Part 1

Mr. Meek--Musketeer

By CLIFFORD D. SIMAK

Adventure flamed in Mr. Meek's timorous heart, the surge of battle and singing blades. And so, with a rocket-ship for his steed and a ray-gun for his sword, he sallied forth ... carrying cavalier justice to the resentful shining stars.

[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.]

Now that he'd done it, Oliver Meek found the thing he'd done hard to explain.

Under the calm, inquiring eyes of Mr. Richard Belmont, president of Lunar Exports, Inc., he stammered a little before he could get started.

"For years," he finally said, "I've been planning a trip...."

"But, Oliver," said Belmont, "we would give you a leave of absence. You'll be back. There's no reason to resign."

Oliver Meek shuffled his feet and looked uncomfortable, a little guilty.

"Maybe I won't be back," he declared. "You see, it isn't just an ordinary trip. It may take a long, long time. Something might happen. I'm going out to see the Solar System."

Belmont laughed lightly, reared back in his chair, matching fingertips. "Oh, yes. One of the tours. Nothing dangerous about them. Nothing at all. You needn't worry about that. I went on one a couple of years ago. Mighty interesting...."

"Not one of the tours," interrupted Meek. "Not for me. I have a ship of my own."

Belmont thumped forward in his chair, looking almost startled.

"A ship of your own!"

"Yes, sir," Oliver admitted, squirming uncomfortably. "Over thirty years I've saved for it ... for it and the other things I'll need. It sort of got to be ... well, an obsession, you might say."

"I see," said Belmont. "You planned it."

"Yes, sir, I planned it."

Which was a masterpiece of understatement.

For Belmont could not know and Oliver Meek, stoop-shouldered, white-haired bookkeeper, could not tell of those thirty years of thrift and dreams. Thirty years of watching ships of the void taking off from the space port, just outside the window where he sat hunched over ledgers and calculators. Thirty years of catching scraps of talk from the men who ran those ships. Men and ships with the alien dust of far off planets still clinging to their skins. Ships with strange marks and scars upon them, and men with strange words upon their tongues.

Thirty years of reducing high adventure to cold figures. Thirty years of recording strange cargoes and stranger tales into accounts. Thirty years of watching through a window while rockets, outbound, dug molten pits into the field. Thirty years of being on the edge, the very fringe of life ... but _never_ in it.

Nor could Belmont have guessed or Meek formed in words the romanticism that glowed within the middle-aged bookkeeper's heart ... a thing that sometimes hurt ... something earthbound that forever cried for space.

Nor the night classes Oliver Meek had attended to learn the theory of space navigation and after that more classes to gain an understanding of the motors and controls that drove the ships between the planets.

Nor how he had stood before the mirror in his room hour after hour, practicing, perfecting the art of pistol handling. Nor of the afternoons he had spent at the shooting gallery.

Nor of the nights he had read avidly, soaking up the lore and information and color of those other worlds that seemed to beckon him.

"How old are you, Oliver?" asked Belmont.

"Fifty next month, sir," Meek answered.

"I wish you were taking one of the passenger ships," said Belmont. "Now, one of those tours aren't so bad. They're comfortable and ..."

Meek shook his head and there was a stubborn glint in the weak blue eyes behind the thick lensed glasses.

"No tour for me, sir. I'm going to some of those places the tours never take you. I've missed a lot in these thirty years. I've waited a long time and now I'm going out and see the things I've dreamed about."

* * * * *

Oliver Meek pushed open the swinging doors of the Silver Moon and stepped timidly inside. Just through the door he stopped and stared, for the place hit him squarely in the face ... the acrid smoke of Venusian leaf, the high-pitched laughter of the Martian dancing girls, the soft whirr of wheels, the click of balls as they bounced around the spinning wheels, the clatter of poker chips, the odor of strange liquors, the chirping and growling of a dozen tongues, the strange, exotic music of Ganymede.

Meek blinked through his heavy lenses, moved forward cautiously.

In the far corner of the place stood a table occupied by one man ... an old, grizzled veteran of the Asteroids with his muzzle in a flagon of cheap beer.

Meek sidled toward the table, drew out a chair.

"Do you mind if I sit here?" he asked and Old Stiffy Grant choked on a mouthful of beer in his amazement.

