A Spaceship Named McGuire Read online

theplanetoid jumping before I was through.

  Colonel Brock, of course, was broiling in his own juices. He managedto get hold of me by phone once, by calling a Dr. Perelson whom I wasinterviewing at the time.

  The phone chimed, Perelson said, "Excuse me," and went to answer. Icould hear his voice from the other room.

  "Mr. Daniel Oak? Yes; he's here. Well, yes. Oh, all sorts ofquestions, colonel." Perelson's voice was both irritated and worried."He says Miss Ravenhurst is missing; is that so? Oh? Well, does thisman have any right to question me this way? Asking me? Abouteverything!... How well I know the girl, the last time I sawher--things like that. Good heavens, we've hardly met!" He was gettingexasperated now. "But does he have the authority to ask thesequestions? Oh. Yes. Well, of course, I'll be glad to co-operate in anymanner I can ... Yes ... Yes. All right, I'll call him."

  I got up from the half-reclining angle I'd been making with the wall,and shuffled across the room as Dr. Perelson stuck his head around thecorner and said, "It's for you." He looked as though someone had putaluminum hydrogen sulfate in his mouthwash.

  I picked up the receiver and looked at Brock's face in the screen. Hedidn't even give me a chance to talk. "What are you trying to do?" heshouted explosively.

  "Trying to find Jaqueline Ravenhurst," I said, as calmly as I could.

  "Oak, you're a maniac! Why, by this time, it's all over Ceres that theboss' daughter is missing! Shalimar Ravenhurst will have your hide forthis!"

  "He will?" I gave him Number 2--the wide-eyed innocent stare. "Why?"

  "Why, you idiot, I thought you had sense enough to know that thisshould be kept quiet! She's pulled this stunt before, and we alwaysmanaged to quiet things down before anything happened! We've managedto keep everything under cover and out of the public eye ever sinceshe was fifteen, and now you blow it all up out of proportion andcreate a furore that won't ever be forgotten!"

  He gave his speech as though it had been written for him in full caps,with three exclamation points after every sentence, and added gesturesand grimaces after every word.

  "Just doing what I thought was best," I said. "I want to find her assoon as possible."

  "Well, stop it! Now! Let us handle it from here on in!"

  Then I lowered the boom. "Now _you_ listen, Brock. I am in charge ofJack Ravenhurst, not you. I've lost her, and I'll find her. I'llwelcome your co-operation, and I'd hate to have to fight you, but ifyou don't like the way I'm handling it, you can just tell your boys togo back to their regular work and let me handle it alone, withoutinterference. Now, which'll it be?"

  He opened his mouth, closed it, and blew out his breath from betweenhis lips. Then he said: "All right. The damage has been done, anyhow.But don't think I won't report all this to Ravenhurst as soon as I canget a beam to Raven's Rest."

  "That's your job and your worry, not mine. Now, have you got anyleads?"

  "None," he admitted.

  "Then I'll go out and dig up some. I'll let you know if I need you."And I cut off.

  Dr. Perelson was sitting on his couch, with an expression thatindicated that the pH of his saliva was hovering around one pointfive.

  I said, "That will be all, Dr. Perelson. Thank you for yourco-operation." And I walked out into the corridor, leaving him with abaffled look.

  * * * * *

  At the next public phone, I dialed the BANning number again.

  "Any news?"

  "Not from her; she hasn't reported in at all."

  "I didn't figure she would. What else?"

  "Just as you said," he told me. "With some cute frills around theedges. Ten minutes ago, a crowd of kids--sixteen to twenty-two agerange--about forty of 'em--started a songfest and football game in thecorridor outside Colonel Brock's place. The boys he had on duty thererecognized the Jack Ravenhurst touch, and tried to find her in thecrowd. Nothing doing. Not a sign of her."

  "That girl's not only got power," I said, "but she's bright as a solarflare."

