Part 6

The champion Copernicus Comets ran out onto the field in big bouncing strides. For on the Moon a person was capable of jumping and running in great leaps because of the low gravity, only one-sixth of Earth’s.

The Plato Rocketeers were the visiting team would bat first. When the outfielders had taken their positions, they were tiny forms far out in the distance with nothing but gray wilderness behind them for a backstop. There were eleven men in Moon baseball because of this greater outfield range. Two extra fielders played behind the shortstop and second baseman and were called “short fielders.”

Bill noticed a wheel chair below the railing of the grandstand. His mother and dad had brought his crippled younger brother Skippy to see the game! Bill had known his parents were going to rocket over from Plato in time for the game, but they had not said Skippy would come along. Bill gave Skippy a wave and his little brother waved back.

The lead-off batter for the Rocketeers walked to the plate swinging a bat, padded to keep it from hitting the ball too hard and far. The Comets’ ace pitcher, Carl Cadman, hurled three fast strikes over almost before the batter had gotten a good foothold. Carl struck out the next batter as well and then forced little Pete Irby to loft a high infield fly for the third out.

“Let’s get ’em, Bill!” Ollie said excitedly as the Rocketeers took the field.

“We’ll sure try,” Bill promised his catcher.

Bill took the mound. With his space gloves he massaged rosin into the baseball. After getting the signal from Ollie, Bill swung his arm down and around. The batter swung sharply, driving the ball toward third. The baseman made a dive for the ball, but he missed it. His body seemed to glide in slow motion in the light gravity.

Bill walked the next batter, making two on and none out. Jack Brenna, the Comets’ heaviest hitter, was up. Bill got two strikes on him and then Jack took a better toehold. As Bill saw bat and ball connect solidly on the next pitch, his heart fell.

The ball arched like a comet across the dark sky. The left fielder took a dozen giant steps after the ball but then gave up. The ball seemed to be going for miles. It was a home run.

The Comets did not score anymore that inning, but the damage seemed to be already done. The champions were leading 3-0.

Bill was first up for the Rocketeers. As he went to the plate swinging a bat, his eye caught Skippy’s wheel chair, and he saw his game little brother waving encouragement. It made him want to try even harder to put his team out in front. Bill knew he would have to do it with his hitting, since he had failed as a pitcher.

But Bill got no closer to a hit than a long foul into the stands. Then he struck out. The two teammates following him also failed to get on base.

The game moved along with no more scoring for the next five innings. It was still 3-0.

In the last of the seventh inning the Plato Rocketeers had more trouble. The first Comet batter topped the ball slowly to Pete at shortstop, who tried too hard to make the play. The ball rolled between his legs and the runner went all the way to second.

Pete was so busy grumbling about his last error that he muffed the next play too. He jumped ten feet into the air trying to reach the high, bounding ball, but he misjudged it and it went on past. The runner on second loped down to third in long strides. Bill called time in order to give Pete a chance to settle down.

“We’ll never win this game!” Pete groaned. “Why don’t you fellows say I’m not any good—like you’re thinking!”

“Stop talking like that!” Bill told him over his suit radio. “You’re thinking too much about going to Earth, Pete. You’re trying _too_ hard!”

“I’ll try to do better,” Pete promised.

The next batter drove a high fly to center, sending the runner in from third and making the score 4-0. Bill walked the player following, but then he was lucky enough to strike out the hard-hitting Jack Brenna.

The next Comet drove a hard liner to Pete. Pete scrambled for the ball, but once again he muffed it and it went on into the outfield. The shortfielder recovered it quickly but threw wide to third, sending the runner into the plate with the Comets’ fifth run.

When Bill looked at Pete, the little fellow had thrown his big fielder’s glove into the air and was beginning to walk broken-heartedly off the diamond.

“Pete!” Bill heard Coach Lippert call sharply over his suit radio as he ran onto the field. “Get back to your position, son! I don’t like a quitter on my team.”

Players and coach huddled in the infield. They looked like a gathering of teddy bears in the space suits. Bill could see tears of bitterness inside Pete’s plastic helmet.

“Fellows,” the coach said, “what did we come seven hundred miles across the Moon to do?”

“To play ball,” someone answered, “—and win.”

