Short Fiction Fritz Leiber (free e books to read .txt) 📖

care of the old geezer.” On the strength of her look I put down Mother and started to pry open the Pilot’s left hand, which was clenched in a fist that looked a mite too big to have nothing inside it.

The girl started to edge behind Pop, but he caught the movement right away and looked at her with a grin that was so knowing and yet so friendly, and yet so pitying at the same time⁠—with the pity of the old pro for even the seasoned amateur⁠—that in her place I think I’d have blushed myself, as she did now⁠ ⁠… through the streaks of the Pilot’s blood.

“You don’t have to worry none about me, lady,” he said, running a hand through his white hair and incidentally touching the pommel of one of the two knives strapped high on the back of his jacket so he could reach one over either shoulder. “I quit murdering some years back. It got to be too much of a strain on my nerves.”

“Oh yeah?” I couldn’t help saying as I pried up the Pilot’s index finger and started on the next. “Then why the stab-factory, Pop?”

“Oh you mean those,” he said, glancing down at his knives. “Well, the fact is, Ray, I carry them to impress buggers dumber than you and the lady here. Anybody wants to think I’m still a practicing murderer I got no objections. Matter of sentiment, too, I just hate to part with them⁠—they bring back important memories. And then⁠—you won’t believe this, Ray, but I’m going to tell you just the same⁠—guys just up and give me their knives and I doubly hate to part with a gift.”

I wasn’t going to say “Oh yeah?” again or “Shut up!” either, though I certainly wished I could turn off Pop’s spigot, or thought I did. Then I felt a painful tingling shoot down my right arm. I smiled at Pop and said, “Any other reasons?”

“Yep,” he said. “Got to shave and I might as well do it in style. A new blade every day in the fortnight is twice as good as the old ads. You know, it makes you keep a knife in fine shape if you shave with it. What you got there, Ray?”

“You were wrong, Pop,” I said. “He did have some metal on him that didn’t melt.”

I held up for them to see the object I’d extracted from his left fist: a bright steel cube measuring about an inch across each side, but it felt lighter than if it were solid metal. Five of the faces looked absolutely bare. The sixth had a round button recessed in it.

From the way they looked at it neither Pop nor the girl had the faintest idea of what it was. I certainly hadn’t.

“Had he pushed the button?” the girl asked. Her voice was throaty but unexpectedly refined, as if she’d done no talking at all, not even to herself, since coming to the Deathlands and so retained the cultured intonations she’d had earlier, whenever and wherever that had been. It gave me a funny feeling, of course, because they were the first words I’d heard her speak.

“Not from the way he was holding it,” I told her. “The button was pointed up toward his thumb but the thumb was on the outside of his fingers.” I felt an unexpected satisfaction at having expressed myself so clearly and I told myself not to get childish.

The girl slitted her eyes. “Don’t you push it, Ray,” she said.

“Think I’m nuts?” I told her, meanwhile sliding the cube into the smaller pocket of my pants, where it fit tight and wouldn’t turn sideways and the button maybe get pressed by accident. The tingling in my right arm was almost unbearable now, but I was getting control over the muscles again.

“Pushing that button,” I added, “might melt what’s left of the plane, or blow us all up.” It never hurts to emphasize that you may have another weapon in your possession, even if it’s just a suicide bomb.

“There was a man pushed another button once,” Pop said softly and reflectively. His gaze went far out over the Deathlands and took in a good half of the horizon and he slowly shook his head. Then his face brightened. “Did you know, Ray,” he said, “that I actually met that man? Long afterwards. You don’t believe me, I know, but I actually did. Tell you about it some other time.”

I almost said, “Thanks, Pop, for sparing me at least for a while,” but I was afraid that would set him off again. Besides, it wouldn’t have been quite true. I’ve heard other buggers tell the yarn of how they met (and invariably rubbed out) the actual guy who pushed the button or buttons that set the fusion missiles blasting toward their targets, but I felt a sudden curiosity as to what Pop’s version of the yarn would be. Oh well, I could ask him some other time, if we both lived that long. I started to check the Pilot’s pockets. My right hand could help a little now.

“Those look like mean burns you got there, lady,” I heard Pop tell the girl. He was right. There were blisters easy to see on three of the fingertips. “I’ve got some salve that’s pretty good,” he went on, “and some clean cloth. I could put on a bandage for you if you wanted. If your hand started to feel poisoned you could always tell Ray here to slip a knife in me.”

Pop was a cute gasser, you had to admit. I reminded myself that it was Pop’s business to play up to the both of us, charm being the secret weapon of all scroungers.

The girl gave a harsh little laugh. “Very well,” she said, “but we will use my salve, I know it works for me.” And she started to lead Pop to where we’d hidden our things.

“I’ll go with you,” I told them, standing up.

It didn’t look