modern writing, especially unfitted for application to fact. For, in fact, this was not a story; it was the truth, told by a man who must tell it as fiction since the truth literally hurt him. But there was no true solution, and once the negative-gravitic generators were started, the unreal root of negative space would spread to engulf the universe.

This 'story' of Maculay's convinced--or rather pinned the last doubt down--Hanson that his guess-work was right. But handing such a story to any official as true data would get the doctor nothing but a horselaugh--at the least--and possibly a trip to the looney-bin for observation.

However, he would have the truth at hand soon enough. Maculay would know what steps to take.

Even if Maculay ordered everything to stop, while the answer was found.

* * * * *

Hanson was working in Larimore's office when Maculay came in with his bride.

The doctor looked at them both; he nodded affably.

"Doc!" roared Maculay cheerfully. "What in hell are you doing here?"

"Came to kiss the bride," said Hanson. "And she looks lovely enough to kiss."

"Go ahead," said Maculay; "I'll permit you eight seconds."

Hanson smiled at Ava, but shook his head. "I've got one more thing on my mind," he said quietly. "Cliff, what do you know of Maculay's Equations?"

"He's an uncle of mine," started Maculay. "He came up against a tough one. He found a way to exceed the speed of light--but doing it would destroy universal space by a sustained and spreading cancellation. It--"

"Maculay, what would you do if you were _The_ Clifford Maculay?"

"Go fishing."

Hanson touched a button at his elbow. There was a soundless flash of brilliant light as the photoflash bulb planted in the desk lamp flared. Then as Maculay stood, tense with shock, Hanson said, in a forceful tone: "Clifford Maculay, the hypnotic suggestion that I gave you before must cease. I order it to stop; I order you released. You are once more Doctor Clifford Maculay, who must--"

The jovial smile faded from Maculay's face. The twinkle in his eye changed to a calculating glitter, and the lines of Maculay's face hardened. "Hanson," he snapped, "what has been going on?"

"You've been on vacation," said the doctor. "And while you were traipsing all over Venus, Redmond has opened your secret file and is starting to build a supervelocity spacecraft. You must put a stop to it."

Maculay looked startled for a moment. Then he said: "Redmond is a pompous sort of juvenile jackass, I admit, but he isn't that stupid."

"I've seen his installation."

Maculay shrugged. "I'm not a jealous man, Doc. I've had my day; I've done my work; I've laid my cornerstone. I've even been stumped. Now if Redmond can solve the problem that had me licked, I'll be the last man on earth to deny him his triumph."

"Clifford, from all I've heard about this, total destruction will result if any man energizes a volume of negative space."

"Quite right," said Maculay. And as he said it, his eyes clouded and he winced gently.

"Redmond has added nothing to your calculations."

Maculay stood up with a dry smile. "As a physician you are Number One on earth. As a psychiatrist you are tops. I know what you've done and it's been good. I hope," he added slyly, "that she likes me as well this way as she did the other way--or can you change her too? Or," he continued with growing comprehension, "is it 'change her back, too'?"

"Back."

"Good. So as a witch-doctor you're tops in any jungle. But as a physicist, you don't know a gravitino from a vocal fricative."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning that before any judgment is cast, I shall have to see the evidence."

Hanson stood up. "So it's back to the laboratory site."

Maculay nodded, held out an arm which Ava took happily, and then he said: "And from the lab site to the stars, Doc."

Hanson grumbled: "Or total extinction."

Maculay did not hear him. He was looking down at Ava. "Doc," he said slowly, "you'd better come along. Snooky, here, needs to be slowed down to my level and you're the guy to do it."

Hanson did not tell Maculay that Ava's reconversion would take no longer than his own; the doctor wanted to be in at the end of this, good or bad. He merely nodded, then waited while Maculay made arrangements to fly to the laboratory site. His name worked wonders; an official plane was being warmed up by the time they left Larimore's office and headed towards the airport.

* * * * *

Redmond greeted them with a hearty smile. Only Hanson, who had every reason to doubt Redmond's happiness at Maculay's return, saw the falsity of the greeting. Redmond, of course, was on a spot; yet, the man was convinced of his own correct reasoning, and this justified his acts. Redmond's greeting was less hearty to Hanson; obviously Redmond would have preferred to deal with Maculay alone. Having the doctor there might be awkward, for Maculay might be talked into belief, whereas Hanson was more than likely to ignore the words and their import, and deal entirely upon whether the sayer of the words was lying or telling the truth.

Redmond believed in a swift attack.

Once the original greeting was over, he plunged in: "We spent some time trying to locate you as soon as it became evident that the energetic streak that went through the solar system produced the sort of radiation that we had been theorizing over," said Redmond. "Lacking Maculay, I was asked to open your secret file and see what could be made of it."

"You discovered the trouble, then?"

"Yes."

Cliff relaxed. He had been under a strain visible only to Hanson; the doctor nodded. When a man is in a mental tizzy because he's hit upon an insoluble dilemma, it makes no difference who solves it. The weight of strain went out of Maculay; the mental run-around that had kept him fighting to the exclusion of everything else was gone. The couple of months of rest had done wonders; now the final true release from strain added to it. Give Maculay another few months of absolute freedom from strain, and Cliff would be ready to take on the world with a hand tied behind him.