“All right, then. What do you say we start doing it? Pete, I’m going to send you to left field where you used to play. Dan, in left field, will take your place at shortstop.”

The Rocketeers retired the side without further scoring. Then as though to prove that the pep talk had helped, the team came up with three big runs of their own!

Pitching with all his skill, Bill was able to set down the Comets in order. It was now the top half of the ninth inning, the last chance for Plato to win the game. They were still behind 5-3, and the two-run lead seemed as big as the Milky Way to Bill.

Dan started it off by walloping a double down the right field line. Pete followed with a single that bounced high over the right shortfielder’s head. The fielder behind him took the ball and threw quickly to his catcher to keep Dan from scoring off third. But then the Rocketeers’ luck seemed to have run out as the next two players struck out.

“It’s all up to you, Bill,” the coach told his pitcher as Bill selected his favorite bat.

“I’ll be swinging, coach,” Bill said determinedly.

He looked toward the stands as he walked to the plate. Skippy was waving encouragement again.

“This one is for you, Skippy,” Bill murmured, stepping up to the plate.

Carl tried to make him swing on two bad pitches.

“Careful,” Bill warned himself. “There are two outs—only one more left to us in the whole game!”

The next ball was just the one Bill wanted. He swung with all his might. He saw the ball rise and lose itself in the white dust of starlight overhead. And then he was off!

Loping past second, he saw the left fielder still bounding like a rabbit after the ball. The coach slowed him up on third base.

“Take it easy, Bill,” he said with a happy grin. “That ball is on the dark side of the Moon by now!”

Bill could see the Plato rooters waving their arms wildly in glee, and his radio picked up their loud cheers. As he crossed the plate with the leading run, he waved to Skippy who was almost out of his wheel chair in his excitement over his big brother’s tingling homer.

The score: Plato 6, Copernicus 5. The game was far from over, though. The Comets still had their last turn at bat.

Bill got the first player to raise a high infield pop-up. In the Moon’s light gravity it seemed as if the ball would never come down. But it finally did, and Dan took it for the first out.

Bill walked the next Comet, to put one on and with one out. The following batter forced the runner at second, making it two out and giving Bill a much more confident feeling.

But then up to the plate walked Jack Brenna!

Bill swallowed hard and began to sweat inside his space suit. He failed to get the ball over the plate on the first two pitches. Jack swung on the next pitch and sent a hard foul ball behind third base.

“Must be careful,” Bill thought. “A homer with the man on base will win the game for the Comets.”

Bill came though with a fast ball. Jack met it squarely and as the ball towered high over the infield, Jack felt all quivery and weak. He turned his head regretfully and saw the ball rising high and far against the midnight black of space. He saw little Pete Irby galloping away from the diamond as fast as he could go.

“Get it, Pete!” Bill pleaded under his breath. “Please get it!”

Everybody in the stands was on his feet. This was the play that would decide the game—and the championship.

Pete finally made a last second leap that brought him twenty feet off the ground. Bill could hardly see ball and glove meet. But they did meet and Pete had done the impossible!

They had won!

The Rocketeers whirled the coach and Bill easily up on their shoulders, because of the light Lunar weight. Then they began parading happily around the diamond to celebrate their very first championship. When Pete had made the long trip in from the outfield, he too was carried around on his teammates’ shoulders.

“That was a swell catch, Pete!” Bill called out to the little fellow. “You sure saved the day for us!”

“You know what, Bill?” Pete said, grinning. “If I’d missed that ball I would have kept on running—yep, right into space! I was determined to make that trip to Earth one way or another!”

_PAPER TREASURE FOR MARS_

Hugh Davone and Link Malloy sat at the wall desk of the space ship compartment poring over their albums of interplanetary postage stamps. The atom-powered _Princess of Mars_, cargo and passenger liner, was only a few hours out on its Earth-to-Mars run.

“It makes me nervous thinking of the thousands of dollars’ worth of stamps we’re carrying in the wall safe,” Link said. “I don’t think I’m going to enjoy this trip.”

“Take it easy, Link,” Hugh replied, with a lighthearted grin. “There are Space Guardsmen aboard ship to protect us.”

The fellows were on their annual vacation from the Space Cadet Corps. Since cadets in training could ride any space ship free, the two were escorting a valuable shipment of Mr. Davone’s interplanetary stamps to another dealer opening up shop in Mars City.

