A maze of crude machinery leaned against the wall and Chuck could see that some of the parts were obviously of still clean and sparkling copper, as if they were tended daily, though most of them were now clearly useless. But the part the old creature was demonstrating now must have functioned more recently, though not in the memory of the younger ones.
Spte-Rrll drew pictures on the dirt again. He picked up the copper gadget, put it down, and finally began taking it apart and reassembling it. Crude as it was in workmanship, the design was sound; it was a hand-tooled rotary impeller, meant to compress the air and drive it up a pipe that Sptz-Rril indicated. Chuck followed the pipe upward to a small pile of stones covered with blackened bits of something.
The Martians had discovered fire, then. By compressing the air and forcing it through some vegetation, they had built themselves a crude forge for handling copper. Now Sptz-Rrll was telling them that it could be made to work again. He even brought out a few bits of metal from equipment that had probably broken or worn out long before.
The casing of the impeller was also ruined, so that the impeller could not work. Sometime in the past, a piece had been cracked open somehow. It had been hammered back into shape, but the crack remained, destroying its usefulness in compressing the thin air for their fire.
Sokolsky would have been interested. Chuck thought He wondered Whether Sokolsky would ever bother to remember that he had first discovered the secret of the canals with Chuck. Would any of them remember the seventh member of the crew if they got back to Moon City by determination and luck?
He’d been a fool to fight for a few hours more of life. What good would it do him? He was captured here, waiting for has battery to run down and lead to the same end, anyhow. Even if he broke free, there was still the maze of the tunnels with no opening from them that he could find. He might as well have gotten it all over with at once.
Then he grimaced at his own self-pity. At least he’d die knowing some of the answers to his questions. He’d wanted to find Martians, and he’d found them. In fact, he was the leading human expert on Martians. And a lot of good if amounted to.
Now activity was going on again, and his eyes followed it as a relief from his own thoughts. One of the younger Martians had pulled one of the bulky welders into the center of the room. With a great deal of manipulation, he managed to get a spark going and start the flame. While Sptz-Rrll watched, he began work on a broken bit of copper—using a stainless steel rod!
Sptz-Rrll studied the work for a minute more, and then jumped forward in disgust, making gestures that ended in the flame being extinguished and the welder returned to its position against the wall. It was easy to see now why the equipment had been stolen.
The old Martian had seen a chance to get back some of the culture that was rapidly dying away, and had seized it. Now, though, he was finding that all his hopes for fixing the ruined equipment were useless.
The sigh the old Martian made was almost human. He came over and stood in front of the boy again, holding the compressor in his hands. He thrust it toward Chuck doubtfully, and looked at the welder.
Chuck nodded, and wriggled his arms frantically, trying to show that they would have to be free. He saw understanding on Sptz-Rrll’s face too.
But the old Martian only sighed again and turned back. He couldn’t risk it. Chuck slumped down. For a moment, he had almost hoped. If he could get the welder in his hands, he’d have a weapon that would be strong enough to force them to map out a way to the surface!
The others in the workshop were going back to their jobs, molding clay, carving at stone utensils, or carefully trying to shape crude bits of copper. But Sptz-Rrll sat despondently in the center of the floor. He lifted a little stone lid there, and came up with a group of thin porcelain plates all painted in bright colors.
Chuck strained his eyes toward them, and the old creature held them out. They were pictures of the work methods used in the past. The last one showed what might have been a windmill on the surface, with a shaft down to gearing that ran what could only have been the compressor. It was obvious that Mars had fought hard to develop civilization, but that the battle had been lost; they were on the long, downhill road back to savagery. After the windmill they had used the treadmill that still stood against the wall. Now they had nothing that needed power.
Chuck coughed harshly; his nose and throat had been bothering him. The cough only made things worse. He frowned, and then realized that the traces of water left in the blower unit for moistening the air must be gone; probably the Martians had drained that precious fluid off at once.
Sptz-Rrll was staring at him in deep thought now. The creature put the plates back slowly. He got up and moved back to a dark corner of the room. Then he approached Chuck again, hesitantly. He drew nearer, a step at a time, watching for a hostile move. Chuck sat motionlessly. Finally, Sptz-Rrll took the plunge. He darted in, and his quick little hands found the cap without error. Something gurgled, and the air grew more breathable. Sptz-Rrll screwed the cap back on, and again his eyes moved from Chuck to the welder.
Suddenly another weird cry broke from outside. One by one, the Martians began to file from the room. Sptz-Rrll waited until the last, but he obeyed whatever command it was without holding up the parade. Chuck was left alone in the workroom.
He muttered angrily, sure that the old Martian had been about to risk freeing his hands in the hope he would handle the welder. It was too late for that now.
He drew his arms up to his chest, testing the cords without any real hope. He heaved—and the cords snapped!
For a second he stared at them before he began unwinding himself. They’d judged his muscles by his size, not by his Earth origin, where he’d had to adapt to nearly three times the effort that would be required for the same results on Mars.
He slid out of the last of the cords and kicked them aside. With a single jump he was across the room and grabbing the big welding torch. He flicked it on, setting the flame to low. Now let them try to stop him! Even their ridiculous doors would be useless against this.
The tanks were a full load for him, but he had carried the equipment around while the ship was being repaired and he had no doubt of his ability to handle it now. He let the flame spurt out with a roar and brought it back to a clean, hot point again.
His step was almost jaunty as he headed toward the entrance. There’d still be plenty of trouble—but not if he walked into the first meeting room he’d seen and gave them a real demonstration of a welder at work. They’d be happy to get rid of him, then.
He passed the low bench where Sptz-Rrll had laid the ruined compressor. He picked it up and examined it, curious about the odd cleverness that had enabled them to find the best design for the housing and blades while they were still hammering it out of bits of copper by hand.
He knew he wasn’t going to leave the old Martian without granting the request that had been in those big eyes. He’d never be able to sleep nights. From Sptz-Rrll’s view, there had been no destruction or thievery; it had been a blinding hope for a rebirth of some of the culture they had once known, and the creature would have been a fool not to do anything he could to gain his ends. At least, there’d been no murdering involved.
Chuck found the right rod and adjusted his flame. He hadn’t worked too much with copper, and he didn’t like the idea. His experience had been with the hardest, toughest allows known. But the equipment would braze copper, and he’d had some training. He spread the housing section on the floor and began depositing metal on it, smoothing it out as best he could. When it was done, he knew it was probably better than the original. One of the impeller blades was cracked off, and he found it among the broken bits Sptz-Rrll had been saving. It was a little more work to braze it back on, but it left the compressor as useful as it had been when it was first finished.