But Hanson knew there was trouble ahead, for, unless he were very incorrect, Redmond was bulling it through and--

"You've discovered the error?"

Redmond laughed. "Your equations showed that negative space cancelled real space."

"Yes. And I could figure no other way."

"This is true in limited cases," said Redmond. "The consensus of opinion is that the streak of energy was nothing more than the mutual destruction of a cylinder of space being cancelled by the passage of a spacecraft enveloped in a spherical field of negative space. Upon working with that theory in mind and applying other bits of true evidence gained from the readings and measurements of the streak, we have solved your dilemma."

"Let's see our equations," suggested Maculay.

"Rather," said Redmond, "let's visit the spacecraft."

"All right."

Hanson said: "Are you certain that you're not assuming too much?"

"Meaning?" asked Redmond coldly.

"You are basing everything on the fact that an alien spacecraft passed through here. How do you know?"

Redmond laughed in a superior manner. "Since matter cannot exceed the velocity of light without being encased in a volume of unreal space--and since a volume of unreal space would kick up the same sort of wake as we measured--we can assume that some intelligence has developed negative space and is using it. Negative space, Doctor Hanson, is not to be found free in nature."

"But you've really added nothing to Maculay's Equations."

"We've proven by observation that the sustained destruction of the universe will not obtain; we'll prove it, too."

Hanson snorted. "This isn't a game of bridge," he said; "you're not bidding a grand slam just to see if you can make it without the ace of trump."

"But we know that it has been done. Nothing more need hold us up; we know!"

Hanson added another page to his mental notes regarding Redmond. Frustrated genius, second rater really, Redmond was the type of man who had always been protected against danger. In the course of his life, he had never faced the consequences of one of his own acts; therefore he fully believed that every time he was about to step off of the deep end, some Divine Providence would save him. If Redmond were permitted to do as he wanted to do, it was "Sign to Redmond" that he was on the right track. Some people call it superstition; some call it intuition; some call it foolishness. To Redmond, it was a sort of Fate.

* * * * *

Maculay stood up and led the way to the doorway. "Let's look at this," he said.

"Cliff," said Hanson, "nothing has changed since you went away. Real and unreal space are still mutually destructive. And if you couldn't figure it out, no other man on earth could."

Redmond said, "True, at that time. But we've had extra evidence to work on."

"But--"

"Forget it," said Redmond; "we know what we're talking about."

Maculay entered the control room of the ship first. He looked it over with interest, then nodded. "Everything is in ship-shape fashion," he said.

"We could start tomorrow if we had to."

Maculay looked at the controls that projected side by side on the polished black panel labelled _Upper_ and _Lower_.

"Dunno," said Maculay thickly.

Hanson watched him carefully. "Cliff," he said quietly, "you knew about the streak of energy, too. If that were the answer, you'd have come out of your mental tizzy."

Maculay turned to Redmond. "What means have you to prevent the sustained reaction?"

Redmond shook his head. "We don't need any. If another race can do it--"

"Don't be an idiot! Just because one race makes iron steamships it is no sign that iron floats on water."

"But it stands to reason--"

"You'd bank your life on it?"

"Yes."

Cliff Maculay took the two handles, one in each hand. His eyes glazed a bit, and he laughed uncertainly. "Maybe the creation of the universe was started by some fool who created negative space," he said thickly. "You simple idiot, this is exactly the danger that almost drove me nuts; you haven't solved a thing!"

Maculay stood there, watching Redmond. Then the frown left his face, and his body tightened. His eyes lost the hard glitter and took on a luminous air, which became half-humorous and half cynical as the corners of his mouth quirked up.

Hanson took a deep breath. Maculay the physicist had become Cliff Maculay the hell-raiser in just that short a time, because he was once more faced with the insoluble.

"No!" yelled Hanson.

But Maculay laughed. "Might as well wreck it," he jeered. "Better to wreck this fool's work than destroy the universe. Damn idiot, Clifford Maculay. Better--"

Maculay slammed the _Upper_ switch to the right.

"--let the ne'er-do-well foul it right!"

Maculay slammed the _Lower_ switch to the left.

There was a perceptible shift in the frame of reference, a hiatus in the solidity of things, like the rug slipping on the polished floor, like the fancy movable steps in the Fun House, like the bottom of the quicksand lake, like space itself being warped.

Then Arcturus passed the nearby viewport in a single flash of blue-white, and seconds afterwards a second star flashed, then a third.

"The backward sort," chortled Maculay. He was neither Maculay the Physicist now, nor was he Maculay the hell-raiser; he was a glad mixture of both. "It came to me," he told Hanson, "just like _That_!"

"But--?"

"Easy. Easy. The output from the upper generator creates negative space. But before it can establish an expanding field, the output of the lower generator nullifies it. For the lower generator is making a field of positive space equal to the force from above. Take unity. Add unity and you have two. Cancel one unity and you have unity--plus a spacedriver!"

* * * * *

Thirty thousand light years away, a recorder wiggled, a bell rang, and a sentient creature came out of a quiet complacence with a roar. Then came the clangor of a huge alarm and other creatures came tumbling into the huge room. They watched the recorder anxiously; then as it levelled off they left, slowly. Six remained; the others got into a small spacecraft and took off. There would be no nova for the suppression squad to extinguish; all that was needed was for the safety squad to go there and teach newcomers how not to play with fire.