"Go ahead, stranger," he finally croaked. "I don't give a dang. I don't own the joint."

Meek sat down on the edge of the chair. His eyes swept the room. He smelled the smoke, the raw liquor, the sweat-stained clothing of the men, the cheap perfumery of the dancing girls.

He shifted his gun belt so the two energy pistols hung more easily, and cautiously slid farther back upon the chair.

So this was Asteroid City on Juno. The place he'd read about. The place the pulp paper writers used as background for their more lurid tales. This was the place where guns flamed and men were found dead in the streets and a girl or a game of chance or just one spoken word could start a fight.

The tours didn't include places such as this. They took one to the nice, civilized places ... towns like Gusta Pahn on Mars and Radium City on Venus and out to Satellite City on Ganymede. Civilized, polished places ... places hardly different than New York or Chicago or Denver back home. But this was different ... here one could sense something that made the blood run faster, made a thrill scamper up one's spine.

"You're new here, ain't you?" asked Stiffy.

Meek jumped, then recovered his composure.

"Yes," he said. "Yes, I am. I always wanted to see this place. I read about it."

"Ever read about an Asteroid Prowler?" asked Stiffy.

"I believe I have somewhere. In a magazine section. A crazy story...."

"It ain't crazy," protested Stiffy. "I saw one of them ... this afternoon. Right here on Juno. None of these dad-blamed fools will believe me."

Furtively, Meek studied the man opposite him. He didn't seem to be such a bad fellow. Almost like any other human being. A little rough, maybe, but a good fellow just the same.

"Say," he suggested impulsively, "maybe you'd have a drink with me."

"You're dang tootin'," agreed Stiffy. "I never turn down no drinks."

"You order it," said Meek.

Stiffy bawled across the room. "Hey, Joe, bring us a couple snorts."

"What kind of an animal was this you were speaking of?" asked Meek.

"Asteroid Prowler," said Stiffy. "Most of these hoodlums don't think there is one, but I know different. I saw him this afternoon and he was the dad-blamest thing I ever laid my eyes on. He boiled right out from behind a big rock and started coming after me. I let him have one in the face but that didn't even nick him. Full-power, too. When that happened I didn't waste no more time. I took it on the lam. Got to my ship and got out of there."

"What did he look like?"

* * * * *

Stiffy leaned across the table and wagged a forefinger solemnly. "Mister, you won't believe me when I tell you. But it's the truth, so help me. He had a beak. And eyes. Danged if them eyes weren't something. Like they were reaching out and trying to grab you. Not really reaching out, you know. But there was something in them that tried to talk to you. Big as plates and they shimmered like there was fire inside of them.

"These dod-rotted rock-blasters here laughed at me when I told them about it. Insinuated I held the truth lightly, they did. Laughed their fool heads off.

"It's pretty near as big as a house ... that animal, and it's got a body like a barrel. It's got a long neck and a little head with big teeth. It's got a tail, too, and it's kind of set close to the ground. You see, I was out looking for the Lost Mine."

"Lost Mine?"

"Sure, ain't you ever heard of the Lost Mine?"

Stiffy blew beer in amazement.

Oliver Meek shook his head, feeling that probably he was the victim of tales reserved for the greenest of the tenderfeet, not knowing what he could do about it if he were.

Stiffy settled more solidly in his chair.

"The Lost Mine story," he declared, "has been going around for years. Seems a couple of fellows found it a few years after the first dome was built. They came in and told about it, stocked up with grub and went out. They never did come back."

He leaned across the table.

"You know what I think?" he demanded gustily.

"No," said Meek. "What do you think?"

"The Prowler got 'em," Stiffy said, triumphantly.

"But how could there be a lost mine?" asked Meek. "Asteroid City was one of the first mining domes built out here. There was no prospecting done until about that time."

Stiffy shook his head, waggling his beard.

"How should I know," he defended himself. "Maybe some early space traveler set down here, dug a mine, never got back to Earth to tell about it."

"But Juno is only one hundred and eighteen miles in diameter," Meek argued. "If there had been a mine someone would have found it."

Stiffy snorted. "That's all you know about it, stranger. Only one hundred and eighteen miles, sure ... but one hundred and eighteen miles of the worst danged country man ever set a boot on. Mostly up and down."

