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Ch. 06 · The Man Who Staked The Stars

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  Chapter six of A Man Who Staked the Stars by Catherine MacLean. This LibriVox
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  recording is in the public domain. Chapter six Approaching the Scientists and technicians row
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  along the subsurface arcades. The expensive restaurants grew fewer and were replaced by German
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  type beer hals, schools with courses advertised in their posted schedules whose titles were
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  completely unintelligible to him, and second hand bookstalls selling battered technical books in journals
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  whose titles were undecipherable, and any tongue Bryce could think of. The lunch
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  hour crowds were beginning to pour out into the arcades from elevators and tube trains
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  in a rush to get first place in their favorite eating places. Pierce half
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  turned as if his eyes caught on the expression of a face behind them.
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  Carter, there you are, you bastard, the voice came from behind him,
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  thick with rage. But more than that was the insult. It meant
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  challenge. This was nothing in which Pierce could defend him. Bryce wheeled left
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  hand automatically, plucking out his magnematic, wondering if the attacker would be the
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  honorable kind of duellist who would hold fire long enough for him to get his
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  gun out. Miraculously, it seemed to be happening. He already had his
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  sights halfway on to the speaker when he recognized him, a gross heavy figure
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  he had seen a hundred times, mister Beldman of the Board of Directors.
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  What was he doing on the moon? Beldman stood with his fists on his
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  hips and his legs sprattled, sneering at Bryce. That's right, he said,
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  heavily, sarcastic. Start shooting when you're surrounded by innocent spectators, when
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  you know I can't draw on you. That's the way of a crook.
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  The husky bassed voice echoed from the walls behind him. To the bend of
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  the corridor, people were scattering hastily out of the firing line. Krook was
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  the central word. Somehow Beldman had found out that Bryce was responsible for the
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  corruption of ut and he was dealing with the matter in the most direct way
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  that it could be dealt with. For a death in a private duel would
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  be laid to a quarrel and not investigated. How had you found out?
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  Bryce forced down the question as he stiffly reholsted his magnematic. There was no
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  use of thinking of that until a question of surviving the next five minutes was
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  settled. He stood with his hands empty, feeling curiously empty inside, oddly
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  missing the white rage and love of murder that usually carried him through such things.
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  It seemed too good at day to spoil. He would rather have continued
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  his way to lunch with Sheila and let the man live, or let himself
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  live. This would be no duel for a little blood letting. Beldman's purpose
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  was to kill, and Beldman himself, knowing what he knew, had to
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  die. Do you understand what you have said? Sir? Bryce used the
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  formal words of the dueling countries. You're damn right I do. Are you
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  prepared to take the consequences, sir? More ready than you are, Beldman
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  said, his hands still on his hips. He amplified his remark with a
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  few well chosen words that harked back to his truck driving days. How many
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  shots? Bryce asked, more softly, beginning to want to kill until one
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  of us is down, with his gun out of it hand. Bryce repeated
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  the provision to the crowd that had drawn up discreetly along the sidelines. We
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  fire until one of us is both down and disarmed. There was a murmur
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  of surprise among the crowd, for that was an unusual and deadly provision for
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  a formal duel. As Bryce paced backward the required number of paces, counting
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  aloud, two men volunteered as seconds. They came forward to compare the guns
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  rapidly and show them to the duel lists. It had to be done and
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  finished rapidly, for lunch hour had begun with its flood of people into the
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  corridors, and they were holding up traffic. Bryce's gun was a forty two
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  magnematic working on an electrical acceleration of the slug by electromagnetic rings in the thick
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  barrel. It was soundless except for a legal built in radio YEAP that announced
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  its firing and number to the police emergency receivers. Beldman's gun was another Maggie
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  of the same make, but heavier with a wide mouthed barrel, apparently throwing
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  a much heavier caliber slug Ready, the second stepped back to the edge of
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  the crowd and began counting off half a minute. By seconds the faces of
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  the crowd faded from his consciousness Bryce stood with his hands empty at his sides
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  as the seconds were counted. Thirty twenty nine, twenty eight, twenty seven
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  came the voice, counting evenly and loudly. The world narrowed to a corridor
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  of space, with the blocky figure of Beldman at one end and himself at
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  the other. Funny Bryce thought that he had never considered that bull headed impatience
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  and strength as dangerous. He was a massive block of a man. Where
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  Bryce was thick with muscle. J. H. Beldman was so wide and
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  shoulder and barrel and so thick an armed that he looked almost round like Bryce.
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  He had worked up from the bottom. Bryce remembered starting as a truck
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  driver and labor organizer, and then owning his own line and giving ut a
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  stiff battle before being bought out. Crude, but that didn't mean there wasn't
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  a lightning brain behind that round face twenty six, twenty five, twenty four,
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  twenty three. He had underestimated the deadliness of the man. Beldman was
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  obviously subject to rages, and in the grip of one now, and if
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  he had survived all the duels and battles that his rages had brought long enough
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  to grow as old as he was. Then his age was an indication not
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  of weakness, but of the degree of his deadliness. The irritable thought came
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  that he might well be killed by this ox twenty two, twenty one,
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  twenty nineteen. He flexed his fingers restlessly and felt in his mind the speed
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  and sureness of his draw and firing. That big, blocky figure was just
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  another obstacle standing in his way to be blasted, aside a loud mouth to
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  be shut. Ten nine he concentrated on the counting six, five, four,
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  sureness growing like a coiled spring in every muscle. Three he crouched slightly.
