By Proxy by Randall Garrett (readnow TXT) 📖

"but I'll risk that if I have to. But I won't risk death just yet. Don't worry; the Army won't know I'm even gone until I'm halfway to the Moon."

"Foo!" said Elshawe. "Every radar base from Albuquerque to the Mexican border has an antenna focused on the air above this ranch. The minute you get above those mountains, they'll have a fix on you, and a minute after that, they'll have you bracketed with Cobras.

"Why don't you let the Government inspectors look it over and give you an O.K.? What makes you think they're all out to steal your invention?"

"Oh, they won't steal it," Porter said bitterly. "Heaven's-to-Betsy no! But this invention of mine will mean that the United States of America will be in complete control of the planets and the space between. When the Government wants a piece of property, they try to buy it at their price; if they can't do that, they condemn it and pay the owner what they think it's worth—not what the owner thinks it's worth. The same thing applies here; they'd give me what they thought I ought to have—in ten years or so. Look what happened to Fermi.

"No, Elshawe; when the Government comes begging to me for this invention, they can have it—on my terms."

"Going to keep it a secret, eh? You can't keep a thing like that secret. Look what happened with atomic energy after World War Two. We kept it a secret from the Russians, didn't we? Fine lot of good that did us. As soon as they knew it was possible, they went to work on it. Nature answers any questions you ask her if you ask her the right way. As soon as the Government sees that your spaceship works, they'll put some of their bright physicists to work on it, and you'll be in the same position as you would have been if you'd showed it to them in the first place. Why risk your neck?"

Porter shook his head. "The analogy isn't valid. Suppose someone had invented the A-bomb in 1810. It would have been a perfectly safe secret because there wasn't a scientist on Earth who included such a thing as atomic energy in his philosophy. And, believe me, this drive of mine is just as far ahead of contemporary scientific philosophy as atomic energy was ahead of Napoleon's scientists.

"Suppose I told you that the fuel my ship uses is a gas lighter than hydrogen. It isn't, but suppose I told you so. Do you think any scientist today could figure out how it worked? No. They know that there's no such thing as a gas with a lighter atomic weight than hydrogen. They know it so well that they wouldn't even bother to consider the idea.

"My invention is so far ahead of present-day scientific thought that no scientists except myself could have even considered the idea."

"O.K.; O.K.," Elshawe said. "So you're going to get yourself shot down to prove your point."

Porter grinned lopsidedly. "Not at all. You're still thinking in terms of a rocket. Sure—if I used a rocket, they'd knock me down fast, just as soon as I lifted above the mountains. But I don't have to do that. All I have to do is get a few feet of altitude and hug the ground all the way to the Pacific coast. Once I get out in the middle of the Pacific, I can take off straight up without being bothered at all."

"All right. If your machine will do it," the reporter said, trying to hide his skepticism.

"You still think I've got some kind of rocket, don't you?" Porter asked accusingly. He paused a moment, then, as if making a sudden decision, he said: "Look, Elshawe, I trust you. I'm going to show you the inside of that ship. I won't show you my engines, but I will prove to you that there are no rocket motors in her. That way, when you write up the story, you'll be able to say that you have first-hand knowledge of that fact. O.K.?"

"It's up to you," the reporter said. "I'd like to see it."

"Come along," said Malcom Porter.

Elshawe followed Porter out to the field, feeling rather grateful that he was getting something to work on. They walked across the field, past the two gun-toting men in Levis that Porter had guarding the ship. Overhead, the stars were shining brightly through the thin mountain air. Elshawe glanced at his wrist watch. It was a little after ten p.m.

He helped Porter wheel the ramp up to the door of the ship and then followed him up the steps. Porter unlocked the door and went inside. The Grumman had been built to cruise in the high stratosphere, so it was as air-tight as a submarine.

Porter switched on the lights. "Go on in."

The reporter stepped into the cabin of the ship and looked around. It had been rebuilt, all right; it didn't look anything like the inside of a normal stratojet.

"Elshawe."

"Yeah?" The reporter turned to look at Porter, who was standing a little behind him. He didn't even see the fist that arced upward and smashed into his jaw. All he saw was a blaze of light, followed by darkness.

The next thing he knew, something was stinging in his nostrils. He jerked his head aside, coughing. The smell came again. Ammonia.

"Wake up, Elshawe," Porter was saying. "Have another whiff of these smelling salts and you'll feel better."

Elshawe opened his eyes and looked at the bigger man. "I'm awake. Take that stuff away. What's the idea of slugging me?"

"I was afraid you might not come willingly," Porter said apologetically. "I needed a witness, and I figured you'd do better than anyone else."

Elshawe tried to move and found that he was tied to the seat and strapped in with a safety belt. "What's this for?" he asked angrily. His jaw still hurt.

"I'll take that stuff off in a few minutes. I know I can trust you, but I want you to remember that I'm the only one who can pilot this ship. If you try anything funny, neither one of us will get back alive. I'll let you go as soon as we get up to three hundred miles."

Elshawe stared at him. "Where are we?"

"Heading out toward mid-Pacific. I headed south, to Mexico, first. We're over open water now, headed toward Baja California, so I put on the autopilot. As soon as we get out over the ocean, we can really make time. You can watch the sun come up in the west."

"And then?" Elshawe felt dazed.

"And then we head straight up. For empty space."

Elshawe closed his eyes again. He didn't even want to think about it.

"... As you no doubt heard," Terrence Elshawe dictated into the phone, "Malcom Porter made good his threat to take a spaceship of his own devising to the Moon. Ham radios all over North America picked up his speech, which was made by spreading the beam from an eighty-foot diameter parabolic reflector and aiming it at Earth from a hundred thousand miles out. It was a collapsible reflector, made of thin foil, like the ones used on space stations. Paragraph.

"He announced that the trip was made with the co-operation of the United States Space Force, and that it represented a major breakthrough in the conquest of space. He—"

"Just a sec," Winstein's voice broke in. "Is that the truth? Was he really working with the Space Force?"

"Hell, no," said Elshawe. "But they'll have to claim he was now. Let me go on."

"Shoot."

"... He also beamed a message to the men on Moon Base One, telling them that from now on they would be able to commute back and forth from Luna to Earth, just as simply as flying from New York to Detroit. Paragraph.

"What followed was even more astounding. At tremendous acceleration, Malcom Porter and Terrence Elshawe, your reporter, headed for Mars. Inside Porter's ship, there is no feeling of acceleration except for a steady, one-gee pull which makes the passenger feel as though he is on an ordinary airplane, even though the spaceship may be accelerating at more than a hundred gravities. Paragraph.

"Porter's ship circled Mars, taking photographs of the Red Planet—the first close-ups of Mars to be seen by the human race. Then, at the same tremendous rate of speed, Porter's ship returned to Earth. The entire trip took less than thirty-six hours. According to Porter, improved ships should be able to cut that time down considerably. Paragraph."