The drinks came, the bartender slapping them down on the table before them. Meek gasped first at their price, then choked on the drink itself. But he smothered the choke manfully and asked:

"What kind of stuff is this?"

"_Bocca_," replied Stiffy. "Good old Martian _bocca_. Puts hair on your chest."

He gulped his drink with gusto, blew noisily through his whiskers, eyed Meek disapprovingly.

"Don't you like it?" he demanded.

"Sure," lied Meek. "Sure I like it."

He shut his eyes and poured the liquor into his mouth, gulped fiercely, desperately, almost strangling.

Said Stiffy: "Tell you what let's do. Let's get into a game."

Meek opened his mouth to accept the invitation, then closed it, caution stealing over him. After all, he didn't know much about this place. Maybe he'd better go a little easy, at least at first.

He shook his head. "No, I'm not very good at cards. Just a few games of penny-ante now and then."

Stiffy looked his disbelief. "Penny ante," he said, then guffawed as if he sensed humor in what Meek had said. "Say, you're good," he roared. "Don't s'pose you can use them lightnin' throwers of yours either."

"Some," admitted Meek. "Practiced in front of a looking glass a little."

He wondered why Stiffy rolled in his chair with mirth until tears ran down into his whiskers.

* * * * *

Stiffy held a full house ... aces with kings ... and his eyes had the look of a cat stalking a saucer full of cream.

There were only two in the game, Stiffy and an oily gentleman called Luke. As the stakes mounted and the game grew hotter the others at the table dropped out.

Standing behind Stiffy, Oliver Meek watched in awe, scarcely breathing.

Here was life ... the kind of life one would never dream of back in the little cubby hole with its calculators and dusty books at Lunar Exports, Inc.

In the space of an hour, he had seen more money pass across the table than he had ever owned in all his life. Pots that climbed and pyramided, fortunes gambled on the flip of a single card.

But there was something else too ... something wrong about the dealing. He couldn't figure quite what it was, but he had read an article about how gamblers dealt the cards when they didn't aim to give the other fellow quite an even break. And there had been something about Luke's dealing ... something that he had read about in that article.

Across the table Luke grimaced.

"I'll have to call you," he announced. "I'm afraid you're too strong for me."

Stiffy slapped down his hand triumphantly.

"Match that, dang you!" he exulted. "The kind of cards I been waiting for all night."

He reached out a gnarled hand to rake in the coins but Luke stopped him with a gesture.

"Sorry," he said.

He flipped the cards down slowly, one at a time. First a trey, then a four and then three more fours.

Stiffy gulped, reached for the bottle.

But even as he did, Oliver Meek reached out and placed his hand upon the money on the table, fingers wide spread. He'd remembered what he had read in that article....

"Just a minute, gentlemen," he said. "I've remembered something...."

Silence thudded in the room.

Meek looked across the table straight into the eyes of Luke.

Luke said: "You better explain yourself, mister."

Meek suddenly was flustered. "Why, maybe I acted too hastily. It really was nothing. I just noticed something about the deal...."

Luke jerked erect, kicking his chair away with the single motion of rising. The crowd suddenly surged away, out of the line of fire. The bartender ducked behind the bar. Stiffy flung himself with a howl out of his chair, skidded along the floor.

Meek, suddenly straightening from the table, saw Luke's hand streaking for the gun at his belt and in a split second he realized that here he faced a situation that demanded action.

He didn't think about those days of practice in front of the mirror. He didn't call upon a single iota of the gun-lore he had read in hundreds of books. His mind, for a bare instant, was almost a blank, but he acted as if by instinct.

His hands moved like driving pistons, snapped the twin guns from their holsters, heaved them clear of leather, grabbed them in mid-air.

He saw Luke's gun muzzle swinging up, tilted down the muzzle of his own left gun, pressed the activator. There was a screeching hiss, a streak of blue that crackled in the air and the gun that Luke held in his hand was suddenly red hot.

But Meek wasn't watching Luke. His eyes were for the crowd and even as he pressed the firing button he saw a hand pick a bottle off the bar, lift it to throw. The gun in his right hand shrieked and the bottle smashed into a million pieces, the liquor turned to steam.

