Part 4

Cal's mind flashed, irrelevantly, to books and pictures he had seen. In such, the villain always spit in the hero's face in such a body-block. Cal snarled, pursed his lips and spat in Benj's face. Then with a mighty effort, Cal shouldered Benj back a full three feet and crossed points with him again.

Benj wiped his face on his shirt sleeve and raving mad, he drove forward, his point making wicked arcs. Cal parried the dancing point, engaged Benj in a thrust and counterthrust, and then with Benj's point blocked high, he drilled forward.

The white-hot point quenched itself in Benj's throat with a nauseating hiss.

Cal stood there, shaking his head at the sight, and retching slightly. His face, which had been set like granite, softened. He dropped his iron and turned away.

* * * * *

"Tink!" he cried.

"Nice job, Cal," she said with a strained smile.

"But you?"

"I'm in no pain."

"But what's wrong?"

"Fractured vertebra, I think. I'm paralyzed from the waistline down. That crash--"

"Bad. Now what?"

"Where's your ship?"

"Back there a half-mile or so," said Cal.

"Don't carry me," she warned as he tried to lift her. "Go back there and either bring it here or get something to strap me on."

"It'll take hours. The ship won't fly. I'll have to radio back to Northern Landing for help."

"I ... won't last."

"You--" the meaning hit him then. "You won't last?"

"Not unless that vertebra is repaired."

"Then what can we do?"

"Cal ... where's Murdoch's Hoard?"

"Nearby, but you're more important than anything that might be in Murdoch's Hoard."

"No, Cal. No."

"Look, Tink, you mean more to me than--"

"I know that, Cal. But don't you see?"

"See what?"

"What could possibly be of value?"

"No. Nothing that I have any knowledge of."

"That's it! Knowledge! All of the advanced work in neurosurgery is there. All in colored, detailed three-dimensional pictures with a running comment by Murdoch himself. Things that we cannot do today. Get it, Cal. It'll tell you how to fix this crushed spinal cord."

Cal knew she was right. Murdoch, in his illegal surgery had advanced a thousand years beyond his fellow surgeons who could legally work on nothing but cadavers or live primates while Murdoch had worked on the delicate nervous system of mankind itself. Murdoch's Hoard was a board of information--invaluable to the finder and completely unique and non-duplicative. At least until it was found.

"I can't leave you."

"You must ... if you want me! I'm good for six or seven hours. Go and get that information, Cal."

"But I'm no physician. Much less a surgeon. Even less a neurosurgeon."

"Murdoch's records are such that a deft and responsible child could follow them. According to history, his hoard is filled with instruments and equipment. Cal--"

"Yes?"

"Cal. _This is the place where Murdoch worked on living nerves!_"

* * * * *

Tinker Elliott closed her eyes and tried to rest. She did not sleep, nor did she feel faint. But her closed eyes were a definite argument against objection on Cal's part. Worrying, he left her and went back to his flier. He called for help and then he went to work on the Key.

Cal does not remember the next four hours. It was a whirling montage of dismal swamp and winking pilot lights and thrumming whistles. It was a lonely boulder with a handle on it that Cal lifted out of the ground with ease. It was an immaculate hospital driven deep into the murky ground of Venus. Three hundred and fifty years ago, Dr. Allison Murdoch worked here and today his refrigerating plants started to function as soon as Cal snapped the main switch.

On a stretcher that must have held many a torn and mangled set of nerves before, Cal trundled Tinker through the muggy swamp of Venus and lowered her into Murdoch's hospital.

In contrast, the next few hours will live forever in Cal's mind. He came to complete awareness when he realized that he did not know his next move.

"Tinker?" he asked softly.

"Here ... and still going," she said. "Ready?"

Cal swallowed deep. "Yes," he said hoarsely.

"In that case over there ... see it? Take an ampule of local--it's labeled Neo-croalaminol-opium, ten percent. Get a needle and put three cubic centimeters of it into space between the sixth and seventh cervical vertebra. Go in between four and five millimeters below the surface of the bone. Can do?"

"I ... I can't."

"You must! How I wish we had a duplicator."

Cal shuddered. "Never."

"Well, I could show you how it's done on the duplicate, and then the duplicate could fix me up."

Cal gritted his teeth, "And which one would I dispose of? No, Tinker. It's bad enough this way!"

"Well, do it my way then!"

Cal fumbled for the needle and then with a steady hand he broke the glass ampule and filled the needle. "Is this still good?"

"It never deteriorates in a vacuum. We must chance everything."

Cal inserted the needle and discharged the contents. His face was gray.

"Now," said Tinker. "I'm immobilized completely from the shoulder blades down and can't harm myself. Cal, find the library and locate the reel that will deal on vertebra and spinal operations."

"How do you know it is here?" demanded Cal.

"It's listed, in Murdoch's diary. Now quit arguing and go!"

"How come this diary isn't common knowledge?"

"Because too many prominent people did not want their names mentioned as fostering Murdoch's surgery. Their offspring have never known about it and the medical profession has been keeping it under their hats so long that it has become a habit like the Px mark."

Cal located the library and consulted the card file. He returned with a reel of film. He inserted the reel into the operating room projector and focused it on the screen.

As the film progressed, Cal took the proper tools from the boiling water, and placed them on a sterilized carrier.

Then as Tinker instructed him through a system of mirrors, Cal lifted the scalpel and made his first incision.

With increasing skill, Cal applied retractors and hemostats and tweezers. Tinker kept up a running fire of comment, and the motion picture on the screen progressed as he did, with appropriate close-ups to show the condition of the wound during each step. Cal came upon the fractured bone as it said he should, and then though the fracture was not just as that in the picture, Cal plied his instruments carefully and lifted the crushed bone away from the spinal cord. With a wide-field microscope, Cal inspected the cord.

"Can't tell, Tinker. I don't know anything about it."

"And I can't see it too well. Look, Cal. Don't touch it. It may be only bruised. Run the projector over to the replacing-operation and put the stuff back according to directions. If the cord is damaged, they can repair it at the Association. You'll be responsible for getting me there, anyway."

"All right," said Cal.

With tiny splints, Cal fastened the splintered bone back into place. It was as painstaking a job as putting a fine watch back together again, and as tedious as breaking the worst code in history. But Cal succeeded finally, and the final wrappings were placed by hands that were beginning to shake.

* * * * *

The plane from Northern Landing located them from Cal's master oscillator and came in for a landing. The official in the plane wasted no time. He ordered two of his helpers to install Tinker--stretcher and all--in his flier and they all took off after leaving a guard at Murdoch's Hoard.

* * * * *

Cal Blair headed up the walk from the gate to the front doors of the Association with a springy step. He headed in with determination, but was hailed by Tony Elliott. Tinker's brother grinned at Cal and shook his hand.

Cal tried to leave, but Tony kept him for a moment.

"For a guy that hates surgery and space flying and roistering around, Cal, you do all right."

"Look, Tony, I want to see Tink."

"I know. You haven't seen her since you brought her back six weeks ago, have you."

"No, and I intend to rectify that error right now."

"You could have been here three weeks ago."

"No, I couldn't, I've been in Vilanortis, working with the fellows on Murdoch's Hoard. After all, I'm not ... not--"

"Not twins? No, thank the Lord! O.K., Cal. Go on in."

Cal left in a hurry, and Tony said to the receiving clerk: "He's changed."

"Cal found Tinker in a wheelchair in the conservatory. Tink!" he roared.

"Cal!" she answered. Then she arose from the wheelchair and came toward him with a light, eager step.

Cal was a gentleman--he met her halfway.

THE END.