“I’m worrying about that white-haired old character your dad said asked suspicious questions at his shop the other day,” Link said. “Seems funny that he is making the trip to Mars the same time we are.”

“Probably only a coincidence,” Hugh answered. “There’s only one flight a month to Mars, you know.”

“There are unscrupulous dealers who would give anything to lay their hands on our shipment,” Link went on. “This deal means an awful lot to your dad’s stamp business, Hugh. If we should bungle the job, he certainly would lose a lot.”

“Sure he would,” Hugh agreed, then he added, “but we aren’t going to bungle it.”

This seemed to satisfy Link and a smile of confidence deepened the corners of his broad, friendly mouth.

Hugh picked up a stamp with his tongs. “I came across this duplicate from the Venus pictorial issue. It’s the six-dollar blue of the Valley of Mists. Have you got it?”

Link leaned over. “No! What have you been doing, Hugh, holding out on me? How about some of my 2027 Lunar commems in trade?”

They worked out an exchange. The Lunar stamps were curious specimens, imperforate and circular. They depicted the Lunar hemisphere which faces Earth. The single-stamp issue had been distributed on the fiftieth anniversary of man’s first landing on the moon and was much in demand.

Suddenly there was a knock on the outer door of the compartment.

Hugh got up and went to the door. As he walked, his magnetic-sole shoes rasped against the metallic floor like a knife being honed. He opened the door.

A man with the face and build of a leprechaun looked at Hugh. His pale but alert blue eyes peered steadily into Hugh’s. Hugh also began to wonder why this customer at Davone’s Philatelic Shop should be making the voyage to Mars with them.

“Yes, sir?” Hugh asked.

“May I come in?” the man asked. “My name is Oscar Benasco.”

Hugh hesitated, thinking about the valuable cargo, then he replied reluctantly, “Yes.”

“Your father certainly has a fine shop, Hugh Davone,” the elderly man said brightly as he entered. “However, I was disappointed to find out that he had packed up some of his choicest space items and was selling them to Mr. Elfs, a dealer on Mars.”

“You know quite a lot, Mr. Benasco,” Link remarked coolly.

“Yes, I pride myself on my shrewdness,” Mr. Benasco replied in a modest manner. His roving eyes came to rest on the boys’ albums. “I see you two have collections of your own.”

“Nothing very valuable,” Hugh replied. “But we enjoy our stamps just the same.”

“Ah, yes,” Benasco said. His eyes brightened with eagerness and he placed the tips of his outspread fingers together. “Speaking of valuable items—those you are taking to Mars—no doubt you keep them in your compartment safe. I wonder if you might show them to me?”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Benasco,” Hugh said, “but I promised my dad I wouldn’t take the stamps out to show anyone until they were safely in the hands of Mr. Elfs on Mars.”

Benasco looked completely crestfallen. His rounded shoulders slumped and the most pained expression covered his face. “Surely just a look—” he pleaded.

“If you are going to Mars, as you must be,” Hugh went on, “you’ll be able to see them all in Mr. Elfs’s shop, and you can talk to him about any stamps you might want to buy.”

“Then that’s your final answer?” Mr. Benasco asked, his disappointment giving way to annoyance.

“I’m afraid it must be,” Hugh told him. “I’m sorry.”

“You’ve disappointed me sorely, young man,” Mr. Benasco retorted. “Good day to you.”

He turned briskly and clattered out the door. As he left, Hugh caught sight of the handle of an old type miniature rocket pistol protruding from his coat pocket.

“Did you see that pistol?” Link asked, in surprise. “It’s a wonder he didn’t hold us up for the stamps right here and now! But I guess he was afraid to risk it.”

“For a moment I almost felt sorry for him and was about to give in,” Hugh admitted. “Now I’m glad I didn’t.”

In the days that followed, Hugh and Link saw little of Mr. Benasco except in the dining room.

One morning, near the end of the flight, Hugh and Link were standing in front of their compartment port looking out. The orange-red globe of Mars was so dominant that it seemed to press back the surrounding stars and nebulae to near obscurity.

“Only a few more days and our shipment will be safely in the hands of Mr. Elfs in Mars City,” Hugh said. “Then Mr. Benasco will be Mr. Elfs’s worry.”