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  That blocky figure that was all the rest of the world was no more
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  than a target, a big target. Two one fire. Something confusing happened
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  as the word came. It seemed that a gigantic blow hit him somewhere on
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  his left shoulder, twisting him around so that he couldn't see his target.
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  He spun back, willing himself to shoot again quickly, but his legs buckled
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  oddly as he turned. He reeled, finding his balance with great effort.
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  Heavy slug, he thought, seeing as delayed memory, the coiled spring speed,
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  which with Beldman had moved. Bryce's left arm did not seem to have
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  any connection with his mind. Glancing down briefly, he saw that it dangled,
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  but the Maggie was still there, held in the numb unfeeling hand pointed
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  limply at the ground. He wondered if he had fired it yet and fall
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  down, advised Pierce's clear voice. From somewhere. There was a stirring and
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  whisper from the blur of the crowd who stood watching to see that the rules
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  were observed. Beldman was walking towards him. Do you end the duel?
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  Asked someone, probably the second No. The blur of Beldman answered, and
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  suddenly he came into focus, walking up, his wide mouthed gun unwavering in
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  his hand. Bryce remembered the provisions of the duel. Fire until one is
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  down and weaponless. There was nothing sad about remaining at a fixed distance.
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  Beldman intended to walk up close enough to shoot him between the eyes. It
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  was too late to let himself fall and end the duel. Beldman would fire
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  if he saw Bryce begin to fall. Now he was already close enough for
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  a sure head shot. Feeling was returning to his left arm. It dangled
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  abnormally far and probably looked broken and useless, but there was nothing actually wrong
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  with it. Only something in his shoulder was broken. After the first cold
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  numbness of impact, sensation returned tingling in his fingers, and pain was beginning
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  to burn in his shoulder. Bryce waited a few more seconds, feeling the
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  control returning to his fingers, not changing the glazed off focus of his eyes.
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  How many duels had Beldman won like this? The impact of one of
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  those heavy slugs hitting bone was a dazing blow enough to stun some men,
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  and he probably counted on that effect. The square figure lumbered closer, a
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  lumpish, clumsy caricature of the self made man, brutally strong on a shame
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  of misfit to the society of the smooth, wise, smiling, easy mannered
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  people that he and Bryce had joined, a model of everything that Bryce was
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  trying to destroy in himself. With a quick twist of the wrist, Bryce
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  swung his palm flat up, flipping the magnematic muzzle into line with it,
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  and put a bullet into the round face in that position of his hand.
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  The back kick of the shot twisted his arm back in its broken shoulder and
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  pulled the maggie from his hand, but it didn't matter. The duel was
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  over. The motionless crowd dissolved again into talking individuals going to lunch. Pierce
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  picked up the maggie and made the usual query of those who chose to remain,
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  which of you has any complaint of unfairness or advantage taken by either party
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  of this duel. Most of them were leaving, anticipated the arrival of the
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  police with their time consuming questions, but twenty or so crowded close round Bryce
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  in the corpse. Press a thumb on your shoulder, subclavian man. Someone
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  advised Bryce, you're bleeding like a faucet. Pierce's clear voice said the standard
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  words over the murmur and shuffle of feet, No unfairness having been observed.
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  When called to give testimony, you can then say that he shot in self
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  defense and under duress. A low wail of sirens was heard. Who was
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  that character? Pierce asked later, sitting beside the table, while the surgeon
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  patiently pieced together the three or four shattered pieces of Bryce's collar bone and fastened
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  them with ingenious plastic bolts. Bryce absently watched the process in a large tilted
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  mirror slung overhead. Medicine bored him. Jay H. Beldman, member of
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  the board of Directors, he explained, and for the benefit of the policeman
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  standing beside the door, he added, bad tempered as they come. He
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  looked into the mirror uneasily, trying to focus on his face. His clothes
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  were being cleaned of blood and dried somewhere. When the doctor finished sewing and
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  patching, Bryce showered and dressed in a small dressing room beside the emergency ward,
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  where he found his clothes hanging neatly in a drying closet. As he
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  finished, a man in playing clothes entered and dismissed the cop with a word,
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  and handed Bryce a printed notice in his magnmatic You're clear, he said,
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  leaving again with a friendly half salute. No charges. The police had
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  already recorded the testimony of the witnesses and inspected the weapons used. It had
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  been a fair duel and the survivor was clear with a standard case for self
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  defense. The printed notice called him to testify at the coroner's inquest into the
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  death of J. H. Beldman during the next Saturday, but there would
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  be no charges and no investigation. There would be no trouble from Beldman.