Slowly Meek backed away, his tread almost cat-like, his weak blue eyes like cold ice behind the thick-lensed spectacles, his hunched shoulders still hunched, his lean jaw like a steel trap.

He felt the wall at his back and stopped.

Out in the room before him no one stirred. Luke stood like a statue, gripping his right hand, badly burned by the smoking gun that lay at his feet. Luke's face was a mask of hatred.

The rest of them simply stared. Stared at this outlander. A man who wore clothing such as the Asteroid Belt had never seen before. A man who looked as if he might be a clerk or even a retired farmer out on a holiday. A man with glasses and hunched shoulders and a skin that had never known the touch of sun in space.

And yet a man who had given Luke Blaine a head start for his gun, had beaten him to the draw, had burned the gun out of his hand.

Oliver Meek heard himself speaking, but he couldn't believe it was himself. It was as if some other person had taken command of his tongue, was forcing it to speak. He hardly recognized his voice, for it was hard and brittle and sounded far away.

It was saying: "Does anyone else want to argue with me?"

It was immediately apparent no one did.

II

Oliver Meek tried to explain it carefully, but it was hard when people were so insistent. Hard, too, to collect his thoughts so early in the day.

He sat on the edge of the bed, white hair tousled, his night shirt wrinkled, his bony legs sticking out beneath it.

"But I'm not a gun fighter," he declared. "I'm just on a holiday. I never shot at a man before in all my life. I can't imagine what came over me."

The Rev. Harold Brown brushed his argument aside.

"Don't you see, sir," he insisted, "what you can do for us? These hoodlums will respect you. You can clean up the town for us. Blacky Hoffman and his mob run the place. They make decent government and decent living impossible. They levy protection tribute on every businessman, they rob and cheat the miners and prospectors who come here, they maintain vice conditions...."

"All you have to do," said Andrew Smith brightly, "is run Blacky and his gang out of town."

"But," protested Meek, "you don't understand."

"Five years ago," the Rev. Brown went on, disregarding him, "I would have hesitated to pit force against force. It is not my way nor the way of the church ... but for five years I've tried to bring the gospel to this place, have worked for better conditions and each year I see them steadily getting worse."

"This could be a swell place," enthused Smith, "if we could get rid of the undesirables. Fine opportunities. Capital would come in. Decent people could settle. We could have some civic improvements. Maybe a Rotary club."

Meek wiggled his toes despairingly.

"You would earn the eternal gratitude of Asteroid City," urged the Rev. Brown. "We've tried it before but it never worked."

"They always killed our man," Smith explained, "or he got scared, or they bought him off."

"We never had a man like you before," the Rev. Brown declared. "Luke Blaine is a notorious gunman. No one, ever before, has been able to beat him to...."

"There must be some mistake," insisted Meek. "I'm just a bookkeeper. I don't know a thing...."

"We'd swear you in as marshal," said Smith. "The office is vacant now. Has been for three months or more. We can't find anyone to take it."

"But I'm not staying long," protested Meek. "I'm leaving pretty soon. I just want to try to get a look at the Asteroid Prowler and scout around to see if I can't find some old rocks I read about once."

The two visitors stared open mouthed at him. Meek brightened. "You've heard about those old rocks, maybe. Some funny inscriptions on them. Fellow who found them thought they had been made recently, probably just before Earthmen first came here. But no one can read them. Maybe some other race ... from somewhere far away."

"But it won't take you long," pleaded Smith. "We got warrants for all of them. All you got to do is serve them."

"Look," said Meek in desperation, "you have got me wrong. It must have been an accident, shooting that gun out of Mr. Blaine's hand."

Meek felt dull anger stirring within him. What right did these people have of insisting that he help them with their troubles? What did they think he was? A desperado or space runner? Another gangster? Just because he'd been lucky at the Silver Moon.

"By gosh," he declared flatly, "I just won't do it!"

They looked pained, rose reluctantly.

"I suppose we shouldn't have expected that you would," said the Reverend Brown bitingly.

* * * * *

The Silver Moon was quiet. The bartender was languidly wiping the top of the bar. A Venusian boy was as languidly sweeping out. The dancing girls were gone, the music was silent.