  "Agreed. She's headed up toward Dr. Midguard's place now. I don't knowwhat she has in mind, but it ought to be fun to watch."

  "Where's Midguard now?" I asked.

  "Hovering around Brock, as we figured. He's worried and feelsresponsible because she disappeared from his apartment, as predicted."

  "Well, I've stirred up enough fuss in this free-falling anthill togive them all the worries they need. Tell me what's the overalleffect?"

  "Close to perfect. It's slightly scandalous and very mysterious, soeverybody's keeping an eye peeled. If anyone sees JaquelineRavenhurst, they'll run to a phone, and naturally she's been spottedby a dozen different people in a dozen different places already.

  "You've got both Brock's Company guards and the civil police tied upfor a while."

  "Fine. But be sure you keep the boys who are on her tail shiftingaround often enough so that she doesn't spot them."

  "Don't worry your thick little head about that, Dan," he said. "Theyknow their business. Are you afraid they'll lose her?"

  "No, I'm not, and you know it. I just don't want her to know she'sbeing followed. If she can't ditch her shadow, she's likely to try totalk to him and pull out all the stops convincing him that he shouldgo away."

  "You think she could? With _my_ boys?"

  "No, but if she tries it, it'll mean she knows she's being followed.That'll make it tougher to keep a man on her trail. Besides, I don'twant her to try to convince him and fail."

  "_Ich graben Sie._ On the off chance that she does spot one and giveshim a good talking to, I'll pass along the word that the victim is towalk away meekly and get lost."

  "Good," I said, "but I'd rather she didn't know."

  "She won't. You're getting touchy, Dan; 'pears to me you'd rather bedoing that job yourself, and think nobody can handle it but you."

  I gave him my best grin. "You are closer than you know. O.K., I'll layoff. You handle your end of it and I'll handle mine."

  "A fair exchange is no bargain. Go, and sin no more."

  "I'll buzz you back before I go in," I said, and hung up.

  * * * * *

  Playing games inside a crowded asteroid is not the same as playinggames in, say, Honolulu or Vladivostok, especially when that game is acombination of hide-and-seek and ring-around-the-Rosie. The trouble islack of communication. Radio contact is strictly line-of-sight insidea hunk of metal. Radar beams can get a little farther, but a man hasto be an expert billiards player to bank a reflecting beam around verymany corners, and even that would depend upon the corridors beingempty, which they never are. To change the game analogy again, itwould be like trying to sink a ninety-foot putt across Times Square onNew Year's Eve.

  Following somebody isn't anywhere near as easy as popular fictionmight lead you to believe. Putting a tail on someone whose spousewants divorce evidence is relatively easy, but even the bestdetectives can lose a man by pure mischance. If the tailee, forinstance, walks into a crowded elevator and the automatic computerdecides that the car is filled to the limit, the man who's tailing himwill be left facing a closed door. Something like that can happen byaccident, without any design on the part of the tailee.

  If you use a large squad of agents, all in radio contact with oneanother, that kind of loss can be reduced to near zero by simplyhaving a man covering every possible escape route.

  But if the tailee knows, or even suspects, that he's being followed,wants to get away from his tail, and has the ability to reasonmoderately well, it requires an impossibly large team to keep him insight. And if that team has no fast medium of communication, they'relicked at the onset.

  In this case, we were fairly certain of Jack Ravenhurst's futureactions, and so far our prophecies had been correct ... but if shedecided to shake her shadows, fun would be had by all.

  And as long as I had to depend on someone else to do my work for me, Iwas going to be just the teenchiest bit concerned about whether theywere doing it properly.

  I decided
it was time to do my best to imitate a cosmic-ray particle,and put on a little speed through the corridors that ran through thesubsurface of Ceres.

  My vac suit was in my hotel room. One of the other agents had pickedit up from my flitterboat and packed it carefully into a small attachecase. I'd planned my circuit so that I'd be near the hotel when thingscame to the proper boil, so I did a lot of diving, breaking all kindsof traffic