David waved the question aside. “I’ll explain,” he said, “when I know if you can help me. For I haven’t much time. My father’s—call them employees—have turned against him. They’ve cut him off and surrounded him, down in his sub-sea fort. We must have a fighting ship and fighting men to rescue him. And there isn’t much time.”
He stood up, staring at us intently. “But not the Fleet!”
“What then?” asked Roger Fairfane, puzzled. David said, “Have you ever heard of the subsea cruiser “Killer Whale?”
We looked at each other. The name sounded a tiny echo for all of us—somewhere we had heard it, somewhere recently.
I got it first. “Of course,” I cried. “The Fleet surplus sale! Down in Sargasso City—there are two of them, aren’t there? Two obsolete subsea cruisers, and they’re going to be sold for salvage…”
David nodded, then checked himself and shook his head. “Almost right, Jim,” he said. “But there is really only one ship. The other one—the Dolphin—it’s only a heap of rust. The Killer Whale is the ship I want. True, I would have to find armament for it somewhere. The Fleet would sell it stripped. But it’s a serviceable vessel. My father knows it well; it was based in Kermadec Dome a few years ago. If I could arm it—and man it with three or four good men—”
Bob said excitedly: “We could help you, David! We’ve completed enough courses in subsea tactics and battle maneuvers—we’ve all of us had training in simulated combat! But the price, David! Those things, even scrapped, would cost a fortune!”
David nodded. He said somberly, “We figured it out, my father and I. They would cost just about as much as a handful of Tonga pearls.”
We were all silent for a moment. Then Roger Fairfane raised his head and laughed sharply.
“So you’ve been wasting our time,” he said. “You’ve lost the pearls. There’s no way of getting the money without them.”
David looked at him thoughtfully. “No way?” He paused, trying to find the right words. “You said you would help, Roger. And your father—a wealthy man, an important man in Trident Lines…”
Roger flushed angrily. “Leave my father out of this!” he ordered.
David nodded, unsurprised. “I rather thought it would be like that,” he said calmly. He didn’t explain that remark, but Roger seemed to understand. He turned bright red, then pale with anger, but he kept quiet. David said:
“I knew there was some danger. Joe Trencher was once my father’s foreman, and now that he is leading the revolt against my father, we knew what to expect. My father told me there was a good chance that Trencher would find some way of getting the pearls away from me.”
“And did he tell you what to do in that case?” Roger sneered.
David nodded. He looked at me. “He said, ‘Ask for help. Go to see Jim Eden, and ask his uncle for help.’ “
I couldn’t have been more surprised if he had turned into one of these strange sub-sea saurians before my eyes.
“My uncle Stewart? But—but—”
David said: “That’s all I know, Jim. My father’s sick, as I said. And perhaps he was a little delirious. But that is what he said.”
I shook my head, thinking hard. “But—but—” I said again. “But—my uncle is in Marinia. More than ten thousand miles from here. And he isn’t too well himself.’
David shrugged, looking suddenly tired. “That’s all I know, Jim,” he repeated. “The only thing—”
He broke off, listening. “What’s that?”
We all stopped and listened. Yes, there had been something—some faint mechanical whisper. It sounded like powerful muffled motors, not too far away.
Bob jumped up. “The sea-car basin! It’s coming from there!”
It was hard to believe—but it did sound that way. All four of us leaped up and raced out of the little apartment, down the steps, onto the platform that surrounded the little basin where the Atlantic manager’s subsea vessel was moored when he was present.
There was nothing there. We looked around in the glow of the violet Troyon lights. There was the little railed landing, the white walls, the face of the water itself. Nothing else, But—the sea doors stood wide open.
We stared out through the open doors, to where the waters inside the basin joined the straight, narrow canal that led to the open sea. There were waves, shrunken imitations of the breakers outside; there were ripples bouncing off the sides.
There was no sign of a sea car.
David Craken said wearily: “I wonder—No, it couldn’t be.”
“What couldn’t be?” I asked.
He shrugged. “I guess I’m hearing ghosts. For a moment I thought, just possibly, Joe Trencher had followed us here—come into the basin, listened to what we were saying. But it can’t be true.” He pointed to the silent scanning ports of the electronic watchman. “Anything that came in or out would trip the search circuits,” he reminded us. “The electronic watchman didn’t sound an alarm—so it couldn’t have been that.”
Bob Eskow said stubbornly: “I’m sure I heard motors.”
David said: “I was sure too—but don’t you see it’s impossible? I suppose we heard some strange echo from the surf—or perhaps a surface boat passing, well out to sea—”
Bob Eskow glowered. “I’m no lubber, David! I know the sound of sea-car motors when I hear them!” But then he hesitated and looked confused. “But you’re right,” he admitted. “It couldn’t have been that. The electronic watchman would have spotted it at once.”
We trudged back upstairs, but somehow the mood of excitement that had possessed us was gone. We were all looking a little thoughtful, almost worried.
It was getting late, anyhow. We quickly made plans for what we had to do. “I’ll try to call my uncle,” I said. “—I don’t know what good it will do. But I’ll try. Meanwhile, David, I suppose you might as well stay here and keep out of sight. We’ve got to get back to the Academy, but tomorrow we’ll come back and then—”
“Then we’ll get to work,” Bob promised.
And that was all for that strange, exciting day…except for one thing.
We left David there and walked slowly back through the fairy garden to the gate. We were all feeling tired by then—bone-tired, exhausted, not only from the strenuous activity of the marathon swim but from the letdown after our strange meeting with David Craken and with Joe Trencher, whoever he was.
Maybe that was why we were out of the garden and a hundred yards down the road before I noticed something.
I stopped still in the coral road. “You closed the gate!” I said sharply to Bob.
He looked around. “Why—yes, I did. I pushed it closed as we came through. After all, I didn’t want to leave it open in case some—”
“No, no!” I cried. “You closed it! Remember? It was standing half ajar. Don’t you see what I mean? Come on—follow me!”
Tired as I was, I trotted back to the gate. It was closed, all right, just as Bob had left it. There was the twenty-foot high hedge, thorny and impenetrable. There was the gate, with the monitoring turret of the electronic watchman at the side.
We stopped in front of the gate, panting.
Nothing happened.
“You see?” I cried. They blinked at me.
“Don’t you understand yet? Watch me ” I pushed the gate open. It swung wide.
Nothing else happened.
Roger Fairfane got it then—and a moment later, Bob Eskow caught on.
“The electronic watchman!” Bob whispered. “It—it isn’t on! That’s an automatic whispered gate—you shouldn’t be able to move it, unless the red scanning ray identifies you…”