Stiffy and Oliver Meek were among the few customers.

Stiffy gulped a drink and blew fiercely through his whiskers.

"Oliver," he said, "you sure are a ring-tailed bearcat with them guns of yours. I wonder, would you tell me how you do it?"

"Look here, Mr. Grant," said Meek. "I wish you'd quit talking about what I did. It was just an accident, anyhow. What I'm mainly interested in is this Asteroid Prowler you were telling me about. Is there any chance I might find him if I went out and looked?"

Stiffy choked, almost purple with astonishment.

"Good gravy," he said, "now you want to go out and tangle with the Prowler!"

"Not tangle with him," Meek declared. "Just look at him."

"Mister," Stiffy warned, "the best way to look at that thing is with a telescope. A good, powerful telescope."

The swinging doors swung open and a man walked in.

The newcomer walked directly toward the table occupied by Stiffy and Meek. He halted beside it, black beard jutting fearsomely, eyes bleakly cold.

"I'm Blacky Hoffman," he said. "I suppose you're Meek." He disregarded Stiffy.

Meek stood up and held out his hand.

"Glad to know you, Mr. Hoffman," he said.

Blacky took the proffered hand in some surprise.

"Seems I should know you, Meek, but I don't. Should have heard of you at some time or other. A man like you would get talked about."

Meek shook his head. "I don't think you ever have. I never did anything to get talked about."

"Sit down," said Hoffman and it sounded like a command.

"I got to be going," Stiffy piped, already halfway to the door.

Hoffman poured out a drink and shoved the bottle at Meek. Meek gritted his teeth and poured a short one.

"No use beating around the bush," said Blacky. "We may as well get down to cases. I guess we understand one another."

Oliver Meek didn't know what the other meant, but he had to say something.

"I guess we do," he agreed.

"All right, then," said Hoffman. "I've built up a sweet little racket here and I don't like fellows butting in."

Meek essayed to down his liquor, succeeded, gasped for breath.

"But I could use a man like you," said Hoffman. "Luke tells me you are handy with the blasters."

"I practice sometimes," Meek admitted.

A smile twitched Hoffman's bearded lips. "We have the town just where we want it. The officials can't do a thing. Scared to. Marshals always eat rock or skip town. Maybe you would like to throw in with us. Not much to do, easy pickings."

"I'm sorry," said Meek, "but I can't do that."

"Listen, Meek," warned Hoffman, "you're either with us or you aren't. We don't like chiselers here. We know what to do with guys who try to muscle in. I don't know who you are or where you come from, but I'm telling you this ... straight. If you don't come in, all right ... but if you stick around after tonight I can't promise you protection."

Meek was silent, mulling the threat.

"You mean," he finally asked, "that you're ordering me out if I don't join your gang?"

Hoffman nodded. "That, big boy, is just exactly what I mean."

Slow anger and resentment ate at Meek. Who was this Hoffman to order him out of Asteroid City? This was a free Solar System, wasn't it? No wonder the Rev. Brown was jittery. No wonder the decent people wanted a clean-up.

Meek's anger mounted, a cold deadly anger that shook him like a frigid hand. An anger that almost frightened him, for very seldom in his life had he been really angry.

He rose slowly from the table, hitched his gun belt to a comfortable position.

"The town's been without a marshal for a long time, hasn't it?" he asked.

Hoffman's laugh boomed out. "You bet it has. And it's going to stay that way. The last one took it on the lam. The one before that got killed. The one before that sort of disappeared...."

Meek spoke slowly, weak eyes burning.

"Horrible condition," he said. "Something's got to be done about it."

* * * * *

The streets were deserted, quiet, a deadly quiet that lurked and hovered, waiting for something to happen.

Oliver Meek polished his marshal's star with his coat sleeve, glanced up at the dome. Stars glittered, their light distorted by the heavy quartz. Stars in a dead black sky.

Bathed in the weak starlight, the mighty walls of the canyon reared above the dome. A canyon, the only sort of place where a city could rise on one of the planetoids. For the walls protected the dome against the deadly barrage of whizzing debris that continually shrieked down from space. Those mighty cragged mountains and dizzy cliffs were pocked with the blows dealt, through long eons, by that hail of armor-piercing projectiles.