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snobbishness he never realized that he was guilty of the most frightful
arrogance hi assuming that what he could do, she could not. In his ignorance
he was not aware that since navigation began, every new instrument, every
technique, has drawn the shuddery warnings of savants that uneducated
skippers, working by rote, could not be expected to master these latest fruits
of science or that uneducated skippers since navigation began have cheerfully
adopted new instruments and techniques at the drop of a hat and that never
once have the shuddery warnings been justified by the facts.
Up the aisle somebody was saying in a low, argumentative tone, "I saw the drum
myself. Naturally it was marked Dulsheen Creme, but the guards here never did
give a damn whether then- noses were dull or bright enough to flag down a
freighter and I don't think they've suddenly changed. It was booze, I tell
you. Fifty liters of it."
"Gawd! The hangovers tomorrow."
"We'll all have to watch our steps. I hope they don't do anything worse than
getting quietly drunk in their quarters. Those foot-kissing orderlies'll get a
workout, but who cares what happens to an orderly?"
"They haven't been on a real tear since I've been here."
"Lucky you. Let's hope they don't bust loose tonight. It's a break in the
monotony, sure but those girls play rough. Five prisoners died last time."
"They beat them up?"
"One of them."
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"What about the others? Oh! Oh, Gawd fifty liters, you said?"
Bernie began to whimper: "Not again! Not those plug-uglies! I swear I'll throw
myself through the spacelock if they make a pass at me. Ross, isn't there
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anything we can do?"
"Seems not, Bernie. Maybe they won't come in. Or if they do, maybe they'll
pass you by. There certainly isn't any place to hide."
A raucous female voice roared through the annunciator: "Bed check five
minutes, boys. Anybody got any li'l thing to do down the hall, better do it
now. See you lay-terrr!" Hiccup and drunken giggle.
For the first time in his life Ross suddenly and spontaneously acted like a
tri-di hero, with the exception that he felt like a silly ass through it all.
"Got an idea," he muttered. "Get out of your bunk." He pulled the wad of
cellosponge, old
Whitker's present, from his pocket and yanked it in half, one for him and one
for Bernie.
The Pullover said faintly: "Thanks, but I don't have
Ross didn't bother to answer. He was carefully fluffing the stuff out to its
maximum dimensions.
He unzipped his coveralls and began wadding them with cellosponge.
"I get it," Bernard said softly. He stepped out of his one-piece garment and
followed suit. In less than a minute they had creditable dummies lying on
their bunks.
The others watched their activity with emotions ranging between awe and envy.
One giant of a man proclaimed grimly to whoever cared to listen: "These are a
couple of smart guys. I wish them luck.
And I want you guys to know that I will personally break the back of any
sneaking rat who tips off a guard about this."
"Sure, Ox. Sure," came a muted chorus.
Arranged in a fetal sleeping position, face down, the dummies astonished even
their creators. It would take a lucky look in a f air light to note that the
heads were earless, fibrous globes.
"They'll do," Ross snapped. "Come on, Bernie."
They walked quietly from the dormitory in their singlet underwear toward the
dormitory latrine and past it. Into the corridor. Through a doorless opening
into a storeroom piled with crates of rations. "This'll do," Ross said
quietly. They ducked into a small cavern formed by sloppy issuing of stock and
hunched down.
"The dummies will fool the bed check. It's only a sweep with a hundred-line TV
system. If the guards do raid the dormitory tonight we'll have to count on
them ignoring the dummies or thinking they're a joke or being too busy with
other things to care. They'll be drunk, after all. Then in the morning
things'll be plenty disorganized. We'll be able to sneak back into
formation and that'll be that for a matter of years. They can't often bribe
the pilots with enough to guarantee a real ripsnorting drunk. Now try and get
some sleep. There's nothing more we can do."
They actually did doze off for a couple of hours, and then were awakened by
drunken war whoops.
"It's them!" Bernie wailed.
"Shut up. They're heading for the dormitory. We're safe."
"Safe!" Bernie echoed derisively. "Safe until when?"
Ross threatened him with the side of his hand and Bernie was quiet, though his
lips were mumbling soundlessly. The guards lurched giggling past and Ross
said:
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"We'll sneak into the lockroom. There won't be anybody there tonight; at least
we'll get a night's sleep."
"Big deal," grumbled Bernie, but he followed, complaining inarticulately to
himself. Ross thought tiredly: All this work for a night's sleep! And saw,
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half-formed, the dreadful procession of days and nights and years ahead. . . .
They reached the lockroom and stumbled in breathlessly.
"Dearie!" Two guards, playing a card game on the floor with a ring of empty
bottles around them, looked up in drunken delight. "Dearie!" repeated the
bigger of the two. "Angela, look what we've got!"
Ross said stupidly. "But you shouldn't be here  "
The guard made a clumsy pass at fluffing up her back hair and giggled. "Duty
comes first, dearie.
Angela, just lock that door, will you?" The other guard scrambled unevenly to
her feet and weaved over to the door. It was locked before Ross or Bernie
could move.
The big guard stood up too, leering at Bernie. "Wow!" she said. "New
merchandise. Just be patient, dearie. We've got a little something to attend
to in a couple of minutes, but we'll have lots of time after that."
Then things began to happen rapidly. There was Angela the guard, inarticulate,
falling-down drunk;
she waved bonelessly at a brightly flickering light on the far side of the
lockroom. There was the other guard, reaching out for Bernie with one hand,
pawing at a bottle with the other. There was
Ross, a paralyzed spectator. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]