He led the way; I followed. The growth was thick, occasionally we had to stop and hack ourselves free from the entangling growth with the sea-knives from our knee- scabbards. Far off to the right, harvesting machines floated through the water, clutching at the tangled kelp and gathering it into bales for transportation into the city, and eventual processing. Harvest was not a season but a year-round event in these farms, where the sun never dreamed of touching; after the harvest machines came cultivators and seeders, and a new crop was growing almost before the old one was inside the ports of Thetis.
We were lucky—we were not seen, though sea-cars floated by within scant yards of us, though a score and more of men in pressure-suits were moving about in the kelp jungles around us. If anyone caught a glimpse of us, no doubt he dismissed us as merely another pair of workers; but, so careful was Gideon in leading me through the concealing growths, I suspect we were never spotted at all.
At any rate, we reached the entrance port of the building around which the sea-cars nuzzled without challenge.
There was no question of talking now, of course; I had only the waving of Gideon’s arms to guide me. We crept up on the entrance port and stopped. He peered around, then worked the port controls. There was a rolling motion in the water around us as the powerful little pumps balanced the inside and outside pressure; then the port opened, we stepped into the lock and closed the outer door.
The water level began at once to fall.
If we had come in a sea-car we would certainly have been hailed and spotted. But you can hardly blame those sub-sea workers for keeping a slipshod watch on the port. A sea-car would have been detected by microsonar, and a dozen alarms would have called attention to it; but we, sneaking invisibly through the kelp, were in the sonar’s blind spot, and there was of course no reason for suspecting that anyone would be stupid enough to come across the sea-bottom on foot. Nor, in truth, was there much reason to do so. There was nothing of value at the farms, except for the sea-cars themselves and the complex farming machinery—and those were pretty bulky objects for anyone to steal.
And yet, that was exactly what Gideon had in mind.
As soon as the water was out of the port chamber and the inner doors open, he strode out with assurance, leading me across the entrance chamber. There were men in sight, operating communications equipment, moving about in the corridors, perhaps half a dozen or more; but they hardly glanced at us. As though he knew every inch of the layout well (and, in fact, he did—for Gideon had worked in many a layout like this, with my uncle and otherwise—in his long sub-sea life), Gideon headed for the suit room. We shed our suits there; fortunately no one was in the room.
Then we stole a sea-car.
It was astonishingly easy—up to a point. With Gideon leading the way, we marched openly through the winding corridors of the farm administration building to the entry ports where the little seacars lay nuzzled. Then we became less open. Gideon spotted a small office; when no one was looking, we slipped into it and waited, listening.
The ready room was just outside our door, where the sea-car operators filed their reports and got their orders. Traffic was erratic; at times there seemed to be a dozen men in the room, and a few moments later it might be nearly empty.
We listened to their conversation, trying to judge which sea-car would be easiest to slip into, which held sufficient reserves of fuel for the trip to Seven Dome. There were remarks that puzzled me; it seemed that one of the sea-cars was special, in some way unlike the others.
A dawning idea began to grow in my mind. I nudged Gideon excitedly, but he hushed me. “Wait,” he whispered. “They’re all leaving…”
The group of operators, talking among themselves, went out of the room on some unknown errand. It looked like our chance; Gideon gestured to me, and the two of us started to tiptoe out of the little office, into the ready room beyond which the sea-cars lay waiting…
“James Eden!” crackled a familiar voice from behind us.
I spun around. There against the other door to the little office stood a tall youth in civilian clothing. He looked familiar, yet somehow wrong. As I stared at him I seemed to see, on his head, the flat scarlet cap of the Sub-Sea Academy, hear the echo of his voice flatly and contemptuously going over me back on the steps of Fletcher Hall.
Brand Sperry!
Gideon was quicker than I. He still had the gun we had taken from Sperry’s “butler”; it was in his hand, and the younger Sperry was staring into its muzzle, before I had quite realized who it was.
“Keep quiet, Sperry,” Gideon whispered softly and dangerously. “If you want to stay alive, keep quiet.”
Brand Sperry stopped as he was about to turn. He looked us over coolly. “What do you want?” he demanded.
I took a deep breath. I had had an idea, the ghost of a thought, listening to the sea-car operators talk; it seemed to me that there was a bare possibility that the “special” sea-car was special indeed. After all, Hallam Sperry had claimed to have something very special in the way of sea-cars, back in the room where Catroni lay dead…
I said: “We want my uncle’s experimental job, Sperry. We know it’s here. Where is it?”
Gideon was a champion; he gave me one quick look, and then backed me up: “That’s right, Sperry! Hurry up!” But he must have thought, for a moment, that I was out of my head.
But I wasn’t. Brand Sperry’s piercing eyes flamed and he snapped: “Eskow! He tipped you off! That little— ”
“Shut up, Sperry!” Gideon said sharply. “You don’t want to attract any attention here—you’ll be the first one hurt!”
“Wait a minute, Gideon,” I said. “What’s this about Eskow?”
“You know,” Brand Sperry sneered. “I told my father. I knew it was a mistake bringing him here. We kept your message from getting to him the first time, but I knew you’d reach him sooner or later—and I knew he’d spill everything he knew to you!”
I said, “Sperry, I haven’t seen Eskow except through the viewport at the docks. Not that it makes any difference. Where is he?”
Sperry shrugged. “Last I saw, he was in the ready room a couple of hours ago. My father transferred him off the liner because he thought we might get information out of him about you. I warned him!”
I stared at Gideon pleadingly, but he read my mind. “No, Jim,” he said. “We haven’t got time to look up old friends. Any minute someone might walk in on us, and then where will we be? You, Sperry—we want that seacar. Take us to it!”
“I’ll do no such thing,” Sperry said frostily—and for a moment there, I almost admired him; he might have had a squad of sea-police at his back as he confronted us. “Put that gun down. I’ll have the guards take care of you two ”
Gideon kept his grin. He said gently, “Mr. Sperry, I don’t advise you to make any trouble. I really don’t.”
Abruptly his tone changed to a crackle: “You young idiot!” he blazed. “Jim Eden and I were that close to being brain-pumped by your father. We know that he sank Jim’s uncle—tried to kill Jim half a dozen times—we know that every dirty deal and corrupt official in Marinia belongs to him. Do you think I’d hesitate to shoot you if you give me half a chance? Get a move on, man! Take us to Eden’s sea-car—now! And thank your lucky stars I don’t shoot you dead this minute!”
Brand Sperry saw the light of reason.
He conducted us to the sea-car, conscious of the gun in Gideon’s pocket. He sharply ordered the dispatcher to mind his own business when the man appeared and started to ask a question. Heaven knows what the dispatcher thought—but he had undoubtedly learned, working for the Sperry interests, that it didn’t pay to get in the way of anyone named Sperry.