“That will be just dandy as far as I’m concerned,” Link replied earnestly.

By this year of 2031, space mail service had increased to such proportions that it had opened up a brand new field of stamp specialization for the philatelist. It was for this reason that Mr. Elfs was attempting a stamp hobby business in Mars City. Mr. Davone’s portfolios of both low and high values was to provide him with the bulk of his opening merchandise.

Even the most remote colonies of the Solar System, including the farthest on Triton, Neptune, had their own postage by now. The lone Triton bi-color, picturing Valhalla Peak, tallest mountain yet discovered in the System, was one of the most wanted by collectors.

Suddenly the chimes for lunch were heard over the compartment intercom.

Entering the dining room, Hugh and Link saw Benasco in his usual place at the end of the table near the door. They took their seats and Link smiled at his plate. “Cubed beef, Hugh.”

Hugh grinned. “You can’t say they don’t aim to please on the _Princess of Mars_.”

But the fellows did not get to finish their cubed roast, nor did anyone else at the table.

A shock hit the ship like an unheralded thunderbolt. Hugh had the crazy feeling of being in a nightmare. After the deafening report, he felt his lap belt snap, and then he was hoisted out of his chair as though in the vortex of a whirlwind. The table tore loose from the floor fittings. Hugh bounced into a coffee urn and it nearly stunned him. Groans of distress from those around him filled his ears.

“What has happened?” Hugh thought dazedly.

The ship’s disaster siren pealed along the corridors of the _Princess of Mars_. Medical men with stretchers came running and officers snapped out brisk orders. Hugh groped anxiously through the melee for Link. He struggled over twisted chair tubing and found his friend helping those who were hurt.

“We’ve got work to do,” Link told him.

Hugh rolled up his sleeves. He was still giddy. “I’m ready,” he said.

It was reported later that there were no fatalities, but there were enough injured persons to keep the infirmary staff busy for awhile.

Hugh and Link, working side by side with the medical men, had not seen anything of Benasco since the accident. The ship’s engineers revealed that a meteorite had caused the disaster. It had struck fairly close to the compartment occupied by Hugh and Link. Hugh shuddered to think what it would have been like to have been tossed about in their room like a pea in a whistle. Such would have been his and Link’s fate had the strike occurred half an hour earlier.

The cadets had not yet had the opportunity to check their quarters for damage. When the physician in charge finally freed them with thanks for their help, Hugh thought about the stamps for the first time since the unnerving incident.

“Link,” he said urgently, “we’ve got to get back and check on those stamps! This has been a perfect set up for Benasco and his scheme!”

“Right behind you,” Link said as they hurried from the infirmary.

Along the way, the two found warped walls and doors that had been flung open. Luckily all the occupants in the worst-hit area had been in the dining room at the terrible moment, or there surely would have been fatalities.

Reaching their compartment, Hugh and Link found that the door had been forced open by the explosion.

Hugh hurried over to the wall safe. He felt a chill of dread race through him. The vault door also was open and the chamber was empty.

“They’re gone!” Hugh said hoarsely. “All of Dad’s stamps are gone!”

Hugh slumped remorsefully on his cot, taut fingers combing through his hair. “Dad wanted to have the stamps insured,” he said bitterly, “but I was trying to save him money. The insurance fee was enormous, and on top of that he would have had to pay the fare both to and from Mars for the agents who would carry the shipment. How I wish they had done it now!”

“If Benasco has the stamps, we may still be able to recover them,” Link said. “Let’s go see him.”

Hugh got up, his face set, his palm shaped into a fist. “If Benasco _is_ the one, I’ll personally—oh, never mind! Come on!”

They moved down corridor “E,” which was away from the center of the damage. This was the hall where they knew Benasco’s room was located. Scarcely anybody was in the section at present. Those who resided in the nearby rooms were either helping out in the emergency, or they were idly watching the beginning of repairs. The outside meteor bumper and the inner buffer bulkheads had kept the destruction to a minimum. By automatically sealing themselves off from the rest of the ship at the moment of impact, the protective bulkheads had kept the ship from being decompressed.

Hugh and Link found their suspect’s door closed. Hugh walked up to it and tried the knob.

The door opened under Hugh’s push, but the compartment was vacant.

“He’s gone,” Link said.

