Raymond Jones: Utility

He cut off without giving McCord a chance to speak. McCord checked with his lawyers and found that Thorgersen had kicked through. He had complied in every detail.

McCord rose then and gathered into himself some of the new energy he seemed to possess.

"Damned clever,” Captain Wilkins muttered. “I’ve never seen a deal put over like that before.”

“You think I’m lying?” McCord said.

“Sure. I don’t care how drunk you were or how hard you were hit. Merely being thrown in a pool wouldn’t give you a psychosis for the rest of your life that would make you afraid to drink a glass of water.”

“There were five hundred Diomedes swimming in the pool at the time,” said McCord patiently. “They were responsible for it indirectly.”

“What’s that got to do with it?”

“Have you ever seen the demonstration where supersonic waves are set up in an oil bath by a crystal vibrating at such frequencies being immersed in the bath?”

“I’ve heard of such.”

“You stick your finger in the oil and it will nearly burn it off. Remember?”

“Sure, but—”

“There were five hundred Diomedes in that pool, some under the surface, some swimming on top. They were chattering and gossiping their heads off—at supersonic frequencies. It was like being thrown in a vat of boiling oil. The hundreds of frequencies beat together and produced waves that hammered and tore at me and others that burned. It didn’t bother the Diomedes, of course. They’re built for it. But I thought I was being boiled alive.

“The Diomedes fished me out of there, but from then on every time I saw so much as a glass of water I felt that burning and tearing energy again. I couldn’t help it. It would drive me crazy to hear water dripping from a tap even. I could only drink something I knew was not water, and whiskey nearly finished the job it had begun.

“I knew I had to get back into that pool without the Diomedes in it. Nothing else would cure me, but it took eight years to get courage enough to do it.”

No one spoke when McCord was through. No one had a moment’s doubt now of the truth of his story. He spoke simply and with the ingratiating honesty that he had always tried to project through his drunkenness though the knowledge of what others thought of him must have been torture.

He went out of the room and after a moment we followed silently behind him.

He stepped out of the hatch and we all caught the overpowering smell of the ologenerator going full blast again. We wondered why in the world he had that thing on again.

But there was an obvious change in the Diomedes now. They rose from their cowering attitude and flocked around him worshipfully.

We saw the little gadget in his hand which he had built during the trip out. It was connected with a little microphone at his lips. We knew now what it was: A device for speaking and listening to the supersonic voice frequencies of the Diomedes. The creatures were quiet, listening to him and when he finished they trooped past him in single file and he handed out several dozen ologenerators which we didn’t even know he had. When they were all gone he left us and crossed the dark plain to the holes of the Arthoids in the cliffs opposite. An hour later he was back.

“What’s the score?” asked Captain Wilkins finally.

“There’s a truce,” said McCord. “It’s an armed truce, but I don’t think it will ever be broken. The Arthoids have got the supersonic pens to annoy the Diomedes’ hearing organs, and the Diomedes have got the ologenerators.”

“What good are they?” asked Dunc.

“Haven’t you ever noticed the smell around the Arthoids’ caves? Like roses and orchids? The Arthoids communicate too—by means of a sense of smell, using their olfactory organs. The ologenerators will raise the merry devil with them if the .Diomedes turn them on. But each side knows better now than to turn on its weapons. If it does, retaliation will be quick. I had to go over and make the Arthoids understand that. They’re sore, but very agreeable.”

“Won’t these things kill the creatures?” I asked.

“Of course not! The Diomedes and Arthoids are my friends!” McCord turned his wide, blue eyes on me in that hurt expression again. “The pens and the ologenerators are annoying as the devil to them, but they won’t harm them.”

“How could you talk to the Diomedes even if you could use supersonics? You hadn’t learned their vocal language,” I said.

McCord shook his head. “I wasn’t sure I could, and don’t ask me how. Their heads are like Jewelworlds. Any language creates the pictures it was meant to convey and their words do the same to me. No abstractions, of course, but we managed.”

We felt better now. All but Captain Wilkins. He sat in his chair as morose as ever. I asked what the trouble was.

He looked up. “Do you think Thorgersen is going to take this lying down? He may be a crook and a murderer and McCord may be safe enough from him, but look what he’ll do to us! He’ll take it all out on us as soon as we get back. I think we might as well resign and find a new trade right now.”

McCord brightened. “Oh, you don’t need to worry about that, Captain. Didn’t I tell you? The transfer of the ownership of the Cassiopeia was one item of my conditions that Thorgersen signed. You fellows all work for me now.” He looked around hopefully at the ring of men. “I hope you don’t mind, fellows,” he said.

Wide grins gave him his answer. Anybody that could come out on top of a deal with Thorgersen was a good man.

“I think we should celebrate now,” McCord said. He leaned towards an audio panel on the wall and called the galley. “Send up a couple of dozen quarts right away!” There was a moment’s pause as he listened, then he exploded in indignation.

“No!” he roared. “Water!”

THE END.