There was a smaller room, well furnished, which seemed to be sort of a wardroom or common room for the officers. It was there that he found a Nazi who was not as the others.
He was sprawled face down and dressed in a space suit. Although he did not move Cargraves approached him very cautiously.
The man was either dead or unconscious. However, he did not have the grimace of death on his face and his suit was still under pressure. Wondering what to do, Cargraves knelt over him. There was a pistol in his belt; Cargraves took it and stuck it in his own.
He could feel no heart beat through the heavy suit and his own gauntlet, nor could he listen for it, while wearing a helmet himself.
His watch showed five minutes of the agreed time left; whatever he did must be done fast. He grappled the limp form by the belt and dragged it along.
"What have you got there?" Ross demanded.
"Souvenir. Let's get going. No time." He saved his breath for the climb. The sixty-pound weight that he and his burden made, taken together, flew up the stairs six at a time. At the top his watch still showed two minutes to go. "Leg it out to the jeep," he commanded Ross. "I can't take this item there, or Morrie may decide it's a trap. Meet me in the Wotan. Get going!" Heaving his light burden over one shoulder, he set out for the big ship at a gallop.
Once inside he put his load down and took the man out of his space suit. The body was warm but seemed dead. However, he found he could detect a faint heart-beat. He was starting an artificial respiration when the boys piled out of the lock.
"Hi," he said, "who wants to relieve me here? I don't know much about it."
"Why bother?" asked Morrie.
Cargraves paused momentarily and looked at him quizzically. "Well, aside from the customary reasons you have been brought up to believe in, he might be more use to us alive than dead."
Morrie shrugged. "Okay. I'll take over." He dropped to his knees, took Cargraves' place, and started working.
"Did you bring them up to date?," Cargraves asked Ross.
"I gave them a quick sketch. Told them the place seemed to be ours and I told them what we found—the ruins."
"Not very ruined," Cargraves remarked.
"Look, Uncle," demanded Art. "Can I go down there? I've got to get some pictures."
"Pictures can wait," Cargraves pointed out. "Right now we've got to find out how this ship works. As soon as we get the hang of it, we head back. That comes first."
"Well, sure," Art conceded, "but... after all—I mean. No pictures at all?"
"Well... Let's put it this way. It may take Ross and Morrie and me, not to mention yourself, quite some time to figure out how they handle this craft. There might be twenty minutes when we could spare you. In the meantime, table the motion. Come on, Ross. By the way, what did you do with the prisoner?"
"Oh, him," Morrie answered, "we tied him up and left him."
"Huh? Suppose he gets loose? He might steal the rocket."
"He won't get loose. I tied him myself and I took a personal interest in it. Anyhow he won't try to get away—no space suit, no food. That baby knows his chance of living to a ripe old age depends on us and he doesn't want to spoil it."
"That's right, Uncle," Art agreed. "You should have heard what he promised me."
"Good enough, I guess," Cargraves conceded. "Come on, Ross." Morrie went on with his job, with Art to spell him.
Cargraves returned, with Ross, to the central compartment a few minutes later. "Isn't that pile of meat showing signs of life yet?," he asked.
"No. Shall I stop?"
"I'll relieve you. Sometimes they come to after an hour or more. Two of you go over to the jeep with an additional space suit and bring back Sergeant What's-his-name. Ross and I are as much in the dark as ever," he explained. "The sergeant bloke is a pilot. We'll sweat it out of him."
He had no more than gotten firmly to work when the man under him groaned. Morrie turned back at the lock. "Go ahead," Cargraves confirthed. "Ross and I can handle this guy."
The Nazi stirred and moaned. Cargraves turned him over. The man's eyelids flickered, showing bright blue eyes. He stared up at Cargraves. "How do you do?" he said in a voice like a stage Englishman. "May I get up from here?"
Cargraves backed away and let him up. He did not help him.
The man looked around. Ross stood silently, covering him with a Garand. "That isn't necessary, really," the Nazi protested. Ross glanced at Cargraves but continued to cover the prisoner. The man turned to Cargraves. "Whom have I the honor of addressing?" he asked. "Is it Captain Cargraves of the Galileo?"
"That's right. Who are you?"
"I am Helmut von Hartwick, Lieutenant Colonel, Elite Guard." He pronounced lieutenant "leftenant."
"Okay, Helmut, suppose you start explaining yourself. Just what is the big idea?"
The self-styled colonel laughed. "Really, old man, there isn't much to explain, is there? You seem to have eluded us somehow and placed me at a disadvantage. I can see that."
"You had better see that, but that is not what I mean, and that is not enough." Cargraves hesitated. The Nazi had him somewhat baffled; he did not act at all like a man who has just come out of a daze. Perhaps he had been playing possum—if so, for how long?
Well, it did not matter, he decided. The Nazi was still his prisoner. "Why did you order my ship bombed?"
"Me? My dear chap, why do you think I ordered it?"
"Because you sound just like the phony English accent we heard over our radio. You called yourself ‘Captain James Brown.' I don't suppose there is more than one fake Englishman in this crowd of gangsters."
Von Hartwick raise his eyebrows. "‘Gangsters' is a harsh term, old boy. Hardly good manners. But you are correct on one point; I was the only one of my colleagues who had enjoyed the questionable advantage of attending a good English school. I'll ask you not to call my accent ‘phony.' But, even if I did borrow the name ‘Captain James Brown,' that does not prove that I ordered your ship bombed. That was done under the standing orders of our Leader—a necessary exigency of war. I was not personally responsible."
"I think you are a liar on both counts. I don't think you ever attended an English school; you probably picked up that fake accent from Lord Haw-Haw, or from listening to the talkies. And your Leader did not order us bombed, because he did not know we were there. You ordered it, just as soon as you could trace a bearing on us, as soon as you found out we were here."
The Nazi spread his. hands, palms down, and looked pained. "Really, you Americans are so ready to jump to conclusions. Do you truly think that I could fuel a rocket, call its crew, and equip it for bombing, all in ten minutes? My only function was to report your location."
"You expected us, then?"
"Naturally. If a stupid radarman had not lost you when you swung into your landing orbit, we would have greeted you much sooner. Surely you don't think that we would have established a military base without preparing to defend it? We plan, we plan for everything. That is why we will win."
Cargraves permitted himself a thin smile. "You don't seem to have planned for this."
The Nazi tossed it off. "In war there are setbacks. One expects them."
"Do you call it ‘war' to bomb an unarmed, civilian craft without even a warning?"
Hartwick looked pained. "Please, my dear fellow! It ill befits you to split hairs. You seemed to have bombed us without warning. I myself would not be alive this minute had I not had the good fortune to be just removing my suit when you struck. I assure you I had no warning. As for your claim to being a civilian, unarmed craft, I think it very strange that the Galileo was able to blast our base if you carried nothing more deadly than a fly swatter. You Americans amaze me. You are always so ready to condemn others for the very things you do yourselves."