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  But who else knew what he had known that Bryce Carter was responsible for the
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  corruption of ut How had he learned it? If somebody else knew there was
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  going to be trouble coming out of the emergency ward. He checked his watch
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  one fifteen, too late to find Sheila Wesley still at Geiger's counter, but
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  he knew he could see her another day, and with a good story to
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  explain why he had not turned up the first time. They ate at the
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  nearest stand and went back to work. Trying to write was almost impossible,
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  and even using his left hand for minor tasks was difficult. In spite of
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  quick healing of muscle and flesh from the amino and nucleic acid powders the doctor
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  had packed in the shoulder ached with a tightness that spoiled his coordination. He
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  shifted to writing clumsily with his right hand. After twenty minutes, he abandoned
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  the pretense of working and began thoughtfully doing practice draws with his right hand.
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  It was stiff and clumsy, and there was no holsher in his right pocket
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  to make grasping easy. The second time, the Maggie caught on his pocket
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  edge and slid from his hand. He left it on the rug where it
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  had fallen, sitting looking at it thoughtfully for a moment. Today was the
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  day he would meet a rillo. How well can you handle a four tube
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  cabin cruiser line of sight only? I'm no navigator, Pierce responded, Bryce
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  said, soberly, realizing what he had decided. This is a good day
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  to have a body guard who's a good shot. I have an appointment to
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  meet a friend, and I'm not sure he is a friend. I shoot,
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  Pierre said, Writing at one of the letters he'd been said to happy
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  to oblige. Shall I wear my bulletproof clothes? You could do with something
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  like that, Bryce said, soberly. Pierce looked up from the letters.
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  Would this be the man behind all these bullets? And you're meeting him in
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  space? Yes? In armor plated tanks with heavy artillery, no no light,
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  in heavy cruisers, no marines, just you. Bryce was smiling at
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  Pierce's mock astonishment. He knew that the kid didn't care in the slightest where
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  Bryce led him, as long as there was a fight at the end of
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  it, and he left it to Bryce to choose the odds. The odds
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  might be even enough. Arillo himself, if he came with murder as his
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  intention, would bring no helpers for witnesses, and he would expect Bryce to
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  bring none. Or if he had hired assassins, he would not come himself,
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  and they would not know who had hired them, but they would have
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  been told to expect one man only. The secrecy of any meeting in space
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  is practically absolute if there is one thing which Space has plenty of its distance,
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  distance enough to lose things in distance, enough to hide in distance,
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  enough so that even if you know where something is by all the figures of
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  its coordinates, if it's smaller than a planet, you can't find it even
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  when you are there. To put it crudely, what space has is space,
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  and finding something that doesn't want to be found in space is like looking
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  for a missing germ in the Atlantic. He had the coordinates of the beacon
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  he had chosen for his own appointment point, and the robot pilot took him
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  to that area with automatic precision, But once there he had to cruise manually
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  back and forth. Three times through the perpendicular plane of Earth's equator, before
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  picking up the radar pip of the Boy, which was set to broadcast its
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  presence by a circular sweep of radar pulses on a flat plane corresponding to the
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  earth equatorial average. He found it no later than expected, which was over
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  an hour early. On the principle that he who arrives first finds no ambush,
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  he left pierced with certain instructions and floated from the ship to the familiar
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  globe that spun so placidly on the anchoring rod that attached it to the controlling
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  bui. The buoy was powered strongly enough to control the orbits of fifty such
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  globes without strain. Buoys of that type were just beginning to be popular in
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  the Belt. Once inside, he opened his face plate, looking around with
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  the same pleasure he always felt on his visits here. It was like being
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  back at the Belt for a time, after the raw harshness of the Moon
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  and the artificial luxuries of its cities, after the agoraphobic vastness of Earth's giant
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  surface. To be within this little, close knit, familiar world was soothing
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  and relaxing. It was a green glade of leaves and branches, greenness underfoot
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  and overhead, a brown metal cliff with vines and a door to his left,
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  a larger brown metal cliff like the round head of a barrel with doors
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  in it to his right, and a circular silver door in the center.
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  Behind the small right hand cliff was a small amount of regulating machinery required behind
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  the doors of the larger cliff was a small kitchen and convertible study bedrooms behind,
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  and the silver door was a corridor leading to the airlock. In space.
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  It was forty feet from cliff to cliff, and from the growing greenery
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  underfoot to the growing greenery overhead, as spacious as a wide glade in the
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  woods of earth. He picked his way among the vines and shrubs to a
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  carpet like patch of green moss, and sat down comfortably to wait. Pierce
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  had drawn the ship off beyond detector range by now, and it would seemed
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  to any ship approaching that he had not yet arrived. It was peaceful there,
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  no breeze stirred. The leaves twenty feet above fixed in the air on
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  clear spokes of lucite. The crystal globe that was the sun for this small
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  world gave forth its warming flood of light, sunlight borrowed from the sunlight outside
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  and let in on the lusite spokes. He had an interest in its manufacture,
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  and had anchored his globe here as a commercial sample of a space globe
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  for the viewing of likely settlers. It was slightly better and more compact,
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  since it was a newer model contained in an ovoid hull that was only forty
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  six by sixty six feet, But in essence it was like any of the
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  farms in the homes of the asteroid belt, and there was nothing like it
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  on any planet in the universe. End of chapter six read by Paul Hampton.