“He must be somewhere close by,” Hugh returned impatiently. “We haven’t passed him on the way, so he must be farther down the corridor.”

“Maybe he’s looking for a place to hide the portfolios until we land,” Link suggested. “He knows we’ll suspect him of taking them.”

Hugh nodded. “Let’s go.”

As the two moved ahead down the quiet passageway, Link spoke in a tense voice, “Do you think we’re right trying to tackle that little guy alone? We’re each bigger than he is, but he’s got a pistol and we haven’t.”

“We’ll be careful,” Hugh promised.

There were a number of storerooms lining the corridor. The cadets checked one after another. The rooms were shrouded in tomblike silence and full of dark hiding places. But the search revealed no sign of Benasco or the missing portfolios.

“He seems to have disappeared right into the air,” Link said discouragingly. “Hugh, I hate to say it, but something tells me we aren’t going to see either Benasco or those stamps again.”

They were approaching the door of an outer-ship repair room. Hugh knew that a ladder in this room led directly up to the outside hull of the ship.

“You’re probably thinking along the same lines that I am, Link,” Hugh replied gravely. “It may be farfetched, but a person as shrewd as Mr. Benasco makes out to be might have cooked up a pretty clever plan. He may have had a portable transmitter hidden somewhere so that he could contact another party outside the ship.”

“I get it!” Link said. “He might have radioed this crony in a space taxi to meet him on the outer skin. Then they could both take off with the loot and either land on Mars or on one of the moons!”

As Link spoke, Hugh was staring through the plastic window of the room. A wall hid much of the interior from view. Suddenly he saw the very man they were seeking cross the room and disappear beyond the corner of the concealing wall.

Link caught a glimpse of him too. “Hey!” he burst out. “Wasn’t that _him_?”

“It sure was,” Hugh replied, feeling better now. “He probably just entered the room from another door along the next side corridor.”

Hugh gently turned the knob and the door swung open soundlessly. “We’ll slip in softly,” he whispered. “Then we can try to take him by surprise around the corner up ahead. We’ll have to watch our step because he’s probably desperate and will have his pistol ready for use.”

“He deserves to get twenty years for a theft like this,” Link whispered fiercely. “How did he ever expect to get away with it?”

“He _won’t_ get away with it,” Hugh whispered confidently. “Right now he’s probably getting into a space suit so he can pop through the outer hatch and join his confederate outside.”

They had reached the corner on tiptoe. Hugh, in the lead, peered carefully around the corner. He gaped in surprise at what he saw:

Benasco was seated on the floor like a child with a new scrapbook, and he was chattering away ecstatically to himself!

“My, oh, my, what a splendid group!” he was saying. “There’s a _tete beche_ pair of old 1989 Space Stations I’ve always wanted! And look at this one—a full sheet of Europa triangles! Oscar Benasco will have the most splendid collection of space stamps in all the Solar System!”

Hugh came out of hiding, followed by Link. “The jig’s up, Mr. Benasco,” Hugh said. “How about returning our property?”

The old man was so preoccupied that he did not notice Hugh and Link immediately. “Dear, dear,” he purred, “what a beautiful set of Einstein memorial surcharges! I wonder if young Davone will break up the set? I have some of them.”

“He’s just a queer old guy,” Link remarked as the two of them strode up to him.

“Oh, hello, boys,” Mr. Benasco greeted them casually. “I was hoping I’d found a place where I wouldn’t be disturbed for awhile. I knew you’d come by my room. I hope you don’t mind the liberty I’ve taken with your stamps. But I did _ask_ to see them and you refused, you know?”

Hugh took from him the portfolio he was holding. “How many stamps have you removed from here?” he demanded.

The man’s snowy brows went up in surprised indignation. “Removed?” he shrilled, his face coloring. “I’ve never been accused of stealing in my life, sir! I merely borrowed your collection to see if it has the items I need. When the explosion blew open your safe, it was simply a temptation I could not resist.”

“Those rare items you need cost money,” Hugh reminded him. “Lots of it.”

“Young man,” Mr. Benasco grunted, “you do not need to tell me of the value of postage stamps. I’m well acquainted with Scott’s catalogue. I have every intention of paying for my merchandise.” He pulled out such a wad of bills that Link gasped. “You see, I _can_ pay.”