Eric Russell - Three to Conquer

The other was blunt enough to appreciate straight talk; he was openly impressed. Leaning back in his chair, Conway surveyed Harper afresh.

“We’ve done a great deal of checking on you already. You heard Trooper Alderson from a distance of approximately six hundred yards. Without listening, I presume?”

“I heard his death-cry. On the neural band, it’s as effective as a scream; I couldn’t help hearing.”

“You have helped nail a number of wanted criminals, and it is now obvious how you did it. But you never listen?”

“Guilt yells across the street. Fear bellows like an angry bull.”

“Is there anything that broadcasts on a level sufficiently muted to escape your attention?”

“Yes—ordinary, everyday, innocent thoughts.”

“You do not listen to those?”

“Why on earth should I bother? Do you try to sort out every spoken word from the continual hum of conversation around you in a restaurant? Does a busy telephone operator take time off to absorb the babble going through her switchboard? If I went around trying to pick up everything that’s going on, I’d have qualified for a straitjacket ten years ago. Continual, ceaseless mental yap can torture a telepath unless he closes his mind to it.”

By now, Conway was three-quarters convinced. His mind had made considerable readjustment. He resumed his table-tapping, cast an inquiring glance at Benfield and Jameson. They immediately put on the blank expressions of impartial onlookers, not qualified to make decisions.

“I understand,” continued Conway, “that to date you have not encountered another telepath?”

“No,” agreed Harper regretfully.

“But if two of you passed by .without listening, neither of you would become aware of the other’s existence?”

“I suppose so; but I couldn’t swear to it. If we radiate more powerfully than the average human—”

“Yes, but your lack of contact is no proof of your uniqueness? For all we know to the contrary there may be fifty or a hundred telepaths in this very city?”

“I think it most unlikely, but wouldn’t define it as impossible.”

“What is your effective range?” asked Conway.

“About eight hundred yards. It varies from time to time. On rare occasions, I have received at three times that distance. Other times it drops to a hundred or less.”

“Do you know the cause of such variation? Is it due to the nature of surroundings, blanking by big buildings, or anything similar?”

“I could not say for sure, not having subjected the matter to systematic test. Surroundings make no difference and that’s all I’m certain about.”

“But you have a theory?” Conway pressed.

“Yes,” admitted Harper. “I suspect that on any given occasion, my range is determined by the amplitude of the other person’s radiations. The more powerfully he broadcasts, the greater the distance over which I can pick him up. The weaker, the less distance. As I’ve said, it would require scientific tests to establish the truth or falsity of that notion.”

“Are you willing to undergo such tests?”

“I am not,” declared Harper.

“Why not?”

“The immediate problem is not that of what to do about telepaths; it’s what to do about invading Venusians. Nobody is going to use me for a guinea pig.”

“Don’t view it in that light, Mr. Harper,” Conway soothed. “We appreciate to the full the excellent part you have played. The trouble is that we’re not satisfied. We want more of you. We want all you can give. In fact, we need it so badly that we demand it as of right.”

“What do you require of me?”

“All the information we can get out of you now, and perhaps some action later.”

“Go ahead. Let no man say Wade Harper was unable to suffer.”

Conway signed to Benfield. “Switch on that tape-recorder.” He returned his attention to Harper. “This one is of the utmost importance; I want you to answer it with the greatest clarity you can command. What impelled you to shoot Jocelyn Whittingham?”

“That’s a tough question,” Harper replied. “I cannot translate it into terms you understand; it’s like trying to describe a rose to a man blind from birth.”

“Never mind. Do your best.”

“All right. It was somewhat like this: you’re in your wife’s bedroom. You notice a new and pretty jewel box on her dressing table. Full of curiosity, you open it. The thing contains a live whip snake. The snake sees you the same instant. It leaps out. Despite the shock, you act fast. You swipe it in mid-air, knock it to the floor, crush it under heel. That’s how it was.”

“I see.” Conway stared at him thoughtfully, then asked, “Can’t you express it in a manner more in keeping with what actually happened?”

“She started up the steps. I knew she might be the girl I was seeking. I made a stab at her mind for the sole purpose of identifying her. The moment I touched, I realized what I had touched. At the same moment—”

“What did you touch?” inquired Conway.

“Something not human; I cannot describe it more accurately. I planted a telepathic hand fairly and squarely on the mental field of a non-human entity. At the same instant, it felt my touch. That was additional confirmation, if any were needed, because no normal human being can sense a telepathic probe. I realized several things in that split second: First, she didn’t know whence the probe had come. She had no directional sense such as I possess. But she correctly assumed that it came from me, because I was in plain sight and already racing toward her.”

“She did not know it was you?” repeated Conway. “You mean, she was in no way telepathic herself?”

“I hadn’t any evidence of it. There was only that abnormal sensitivity which, I suppose, has been developed as a defense-mechanism somewhere else. She did know, beyond all doubt, that suddenly and without warning, a strange and dangerous mind had lifted her mask and seen beneath. She gave out a panicky thought that she must get away, she must warn the others that they’re not as well-hidden as they think, that they can be exposed.”

“A-a-ah!” Conway displayed hopefulness. “So she knew the precise location of these others? She knew how to get into touch with them?”

“If so,” Harper, “her mind did not admit it. Things were moving fast. We were both thunderstruck by the encounter. Her mind was yelling, ‘ Escape, escape, escape!’ while mine ordered imperatively, ‘ Stop her, stop, stop… kill, kill!’ I shot her down without any compunctions whatsoever. I’d quite forgotten that she was a girl, or had been a girl. For the moment she was something else, something that had to be laid good and cold. I gave her the magazine right through the head. I heard the alien mentality cease sizzling and fade to nothingness. That showed it could die.”

“Then you went away, without making further examination?”

“I did; I had no time for further horsing around. I didn’t dare risk being picked up anywhere but here. To tell this story in any police barracks or sheriff’s office, where they didn’t know the score, would eventually land me in an asylum.”

“Couldn’t you have saved time, trouble and anxiety by calling us long distance?”

“How far would I have got that way? Some underling would have sent police to the booth to pick up a loony. I’ve had a tough enough job reaching the right people in person.”

None of the listeners relished that remark, but were unable to deny the truth of it. A formidable guard of minor officials stood between the high executive and a besieging force of malcontents, theorists, halfwits and world-doomers. Perforce they also held at bay the rare individual with something genuinely worth hearing.